What's my occupation?

[allthatmalarkey]

I have to give my occupation on something official. The last time someone (a doctor) asked, I really struggled with what to say. I hate saying housewife. I'm crap at running the home and am basically a SAHM because the childcare cost more than my job paid, which I didn't like enough to pay to do until the preschool funding kicked in (had my kids completely the wrong month of the year and would have had to pay until both were nearly 3.5). I feel like a fraud saying housewife. It smacks of being patted on the head by your DP and having a status somewhere between a child and an adult. Not being able to have your own bank account or get a mortgage. Does anyone know what options I have? Carer seems a bit wrong as carers have rights which don't apply to regular SAHM stuff. Unpaid child carer? Voluntary worker? I once said household manager as a joke. Is there an agreed term I don't know about?

I think I've only had to fill in one official document since becoming a SAHM and that was dd's birth certificate. I said to the registrar 'I'm at home with my dc so not working' and she put 'homemaker' in the mothers occupation section. If it were for anything job related I would put SAHM I suppose.

Trills as late as the seventies it was hard for a woman to get a bank account if she was a SAHM. Jenny Murray (Womans Hour presenter) had a salaried job with the BBC and couldn't get a mortgage in 1975 because she wasn't married and her dad was dead so she had no man to sign the mortgage for her. My mum had to get her landlord to sign a hire purchase agreement for a radio for her in the sixties because she lived away from her dad and she wasn't married. She says women who worked went on to temporary contracts as soon as the got married as it was assumed they would have children and leave. And that's what I mean about going on to a status somewhere between adult and child. Thanks for all the stuff folks. Full-time parent is my favourite so far.

Margaret agree the National Statistics Office would say it's pushing it but humans are one of the factors of production and I'm making some. You could pay someone to do what I'm doing instead of me, although it would actually cost more than DH earns by some way.

I always just say unemployed...

OK, you're talking about 40 years ago, that's fine. It sounded as if you were NOW being told you were unable to get a bank account and I was wondering if the staff at your bank were incompetent or if you were being financially abused.

And you can be considered economically active if you running a business which makes no money.

I just put a line or n/a if I can't leave it blank

Or I put my profession (I'm on a career break) if it's a "what does everyone do in the country" type official form

...but if it helps, the mortgage broker said he didn’t want to put unemployed because it sends the wrong signals so I was put down as a homemaker instead.

I personally hate ‘full time mum/parent’ - all parents who are involved in their children’s lives are full time! My DH isn’t a part time Dad and I dislike the insinuation that he is. I guess family childcare provider would be the closest description.

Trills thanks for the concern
I'm hoping to do something different when I go back to work, so don't identify with my old work plus it didn't have a professional status which would make you one of those people who can sign passport applications ludicrously and might make you think of yourself as an accountant even if you haven't done it for years. There doesn't seem to be a consensus here. I don't want to be identifying but it's to go on a public register of something. Stay at home mum seems to be the most popular and works in speech, but is it likely to be on the drop down list on the database? I'm also trying to make a point. We should have a term for this and it should be a positive one. It's like it's been kicked permanently into the long grass. People shouldn't have to say unemployed or something they haven't done for years. Anyway, 'full-time parent'...

Oh bugger, just seen post post batteries

Domestic goddess.?
Domestic engineer?

I really wish I could, glitter. Can't bring myself to put Jedi on the census either.

I'm sure there won't be a limited list of options and whichever system your data is being entered into will allow your own definition to be entered.

Stay at home parent it is then. Thanks all!

Sorry late to the party, but I always use the phrase ‘Not currently in paid employment’.

It is a bit cumbersome, but I hate any implication that just because I’m not employed means that I’m not working so I feel that this states the facts accurately without having to define myself by either the house or my children.

I used to wrote Primary Carer for children

write even