Working mothers lambasted again!!

[Missmibaby]

Has anyone seen The Times today? Yet more articles telling us that wokring mothers are bad for their kids development. Isn't it funny how all the examples they use are middle-class women who left well-paid jobs, who are married to husbands with extremely well-paid jobs: bankers, lawyers, media-types. One of the headlines was that a woman didn't go back to work until her children were ten years old. The article then went to explain how she worked from her attic whilst employing full-time nannies! Real world? Not for most of us. I am the main wage-earner in our house. My DP is on £20,000 per year and our mortgage is c.£10,000 per year. What little luxuries would anyone recommend we cut back on if I were to give up work. Beleive me I do nothing but think about my son all day, I would love to be with him. I have another on the way and am trying to think of ways that I can work less. My son has always been cared for by well-chosen loving people. The childcare arrangements have changed very little inhis short life and I think he is a well-balanced, sociable, well-advanced little boy. I think the most important thing that he has in his life is that I love him to bits and I make sure he knows it!! Sorry for the rant I know it's not mumsnet faultbut but these generalisations make me so

I don't think women who stay at home are better or worse than women who go to work. It's how they treat thei kids that matters.

I don't think it was a generalisation as she said 'most'teachers are able to spot kids from the traditional type set up however old fashioned etc you may feel this is.I myself am all for women and parents having choice and know that staying at home for some isn't an option She certainly didn't make a sweeping statement or say it with any malice and she is a quite progressive teacher etc so she did actually seem loathe to admit it as she said many of her colleagues with children had to agree with her

yes

dd1 was going to after school club and her teacher said 'does she usually go?' and I said, no, but I can't pick her up tonight and she wants to go - the teacher said 'but you usually pick her up yourself don't you' and I said 'yes usually' and she said 'ah we can always tell the ones whose mums pick them up'

now feel a pang of guilt if she even goes to tea with anyone else

I don't understand how this reserach works. Surely the children all came from different backgrounds, went to different nurseries, childminders and had different types of grand parents and mothers? Even if you stay at home with your mum all day does not mean you have a happy home life.

I don't worry about my children being in nursery, but I do worry about these types of study influencing policies. I would like all children to have access to good quality care and for all mothers to be able to go out and work because I think it's healhty for all.

UK has one of the lowest social mobilities in Europe. I certainly don't think it's the children from my top private nursery who will be the loosers in the future neither financially, intellectually or emotionally. I think you have to look elsewhere and spend money on other types of research in order to improve children's lives.

If we speak anectoes I can tell you that 2 of my GP-friends tell me that most the prozac and other anti-depressants they prescribe goes to SAHMS. I much rather have ahappy mum than a mum on prozac!

I was just thinking of Lottie's pre-school and the kids there. The 4 that are bought in by a childminder are always jumping up and down, really excited, really chatty and loud, in fact they are the a bit too loud sometimes! The ones that cry and and don't want to go in are the ones who are with their mum. That's not to say all the kids dropped by their mums cry.
I'm not drawing any conclusions, I know nothing, but the posts about teachers comments just made me sit and think for a moment and it's just something that I realised about the kids at Lottie's nursery.

I have been a stay at homer through circumstance and my son has had certain benefits but I have also been ill most of the time and so he missed out on some things and not others. I am not offended by the thought that he would have been happier with a healthier mum and so don't think working mums should be offended by a statement that is in many ways unable to be proved. Some things are just facts and we have to accept them I don't know whether SAHM produce happier brighter kids I think we should ask the children themselves although most would say SAHM as they are lazy buggers who hate change.Kids who are loved generally flourish regardless of who picks them up from school

it's also interesting that all my girlfriend who have children are talking about this study today. None of the father's in my office have mentioned it at all and my DH just laughed and rolled his eyes when I mentioned it to him and that was as much as he cared. Anywa, in a few months time there will be a study which prooves something positive about nursery education and all children of SAHMS end up in the gutter.....Let's just ignore.

I think the next study should have something to say about gender - how men are as carers compared to women, and how boys do in various settings compared to girls. And how an only child gets on compared to those with brothers and sisters. If dd didn't go to a childminder she's not likely to get experience of having to share her toys with younger or older children.

Interesting about the prozac. I wonder if that's because GP's are more likely to diagnose a SAHM as needing prozac, whereas they might be more likely to suggest something else for a WOHM?

TC- but you could equally say that that's because the kids of the working mums all have attachment disorders (I'm NOT saying that- I'm just saying that being happy to go in doesn't tell you much).

lol

loving all this 'evidence' for and against

Actually I agree with noddyholder. If studies show something - then they show it. It doesn't have to offend or be taken as someone having a go at your family. I'm sure there are studies out there that show that children with siblings with severe SN can suffer emotionally - that doesn't offend me- I can see it is true- I just do my best to counterbalance that.

agree with you jimjams

in fact have been trying to make that point

but badly

what do you mean caligula?

I think their point was that they thought it was a lot of hidden depression amongst SAHMS. Of course this does not proove anything, but I am of the school of thought that children are happy if they have good care. Good nursery, good childminders, grandparents or a happy SAHM too of course. But it's really important that we don't push mothers to be at home because they think they are doing it for their children. They should do it because they want to and they truly love it. I am grateful that my mum worked. I know she would have been bored at home (and she was when she was a SAHM for a few years). I would hate her to have given up work for my sake and my siblings because I was absolutely fine either way. Of course there are children who truly need their mums at home too. I would not hesitate to give up work if I felt my child went through a difficult phase at school and really needed me there 100% of the time and at the gates at the end of the day.

I think the main thing is to strike a balance. We are lucky because me and DH both work flexi. My children have breakfast time with their dad and quite alot of time with me chilling out or playing in the evenings. I feel we have the best of both worlds, but I think we have been very lucky to be able to live like this. Often it is a logistical and financial nightmare I know!

I think this sounds a very good study, well conducted (a mumsnetter was part of it and speaks highly of its depth and detail) and yes, I do think it is important to find out how childcare affects children. If the study had concluded that going to nursery at, say, seven months, increased children's wellbeing, social skills etc, that they shouldn't say that for fear of offending SAHMs?
Penelope Leach hardly has it in for working mothers - she was one, and she's president of the childminders association.
The survey doesn't say that mothers should all stay at home, but it does say that certain types of care seem significantly more beneficial to children than others and, moreover, that childcare does affect children so parents should choose carefully (some parents in the study didn't really, apparently). Good interview with PL in the Mail (yes, I know, but it is) today.
As it happened, I went back to work when ds was five months old, he went to a childminder, had a nanny AND went to nursery. I do think I made some mistakes with his care, which I regret in retrospect (I don't think his childminder liked him much), so I'm not being smug here.

Yes, but do we really need a study to tell us we have to choose our care carefully? I think there are good and bad nurseries and good and bad child- minders. Some grand parents could be very well equipped to look after their grandchildren, whilst others not at all. How can you generalise? If someone conducted a study which said babies thrive in nurseries I would ask the same questions. Mine have been in nursery since very early on and they have been happy babies, but they would have been happy at home too. There is a combination of factors and how do you draw your conclusions. I don't understand it.

Most studies are generalisations and therefore we can all talk of cases where the opposite is true. It's the same with the breast vs bottle debate for me - you can tell me all you like that breastfed babies are less likely to be obese, less likely to have allergies blah de blah, but it don't wash with me! I see too much of the reverse.

This is just the same for me.

At the end of the day, we all do what we think is right, what we can manage, the best we possibly can do (or even want to do!) and as long as we have happy and healthy families, who cares how we do it?

I agree with that. There are so many variables, isn't there. Who has a bottle-fed child who wathed 10 hours of tv a day at thir grand parents then?

my son cries when i pick him up from nursery, he doesnt want to come home. Bless him though he is four should be at school IMO

anyway i have only come onto this thread to say i dont care what studies tell me. i am actually confident enough with myself as a parent (about the onlty thing I do have confidence in) But I am a good Mother, my kids are happy. i dont really care if some other person judges me or not for my decisions as a mother because quite frankly they are my children. No mother i ahve ever met wants anything more for their children than happiness and I thinkw e are all in the same boat as far as that is concerned.

Sopmeone said further down the thread about women always working, and they have. really at the end of the day as long as we are all happy with our decision or have no choice and have to do it, we really should take no notice of other people judgemental crap. we dont have to justify ourselves to anyone

right will stop spouting crap now

Who actually commissioned this survey?

ssd - just that GP's are as vulnerable to prejudice as the rest of us, and when a SAHM comes before him/ her with symptoms of depression, a GP might recognise it and diagnose it more quickly than someone with a different lifestyle. My DB had massive difficulty getting his GP to recognise that he had depression, because as a young, healthy, employed man, he simply didn't fit the profile.

(Apropos of that, years ago I was diagnosed with a possible kidney infection by a GP when I was actually having a miscarriage. It simply didn't occur to him to test for miscarriage as I wasn't married! - didn't fit the profile! )

Caligula, just wanted to point out I agree with that (since GPs were my example). My GP, by the way,always says he thinks I send my children sick to nursery too often and clearly disapproves of us working. When my DH took DS2 to see him he asked where his mum was and said "children need their mums when sick". So yes, they are biased too. He must be about 105 years old though. I do send my children to nursery when sick too often though. One of the nice things having a SAHM I think. You get to stay home with heavy colds when you need to more often.

It was a large study over many years, conducted in depth. It is NOT judgemental! To say it is presumes that the results were predetermined (which I don't think they were). As I said before, the lead researcher, Penelope Leach, is president of the childminders' assocation and was a working mother when her children were small. I sometimes think people think that what children feel isn't that important. I know all of you do care, but why are their feelings about something that is out of their control not worthy of study? And as PL says, the 'point' of this study is to find out how children respond to different types of care and how to make it better and more appropriate. And you might think people wouldn't need to be advised to check out their childcarer, but clearly they do, if numerous people in this study didn't do it.

I do agree btw that exclusive care by the mother is a relatively recent 'invention' - and I have said that quite often before.

The article in the Times for anyone who wants to read it is here

The website for the research project is here You may want to direct specific queries to them. It's certainly not a "survey", it is rigorous and backed by serious academic bodies (Oxford University for one).

My ds2 is actually part of this research project, and I'm happy to answer any questions I can about how rigorous it is.