Would you leave a £250,000pa job to be a SAHM?

[misosoup]

Ok, I've changed my name for this, not quite sure why....

I really enjoy my job and it is pretty well paid but since I returned to work after having DD2 I have been thinking a lot about this.

I can afford not to work, dh's income is nothing like mine but still above average although it will clearly be a huge drop in our standard of living.

And I miss the kids do much during the day... I spend 2 hours per day with them plus weekends. There is no way I can cut my hours any more and part-time is out of the question.

But I have worked so hard to get here, against all odds. I don't want to throw it all away.

You know what? Who really cares what anyone else thinks of us staying at home to be a so-called 'full time' mum, working part-time, or working full time? We all do what's right for us. There's nothing harder than combining being a mum with working, but I bet my bottom dollar that when our kids grow up they won't give two hoots whether we worked or stayed at home. They won't be screwed up because we worked full time, they won't be damaged because we focused totally on them as a SAHM. It all evens out in the end, so why not do what makes you happiest and keeps you sanest at the time?

Misosoup - you say you miss your kids so much during the day, but I reckon you'd miss your job too. My advice would be to salt away some of your considerable earnings for the next six months or so (and give yourself some practice at living on a lower income) and then see about retraining/running your own business or something that will allow you a bit more felxibility to combine home and work.

Xenia you don't read other people's posts

you're like a stuck record

just go away

surely you have some work to do?

"Don't see why the SAHMs can't also respect both choices and not assume their way is best."

oh, the irony

Wordsmith, I agree with your attitude and also think we women sometimes do ourselves a great disservice battling out whether or not to stay-at-home and who's 'right' rather than tackling the broader issue of gender inequality which has become somewhat sidelined in recent times IMO. Although rather simplistically put, I do feel it is the latter which leads to the devaluing of women generally in whatever role they CHOOSE and therefore placing greater burdens on women to make an acceptable decision rather than a personal one depending on their unique situation and preferences.

That and the insurmountable problem of staying at home being unpaid work of course...

This is such an interesting thread that I really wanted to contribute.

For Misosoup, you must go with your gut feeling. There are practicalities to consider of course but when it comes down to it if you want to be at home with them you can be and vice versa. Remember, neither decision is completely irreversible.

For Xenia, I understand and agree with many of your points but I can?t help feeling that your stance actually perpetuates what is the true problem here. STAHMs (and STAHDads too) are still vulnerable if they ever find themselves in a position where they are forced to become the ?breadwinner? for whatever reason, divorce or bereavement and so on. Or if they simply want to return to their career and time out of the workplace or lack of qualifications makes that difficult. It is wrong that they are therefore penalised for making the choice to stay at home. The Government, employers and actually all of us should be working to change that and then the STAHM v work full time debate can truly become just about what is best for the children.

I suppose I should declare my hand in that I am a 29 yr old fairly new STAHM (have 6m DS) with a degree and an MBA but I had to leave my career just as I was about to get my first senior position 2 years ago to move near and care for my disabled father. But regardless of that, I was always planning to be a STAHM anyway (luckily as it turns out!)

P, yes. I would like a guaranteed income system which has been proposed by some bodies. You would pay everyone over 18 a sum, say £200 a week. you would abolish all state retirement pensions, invalidity benefit, dole etc and everyone would get that whether they worked or not. You also get rid of the concept of benefit cheats and all that stuff and means testing at a stroke too. Plus you benefit stay at home parents and those who care for elderly relatives.

It seems to me that looking after children full time - whoever does it - will not be properly vslued while a. it is largely done by women, and b. the wome who do it professionally are paid a pittance largely by other women who do what are percieved as "more important" and therefore more highly paid jobs. Like, for one example, my friend, who is a public relations executive for a major tobacco company. She is paid HUGE amounts of money to promote smoking to people in the third world - and pays a tiny percentage of that money to the woman who cares for her children from 8 to 8 every day. Will someone please explain to me why my friends time is more valuable that her nanny's? I was a senior Civil Servant in my past life. I did lots of important things, and I was paid a lot of money. I have to say that NONE of those things made a blind bit of difference to the world. The way I bring up my children, however, and the sort of people they will become under my guidance, may very well make an impact on the world - for good or ill. So why am I not paid to do it? And why are people who look after children among the lowest paid people in society? Is it because I is a woman? Rhetorical questions of course......

oh GOD is this still going

yes it is still going, and a good thing too if only to give the SAHMs some practice at putting togrther a structured and sensible discussion.....I like your points Xenia,( even though we ARE different people !), and think you shoulld feel free to keep posting . I , and am sure I'm not alone think you've made a really good contribution.Let's hear it for Xenia and all the workers out there !

look, this is a forum right? where people give their opinions, is it not? I feel completely justified in everything I have writen on this thread because it is how I feel.

Obviously I have caused somepeople to feel very and have got lots of 'back's up' -being accused of deliberatly winding people up etc.

Of course I know everyone makes their individual choice -NEWSFLASH- I do respect that. YES but does that mean I have to be careful how I give my opinion? so as not to really upset the people that 'don't have a choice but to work'.

It's my very strong opinion that children are so much better off with their mothers/fathers (please assume I mean 'in most cases').

so I will give my opinion.

I feel sorry for kids in daycare. I think their is a problem in this country that this has become so normal.

I wouldn't get upset, Poppet. Without your views we'd just have telephone customer service centre staff to take it out on. Consider your views as doing the website a huge service in allowing all us workers to batter you senseless and thus relieve all feelings of rage and anger and so restore images of beautific grace and serenity (as demanded by our bosses, obviously)

poppet. I've stayed out of this before and probably will hereafter, but your sarcastic quotation marks around '"don't have a choice but to work"' make me so angry. Do all of us who genuinely do not have a choice the favour of believing that we don't have a choice. (FWIW ds is not in daycare).

(Why did I write that last sentence? Why am I justifying myself to her?)

justifying yourself to yourself maybe?

pelvicdoors glad to be of service!

OK, poppet you have a right to have views and express them on a public forum... BUT

I resent being called selfish and greedy because I choose to work

I also think saying "ask your children" amounts to emotional blackmail. I had a friend whose mum kept asking his 7-year-old brother if she should divorse his dad. She was really proud of herself too as she was listening to her child. No wonder the boy had all sorts of issues.

curlew, I think it's market forces. In London child care is fairly expensive. I pay about £9 an hour when the minimum wage is about half that. In other places it's cheaper. In China they tried for a time to pay dustbin men what doctors were paid. It didn't wok very well. I'm not a communist so I'm not the best person to debate this with. I suppose because so many women are prepared to be housewives there is huge supply that meets the demand and thus they can't demand huge payments. I don't feel what I pay for child care and for cleaning is a pittance. It's a lot less than I earn but my services are rarer. My brother is an NHS doctor. He earns a lot less than I do. But again it's just a matter of supply and demand.

If people choose to opt out of work/capitalism I suppose then it doesn't need to bother people at all what they are or aren't paid because what matters is your relationships to children. I suspect however that even the few women who run our biggest plcs and hedge funds (and their husbands) know that not only is their work important but also their personal relationships so I don't think there is a massive divide between working mothers only interested in money and stay at home mothers who aren't. We're just people with close relationships with our children.

I am also delighted that people like thankyouf express a view that they think a mother or father should stay home with under 5s and that that is best for children. I don't agree although I do think day nurseries for under 3s are not that great and I know others will disagree with me. I like small children in their own home with a loving adult fairly one to one. We always had a nanny and the first on stayed 10 years which is longer than some marriages last.

I would hate to live in a country where we didn't have freedom of speech which enabled people to give that view. My sister slept with her children for 5 years, flesh on flesh and presumably thinks any stay at home mother who is parted from her children for 8 hours every night is treating them badly. We all have different standards of how mch time we think children should spend with a mother. Many mothers aren't happy for the father even to be with the children alone and others are happy to stay at home but have the child in a creche whilst they're at the gym or whatever.

You feel sorry for children in daycare? That is such a generalisation. There are lots of children you could feel sorry for in daycare I am sure. There are also lots of children of SAHMs you can feel sorry for. Tbh I feel a little sorry for children of those mums who obsessively think they have to be around them 24/7, noone else is good enough for their children and they have to be loved and nurtured all day long. Not sure if I feel most sorry for the children or the mums actually. Luckily there are only a few on this thread who are obsessive-compulsive mums.

Xenia - it didn't wok very well

love it!

Also, I don't really agree with some people who said the money was a red herring here.

It is an easy decision to give up a job that you hate and pays peanuts.

Not such an easy decision when the job makes you a happier and more fullfilled person and the money could give your children various oportunities in life.

justaphase, come on, comparing asking a child if they want their parents to divorce to asking them who they would rather look after them everyday -not exactly the same thing.

emotional blackmail? ok then what about the emotional stress a kid is likely to suffer at some point by being dumped off every day? If you're gonna be like that.

Fairymum, you are right actually, how terribly awfull for a child if the mother loves them so so much! the poor child. I would hope you would report to social services straight away if you had any whiff of suspicion that a child was in danger of being loved too much.

(fwiw I'm not a co-sleeper but probably do fall into your obsessive-compulsive mother type because I choose to meet all of my childs needs, myself, every day -physical, emotional, spiritual, mental etc. AND- I still bf my 1 year-old, whilst pregnant -YUC! )

poppet

FFS. Parp.

FIT

Xenia, we all have different standars, but not al of us apply our standards to everyone else around us too. Do you know any children of WOHMs? Are they really unhappy children insecure in their parents love for them? See I know children of both SAHMS and WOHMS and tbh I could not tell if their mothers work or not. Can you really?

Oh, poppet, and if we're on that level, I still bf my 17-month-old. Through 2 miscarriages.

I'll say it again FFS. Parp.

I am in the bizarre position of being a SAHM and finding Xenia's posts MUCH more palatable than poppet's.