going out to work vs motherhood dilema

Abi wrote:


Many thanks everyone for your advice - I can see how salaries dont go
as far today as they used to in the past.

I think part of the reason is that people think they *need*
all sorts of things that they really only *want*. A frugal
couple (not us :-D ) can live on one income. You just have
to choose what is most important to you.

[snip]
I can understand my partner's fear of being the sole breadwinner
aswell - but I have stated all along that if he wanted to trade places
with me then this would be acceptable to me as I would rather he be
happy and also that our child is being looked after by him as opposed
to a stranger.

Of course, your child will not be looked after by a stranger
if you choose that route, because you will get to know your
care provider quite well, even before you place your child
in their care.

I just cant believe the low status full time parenting is given in
general though. It is a really important job - one that impacts on
society as a whole, and yet it's completely `unpaid'!

It's also something entered into quite voluntarily, ideally
at least. If being a parent is something you really and
truly do want, you should be prepared to make some sort
of sacrifice at some point down the line, don't you think?

Scott DD 10.5 and DS 8

"Abi" wrote in message
om...
Many thanks everyone for your advice - I can see how salaries dont go
as far today as they used to in the past.

Well, I think that as much as that, the difference today has to do with our
lifestyle. In the past, a family of 3 or 4 kids tended to live in a much
smaller house than we live in nowadays (a 1000-1200 foot 3 bedroom 1 bath
house vs. today's 2000 or 2500 sf 3/4 bedroom house with a family room and 2
1/2 baths). Also, most families had one TV, one car, one telephone line, no
computers, etc etc. Our lifestyle today (well, what is more typical) costs
more because we have lots more STUFF. We tend to eat out more than our
parents and grandparents did as young adults, etc etc.

So I'm not sure it is so much that salaries don't go as far, but that we
have much more expectations of material things that we want.

Scott wrote:

Abi wrote:

I just cant believe the low status full time parenting is given in
general though. It is a really important job - one that impacts on
society as a whole, and yet it's completely `unpaid'!

It's also something entered into quite voluntarily, ideally
at least. If being a parent is something you really and
truly do want, you should be prepared to make some sort
of sacrifice at some point down the line, don't you think?

Since it is a choice, not a given, I couldn't help wondering who it was the OP
thought should be the one to pay her. I'm not being snotty here, honest; I'm
just not sure she's fully fathoming the implications of her statement.

I took 4 months of unpaid leave to stay home with my daughter -- which was
exactly how long my company would continuing paying my (and her) medical
insurance. I then worked a four-day week (33 hours) until she started
kindergarten. At that point, my daughter begged me to go back to work Fridays
and let her attend afterschool care on that day, too...since that was when they
finished off their art projects!

beeswing

In article , Scott wrote:
Abi wrote:
I can understand my partner's fear of being the sole breadwinner
aswell - but I have stated all along that if he wanted to trade places
with me then this would be acceptable to me as I would rather he be
happy and also that our child is being looked after by him as opposed
to a stranger.

Of course, your child will not be looked after by a stranger
if you choose that route, because you will get to know your
care provider quite well, even before you place your child
in their care.

Actually, many of the most common options, and even some of the best
options, do require putting your child into the care of a "stranger".
Even the best daycare centers have turnover in staff. Small daycare,
where there is only one provider, is often not as good an option, as
there is no backup if the provider is ill or in a bad mood.

A good daycare center has enough staff and low enough turnover that
most of the staff will be familiar to you and the child, even if an
occasional new provider comes in.

Of course, if your job is flexible enough (and pays enough), you may
be able to have a nanny care for your child in your own home, which
gives you greater oversight.


--
Kevin Karplus http://www.soe.ucsc.edu/~karplus
life member (LAB, Adventure Cycling, American Youth Hostels)
Effective Cycling Instructor #218-ck (lapsed)
Professor of Biomolecular Engineering, University of California, Santa Cruz
Undergraduate and Graduate Director, Bioinformatics
Affiliations for identification only.

Abi wrote:

[...] In part I feel they have made me feel guilty
for considering working at the same time as caring for children simply
because they didn't do it [...]

The wonderful thing about "feminism" is that you can
make a choice. You are not limited by what "society"
deems acceptable, but by what you and your partner
want and believe is the best solution. You should not
feel guilty for working and you should not feel guilty
for staying home.

I suppose if the worst comes to the worst I can use my savings to
afford the ability not to have to work to buy me a few more months
longer of being able to stay at home and treat the exercise like a
career break....

Yes and no... For us, the reason I work is so that we
can put more away in retirement (not to depend on social
security or the kids) and also put money away in their
college funds. It's not just the immediate day-to-day
mortgage payment plus food.

I can understand my partner's fear of being the sole breadwinner
aswell - but I have stated all along that if he wanted to trade places
with me then this would be acceptable to me as I would rather he be
happy and also that our child is being looked after by him as opposed
to a stranger.

Well, we have a wonderful nanny whom we found by
advertising in the newspaper. DS (9 months) loves her
and laughs and is very happy with her. I do not pretend
that she is my surrogate, but for now, this is the best
childcare option for us. I have plans to cut down to
part-time work once DS (and maybe other kids) goes to
pre-school and up, just because I do want to be there
when they come home from school.

I just cant believe the low status full time parenting is given in
general though. It is a really important job - one that impacts on
society as a whole, and yet it's completely `unpaid'!

Well, only amongst people who do not have children,
I believe. Anyone who has children knows exactly
how important and "high" status it is. And what's
wrong with it being "unpaid"? Most important work
in the world is done by volunteers. That is beside
the point. Having a child is a lifetime sentence of
worrying and guilt. You will feel guilty for staying at
home and you will feel guilty for going to work. You
just have to come to terms with it -- in your mind, and
with your partner.

-- Anita --

Abi wrote in :

[snip]
I am a bit confused of late and wondered if anyone can advise? I am
just about to have my first child, I am incredibly excited and looking
forward to raising her, seeing this as a more important `job' to me,
than `going out to earn a living'. Having worked in a variety of
jobs/careers for the last 11 years, I now want to enjoy being a
housewife and child carer and put as much effort into this as I would
anything else. I will maintain other interests during this time and
may try a few working-from-home ideas for `pocket money', but for at
least the next 2 to 5 years I want to make being a mother a priority,
choosing to be the main carer of my child for what is, after all, only
a few short years. I suppose this should all be a natural normal way
of thinking, but my problem is down to my partner.
My partner thinks that staying at home being a housewife/carer is
`taking the easy way out', and plus he is worried about taken on a
greater responsibility for ensuring we have enough money. He also
thinks it isn't going to be stimulating enough for me.

First of all, I'm a UK mum who stopped work when my oldest was born,
nearly 10 years ago.

First of all, being a full-time mum is not easy, when the kids are little.
Depending on where you live, you may find lots of other AH mums, or none
at all. Anyway, why shouldn't you "take the easy way out"?

For the stimulation side, well, a lot of people find themselves
getting very wrapped up in their babies, and not *wanting* much in the way
of other stimulation. I have a degree, and whenever I worked, I worked with
people with PhDs and MScs, so I was used to a very intellectual working
environment. However, I found that debates on usenet provided most of
the stimulation I needed. I also found (and I'm now sure this was
biological/hormonal, not due to my environment) that I suffered from
what the people on mkp call 'preg-nesia' until my youngest reached
about 4.5yo. At that point, I suddenly got my old brain back, with my
old quick-wittedness, and it is only in the last year that being AH, in
the company of other AH mums isn't really enough. So you might find
that being at home is all the stimulation you need when you are in the
baby stage.

I wonder if his mum was at home, and how she felt about it. He won't be
able to remember how she felt when he was a baby, but as he grew up, she
may have been feeling very trapped.

I do know people who have part-time jobs at home: selling things like
tupperware (although there is a huge variety of similar things). If you
could set up a plan, then maybe that would reassure your husband.

However, his fear of being the sole breadwinner does seem reasonable.
Later on you talk about using 'my' savings. Now you have a shared
responsibility to another person, the two of you have a shared financial
responsibility to each other as well. The money issue is one the two
of you have to come to an agreement about, whether you are married or not.
Maybe you could show him ways that being at home would enable you to
save money: not forgetting that child care costs could be considerable.

[snip]

I also want to know how women in the past - even as recently as 20
years ago - never seemed to get the pressure to go out to work and
bring in half the finances? Were men happier to have this arrangement
or are they actually happier to have more financial stability? If the
latter - why didn't more women go out to work at this time?

It depends on where you lived: I do know that one of my sister's friends had
a nanny: her mother was a hospital consultant at a time when that was almost
unknown.

[snip]

Mom staying home with the kids has historically been a middle and
upperclass phenomenon anyway--during my grandma's first marriage and
after her divorce in the 1920s, she ran a stenography service in L.A. to

It is a very short-lived phenomenon as well. Housework - including the
growing of vegetables and preparing of food - took up a significant
amount of time. Pre-Victorian times a woman at home was making a very
big contribution to the household, and her presence was needed.

I've been reading a 1914s book about "married woman's work" (among the
working classes): it was common for a factory worker to have a two-hour
lunch break, so she could go home and prepare the midday meal.

[snip]
Many thanks everyone for your advice - I can see how salaries dont go
as far today as they used to in the past. I didn't realise it was more
common than I first thought for women to go out to work, in the past
few decades. I have been just looking at the example of my housewife
mother and her friends who raised children in the 1960s and early
1970s and suppose thought everyone did this (full time carer/not
producing any income). In part I feel they have made me feel guilty
for considering working at the same time as caring for children simply

Your mother will make you feel guilty about lots of things ("that child
needs a vest", "he needs water to drink" "why isn't he in bed: its 6pm").

[snip]
I suppose if the worst comes to the worst I can use my savings to
afford the ability not to have to work to buy me a few more months
longer of being able to stay at home and treat the exercise like a
career break....

I really think you need to review how you see your finances. Your
savings are not really 'yours' anymore, but should belong to the family
unit, no matter whose name it is on the account. It shouldn't be a
case of supporting 'you' but supporting his 'partner and child'.
Why don't you suggest that the two of you review your budgets, and
that if you go out to work, *he* pays for childcare, and you take on
some of the other financial responsibilities.

[snip]
I just cant believe the low status full time parenting is given in
general though. It is a really important job - one that impacts on
society as a whole, and yet it's completely `unpaid'!

I think it is a combination of factors. The mothers that people in the
media know are probably almost all working mothers, and they probably
know very few of the other kind. Throw in people like Cherie Blair,
who probably would go nuts at home, and you see why the labour party
want everyone to choose a 'work-life balance' that has to include 'work'.

--
Penny Gaines
UK mum to three

Just adding my two cents...

First off, I think that regardless what decision a woman makes in this
situation, there are folks who will second-guess you and guilt you will put on
yourself. IMO, and assuming that you have the financial ability and really
most of us do, assuming we are willing to make drastic changes such as moving
to a more affordable home, etc, it erally comes down to this: what choice will
leave you best capable to be a good parent? For some, that means staying at
home. For others who have less patience with a small child, it may mean
working outside the home. For still others, who may hav the patience for child
care but who will resent leaving a fulfilling position at work, working outside
the home may still be the best solution.

That said, my personal opinion on this is that our very young children
(infants/toddlers) need us far less than our pre-teen and teenage children do.
A baby's needs are fairly simple and a good caregiver can meet those needs; if
you are the caregiver at home and in the evenings, weekends etc., you will
still bond completely to your child as his/her primary caregiver. But come age
10 or 11, when every day at school can bring some sort of milestone that a
tween may have difficulty dealing with, I have found it's much more important
to be the person who is at home when my son comes home from school. Working a
different schedule (7-3 instead of 9-5) allows me to do that.

YMMV, on this more than almost any other parenting choice. Good luck with your
decision.

In article ,
"Tracey" wrote:

"Abi" wrote in message
om...
Many thanks everyone for your advice - I can see how salaries dont go
as far today as they used to in the past.

Well, I think that as much as that, the difference today has to do with our
lifestyle. In the past, a family of 3 or 4 kids tended to live in a much
smaller house than we live in nowadays (a 1000-1200 foot 3 bedroom 1 bath
house vs. today's 2000 or 2500 sf 3/4 bedroom house with a family room and 2
1/2 baths). Also, most families had one TV, one car, one telephone line, no
computers, etc etc. Our lifestyle today (well, what is more typical) costs
more because we have lots more STUFF. We tend to eat out more than our
parents and grandparents did as young adults, etc etc.

So I'm not sure it is so much that salaries don't go as far, but that we
have much more expectations of material things that we want.


But in fact, salaries don't go as far. I think what happened was that
in the 1970s and 1980s, inflation and wage freezes (who else is old
enough to remember those?) caused a cost-of-living gap. One salary
couldn't quite cover it anymore, but two salaries (especially two equal
salaries) were more than enough. So two-income families had more
disposable income than the one-income family of 20 years earlier, though
not as much more as the 1960s family would have had with two incomes.
And to keep the economy cooking, their desire for more stuff had to be
constantly fanned. So the bar keeps getting higher, unless you have the
strength of mind to ignore the babble of commercial speech around you at
all times and make your own decisions about what you need and want.

But even if you opt for frugality, you probably can't equal the
lifestyle of a typical early 1960s family on one average salary.

. But come age
10 or 11, when every day at school can bring some sort of milestone that a
tween may have difficulty dealing with, I have found it's much more
important
to be the person who is at home when my son comes home from school.
Working a
different schedule (7-3 instead of 9-5) allows me to do that.


Oh wow! I completely agree with your take on this - As my son (now 11) has
grown up, it has become more and more important for me to be home and
available when he gets in.

He wants to talk about his day at secondary school, his changing feelings
about his friends and girls in his class, his homework - etc etc..... He
also has more freedom as his friends can come round and I can take my turn
picking him and friends up from swimming, or whatever.

Pat

"beeswing" wrote in message
...

Since it is a choice, not a given, I couldn't help wondering who it was
the OP
thought should be the one to pay her. I'm not being snotty here, honest;
I'm
just not sure she's fully fathoming the implications of her statement.

I took 4 months of unpaid leave to stay home with my daughter -- which was
exactly how long my company would continuing paying my (and her) medical
insurance. I then worked a four-day week (33 hours) until she started
kindergarten. At that point, my daughter begged me to go back to work
Fridays
and let her attend afterschool care on that day, too...since that was when
they
finished off their art projects!

Our U.S. experience is not universal. It's my understanding that several
European countries offer a social welfare "mother stipend," that is not
means tested.

From the page Odin - Norway's Social Security and Health Service:

http://odin.dep.no/odin/engelsk/norw...dex-dok000-b-n
-a.html

"When pregnant, women who have been employed for at least six of the last
ten months are entitled to a maternity leave with full pay, limited upwards
to six times the basic national insurance sum. The mother can choose between
42 weeks of leave with full pay or 52 weeks with 78 per cent pay. Three
weeks of this leave must be taken prior to the birth. Four weeks of the
leave must be taken by the father (the paternity quota). "

That's almost a year of full time pay after having a baby.

Here's a link about the child raising benefit in Germany:

http://www.bmgs.bund.de/downloads/01_Kindergeld.pdf

While there is some means testing in Germany, apparently everyone is
entitled to some benefit. In Norway, there does not seem to be any means
testing for almost a year off with full pay!

Best,
Ann