Housewife (emotionally, wedding, experiences, feelings)

[stan4]

I have read and studied enough studies in this lifetime to know you can get a study to justify whatever behavior you want. And you can use anecdotes to make any argument you want.

For example, your numbers on how much more time the parent spends is ASSUMING they are shipping their children off to school at the earliest available moment. Not everyone does that, btw.

All I am saying is you live your life your way, I'll live my life mine, and everyone should can the disparaging comments about stay-at-home mothers.

I can't argue with someone who can't see both sides of the equation.

[Ivorytickler]

Originally Posted by stan4

I have read and studied enough studies in this lifetime to know you can get a study to justify whatever behavior you want. And you can use anecdotes to make any argument you want.

For example, your numbers on how much more time the parent spends is ASSUMING they are shipping their children off to school at the earliest available moment. Not everyone does that, btw.

All I am saying is you live your life your way, I'll live my life mine, and everyone should can the disparaging comments about stay-at-home mothers.

I can't argue with someone who can't see both sides of the equation.

Actually, if you work in reverse, you come up with about the same numbers without shipping kids off to school at the earliest possible moment.

First, put things in perspective. 28% of all days fall on the weekend and most people have them off. Second, most people have another 5% of days off in the form of holidays and vacations. So, 1/3 of all days, working parents have just as much time as stay at home parents.

Looking at a typical work day and accounting for the fact that fathers take a more active role when mom works you'll find that some of the time gained by mom is really time lost by dad. Some of the time home is also lost to nap time and it's a given that mom will not spend every single minute she gains home on the kids.

If I had stayed home, I would have gained 9 hours per week day (2/3 of all days) at home with my kids, however, one of those hours would have been spent with dh getting the kids off to day care and they would have slept 3 of them so the net time gain is really 5 hours per work day. Let's assume that half of that time is spent on things not involving the kids (dishes, talking on the phone, whatever) and we're down to a 2.5 hour gain per work day.

Now we need to consider time studies that show that when working moms get home, they are ready to spend time with their kids. This same time coincides with a stay at home mom looking for adult interactions because she's been with the kids all day so, evenings in dual working parent homes are more child time intensive resulting in the working mom actually making up some of the lost time. Let's say half or 1.25 hours (I'd say this is close having been home on leave, worked part time and worked full time). Now we have to account for the fact this is only done on 2/3 of days because we all have the same time the other 1/3 of days so, averaging over the entire year, we're looking at a gain of about 50 minutes per day. Just 12 minutes off what you calculate if you look at the time studies that were done.

The $20,000 question is do kids need those minutes to thrive? And does it do any harm if a non family member provides them? Research says no on both accounts. Research supports that it is things like quality of parenting, SES and maternal education that impact a child's quality of life not mom's working status but ther is one big flaw in the research. They compare like SES families and for many working moms, they would not be in the same SES if they didn't work. So, they are negating the SES increase many of us working moms bring to our families and that shouldn't be negated because that does matter. The problem is they have no way of knowing what our SES would be if we didn't work so they just compare our kids to the kids of stay at home moms who have the same SES.

What I know is that I can expect my kids to do just as well as the kids of a stay at home mom with the same SES and education level I have. It's not our working status that matters. There are lots of things that do matter but whether or not mom works isn't one of them.

Seriously, could you walk into a room of high school students and tell which ones had working moms or stay at home moms? You're trying to claim something matters that just doesn't. Staying home or working is a lifestyle choice not a parenting choice. We can and do parent well regardless of working status and our kids, pretty much, turn out the same in spite of which we choose.

If one is going to claim advantage, it has to go to the working moms who are raising their family's SES by working, releaving financial stress and taking some of the burden off of their husband's shoulders which allows him to be a better parent not the stay at home moms.

And I'm not asking you to argue. I'm asking you to support your claim that children of stay at home moms have some advantage. You're the one who doesn't want to see both sides. There are, measurable, benefits to having a working mom. I don't know of any for having a stay at home mom. Please enlighten us. What about having a stay at home mom puts a child at any kind of advantage and what will the results be of growing up with that advantage? This should be easy to answer if there really is an advantage. No arument required. Just tell me what the advantage of having a stay at home mom is and why working parents can't manage to give their children the same advantage.

[skeet09]

I wouldn't be able to be a stay at home partner. My husband makes about $30k a year and our mortgage is $854/month. Even when we lived in a 1 bedroom apartment for $568/month, we still wouldn't make it. Even without car payments, it would be very difficult. I already did the math on it and after taxes and a modest 401k contribution of $175/month, we would net $1700/month. Eek!
Not only that but I would get bored being at home. I'm already bored at work so might as well earn some money while I'm at it, lol. I have a lot of time to catch up on bills, homework, housework and post on City Data and watch a movie.
I make about $35k/year and my husband would be able to stay at home but it would be a very tight budget with no modest vacations or a monthly treat of a modest restaurant like Olive Garden or something.
We are both working at making more money (hubby is taking another computer certification and I'm taking some accounting classes after my bachelors) but it will take some time to get there.
We don't wish to have children and we eat pretty healthy 90% of the week with a little eating out treat here and there.

[Shysister]

I have a friend who's a grade school teacher and she says there is a difference in the kids who have moms at home vs the kids moms who work. She said those kids are more involved in learning and behavior is better because their moms are involved in the school so they basically feel they're being watched even when their mom isn't present because she can show up at anytime vs kids who knows mom is at work and won't be able to take off and check on them or do pop up visits. My friend was working at a school were most the parents had both mom and dad working but she's been teaching at a different school for a couple years now where the majority of the kids have non working moms and she said she noticed the difference immediately from her previous school and the one she's teaching at now.

I think BOTH sides have advantages just in different ways. A SAHM can't provide the advantages of a working mom just like a working mom can't provide the advantages of a SAHM but that doesn't mean there aren't any advantages that exist among BOTH sides. Working moms have no way of knowing what the effect would be on their kids if they didn't work, so you will never know what advantages you are providing your kids that SAHM are not. It all goes back to HOW ONE WAS RAISED and the lifestyle they are accustomed too. I wouldn't expect a woman who comes from a home where the mom worked to understand what it's like for a woman who had her mom in the home full-time but to discredit either side is ignorant because you only know what YOU were accustomed too but you cannot demean or think less than of someone who's not cut from the same cloth nor should you get upset when they can't see or understand the advantages your choice brings to the table. That's just like telling someone they're not Hispanic because they can't speak Spanish. The Hispanic who can speak the language is no better than the ones who can't. Is it a disadvantage? Yes but it doesn't make them less or better, they're both Hispanics at the end of the day.

Working moms and non working moms are both MOMS and will impact their children's lives in different ways and their are advantages and disadvantages in choosing to be one or the other. There is no one size fit all. I know men who seen their mothers work hard to support/help support the household and they didn't want the mother of their children to have to worry about bring in money or having to be financially sufficient. So they sot out great careers that comfortably enable their wives to not have to work. I know guys who had both parents working and they only want to marry women who can contribute financially because that's how their parents did it. My fiance knows I come from a traditional family and although he didn't come from a 2 parent home, he doesn't want me to work because he supports tradition. So it all depends on what you feel is best for YOU and your situation.

A woman choosing to work or not work has nothing to do with the child but everything to do with how she feels about herself.

[Ivorytickler]

Originally Posted by Shysister

I have a friend who's a grade school teacher and she says there is a difference in the kids who have moms at home vs the kids moms who work. She said those kids are more involved in learning and behavior is better because their moms are involved in the school so they basically feel they're being watched even when their mom isn't present because she can show up at anytime vs kids who knows mom is at work and won't be able to take off and check on them or do pop up visits. My friend was working at a school were most the parents had both mom and dad working but she's been teaching at a different school for a couple years now where the majority of the kids have non working moms and she said she noticed the difference immediately from her previous school and the one she's teaching at now.

I think BOTH sides have advantages just in different ways. A SAHM can't provide the advantages of a working mom just like a working mom can't provide the advantages of a SAHM but that doesn't mean there aren't any advantages that exist among BOTH sides. Working moms have no way of knowing what the effect would be on their kids if they didn't work, so you will never know what advantages you are providing your kids that SAHM are not. It all goes back to HOW ONE WAS RAISED and the lifestyle they are accustomed too. I wouldn't expect a woman who comes from a home where the mom worked to understand what it's like for a woman who had her mom in the home full-time but to discredit either side is ignorant because you only know what YOU were accustomed too but you cannot demean or think less than of someone who's not cut from the same cloth nor should you get upset when they can't see or understand the advantages your choice brings to the table. That's just like telling someone they're not Hispanic because they can't speak Spanish. The Hispanic who can speak the language is no better than the ones who can't. Is it a disadvantage? Yes but it doesn't make them less or better, they're both Hispanics at the end of the day.

Working moms and non working moms are both MOMS and will impact their children's lives in different ways and their are advantages and disadvantages in choosing to be one or the other. There is no one size fit all. I know men who seen their mothers work hard to support/help support the household and they didn't want the mother of their children to have to worry about bring in money or having to be financially sufficient. So they sot out great careers that comfortably enable their wives to not have to work. I know guys who had both parents working and they only want to marry women who can contribute financially because that's how their parents did it. My fiance knows I come from a traditional family and although he didn't come from a 2 parent home, he doesn't want me to work because he supports tradition. So it all depends on what you feel is best for YOU and your situation.

A woman choosing to work or not work has nothing to do with the child but everything to do with how she feels about herself.

I have a friend who is a grade school teacher who says that kids of working moms are more prepared for school when they start school. We can all find someone to say what we want. That's why we have researched this to death and the research finds no difference if you compare like SES and like maternal education.

The strongest two factors in how well children do educationally are maternal education, at the time of birth, and SES (really demographics as peers play a very strong role in how well children do in school). Where I live, stay at home moms happen to be far more likely to be uneducated. I'm sure there are wealthier areas where this is not true. My friend (and my dd's kindergarten teacher) both tell me that many kids here start school having no clue what a book is and it's not the children of the working moms. Even if a working mom doesn't read to her children, the day care provider likely does.

For the most part, however, it makes no difference which you choose. They have studied this to death since about the 1970's and they have yet to show that staying home makes one hill of beans difference. Those with opinions on the matter will see what they want to see and ignore what they don't. That's human nature so I really wouldn't take a teacher's word on it if she hasn't collected measureable data. Dd's kindergarten teacher did. She kept data for years on both behavior and reading readiness based on maternal working status and concluded the children of working moms were the ones ready for school (there is research out there to support this especially as maternal education decreases).

As a high school teacher, I can't tell you who had a working mom and who didn't but I do find that when I have a student who doesn't seem to know how to do for himself or advocate for himself, more often than not, his mom was a stay at home mom (I've asked because it tells me the nature of the problem.). Sometimes it's apparent. I have one mom who keeps emailing me about her sons grades, project due dates, project requirements and I want so much to reply back "Please do your son a favor and cut the umbilical cord already" but I can't. That's not PC.

Usually, my hover parents are stay at home or former stay at home moms but most of my parents are not hover parents so we're talking a subset here.

To be honest, I can't tell which most of my 146 students had. I teach in a wealthy community where staying home is pretty typical but no one seems to care which mom does. Every now and again, you can see that a child has been too coddled and that, usually, but not always means mom stayed home.

Certain behaviors increase the odds of one over the other but for most of my students, I couldn't tell if my life depended on it. It's just not on the list of things that really matter.

If you start listing what we know really matters, you'll see that staying home or working is pretty trivial in of itself. It's not which you choose to do. It's how you handle your choice. It's quality of parenting that matters not working status. My current hover mom chooses to be a hover mom. She's not a hover mom because she stays home. She's doing her children no favors. They are not learning to advocate for themselves or to manage their own workloads. She's always fixing things so they have no motive to fix them themselves. I'd like to be a fly on the wall when they get to college.

Because this is an emotional debate, you really need to look to the research. People tend to see what supports their paradigm and ignore what doesn't without ever meaning to and they tend to attribute things to what they want to support/tear down when they shouldn't be attributed to it. My dd isn't one of the top two students in her middle/high school (she's one of two students on an accelerated pace to graduation in her class so she's split between schools right now as they've run out of classes for her at the middle school) because I was a working mom (nor is the other child because his mom worked. They just both happened to have working mothers). She's not confident and self assured because I was a working mom (well not directly as I'll discuss later). She happens to be all those things and have had a working mom but she didn't get any of that from my working. My working was inconsequential except that it paid for the early piano lessons that made her the self assured and confident young lady she is today. You see she's been performing, publically, since she was six and writing music and competing since she was 5. THAT's what made her the girl she is today but she started with good raw stock and had parents who recognized talent early. All the time she spent working towards goals, falling down, picking herself back up and getting on that stage in spite of butterflies has made her very strong and resilient. But my working didn't determine any part of this (other than what we could afford for her).

Staying home is, entirely, unnecessary. Kids can and do thrive with working parents and the workload at home doesn't support it either. With all of our modern conveniences and smaller families, more than enough time to accomodate a full time job has been cleared without taking one minute from the kids. Studies have shown that today's full time working mother spends more time on her kids than a 1950's stay at home mother. Much has changed in the last 60 or so years.

Seriously, the divorce rate impacts kids more than whether mom works. Quality of parenting impacts them more than whether mom works. Maternal education impacts them more than whether mom works. Where they live impacts them more than whether or not mom works. Stress in the household impacts them more than whether or not mom works. Paternal involvement impacts them more than whether or not mom works. Birth order impacts them more than whether or not mom works....the list goes on and on. Maternal working status, if it matters at all, pales next to dozens of factors that really do matter.

You are very correct that this is not about the kids but about how mom feels about herself. So is trying to justify the decision to stay home with claims that it gives kids some kind of advantage when the research says otherwise. I really don't get why people care so much and sweat so much over this one decision when there are so many that really matter and this one just doesn't.

[Shysister]

This is not an emotional debate, it's certain people who have allowed their emotions to control their thoughts so they're commenting in defense of their choice when there isn't a need to do so. You chose the choice you made you felt is best for you and others did the same. So to try to convince someone your way is "right" is pointless and you're not accomplishing anything by attempting to do so.

You don't KNOW in what ways you being a working mom has effected your kid/s. You want to believe it hasn't because that relieves you of guilt but you don't know because there isn't a way to prove it. All you know is what your kids have accomplished due to you being a working mom but you don't know nor will you ever know what they would have accomplished or become if you didn't work. You made the choice so be confident in your choice and don't feel the need to be defensive to others who didn't or wouldn't make the choice you did.

[Ivorytickler]

Originally Posted by Shysister

This is not an emotional debate, it's certain people who have allowed their emotions to control their thoughts so they're commenting in defense of their choice when there isn't a need to do so. You chose the choice you made you felt is best for you and others did the same. So to try to convince someone your way is "right" is pointless and you're not accomplishing anything by attempting to do so.

You don't KNOW in what ways you being a working mom has effected your kid/s. You want to believe it hasn't because that relieves you of guilt but you don't know because there isn't a way to prove it. All you know is what your kids have accomplished due to you being a working mom but you don't know nor will you ever know what they would have accomplished or become if you didn't work. You made the choice so be confident in your choice and don't feel the need to be defensive to others who didn't or wouldn't make the choice you did.

I'm not trying to convince anyone to make my choice. I am, simply, countering the argument that staying home imparts some undisclosed benefit to kids over having a working mom. So far, no one has named this benefit but I'm supposed to accept it's there???

Which you choose is irrelevent. The kids will turn out the same either way assuming that there isn't a negative/positive financial impact from your choice. If there is, then the choice is either a negative or a positive, whichever fits. I don't beleive what I believe to relieve guilt. I believe it because it's supported by many years of research!!!! I believe it because I have eyes and know that people can't walk into a room and tell which people had stay at home moms and which didn't. I know we turn out the same. As I've said, there is only one measureable difference into adulthood and that one favors the working mom not the stay at home mom. Exactly what do I have to feel guilty for? (I also hate that this debate always comes down to this. Working moms being told they believe what they do to assuage their guilt. How about some evidence we have anything to, remotely, feel guilty about???)

I don't care what people think of me but I don't like the guilt trip some try to lay on working moms by saying things like that children of stay at home moms are given some advantage when they're not. I'm strong enough and sure enough of myself and my choices to walk away but I've seen moms reduced to tears by such claims. They are only intended to hurt. They shouldn't be thought much less said out loud or typed.

There is NOTHING to support that staying home is a better brand of parenthood. Working can be if it has a positive impact on the family's finances and it can lead to side effects like a more active dad. I'm still waiting to hear what this advantage that children of stay at home moms have but thinking I probably shouldn't hold my breath while waiting .

And it is a very emotional debate. No mother wants to be told that her choice in working status has denied her children some advantage that someone who chose differently gave her children. The fact you resorted to the tired and untrue: You only believe what you do to assuage your guilt is proof it's an emotional debate. Is the guilt you accuse me of not an emotion? It's also emotional for you to make the accusation. It's a response I'd expect from someone who can't prove her point. I see it all the time in debates. Attack the poster if you can't defend your position. Yeah, this is emotional. (This is why you really need to stick with the data. We have longitudinal, multi generational data that says working or not working by itself does not matter.)

Working status often isn't a real choice but we're told about how other moms live on less as if we should too for that yet undisclosed advantage for our children... It's normal to question your decisions WRT your children. Having people tell you you've denied your children some advantage (that can't, actually, be named ) does not help. Heck, it doesn't help just thinking people really think you've denied your children this non existent benefit. No one wants to feel judged for their parenting choices. So yes, it's an emotional debate. One I don't get when 40 years of research can't find any real differences between our kids beyond their attitudes about women and women's capabilities.

[Shysister]

If you weren't trying to convince anyone of anything, you wouldn't be writing essays on why YOU feel children benefit more from working moms than SAHM. Whatever someone tells you, you're going to go against it and find a reason to assert working moms being better. I told you my friend is a teach and she's told me she can see a difference in the behavior of kids who have working moms and those who do not. What did you do? Make a comment stating just opposite, why? To again try to prove why a working mom is better than a non working mom which is not something you can prove because you can't do research on the same kid twice and that would be the only way to PROVE whether or not a working mom has benefiting the child better or worse than a non working mom. So your argument about research is void because it's no way to prove it nor do you need "studies" when you can pull from experience. You wasn't with them when they did the research and came to their conclusions, so how do you know what all was entailed during the "research" I don't need research to tell me anything, I go off experience and what I can vouch for with my own eyes, not a bunch of words written on paper that I have no idea under what conditions those words were a result of. YOU are the one who feels like you're being judged and have become defensive. There have been others in this thread who've expressed their difference of opinions without attacking those who didn't agree with them. I accused you of guilt because you are way to emotionally invested and your emotions are coming from a different place. Now whether it's guilt or something else I don't know but its evident that this issue is a deep one for you.

[the minx]

I don't really think you can argue against the advantages to having a parent that stays at home. Putting your kid's life in the hands of strangers is obviously not the best choice. Having your kids come home to an empty house is also not the best choice.

If your family can't manage it (for whatever reason), then that's reality. No reason to rail against those who can.

[dreamoutloud]

As though the only option is you can't afford to be a SAHM, but you really want to be one, or you are a SAHM? There are plenty of women out there who love being mothers, who love spending time with their children, but who also get a sense of personal accomplishment and fulfillment from their careers.