In my last post, I hinted at the feelings of self-worth I have been struggling with as a stay at home wife/homemaker, but I didn’t really delve into the topic too deeply because I wasn’t certain about how I wanted to approach it. In general I have a problem with the term “working mom” as compared to a stay at home mom. The reason being, I think the term “working mom” sends the message that stay at home moms don’t work. It is especially important to be careful when using these terms around children. I think when it comes to our kids we need to be super careful about the messages we’re sending them consciously or subconsciously.
My mom was a stay at home mom for most of my youth, in fact because the Island we lived on lacked good schools, she even home schooled my brothers and I up until high school. Let me tell you, I know we were a huge handful, and home schooling us must have been a huge challenge for her. She really did make the ultimate sacrifice for us. However when I was younger I can remember over hearing conversations between my parents where my dad would saying something like, “well I have to work” and I can remember how upset this made my mom and how my dad would quickly try to rectify the situation, but I think on some subconscious level these snip-its even though they were immediately retracted sent me the message that the work of being a stay at home mom wasn’t as valued or recognized as the work one does outside the home. So I have long since struggled against the idea of being a domesticated house wife. Yet, the rational side of my brain knows full well that there is tremendous value in being a stay at home mom. The challenge is redefining that role and perhaps my own perceptions of it and making it into something that I feel just as proud to display (if I end up assuming this role) as I would being a top CEO.
This blog post by my amazing cousin, couldn’t sum up my own feelings better.
What are your thoughts?
When Aidan was born, I put a lot of pressure on myself to clean, cook and do laundry and all the Susie Homemaker things I thought being a stay-at-home mom was meant to do. At first, it felt completely doable. While my husband was home with me on paternity leave, we spent those two weeks together cooking, cleaning, entertaining friends and family who came to visit Aidan and when he went back to work, I felt like a groove had been established that I could keep on with.
But then reality slowly crept in and there were days when I didn’t manage to keep the house pristine or get all the house chores done. Then my husband asked if I’d done the laundry — in a completely innocuous way — because he was looking for some socks. And, I snapped. I’d like to blame the lost sleep but that wasn’t it. I realized that I am a stay-at-home MOM. Not a stay-at-home housekeeper, maid or laundress. A mom.
And if I were a mom that worked out of the home, then I would be paying someone to care for my child. And maybe it depends on the nanny, but most nannies I’ve heard of are only paid to care for the child and no one asks them if they also got to any of the other household chores.
Surely, if I were working out of the home, then all the housework would need to get done in the evenings and weekends and my husband is home in the evenings and weekends and is just as capable of getting through the housework. Afterall, when we both worked out of the home, we didn’t depend on me to do all the housework.
My husband, thankfully, understood. In his defense, he said that he’d just come to expect it since I had been managing it all so well up until Sockgate and now, he and I have our own assigned chores.
Does that mean I absolve myself of any cooking and cleaning during the weekday? Of course not. I want to be able to do all these things. And when he leaves for school, if I don’t return to work out of the home, I’ll work housework into my job responsibilities. But for now, while he’s a baby and depends on me 100%, being a stay-at-home mom means I spend my 9-5 (but it’s actually 5-8) keeping my son loved, fed, clothed, clean, healthy and enriched and my husbands socks can wait.
Amen! I totally agree!