Mothers Working, Fathers providing, and where shoud it all meet up?

[Smber2c]

And I havev had a great career to make me feel even more blessed! Now we go on lots of vacations, can afford college educations for our children, and can do numerous home-improvement projects to make our home a paradise without going into debt.

AAHHH!! That’s the one I’ve just made a mental block on. The thought of putting 5 or 6 kids thrugh college…

I’m just trusting that my children will be little Einsteins getting full ride scholarships or that we’ll have reached the point in 20 years where nearly all high school grads are going to college too, so they somehow make it free (of course that really means gov’t funded, thus tax funded, but maybe they can fix it where every other big lotto jackpot pays for 10,000 kids to go to college ).

 

[Truly_Beloved]

The thought of putting 5 or 6 kids thrugh college…

I wouldn’t sweat this, either. DH and I both had free rides to any state university, and my siblings just took out loans. Loans won’t kill your children, if they have to take any out. Or they can pay as they go. But I’m weird… I don’t think parents “owe” their children college educations, weddings, etc. My poor kids!

 

[dulcissima]

AAHHH!! That’s the one I’ve just made a mental block on. The thought of putting 5 or 6 kids thrugh college…

I’m just trusting that my children will be little Einsteins getting full ride scholarships or that we’ll have reached the point in 20 years where nearly all high school grads are going to college too, so they somehow make it free (of course that really means gov’t funded, thus tax funded, but maybe they can fix it where every other big lotto jackpot pays for 10,000 kids to go to college ).

My sister just went to Georgia Tech for grad school and was telling me that in Georgia if you maintain a B average in high school, the state will pick up the bill for a state college. Maybe something like that could factor into where you decide to live.

Or, I have family members who work at colleges (one in New York and one in Lousiana). Their kids have been able to go to college free as a benefit.

 

[whatevergirl]

I am a stay at home Mom, earned my bachelor’s at 21 years old, use my degree every day, and no, I didn’t major in Child Development. Please be very careful when making statements like this; they can really sting. We SAHMs hear plenty from people who think we’re not using our educations. I entered college (indeed, kindergarten) planning on staying home with my babies until the youngest graduated from high school, maybe longer.

God bless you, Smber, for sticking up for us SAHMs.

I am one of those women, too. I asked my DH (boyfriend, back then) how he felt about having his wife stay home. He told me that it was VERY important to him to have his wife stay home and take care of his precious children. He is 100% committed to this. He would work 2, 3, or 4 jobs; sell the house; sell all our “stuff”; anything to allow me to stay home with our babies. After asking some other guy friends this same question, I decided that it wasn’t enough to just marry a guy who would say, “Sure, whatever, stay home if you want,” because he may not have the same kind of commitment to me staying home as a man who says, “Please stay home with my babies; I’ll do everything I can to make that possible, so they never have to be without you.”

DH and I both grew up with SAHMs, and both were forced to endure the pain of our mothers temporarily returning to the workforce (I was in elementary school; DH was in junior high). We associate those times with family discord, personal struggles, and missing our moms. We will do everything we can to keep me at home (especially if we’re blessed with a large family, God willing). The issue is that important – To both of us.

Oh, I didn’t mean it in that way. I apologize for it coming across in a negative way. It all boils down to what is best for one’s family…and whether a woman chooses to stay home through her child(ren)'s teenage years…or go to work once the children go to school…she shouldn’t be judged either way.

At times, I have seen working mom’s condemned by SAHM’s…and again–whatever works for one’s family is what should take place.

I have always found it interesting that men are not called…‘working dads?’ Always been curious to me. I know men who stay home with their kids, because their wives make a better living…so, it really again, is what fits one’s family.

Sorry–didn’t mean to stray off topic—>to OP! PS: I discussed your thread with my husband, and he said that it’s soooo wise to know what you want now, than wait until you are married. We talked extensively about raising kids…me staying at home…for how long…would I want to work…etc…BEFORE we married…and he is a firm believer, that if a potential wife doesn’t agree with these major life issues–it’s better to sever the relationship, before marrying. Just adding his 2 cents.

(He really should just join this board already!)

 

[kage_ar]

DH and I have learned and matured and grown during our marriage. We have had times when we both worked, when he worked and I was at home, and for the past few years I have worked and he stays home.

Each family needs to pray and know what is best in their particular situation. In this period of time, no job or carreer is guaranteed. Carving anything in stone is just not sensible - when you marry and agree that he will work and she will stay home with the kids that is wonderful, just be humbe enought to know that life can change your perfect plans. What happens if he loses his job or becomes disabled and cannot work?

There is no page in the Bible or the CCC that says “thou shalt not be a working mother” - in fact, Proverbs 31 shows us an industrious woman

Thank GOD for parents who do what is best for their kids, and who works where and in what manner is of less priority than getting the entire family to Heaven! A wise couple puts God first and the care of the family second, and works out the rest

 

[whatevergirl]

DH and I have learned and matured and grown during our marriage. We have had times when we both worked, when he worked and I was at home, and for the past few years I have worked and he stays home.

Each family needs to pray and know what is best in their particular situation. In this period of time, no job or carreer is guaranteed. Carving anything in stone is just not sensible - when you marry and agree that he will work and she will stay home with the kids that is wonderful, just be humbe enought to know that life can change your perfect plans. What happens if he loses his job or becomes disabled and cannot work?

There is no page in the Bible or the CCC that says “thou shalt not be a working mother” - in fact, Proverbs 31 shows us an industrious woman

Thank GOD for parents who do what is best for their kids, and who works where and in what manner is of less priority than getting the entire family to Heaven! A wise couple puts God first and the care of the family second, and works out the rest

what I was trying to say…but your words here are much more eloquent… good points.

 

[maria29]

In mainstream America and at 21st century college campuses, this idea could likely get me tared and feathered…but I really don’t want my wife to work unless it is a necessity.

I’m 23, have an English degree and am studying nursing presently. I think I may like to teach English and Religion, but also want to be able to provied for a large (at least 5 kids) family - hence the nursing.

When you say Religion, do you mean Theology? At a high school or Unviversity Level? If you are talking high school many require you to have a Masters in Theology. This will cost you around $25,000- $50,000. Add another $50,000+ to that if yoiu are looking at a PhD program. For the hundreds of people graduating with a Theology PhD there are about 4-5 positions a year. I would say stick with Nursing it pays much better.

I’m more than happy to not have a 3rd or if it’s possible 2nd car, a boat, a time share, a big TV, or any of that. But with salaries as they are I doubt my ability to teach…heck even to be a nurse, and afford the expenses of a home and family with a mother there full time.

I’m big on these goofy quotes, and I don’t have it now, but I read a quote from a Doctor of the Church that explained, “a mother who chooses to work over staying with her children commits grave sin, unless her working is required to help (or fully) provide for her children’s basic shelter, food, and education.”

I would be interested to see which of the 33 doctors said this…

I think the idea of a stay at home mom is beautiful. It will take alot of humilty in this culture. It will also take sacrifice by a family to make due with less. But the care that could be provided by a good Catholic woman for her children, it seems more precious that annual Disney trips or dinners at fancy resturants.

Maybe I’ve an unfair advantage. I don’t care for nice stuff. Driving an old car. Watching a fuzzy tv. Eating Ramen. It doesn’t bother me. But those savings may not be enough.

A bunch of questions here:

Is it practical/possible? Even as a teacher?

Exactly how much ridicule might society really fling?
How do I explain to family?

• I can see my family thinking me lazy for accepting less materially.
• I could see a wife’s family thinking I’m holding her down and not showing respect.

Any big problems with such conventions that I may not see?

(I’d ask if y’all think I could find that girl, but I’ve found a few who think this way, so they exist )

I think of course in a perfect world a woman would be able to stay home, but it just always can’t be. And sometimes no matter how many corners you cut, its just not enough.

For example, my husband and i both work. I’ve had people say you’d save thousands of dollars after you figure in wardrobe expenses, gas, lunches etc. In our case, I can wear PJ’s to work, it’s 10 minutes away and I am so busy at work I don’t eat (ok I am kidding but I just bring my lunch)So actually we’d be losing almost $28,000 a year if I quit my job.

We have 3 college degrees to pay off (my undergrad and my DH undergrad and Masters ) And yes, he has a Masters in Theology and couldn’t find work that would actually pay him a living wage. So he’s a lead foreman/carpenter, just so we can barely make ends meet.

 

[drawnhome]

There are so many valid points made here. I agree my choice wouldn’t have been right for many women. I did go to college and get my degree, and it was in the fine arts so it’s something I’ve been able to keep doing even out of the mainstream.

I feel that my life of being home with my kids was more a privilege than a sacrifice and I am so very grateful it all worked out because it has truly been a joy for all of us.

One thing that hasn’t been mentioned too much is that no matter what choices made, who works, who stays home, how these things are decided, it is our faith that has to be central to all of these decisions and in the course of our marriages and lives. A strong faith and bringing children up in the faith, that’s the main thing, however it gets done.

God Bless

 

[DiannaK]

what a wonderful topic! My post will be rambling … I had lots of things I wanted to say …

I’ve struggled with this very issue from different angles in my life.
First, let me say that I think some of one’s outlook on the issue may depend on how you were raised. For instance … my DH’s mom was a SAHM to 5 children. In my family, my grandmothers, as well as my mother worked many hours to make ends meet.
In turn, we tend to lean more towards what we grew up with.

My opinion of working vs staying at home has also changed as I have gotten older. When DD#1 was born, I was working full time. (I’m a nurse) I stayed home from work for 9 weeks, and went back part time, working 2 12-hour night shifts, on the weekends. Staying at home was never even discussed — I don’t think we could have done it, financially, and at that point in my life, I was too much of a brat to “have my husband tell me what I can spend.”

I eventually went back full time, and if my XH schedule overlapped with mine, his parents watched the baby. At that point in my life, I felt like I had spent time in school to start a career, and I wanted to make sure I put my education to good use.

As the years progressed, I’ve tried to work while Abby was in school – being at home when she is home is paramount to me.

Now … add new DH and DD#2 to the mix.
DH had always said he thought that children needed their mothers … I poo-pooed that idea, being a “career woman”.2 days after being at home with DD#2, I didn’t want to go back to work.

After much discussion, we decided that I was going back to work part time, 4 days per week, and that DH would stay home with our baby. I missed her when I was gone, but knew that she was being cared for by her father, and that they were creating a very special bond.
I was a bit jealous/resentful, since part of me felt like I should be the one at home. I was the one with the more stable career, as well as benefits (DH is in real estate)

Now … the pendulum has swung back the other way …
My DH wanted/needed to work more, so I went even more part time … down to 20hrs per week. I work 3p-1a now, so I’m able to take the girls to events in the mornings. DH feels better, since he is working more.

I think every situation is unique. Do I think that children need their moms at home? Absolutely! Having said that, I also do enjoy my time working. I miss my girls, but I look at it as contributing to my household, and performing corporal works of mercy. Plus, I think it instills a good work ethic in my children. At some point in their lives, they will have to work. I don’t expect that they will grow up, and immediately get married/have children, thus staying at home.

I don’t think I will ever be able to stay at home full time, due to the fact that my DH works for himself. It makes much more sense financially for me to work 20hrs a week, and pick up our insurance, rather than me stay at home, and him pay $600+ a month. There were pros and cons to DH staying at home … the only real con I saw was the potential for isolation on his part. I think he felt a bit uncomfortable taking Rachel out on his own. From a pyschological standpoint, I think he feel better now that he is out working. He misses Rachel, but I think men are hardwired to be the provider in the family. (ducking flames)

You have to decide what is important for you …
Nursing is a wonderfully flexible career for moms/dads, since you can work a little, or a lot, and the money is good. (at least by my standards)
My goal is to whittle our bills down so that we can live on one income, and start sticking the rest away for future maternity leaves, etc.

 

[drawnhome]

But really, that sewing of clothes, cooking from scratch sounds pretty good. If I can manage to get a place with a decent back yard, I want to put in a pretty nice vegetable garden. It’ll save money and allow for more interesting chores than that ones I had when I was 8 (clean the fire place, clean the toilet bowls, unplug the toaster, clean the toaster, plug the toaster back in ).

LOL our boys are a HUGE help in the garden but you know the litter box still has to be cleaned, the toaster unplugged and cleaned, etc. etc. etc. One thing about big families is that there is a lot of extra work and so lots of chores to assign to different family members. And so you don’t think I am more efficient than what I really am, I have honestly not ever really gotten caught up on laundry.

 

[Truly_Beloved]

And so you don’t think I am more efficient than what I really am, I have honestly not ever really gotten caught up on laundry.

Is this even possible??? I don’t think it is, and I’ve resigned myself to spending the next 20-30 years catching up on laundry.

 

[actorgirl]

Is this even possible??? I don’t think it is, and I’ve resigned myself to spending the next 20-30 years catching up on laundry.

I don’t GET IT. I’m home all day, yet it never ends. It’s two small adults (5’1 and 5’7) and a baby. There’s clothes on my side of the bed right now. That’s why I’m still up!

As far as working. I NEVER saw myself as a SAHM. I was kind of forced into it, by way of my contract wasn’t renewed when my baby was about 4 months. I like my current situation. As my name suggests I’'m an actress. I average a gig a week. I’m in rehearsals for a show now, but mostly I’m at home. I’m away enough so I don’t go nuts.

OH and my husband is a teacher at Boys Town. He sometimes tutors on the side and a few nights a week he is a personal trainer. We have a beautiful home, both have cars. It can be done

 

[Em_in_FL]

There is no church teaching regarding “a woman’s place” in her role as wife and mother… and anyone who suggests there is is doing a great disservice to the faith. Suggestions in on direction or the other would insult the other school of thought, every time. Ideas like this may even turn people AWAY from the faith, so please don’t suggest the Catholic Church is biased. We’re universal.

Don’t forget that we’ve all been given different gifts of the Holy Spirit. God uses us all in different ways.

Let me give you an example…
My mom was a strong advocate for SAHMs, a hippy (of-sorts) in her time. We grew up cutting corners financially and my parents didn’t pay for us to go through college.
Guess what happened? Since I became financially responsible for my college education I was thrown into quite the personal dilema! Growing up in a household advocating for SAHMs (who thought it was very important for me to get a college education) placed me in a situation of HAVING to WORK!

Kinda frurstrating… and quite inconsistant.

If my mom really wanted me to carry on her beloved tradition of being a SAHM then the logical approaches to that would have been…

1. For my parents to pay for my college education.
2. For my parents to suggest I shouldn’t go to college, because I know I would not have needed a degree in electrical engineering to be a mother.

So, just speaking as a child of someone put into this situation… remember the consequences of what you’re advocating for. I still get a lot of pressure from my mom about working.

For me and my children… I will consistantly share my open views… do what works for YOU… I will not suggest one method over the other.

 

[CCM08]

My thoughts on the subject, which are my own and I presume to speak for no one other than my self:

1.People have a duty to provide for their children, and it goes beyond merely the extreme basics like food. It’s irresponsible to chose a low paying profession and then have more children than that profession can support.

2.Children in the United States start at an early age attending school from 7-8 hours a day. With modern technology a stay at home mother could find herself quite bored.

3.Most people do not enjoy living at near poverty levels, it may be very unreasonable to expect a woman to stay at home when your salary is not sufficent to provide some comforts.

4.Most women that attend college do so with plans of work, not just so they have something pretty to hang on a wall somewhere.

 

[RWMorris]

AAHHH!! That’s the one I’ve just made a mental block on. The thought of putting 5 or 6 kids thrugh college…

I’m just trusting that my children will be little Einsteins getting full ride scholarships or that we’ll have reached the point in 20 years where nearly all high school grads are going to college too, so they somehow make it free (of course that really means gov’t funded, thus tax funded, but maybe they can fix it where every other big lotto jackpot pays for 10,000 kids to go to college ).

Don’t worry about this part. We’ve managed through savings, student loans, grants, scholarships, and having our kids work. It is a definite plus to have a college education.

 

[whatevergirl]

My thoughts on the subject, which are my own and I presume to speak for no one other than my self:

1.People have a duty to provide for their children, and it goes beyond merely the extreme basics like food. It’s irresponsible to chose a low paying profession and then have more children than that profession can support.

2.Children in the United States start at an early age attending school from 7-8 hours a day. With modern technology a stay at home mother could find herself quite bored.

3.Most people do not enjoy living at near poverty levels, it may be very unreasonable to expect a woman to stay at home when your salary is not sufficent to provide some comforts.

4.Most women that attend college do so with plans of work, not just so they have something pretty to hang on a wall somewhere.

CCM;
I apologize for inferring you speak for everyone…forgive me. It appeared in one of your replies back to me, (in the thread about separating bank accounts) that I wasn’t being transparent by having two sep accounts. It wasn’t in this thread, that I felt that…but either way, I apologize for coming across wrongly to you.

Blessings,
Sharon

 

[leonie]

2.Children in the United States start at an early age attending school from 7-8 hours a day. With modern technology a stay at home mother could find herself quite bored.

 

[drawnhome]

My thoughts on the subject, which are my own and I presume to speak for no one other than my self:

1.People have a duty to provide for their children, and it goes beyond merely the extreme basics like food. It’s irresponsible to chose a low paying profession and then have more children than that profession can support.

2.Children in the United States start at an early age attending school from 7-8 hours a day. With modern technology a stay at home mother could find herself quite bored.

3.Most people do not enjoy living at near poverty levels, it may be very unreasonable to expect a woman to stay at home when your salary is not sufficent to provide some comforts.

4.Most women that attend college do so with plans of work, not just so they have something pretty to hang on a wall somewhere.

Forgive me but this post seems somewhat hostile. I guess #4 was directed at me for having a degree in the fine arts. Hmmm. Well we do have some pretty things on the wall but there have also been some wonderful opportunities for exhibits and galleries and a good bit of college tuition (3 so far) has been paid due to my dabbling. We all do what we can, and we all presumably are doing the very best we can with the gifts God gave us. I’ve had kids in school, kids in college, kids at home, and now homeschool a couple of teenagers…and I’ve worked part-time when we couldn’t make the bills. Again, we are called to do what we can for our families but let’s not diminish the importance of kids having someone there at home when they need them to be there. It’s truly one of the best decisions we ever made in our marriage. It has enhanced all of our lives in ways we couldn’t have understood in our early 20’s.

God Bless

 

[Truly_Beloved]

2.Children in the United States start at an early age attending school from 7-8 hours a day. With modern technology a stay at home mother could find herself quite bored.

I don’t want to come across as hostile or mean, but which modern technological conveniences make housekeeping so fast that a SAHM would have nothing left to do? Just curious… I’d like to invest in a few of them, since I can never seem to get caught up on everything (like laundry…).

This also assumes you don’t homeschool your kids.

 

[gardenswithkids]

…but also want to be able to provied for a large (at least 5 kids) family - …
A bunch of questions here:

Is it practical/possible? …

There are significant expenses to a second income, and child care is one of the biggest. If God blesses you with a large family, you may find that on the practical level it makes complete sense that one of you stays home with the children. We have seven children, and if we had to pay for their child care we would loose money by my working.

I’ll also add that many say they need the second income because they incurred large debts before they even married or began their family. Some of the choices you and your future wife make *now *will greatly impact your ability to live the life you want in the future.