E
EasterJoy
Guest
In the interest of full disclosure, I have a PhD in chemistry. Due to a variety of factors, including a choice to attend to public universities, I never had to take out a student loan. We opted to have me stay at home with our children and with my live-in MIL after our children were born; my husband is the sole bread-winner. My father believed very much in traditional gender roles. I was a top student, but I also grew up with the intention of being a wife and mother. If my father had told me I could not go to college, I would have found a way to go on my own. There is simply no way that library books or even college-level DVD courses from the Teaching Company could have substituted for a higher education. Denying me an education that my brothers were given would not have made me more content to stay at home. To the contrary, I am more content knowing that I was given the time to develop my talents and then, having done so, positively chose the role I have now.
I have had many other SAHMs thank me, actually, because when you choose staying at home when you could have been a doctor or lawyer or professor, instead, that says something. They say it validates the role of a SAHM. I believe it says something to my kids, too. They know that I spend time with them not because I am not trained to do anything else, but because there isn’t any better use of my time. I could be teaching at the college level, and I chose to be with them, instead. Having said that, I feel very strongly that it is parents who have the duty and the right to decide how to raise their children and manage their family affairs, including whether or not and how much each parent works outside the home.
Parents who believe they can guarantee that their grandchildren will be brought up as faithful Catholics by merely denying their daughters higher education could not be more wrong. Most of them are in for a rude awakening.
I have had many other SAHMs thank me, actually, because when you choose staying at home when you could have been a doctor or lawyer or professor, instead, that says something. They say it validates the role of a SAHM. I believe it says something to my kids, too. They know that I spend time with them not because I am not trained to do anything else, but because there isn’t any better use of my time. I could be teaching at the college level, and I chose to be with them, instead. Having said that, I feel very strongly that it is parents who have the duty and the right to decide how to raise their children and manage their family affairs, including whether or not and how much each parent works outside the home.
Parents who believe they can guarantee that their grandchildren will be brought up as faithful Catholics by merely denying their daughters higher education could not be more wrong. Most of them are in for a rude awakening.