Thursday, May 03, 2007

SAHM

I find articles like this absurd.

I think it's ridiculous to try to put a dollar amount on being a stay-at-home mom, to try to make it sound like she actually has about 6, or 8 or 10 different jobs. It reeks of an inferiority complex. I'm not suggesting stay-at-home moms don't work hard. Certainly, they do take on the role of "day care teacher" that working moms (generally speaking) don't assume. But housekeeper? Laundry service? Janitor? Cook? Um, excuse me, but who did these things before you had kids? I'm not sure about everyone else, but I'm the housekeeper, laundry service, cook and janitor of my household. And CFO too. And I'm not a mother yet. I call it living my life. Yeah, a stay-at-home mom wears many hats. So do we all.

Sure, there are days when I want to throttle my husband for not doing enough around the house. Are there days where I feel like I have to do everything in order for anything to get done? Sure. Will I need to do even more when this kid arrives? You betcha.

I mean my husband isn't a total lazy slob. He does his part. He also works longer hours than I do so it makes sense that I pick up more of the household chores. But it's never occurred to me to actually try to figure out how much my services are worth in a dollar value. I realize that this stay-at-home mom salary thing is really just supposed to be a wake-up call that, duh, you shouldn't take the stay-at-home mom in your life for granted. That she really does actually do something.

But I still find the article absurd.

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1 Comments:

At 4:34 PM, Blogger Star said...

I pretty much agree.

Having kids adds a ton to your daily duties, your emotional responsibilities, and takes time away from you as an individual while adding others' lives to your list of responsibilities.

But like you said every household has those cleaning, cooking, paying the bills, etc responsibilities.

I think that a stay at home mom deserves as much credit as any other woman who does something to contribute to society through their work. Perhaps the message ought to be not to take it for granted, like you said. Otherwise let's tally up what we each would make playing every role that we play.

 

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