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@mrskansas: No. I would be the worst stay at home parent on the face of the planet. If I am craving some quality time with my son, I will take half a day off and do a morning outing before daycare drop off. Maybe if you have that option (or PTO or similar) you could do it once a month for the summer?

@mrskansas: I would love to work a 4 day week and have fridays off with the kiddos to do fun things. During the times that I have been a SAHM whilst on maternity leave I struggled to find balance. Being at home full time is hard and just not for me

I'm a SAHM, but it's one of those things where the grass always seems greener on the other side! I love my kids and I've enjoyed staying home the last 6 years, but I'm jealous of people who get to work part time, especially really flexible jobs and work from him.

I am a mostly SAHM (PT evening hours) and every time I stroll Target I have to constantly wrestle my baby back into the seat and try to get my preschooler to not hit him or beg for things. "Browsing" doesn't really happen. I would love to work a few more regular hours just to talk to someone about anything other than trains and trucks.

All. The. Time.

I wish we could all be PT or leave work at 3.

I always thought a 4 day week would be the absolute best!

I mostly SAH (work 1 day a week) and I mostly enjoy it but I think it has a lot to do with where we live. We live in a very urban area with 10 playgrounds within a 10 min walk, lots of stuff to walk to, errands that are walkable. Toting around my 2 yo is mostly fun most days. Monotonous at times, but generally fun. However I think that is mainly dependent on our location. If I lived in the burbs, had to drive everywhere, really had to work hard to seek out adult interaction or playmates for my kid, i think I would struggle and feel really isolated. And hate staying at home completely. I do know that during the depths of winter, staying at home isn't all fun and games.

@Truth Bombs: NAILED it.

Grass is always greener! I SAH for 2 years and during that time felt like I never got a break from my kids and it was really hard! I do have times (like summer, mostly) where i want to SAH or get jealous of SAH parents....lately it's been so much work juggling work demands, demands of the kids and house and being pregnant.....I often just wish I had to worry about the house and kids. Right now, I have to do it ALL - all the shopping, cooking, cleaning, errands, planning, kid stuff, primary line of defense for child care when sick, etc...plus work 30 hours a week and if someone is sick have to work at night or on weekends. But then I remember how hard it is to be at home with a 2 year old all day, LOL. I always say I'll make a great SAHM when my kids are in school all day

@sarac: But see. That's what makes WOH parents so badass. Because we DO have fun weekends. We figure out how to get shit done. I don't sacrifice family weekends for cleaning. I just stay on my grind. And I do it because I want to. Not because I have to.

@pwnstar: Agree! We have tons of fun on the weekends (And during the week, Monday night we had dinner with 3 other families who we love, and last night I had a mom's night out while the kids had a fun night in with Daddy, tonight we're doing swimming and dinner at our country club with friends). I have to manage the household, which is mentally exhausting, but I don't physically do it all. I outsource things like cleaning to paid help and I'm able to do that because of the salary my career provides our family. I do things late at night because I'd rather sacrifice sleep, than fun with my kids. I make it happen and my kids don't miss a beat. I'm just really tired most of the time. But not being fulfilled or intellectually stimulated is not what I want for myself.

I think we're all incredibly lucky, we have real choice. We weren't kept from attending school or told that we would have a job in a factory for 50 cents an hour with no weekends, etc.

We're all in a real position of privilege that a lot of women in the world don't have, let's not forget that.

@looch: agreed. i'm a PT WAHM, the default parent (DH works shift work as a firefighter, so when he's gone, he's gone for 24-72 hours and cannot do any sick days) and while i struggle with a lot of this, when i think of other options, i'm glad i do have the choice to do this at the moment. and the option to change it up as the years pass if needed.

@sarac: Yes. This is how I feel about my summers off. I have more choice on balancing my time and I really appreciate it.

I've done many different configurations FT SAHM, PT WOHM, FT student, FT WOHM, PT student/PT WOHM. What happened as all of this went down is that I slowly lost any sense of identity stemming from any of the above roles. When I was a FT SAHM I threw myself into being perfect mom/food maker/costume maker, and that eventually drained me and left me frustrated, because the ratio of successful playtimes to frustrated long afternoons was about even. Once I had two it was literally impossible to do a fun outing without screwing up a sleep schedule so any time I got out I felt like I was going to have to "pay for it" later. So I decided to go back to work and school and decided to dive into that completely. That was intellectually energizing and gave me a new identity but I made some massive mistakes due to poor time management and I felt like I was just grazing the surface of every task I did. But I also had a greater appreciation for down time and how to let things go that are really not important. My husband and I had a lot more in common and similar priorities, and money wasn't as tight. I felt like I had more 'wins' on a daily basis, and I could see tasks through to completion. I came out of that time feeling very accomplished but like time was flying by in a way that scared me. Right now I work PT and I get frustrated when I'm treated like a FT employee when in reality I can only work in small slivers of time, and my pay reflects that, so why are people hassling me like I'm a FT employee? So I've had to put boundaries down around my workplace, which makes me feel guilty. And I'm stunned again at how dirty my house is now that two people are at home full time. Tuesday I swear I spent every minute of the day in the kitchen making three meals, plus breakfast for the week and grocery shopping with a two year old at my heels who watched way too much TV. I miss popping by the store on the way to pick up the kids, and worrying less about the grocery budget. And I'm dreading adding another full time inhabitant when my 4 yo comes home from pre-k next week. I've basically stopped investing "meaning" in my ability to do anything perfectly, or even to completely enjoy any particular setup. I'm just an imperfect person who is doing the best I can, and it seems like no matter how I try to balance everything, there's always something that is "off." Now that my kid is almost in kinder I'm amazed at all the different configuration I tried but mostly just amazed at how fast it went. I have a two year old and am thisclose to having total flexibility (well as much as you can with two kids), and all the managing of times before feels like last night's dream-- sort of hazy.

If I reflect even further I have to admit sometimes I was really the problem. When I was an SAHM I would get irrationally frustrated by how messy my house was. When I was WOHM I would get irrationally frustrated by my 80 minute afternoon commute to daycare and pre-ks. In reality the situation changed but my propensity for irrational frustration never changed...

I will admit of all the configs, current config of one kid at home FT, one kid 5 day pre K and working two nights a week is really pretty nice.

Doing all the different configs is the only way I have peace with my decisions. I have been so lucky to be able to try so many different ways of making it work and as looch said, being able to make the choice is ultimately the most meaningful thing.

I hope this post is not offensive to anyone! Just my thoughts.

Not jealous at all. Summer is a much slower pace at work so it's almost like a break for me to go. I also get more me time since I have half days on Fridays that I can use to run errands or just go to the movies by myself. It's heaven.

I'm a SAHM and I mostly love it.

BUT.. As others have said it is a NOT a dream most days- they mess up the house and my house is *never* clean. Cooking for cleaning them entertaining them takes up most hours and I have very little left to do "real" housework and cooking that I do it at the hours that working moms would- after the kids are down!

It's a financial sacrifice for me to be home and we live in a very high cost of living area so I'd love to go out for lunch with them and go liesure target shopping .. but does it happen? No almost never because we are on one income I can't just spend freely.

Also because we don't have extra funds I don't send them to the babysitter/school so I am always expending time and energy teaching/crafting/etc whatever they would be doing in school. By all means I don't do this everyday but it's just another thing that takes up my mental and physical energy.

This is unique to me but recently I've been having bad chronic arm and shoulder pain- I think taking care of two kids 100% of the time and doing all the housework/etc has taken a toll on me.

I have no complaints as a SAHM because as others have mentioned it's a privilege to have the choice to be home! But at least in our family me being home is a sacrifice and we give up a lot (financial freedom mostly) so that I can be home with them. I do sometimes envy WOHMs when I see them shopping for groceries on their lunch break with a coffee in hand (ALONE!) and how they're able to maximize their fewer hours with their kids (vacations and fun stuff) but really I know they're sacrificing something to do what they do too.

@Truth Bombs: this.
It's been so hard for me to feel like there's no time for the life I want to have... because with full time work, meals, cleaning, grocery shopping, all that normal life stuff - there's so little time to do the family stuff we want to have time for.
@sarac: I remember that article. It's very hard with two working parents who both bring their work home with them and put in 10-12 hour days. DH is off for the summer and I feel like I'll be able to breathe because I will just have to focus on work and school and know he'll do most of the basic cleaning and meals.

I have the best of both worlds since I only work 3 days a week and I personally consider going back another day all the time. SAHM life isn't for me but I try to be grateful for the opportunity to be with my kids despite the challenges!