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@Mrs. Sketchbook: I'm still missing your point. And I think you've gone a bit off-track for this thread. While your SAH experience seems...tough, I think it's probably has a lot to do with your particular situation (rural, moving for a husband's job, etc.). While they sound challenging, I'm not sure how they pertain to OP.
Her original question was--was her husband expecting too much in wanting her to do EVERYTHING around the house as a SAHM and I stand by my answer that yes, he is expecting too much. However, if it is a priority for her there is time in the day, even with a baby, to get a few things done each day.
I'm not debating the merits of SAHP vs WOHP or having a pissing contest over who has MORE time. In fact, it's wierd to me that this conversation between us is happening at all, because I feel like it's so off base from what the OP was about and what my response to her was.
But I will still say, that as both a SAHP (I totally consider 5.5 months at home with a baby being SAHP, so we will have to agree to disagree on that point) and a WOHP, I have had time in each situation to take showers, cook dinners (when we don't have leftovers to eat), and do the occasional light cleaning.
As I have stated in other threads, working in a lot of ways has been easier for me, but not because staying at home with my LO was so hard (for me. I realize this is an individual experience), but because when I was on mat leave, I felt like I *should* take most of the night wake ups, and I *should* clean or cook or pump when LO was sleeping during the day, so I was literally never sleeping.
And when I went back to work, I realized that it's a total crock that women who SAH have husbands who refuse to do night wakeups "because they have to work".
I can tell you first hand that being at work sleep deprived is no harder than being at home with a baby sleep deprived, so in my opinion, husbands/dads who are working should still be doing 50/50 of what needs to be done in the hours they are home. Unless say, they are a commercial pilot or a brain surgeon and their sleep is literally a life or death situation.
That's cool if your marriage is different, and you both prefer to split the duties in a more traditional way (with you doing all the house work and child rearing, even in the hours that your husband is home). But I feel like I'm free to say that I would not sign up for that situation and I don't feel OP needs to.
Again, back to the original post. Having a baby at home is hard. The husband should pick up his own plates and load the dishwasher, among other things. However, having a baby is not the horror show many people make it out to be and if it's a priority for the OP, she can definitely find some time to do some basic chores should she want to.
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@Anagram: I really don't know what to say. You gave what I felt was unrealistic advice because you only had a few months of experience with a certain lifestyle. I didn't think your advice totally answered the OP's question, because I don't think that ML fundamentally changes a person and/or a marriage in the same way that becoming an SAHM does.
Other people who are SAHMs have weighed in on their view that comparing ML to a SAHM lifestyle is not realistic; you can scroll up and see that for yourself. Other WOHMs asked me for clarification on my position and accepted my response and we left it where it was.
Honestly, without getting too personal, I took a look at your profile to see if there was some difference that I was missing. Your child is half my child's age, and you live in a more affluent area than I do. That, more than anything, will drive us to have different answers to this question. I take no issue with what you are saying re: chores, but to imply that SAHM life is one long coffee date....what can I say? It read as naive and dismissive.
For me, and I suspect for many (most?) of the SAHMs here, becoming an SAHM is a sea change, a paradigm shift. Mine included a move, but it doesn't have to include a move to be life-altering. It alters the space of a relationship in ways that I honestly don't think someone can understand until they've done it.
I'm assuming that the OP is planning to SAH for longer than 5.5 months. I just don't think it is fair for someone who SAH for 5.5 months before returning to work to offer advice to someone who is planning to SAH full-time into the toddler stage and beyond... especially when the advice offered feels dismissive. I can't help you to understand that. Other people called me out on that, and after some clarification we came to a mutual understanding, so I'm thinking that, for some people, my rationale made sense.
Let's agree that we'll never see eye-to-eye on this small issue and let it go!
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@Mrs. Sketchbook: I just wanted to quickly address what you wrote in a previous post where you said "being an SAHM isn't equivalent to being a daycare worker or a WOHM who is home on the weekends etc." It's true that daycare workers don't have the clean their house *while* providing care for the child, but at some point, they *do* have to clean the home - when they go home, I'm assuming they have to pick up and tidy up their own home. So do parents who work outside the home all day - when they get home, they still have to prepare meals, tidy up, etc while providing care to their child. As a SAHM, I have the luxury (and yes, I do think it's a luxury) of doing the dishes throughout the day, or quickly running a load of laundry at 3pm. I don't have to wait until 9pm, when I'm home from work and LO has been fed, washed, and put to sleep.
Hope this doesn't come across the wrong way!
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@pinkcupcake: no, doesn't come across the wrong way at all! But I think for the out of the home parent it is hard to understand why sometimes the house is messier when they get home than it is when they left! I mean, how is that possible? It is--as you well know!--because toddlers make messes when you're trying to clean, and any special cleaning chores (bathrooms, baseboards) take time away from general maintenance chores. I am off of work (I work very very part time) this week and you would not believe what a mess my living room is because I've spent all week deep cleaning the places I don't usually get to!
I will say I wonder this hypothetical daycare worker...does he/she have kids? If so are they in school/daycare while she/he is working? In that case they are making a lot less mess in their home during the day. All the stuff kids do at daycare....eating, painting, sensory play...is done in the kitchen and it feels like I never get done cleaning up after a craft or eating. Ultimately I think it is infinitely better not to have to devote all weekend to cleaning like my WOHM friends do, but I also think my house gets messier more quickly!
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@Mrs. Sketchbook: I don't have too much to add here that hasn't a;ready been said, but I will say that the same way you feel that ML folks can not know what people who have chosen to SAH long term will feel, you also cannot know what ML people feel. I stayed home on ML for 6.5 months and yes, it was actually quite hard but also amazing.
For me, SAH would never work because I find having to be 'on' all teh time and answer DD's demands evry minute of teh day exhausting. I also found it really tiresome that my entire day was reduced to getting baby to nap! I WOH, but I cook, clean and care for baby in the morning before I leave and also in the evenings.
My house looks like crap, but it really didn't look much better when I was on ML so I assume it will look like crap until DD is 3 years old hahaha.
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@pinkcupcake: I thought a little more about what you said. I think you are right, it is not good to underestimate the luxury of being able to make the choice to SAH or WOH; lots of people around the world have that choice set out for them. But as far as luxury goes....as far as I'm concerned, it is quite a luxury for DH too! Because not only is he not directly dealing with the less elegant parts of parenting for 40+ hrs a week, but he also doesn't have to do those chores when he gets home, because I've already done them. I guess what I mean is, I try to think of my choice to SAHM not as something that benefits me only, but that has benefits for my whole family. SAHM wasn't something I set out to do my whole life, so perhaps I rationalize my value to my family. At the same time, I hate to see an SAHM devalue themselves....depression is a huge problem in SAHM world; SAHMs are more likely to become depressed, and I can't help but wonder if that has something to do with low self-esteem. Oddly enough, the internet seems to be blowing up with SAHM/WOH debate, but my husband is never anything but grateful for what I do (and yeah, that usually includes putting his dishes in the washer, he's just usually too rushed or too tired to do that stuff, although he is a fantastic parent). Sometimes I think I should listen to him more closely and listen less to all the internet chatter surrounding this debate.
@plantains: My DH and I had a lengthy discussion about this at lunch when I told him about this thread. He is pretty bad about doing a lot of the things that were discussed in this post: he doesn't throw his clothes in a hamper, he definitely leaves dishes all over the place, etc. We have fought over it a million times but YES, I agree with you....I have just decided this is just the way it is until our LO gets a little older.
You are right that having never had a proper ML, I definitely don't know what it feels like. I will say this....any woman who has just gone through birth or any parent who has just welcomed a child home deserves to be cared for and deserves time to enjoy their baby! Sadly, as time passes that happens less and less. I actually wrote a post about the "honeymoon" phase ending; around the 3 month point we pretty much had exhausted all of our help and I had the feeling that life was "back to normal"-- a new normal, albeit, but the expectations of us as a family had gone back to normal. DH was taking on more work and our family expected normal attendance at get-togethers, etc.....it was a rude awakening for me!
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