Did anyone read this article today in the NYT? What did you think about the perspectives of the women? It certainly is food for thought.
Mostly, I thought the changing views on their marriages was really interesting.
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Interesting. The is personally why I would never stop working. DH makes good money but I don't want to depend on him for financially stability. I love making my own money and having a challenging career. But I think everyone is different. I have seen lots of women who were SAHM have their husbands leave them and struggle to support their family and I personally would never went to be in that situation. With my career, the minute you leave it is very hard to get back in. I left public accounting for a job in industry and I'm so far behind were I would have been if I would have stayed in public.
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@littlek: Like you, the financial independence is such a big deal for me. I just can't face the potential helplessness I think I would feel if anything were to go wrong. I also come from a culture where no one SAH, so maybe that warps my perspective. I just don't see it as being remotely worth the risks and damage to my career.
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I came from a mom that was a SAHM and I am glad I work now. I know my mom had a good career and it made me happy as a child to know she chose to spend it with us.
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As much as I love Xander and wish I could spend more time with him, I spent soooooooo much time working and studying to have the career that I have now. I can't imagine just giving that all up! It would seem like such a waste to me! Plus, once you're out of my field, it's VERY hard to get back in. You really have to stay up-to-date on the latest technologies, and I doubt I'd be able to do that if I stayed at home.
I think it definitely works for some people though! My mom was a SAHM for 8 years and it was great! But when my dad got laid off, it was a struggle and she had to find a job - any job!
I don't think I could ever do it, not only because I love my career, but also because you just never know what's going to happen. While I doubt my husband would ever leave me, you never know if he'll be able to keep his job forever! Plus it's a lot harder to save for retirement with only one person contributing. And what about saving for your children's college education (though I know some people don't do this anyway)?
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I am so torn about this topic. We are still TTC, so it is a theoretical decision for me. I hold an executive level position, but without relocating, I won't be climbing any higher with my company. I have always said I would like to SAH. If I were to remain in my current role and have kids, the long hours and commute would not leave much time with our future children during the week. Yet as the possibility of leaving the workforce is closer, I just don't know what I would decide if I were pregnant today. I think the decision will depend on (1) if we have multiples and would have to pay for daycare for 2 (we will be doing IVF), (2) paying down some debt/increasing our savings first, and (3) determining some alternate career options for when kids start school. With all that said, I think I still need to decide if I could be happy and fulfilled without WOH. Great article, thanks for sharing!
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I also think that my perspective on this is coloured by the nature of my job and the fact that I have a lot of flexibility and live very close to the office so I get to spend a lot of time with my DD. Maybe I would feel differently if I was doing 80 hour weeks.
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@plantains: I'm the same. I only work 40 hours and have a lot of flexibility and everyone that I work with is very understanding and consider family more important than the job. But I'm also not making the $500,000 that was mentioned in the article! Definitely not a high powered woman - just a regular powered woman.
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@Adira: I don't see money as the issue as much ast the lost time. I think depending on your profession you may or may not be able to step back into the same job at the same level.
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Wow, this is a great article. During my maternity leave, I really contemplated becoming a stay at home mom. Then, my MIL visited and all hell broke loose. The insecurity I felt in our marriage at the time made working so much more important for me as a person financially and emotionally. I realized that I needed to work with that "just in case" things don't improve.
Fortunately, my marriage has improved and I've grown in my job and career. As hard as it is to drop him off at daycare, I know that it's best for everyone in the family to have me working. Daycare hasn't eaten as big of chunk out of our expenses as we originally thought too. When I started working again, I didn't realize how much I would thrive on it like my SIL does. I didn't think that I was similar to her in that respect. When I was on maternity leave, I felt like a mess with the whole parenting thing. It's gotten a lot better, but felt out of my element.
What the article doesn't mention is telecommuting or work from home. Getting two days of work from home has been beneficial to our family and marriage. I get the laundry done, get groceries delivered, go to Target. It's been hugely helpful for maintaining our life at home.
I'm a bit resentful of our new hire whose working 3 days at home when myself and my longtime boss are doing 2 days at most. But that's another story.
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@Adira: Yeah, I'm regular powered woman too. Right now, I'm taking steps to make myself more valuable in my profession for a number of reasons. The time lost thing scares me the most. I've heard from many women who hard it is to return to the workforce. It's not a risk I want to take. I still think and hope that I'm a good mother for working and setting an example of working.
The chore thing mentioned in the article got to me. We've had huge fights over chores since LO arrived. It's been a learning experience in how babies change a marriage and expectations. Chorewars makes for clear accounting of who's doing what and what's going on for us. I believe in equality and fairness in a marriage, so it helps with it.
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@littlek: Definitely the time lost is huge. If I left my career for even a couple years, it'd be really difficult to come back to!
@cascademom: Yes, I hope that I'm setting an example for my son by working! And if I ever have any daughters, I think I would feel even more strongly about setting the WOHM example!
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I have been both, a stay at home mom and a working mom and I ultimately decided to return to work in order to keep the time out of work as short as possible (2 years).
The way I look at it, if you or your spouse has to work to earn a living, then you really need to prepare in case something happens to a wage earner. And I am not just talking about job loss. What if your spouse has an accident and becomes disabled?
So, I think it's important that while I can, I work. It's not because I don't want to be with my son, but I don't want to be in the position of having to take just anything because our circumstances changed. I prefer choice above anything else.
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@cascademom: you are right! Working from home is such a game changer. Just being able to put a load of laundry on or even look in on DD while the nanny puts her down for a nap changes everything. Your story about the solace you found in work when things were a bit rocky at home really resonated with me. I had 6 months off for maternity leave, and I really found it hard remember who I was outside of the baby. Once I returned to work, oddly enough, I felt much more confident in my parenting abilities.
@Adira: I have to say that having a family friendly organisation to work for has also been very helpful. I hope that they continue to be as flexible as DD gets older, and that I am able to find enough balance to avoid being 'mommy tracked'.
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@plantains: Aww, thank you. I remember reading a blog post from a woman who returned to work after maternity leave long before kids were on the table. I still think back to that blog post sometimes and can relate so much. My sense of organization has greatly improved since returning to work. Now, it's finally gotten into the cooking realm where I write our meal plan on our whiteboard for the week and go off of that. Making changes within me emotionally, physically, and professionally has helped rebound from the rough spot in our marriage.
I still have issues with my DH, but they're better managed. My relationship with my MIL is non existent at this point because of so many things. Personally, saving my marriage over a relationship with her is so much more important to our family.
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@littlek: I absolutely cannot get out and come back in. That is a huge consideration for me . . . I really want to stay home with LO, and we can afford for me to do that, but what do I do when she goes to school . . . *gah* Never an easy decision. It's either I pay now or I pay later . . . and I don't want my DH to feel like the (considerable) weight of our life is all on his shoulders. And then there's the idea of what type of role model I want to be to my daughter. I hope beyond hope that I am the kind of mother that she needs me to be . . . I hope she understands why I am making the decisions that I am making. Although that is a total crap shoot. When the mommy guilt kicks in I can imagine her screaming at me as a teenager about how I am never home and she doesn't understand why I can't be home for her . . . and it breaks my heart. I hope that that scene never comes to be. I know all parents just do the best they can and hope that their decisions are the best that can be made for their families. Where the EFF is a crystal ball when you need one?!
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@cascademom: In my profession (law), while it is possible to work from home, for career progression (as opposed to stagnation), being physically present is a must. I have flexibility, sure, but I will never be able to work from home and maintain any kind of career progression.
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@MsLipGloss: In my profession (archives and records management), you need to be present as well. For nearly 7 years, I spent every day in the office. It didn't become tough until I had LO, daycare, managing meals, etc. Once or twice a week helps to manage it better. Right now, I could be working on hardcopy that's been delivered, but I'm at home, so there's that. For my profession, working from home full time or more than two days a week seems excessive hence my resentment over a newbie doing it.
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Thanks for the very enjoyable read. SAH is not an appealing option for me.
S/N my alma mater was mentioned in the article!
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@MsLipGloss: Same here. You really need to be "seen" at the office. On occasion I can WFH, but it's not really the best thing for career advancement.
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I'm not a "high-powered" worker the way the article described, but I do make a very good living and together, DH and I are fairly comfortable. I'm sure I will have pangs after our LO is born and the time comes to return to work, and I wish I could have 6 months of maternity leave instead of 3. But on the whole, I find the argument for staying in the workforce much more compelling for me than staying home. First off, I think I'd go nuts staying at home; I don't love my job with every fiber of my being, but I enjoy it and I need the intellectual stimulation. Its pretty flexible and family-friendly, and aside from some occasional travel (planned well in advance), its 40 hours per week. I also know it would be incredibly difficult to get back in if I leave.
More than that, though, is the fact that I don't want to be a burden on my kids in my old age, and there's no way we could sock away enough money for that if we weren't both working. And we want to be able to sustain our lifestyle as much as we can once the kids are here -- restaurants, trips to both international and domestic destinations, sailing, whatever else sounds good. Both of us come from families who really struggled financially when we were growing up, and I personally don't think a few years at home with the kids would be worth (potentially) subjecting them to that kind of stress for their older childhood and teen years. Sh*t happens, of course, but I'd rather do what we can to hedge against it. As well, DH helped support me when I was in law school and there absolutely was a money dynamic I didn't like during that time; I don't know if it would be the same if I stayed home but I don't really want to risk it.
I know some of the women from the article didn't think these kind of concerns applied to them, but I think the end results are a good reminder that whatever decisions we make should carefully balance both the long- and short-term considerations.
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What a powerful article. If there was ever a cautionary tale about "off-ramping" this story tells it. Even more than not wanting to leave my career, I felt equally strongly about not being mommy-tracked in any way.
Yeah, maybe these are tough and frazzled years and while I don't "have it all", I certainly "have enough" and my girls are thriving.
The one voice that is missing from this piece is that of the children. Did the children fare any better or worse whether their mothers were working or not? The research says no on the whole (though I'm sure there are some papers that say yes and some that say no).
I figure if my kids aren't going to suffer at the hands of my career, then why make a big change in it?
Edited to add: I AM an 80 hour a week player, but even with that I feel like my girls are getting what they need. I make it to all the school events and picnics. I take them on business trips with me whenever possible. Maybe I'm lucky in that I've learned to function on relatively limited amounts of sleep... so like last night, I just worked after the girls went to bed.
Here's a link to one review of the outcomes for working/SAHM moms: http://parenthood.library.wisc.edu/Hoffman/Hoffman.html
This article references a recent extensive meta-analysis on the subject:
http://articles.latimes.com/2012/feb/13/health/la-he-the-md-working-mom-20120213 -
@Mrs. Jacks: very informative study. The findings are utterly fascinating. Thanks for sharing!
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Oh man, you definitely cannot leave my field and just expect to come back. Staying home is not for me, for these reasons and many more. Looking forward to reading the rest of the study.
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I sort of struggled with the idea of becoming a SAHM. I kept thinking, I went to a 4-yer college, them got a graduate degree, and now I'm going to stay home? But then our family circumstances changed and it makes sense for me to stay home.....and I just can't put LO in daycare. (mostly because in the beginning of her life she spent so much time in the hospital....I feel mother's guilt leaving her again!) I can see myself going back to work one day though. In my industry, there are a lot of women who take time off to have kids ad return when their kids are in school. Gosh it's just so hard to have it all!
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Very interesting article. I know for myself, SAH is not on the table, because of the struggles mentioned in the article. I feel like it's important for me to contribute financially to the household, because I can. It's also important that we save enough for retirement, and that would be difficult to do on one salary. And DH and I both work in the software industry, which can be volatile. Just because we could in theory afford for me to stay home now, it doesn't mean that will always be the case.
And on the more selfish end, I like working. I will love my child more than anything, but after having a few bouts of unemployment, I need a purpose for my day and a place to go, and adult interaction. I also like vacations and nice houses and being able to provide nice things. We wouldn't be able to do that on one salary. I also hate housework and prefer to pay someone else to do it, lol.
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I think there's a variety of reasons why women decide to stay at home or continue working. Most women who decide to stay at home do realize that their career isn't going to magically progress while they're home. This paragraph towards the end of the article shows that most of the women who 'opted out' had enough dissatisfaction with their job pre-kids that even with the penalties they paid they still wouldn't want to return to where they were before.
"But most people don’t make life decisions based on statistics or the collective good. And not a single woman I spoke with said she wished that she could return to her old, pre-opting-out job — no matter what price she paid for her decision to stop working. What I heard instead were some regrets for what, in an ideal world, might have been — more time with their children combined with some sort of intellectually stimulating, respectably paying, advancement-permitting part-time work — but none for the high-powered professional lives that these women had led."
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@MrsCB: your last sentence totally cracked me up!
@Maysprout: I agree that most of the women profiled were not necessarily happy with their working lives before anyway, but I'm not sure I agree that most women realise the effect staying home can have on career progression. I have seen first hand that a lot of people think that with a good amount of hard work etc, they will be able to make up the difference and in many scenarios, this simply isn't true.
I'm not saying that SAH is a bad idea, simply that a lot of people haven't accounted for just how difficult it can be to get their careers back on track nor have they accepted the possibility that they might very well be leaving for good regardless of their intention.
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I'm neither in a high powered profession nor working out of the home at present, so I'm not sure my comments count, but I found this interesting! I've been urging DH to consider taking a year off when I go back so he can stay at home but he has concerns about how it'd affect his career long term.
I read it quickly on my phone, but I'm struck by how the author portrays some of the women as really surprised that just doing "bake sales" didn't keep them in the loop enough to get a job again once they wanted it. I know they gave at least one example of a woman staying connected and easily getting a job through her (elite) personal network but I find it surprising that these bright, high achieving women didn't actively stay with their foot in the job pool even while SAH. Or at least that is how I read it.
I cannot imagine going back to work FT and having DH expect me to still manage all the household stuff. Yikes.
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@plantains: It wouldn't make sense for you to say that being a SAHM is a bad idea for everyone so I'm glad that's not what you're saying. And I agree that finding a job in the future for a SAHM who wants to return to work isn't going to be straight forward and is definitely something to consider but I've just never talked to anyone who didn't consider this in their decision.
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@Maysprout: It looks like we have had very different experiences as I do know a lot of people who are fnding it so much harder than they thought to re-enter the workforce. I have a lot of friends who left big pharma thinking they wouldn't have a problem getting back in and that industry has completely turned upside down.
A lot of people don't consider all the potential ramifications and are taken by surprise at how difficult it can be to get back in. This was actually true for almost every single woman profiled in that article.
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@plantains: change "big pharma" to "wall street" and you have most of my peers!
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@looch: And in medicine, you can't really leave and hope to keep skills at the high level needed to take care of patients.
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@looch: I can't even imagine how anyone who was planning on job hunting aroud September 2008 felt.
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@Mrs. Jacks: I agree!
@plantains: yeah, it was interesting times...I was trying to get my firm to pay for an international relo that spring, not pretty.
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@plantains: I'm not saying it wasn't difficult just saying it was something they had considered. For the MDs I know backing off (though I don't know any who fully stayed at home) it impacted their career but they knew that going in. Same with the PhDs, there was difficulty and setbacks when reentering but they weren't naive about what the situation would be. I'm not surprised that this article highlights women who were surprised, since that's what the article is about, I guess I'm just surprised that women wouldn't consider the effects since I've never encountered women who hadn't made the decision a long and thoughtful process.
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I have a bit more time to post my thoughts so here goes...
Although these women may lament about their current pay and responsibility the article says all the woman still think their decision to leave the workforce at that time was best. There is still something to be said about work-life balance. If you have it being a working mother can work. Clearly, they underestimated the toll it would take on their careers and to some extent their marriage, but here we are able to learn from them.
I am not surprised many of these marriages fell into a more traditional role where the wife ran the home with little input or help from the husband. Even now DH thinks cooking, cleaning and such should be my domain. He is absolutely unhelpful. DH would have a field day if I stayed home. I worry too much for DH ever stay at home. My dad was a SAHD and my parents did not have a partnership, I wouldn't want that in my marriage.
SAH is luxury wether you have to save & sacrifice to do so, or can easily opt out and never look back. But, if you want to get back in the work force at some point like the article said you have to strategic with how you spend your time out of it.
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@MsLipGloss: Oh my gosh... i am feeling this 'progression of career" pressure right now. As a fifth/sixth year associate, I really need to move up to a bigger law firm. But moving up aboslutely means higher expectations which, ugh, means working more. DH switched careers so that I can work less once we have LOs. Ugh again... my career is being sacrificed. I care and don't care in equal amounts.
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@MrsMcD: I've been able to find some wonderful work-arounds. Moving to Utah was probably the best decision I ever made. Everyone is so family focused here that the baseline expectation is much lower than it was in Seattle. I'm still on the fast-track, just measured against a different bar.
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@MrsMcD: @Mrs. Jacks: this is a very real problem that most of my friends are facing at the moment. How long can one delay increasing pressure/expectations without negatively affecting prospects for progression?
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