Comments on: How to Decide Whether to Be a Stay at Home Mom or Working Mom

By: JL

JL — Sun, 22 Apr 2012 16:47:41 +0000

I am very surprised that not many folks had pointed the fingers at the Fed for their easy $ policy in the past years that had made it impossible for anyone to stay home. The 0% interest rate has fueled inflation – in food & medical costs! Even those families who had saved to prepare for staying home – only gets to see their cash eaten away by inflation & not earning anything in bank. Please add to this the possibility of having to help out your elder parents in the future as they will be on fixed income retirement (which would be eaten away by inflation too). Any candidate that can address this issue will win my vote this election!

By: Lena

Lena — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 13:23:51 +0000

Ryan – Your wife’s reasons for staying at home are identical to mine, primarily wanting to be the one to take care of my children in the early years. I also love exploring new job opportunities and new businesses, so I’ve used my past four years at home (we now have three kids!) to start a tax consulting business, a seasonal consignment sale, write articles online, and start three blogs. I also help raise money for a local children’s charity, Backpack Buddies. Being at home definitely doesn’t have to mean not using your brainpower or giving back to society. In fact, it really frees up your time because you’re not a slave to the work day and can incorporate your kids into lots of your own interests. The main difference between my story and yours is that my husband and I didn’t start off living on one income. If we had been smart, we would have, but we realized the error of our ways in time to turn our habits around right when we needed to. I linked to my story above. Take care! ~Lena

By: Emily

Emily — Sat, 10 Mar 2012 05:39:20 +0000

Wow, thank you. I have had a similar “past life” as you, had both my boys after 35, and never in a million years thought I would want to be a stay-at-home Mom. Surprise! Even after #1, I was ready to go back to work and returned promptly after 3 months. But now, after #2, I don’t want to do it anymore. In the past, I worked gigs, night jobs, things the world deems as less stable (but really exciting!) but offered me more time with my first son. But then after #2, I decided to get a little more realistic with my career choices and chose a day job as a means of career longevity, and ironically my taking it has actually had the opposite effect. I joined the 9-5 world–which I learned is really actually 8-6–(when did that happen?!). The day care we chose is awesome, really really amazing, but having them there 9 hours a day is quite excessive. I can see that both boys are exhausted emotionally when I pick them up (as am I, actually). The tuition is yes, $1500/mo for both of them, which is just about half my take home salary for the month. I’m currently in the process of trying to figure out how to separate, how to make this happen. We, unlike many of you, did not plan on this, and that does not mean that we are not planners. When my husband and I met we did talk about our plans–we knew we wanted to have kids and I very plainly said that I had no intention of staying home, period, and that my career made me a more valuable parent and that he’d have to deal with that. I went to day care from day 1 and both my brother and I turned out just fine (true story). The nice thing, actually, is that even after agreeing wholeheartedly to that statement some 8 years ago, that now he’s kinda sorta starting to be on board with actually doing the opposite. In a perfect world, I’d stay home, do part time work, the kids would still go to “school” 2 days a week–because for real, it really is that amazing. Can we survive it?? I guess we’ll find out.

By: Cc

Cc — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 02:57:44 +0000

Of course. We have this lady at work who started as a contractor. After 2 year, we converted her to employee. That’s when she started come after 9am and leave early 4:30., with one hour away for lunch. You can count how many hour she is at her desk plus chatting on the phone from time to time. Now that she is pregnant, she has been working from home a day per week because she claimed she is sick. ( but then she just took a 2 week vacation to go to India). So she is not sick going long distant vacation but sick coming to work. And when she work from home , she keep her same working hour 9-4:30 with an hour lunch. Some people is just plain lazy and take advantage of the company and people she work with. Sad…

By: Mary

Mary — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 20:53:10 +0000

We need to clarify that just because your child(ren) is in daycare does not mean they are being “raised by” others. Absolutely not. Both of my daughters are in daycare and I can assure that I AM RAISING them. I AM their parent, role model, instilling values, and spending most of their week with them. I love, teach and help to form them – feed them, bathe them, rock them, teach them, read to them, take them to church. They are very emotionally secure and confident young children. They have the capacity to learn from and be loved by not only their parents, but other wonderful, caring adults. It doesn’t matter if a parent has to go work to make money, or chooses to go to work, either way s/he should not be made to feel bad about it. Children were meant to raised by “the village.” We need to stop judging each other’s choices and start supporting each other in our mutually difficult job of parenting.

By: Daniela

Daniela — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 01:36:58 +0000

Who do you have that watches your kids? You must be gone a lot…I don’t have the luxury of anyone watching my kids and would have to hire a live in nanny to do what you are.

By: Daniela

Daniela — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 01:24:22 +0000

I worked for 15 years after college in a professional position and put a ton of money into the system. I am taking a few years off and then will go back to work in some capacity. We have life insurance and savings….and I will find a job if I need one. Not worried.

By: Daniela

Daniela — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 01:17:42 +0000

(((hugs)))
I know -part time I believe would be the way to go. Unfortunately many professions just haven’t gone that way yet. It is very frustrating…