Lauren on Living

A Lifestyle Blog about Simplifying Healthy Living

The Stay at Home Mom Stereotype – Breaking the Mold

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In my last post, I hinted at the feelings of self-worth I have been struggling with as a stay at home wife/homemaker, but I didn’t really delve into the topic too deeply because I wasn’t certain about how I wanted to approach it.  In general I have a problem with the term “working mom” as compared to a stay at home mom.  The reason being, I think the term “working mom” sends the message that stay at home moms don’t work.  It is especially important to be careful when using these terms around children.  I think when it comes to our kids we need to be super careful about the messages we’re sending them consciously or subconsciously.

My mom was a stay at home mom for most of my youth, in fact because the Island we lived on lacked good schools, she even home schooled my brothers and I up until high school.  Let me tell you, I know we were a huge handful, and home schooling us must have been a huge challenge for her.  She really did make the ultimate sacrifice for us.  However when I was younger I can remember over hearing conversations between my parents where my dad would saying something like, “well I have to work” and I can remember how upset this made my mom and how my dad would quickly try to rectify the situation, but I think on some subconscious level these snip-its even though they were immediately retracted sent me the message that the work of being a stay at home mom wasn’t as valued or recognized as the work one does outside the home.  So I have long since struggled against the idea of being a domesticated house wife.  Yet, the rational side of my brain knows full well that there is tremendous value in being a stay at home mom.  The challenge is redefining that role and perhaps my own perceptions of it and making it into something that I feel just as proud to display (if I end up assuming this role) as I would being a top CEO.

This blog post by my amazing cousin, couldn’t sum up my own feelings better.

What are your thoughts?

Juggling: Reconciling career dreams with motherhood

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I don’t have the answer to this issue.  My biggest dream has always been to have children of my own but in recent years I’ve also developed a new dream of having a thriving career in my professional field, one that I love by the way.  When Raf and I got married we decided that we would wait 4-5 years before starting a family, while knowing full well that I would be in graduate school around that time.

Well, I got pregnant with this little boy in my last semester of grad school, which I couldn’t have been happier about, but suddenly I started worrying about what this would do to my career.  I was applying for jobs and soon after graduating I went on a bunch of interviews but none of them seemed to work out and then I became VISIBLY pregnant so we decided that I should table the job hunt until after the baby arrives.  In any case I never felt good about keeping my pregnancy a secret from potential employers during the interviews, I mean, don’t get me wrong, I still did it, because I knew that despite the fact that they weren’t allowed to discriminate, that the pregnancy would hurt my chances of being hired.  It’s just the reality of the world we live in, but still it felt icky to keep the secret.

Here’s the thing.  I want to have a career.  I have a passionate desire to make an impact on the world that goes beyond my nuclear family.  I also want to be a mom AND I don’t like the thought of anyone other than my husband or I raising our children.  So how do I reconcile these two things, without feeling like I’m giving something up?

The other issue is that we want to have our children be close in age, so if we have 3 children, spaces roughly 2 years apart that could mean 10 years before the youngest is in pre-school.  It would be brutal for my career aspects to take the first 10 years straight out of graduate school to raise my children before pursuing my career.  How would I explain that 10 year gap on my resume?  How would I stay current during that time?

I don’t have hard and fast answers to these questions. I know loads of women make it work, but I’m not sure how I am going to make it work yet.  Perhaps I need to look into finding a way to work from home, or working on a flexible schedule, or finding something part-time for a while.  I just don’t know.  Right now I can’t really have an exact idea because our son isn’t born yet and I know that my feelings and thoughts on this subject will be a lot easier to sort out once he gets here…or I least I’m hoping they will be.

The last issue is that we have a TON of student loan debt.  Even though Raf has a good job (not to mention we have very supportive families), I feel guilty about putting the financial burden solely on his shoulders, and it’s not just guilt either that eating me.  I find myself struggling with feelings about my own self-worth.  Right now since the baby hasn’t arrived yet, I’m feeling pretty useless as a stay at home wife.   Again I’m hoping these feelings change once I have our son gets here, because then I’ll feel like we’re both contributing equally to the family, albeit in very different ways.

I wish I had the answers to these questions, but I just don’t.  The only thing I know for sure, is that if I had to sacrifice one of these things, if I was forced to choose, I would without a doubt sacrifice my career for my children.  I just hope it doesn’t come to that.

I wonder if anyone has it truly figured out, or if this is something that all moms with career aspirations face.  If anyone has any ideas I’d love to hear them.  How do you reconcile career goals with parenting desires?