Is being a stay at home parent worth it?

4ndroid

How Strange wrote: »

I'd definitely agree with the wait and see approach. I know I couldn't be a sahm because I'd go insane from loneliness. I love the bones of my son but I'm a much better mother because I go to work.

During first five months of maternity leave I couldn't imagine being away from him everyday. I took all my annual leave and two weeks unpaid so he was 7 months when I was due back at work and by then I was ready. Of course I cried a lot for the first few days but only a parent can appreciate what's its like to make a cup of tea and drink it while it's still hot, to talk to adults, to have lunch and even better when you want to. My ideal scenario would be a 4 day week but my employer doesn't consider part time so it's full time or nothing.

So don't go making decisions yet. Wait and see how you feel when you have a 6 month old baby.

By law you are entitled to 14 weeks parental leave. Nothing your boss can stop. He could only postpone for 6 months

http://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/employment/employment_rights_and_conditions/leave_and_holidays/parental_leave.html

How Strange

Yes 4ndroid that's right but they don't have to let the parent take it in a way that suits them ie a 4 day week. You can ask for a certain amount of time off ie a block of 4 weeks and after refusing twice they have to come to some compromise but if taking 1 day week isn't possible for business reasons they can refuse without any obligation to compromise. There are a few mums in our workplace going through this at the moment and our employer is sticking to the letter of the law.

BostonB

Quoted from the above link.

The 14 weeks per child may be taken in one continuous period or in 2 separate blocks of a minimum of 6 weeks. There must be a gap of at least 10 weeks between the 2 periods of parental leave per child. However, if your employer agrees you can separate your leave into periods of days or even hours.

Basically they can force you to take it in one or two lumps rather than a few days a week. The latter might be the only way to afford it though, if someone needs a salary coming in.

bouncyball

As the others said, wait and see is definitely the way to go

The advice I was given was to go back for 6 months and see. I didn't want to go back to work and leave my then 9.5 month old as loved being home with her. Then again I didn't like my job either. However I did get my days of wishing I could use my brain in other ways other than nappy changing and deciding on dinner.
So I went back 3 days a week and found the first 6 weeks terrible but soon got used to it. I'm now back almost a year and job sharing which is even better.

It's a very personal choice but definitely make sure to get out to groups and meet people as if you're a SAHM and don't know anyone else who's around during the day you'll slowly go mad and the baby also likes to get out and about too.

Daffodil.d

I am a sahm. I think you should wait and see but in the mean time take all the time off that you are entitled to. Here's the thing, you have to make contact with other adults, join a club maybe in the eve for you time, Make a routine around gettin out. Its easy to fall into the trap of it being just you and the kids all the time. That's tough going for all parties. Being a sahm is what you make it. My own personal choice would be to job share, which I did before my 2nd was born. I have been at home 3 years now and yes, as other posters have said you do get a look off people when you tell them you don't work. I think its funny. I used to work full time too and its hard being away from your baby. I used to pine to be at home, now I want to go back to work part time. Part time is the answer. you get the best of both worlds. Best of luck with what ever you decide.

Sesame

I knew I'd always go back to work, but we were in a different situation whereby if I didn't we'd be managing on a lot less money.
I planned to take 6 months Mat Leave, then at about 5 months in, I started to get very apprehensive about leaving my little baby into a creche. So I decided to extend it to 9 months. By the 8 months stage, I was itching to go back.
I went back full time which was a big change and shock to the system.
I relished the leave and knew every coffee shop far too well! I really enjoyed the housewife thing and spent a lot of my day planning dinners, going to butchers etc, that was all a novelty for me as I'm usually an after work, quick dinner from Centra cook!
Anyway its a few months into work and I found it quite sad to be apart from my baby for so much of the week.
I'm now doing a 4 day week and much happier. Its a better balance.
I couldn't not work. I relish my own income and independance and talking with colleagues about work things. Chatting with other mothers about babies can get tiresome.
One point to think about is long term. If you plan on working in something when your children are at school age, can you pick up your career where you left off?

Sleepy

Sesame wrote: »

If you plan on working in something when your children are at school age, can you pick up your career where you left off?

Realistically, there's no career you can just jump straight back into after 5 years off. You're always going to be going back a level.

I'm amazed at the number of job-sharers on here. With no disrespect to anyone doing it, it's an incredibly expensive way to employ staff and I'm surprised employers are still catering for it in this climate.

We're hoping that as the youngest starts school my other half can get back to the workplace at least part-time but honestly, I'm not that hopeful there'll be much family-friendly work available by then unless the economy takes a magical turnaround...

edellc

I am a stay at home mam, at first it wasnt through choice but it is what it is and I love it. I love waking up to my little mam every day and we have our morning routine with lots of fun and laughter, I love going for naps with him in the late morning, I love waking him up and seeing his smile and having games and fun in the after noon, I love how he loves his baths and I love smuggling down with him when he is going to bed.

I am qualified in accounts and will go back to some form or work, even if it is just part time or even in a different field but only when my little one can talk to me and tell me how his day went, maybe its me being paranoid but I have no intention of leaving him in a creche until he can tell me what has happened there that day, I have read too many horror stories, yes there are plenty of good ones but I would just die if anything bad happened to him when it doesnt need to

I also feel that you can never get this time back and it is so magical to watch you baby develop into their own self and see life through their eyes, there is plenty of time for work in the future but only once will your baby go though this stage

okiss

I have a number of friends who are mothers.
One of them is happier when she is working rather than spending all day every day with her children. Because of her income her children can do extra circular interests and they have traveled a lot.
I know a woman in her 30's with 2 small children who stays at home.
Due to money reasons she has nothing outside the home to go to or be involved in. All she does is talk about the children. Her oh is working but his work is not that secure and things are tight for them.
I would stay working after having a child as you will have an income and you have adults to chat to. You can also put money into a pension or save money.
Also with the way things are at the moment if your oh hours are cut or they lose there job you can still have an income coming each week or month.

Moonbeam

okiss wrote: »

I have a number of friends who are mothers.
One of them is happier when she is working rather than spending all day every day with her children. Because of her income her children can do extra circular interests and they have traveled a lot.
I know a woman in her 30's with 2 small children who stays at home.
Due to money reasons she has nothing outside the home to go to or be involved in. All she does is talk about the children. Her oh is working but his work is not that secure and things are tight for them.
I would stay working after having a child as you will have an income and you have adults to chat to. You can also put money into a pension or save money.
Also with the way things are at the moment if your oh hours are cut or they lose there job you can still have an income coming each week or month.

That can only work if your not in a city where childcare is often > wages.

Sleepy

It's also heavily dependent on the parent who would otherwise be staying at home having skills/qualifications/earning potential to cover the costs of childcare, keeping a second car on the road / commuting to work, maintaining a "work" wardrobe, office collections etc.

When there's just the one child, a second salary of any kind should cover these costs but once there's two or more I'd say there's far more couples that would actually be financially better off with one of them being a stay-at-home parent than would like to admit it tbh.

mariaalice

When my oldest child was small I only worked intermittently, but with my second child I started off working part time and was working full time by the time she was 6. Money aside the biggest different in having a child and not working outside the home and having a child and working full time outside the home were for me all to do with time....haveing time to potter around the house and show my daughter how to cook and do house work, the time to take her to dancing and music lessons in a relaxed manner time to supervise homework properly and so on.
When I worked full time and my second was small life was a stressful rush to get everything done I never had time to relax, for the first time in my life I began to buy convince foods and I stooped baking.

doubletrouble?

Sleepy wrote: »

When there's just the one child, a second salary of any kind should cover these costs but once there's two or more I'd say there's far more couples that would actually be financially better off with one of them being a stay-at-home parent than would like to admit it tbh.

i'll/ we'd admit to it. myself and purple have long discussed this. shes in a better paid job and more secure than mine. we've had a look at child care and our outgoings and have weighed up the options. and in reality if my employer offers early redundancy i'll have to take it and be a s.a.h.d. we had a quick look at childcare for the twins and for a creche we're looking close to the guts of nearly €2000 p/m. really says it all for childcare costs in this country

Moonbeam

It was 2100 full time or 1500 for a 3 day week for my 2 a month in crèche . I could not have done it happily long term.

Hannibal Smith

Wait and see how your maternity leave goes. I remember my maternity leave with my first, I took the full 10 months and really looked forward to going back. I was going mad at home.

Being away from work was like a culture shock, you spend your time running around trying to do ten things at once and all of a sudden the pace (though not the work load ) changes. It's like that episode of Friends where Ross is on sabatical and Joey tells him he's just done a week's worth of things in one morning, you got to spread it out

The thing about returning to work is, that it's like riding a bike. You've spent 6-10 months fumbling your way through parenthood, not having a clue what you're doing and then you can just fall back into work like you never left

Though I have to tell you, I'm on my second maternity leave now, and I'm loving it. I can't go back because we can't afford it, and now the creche is full so everything has kind of gone against me. I'm not a bit sorry about it though, not in this weather

Shelli2

I have one son, he's in junior infants and turns 5 in August. I work a four day week, at the moment it's perfect for me and I still get lots of time with my little man. We're hoping to start trying for number 2 towards the end of this year (waiting due to medical reasons), but if we have another I wouldn't go back to work. There are two main reasons, first being that I personally wouldn't feel like I had enough free time with each child individually. The second being that financially it would make no sense as the creche fees would be so high.

Mink

Sleepy wrote: »

I'm amazed at the number of job-sharers on here. With no disrespect to anyone doing it, it's an incredibly expensive way to employ staff and I'm surprised employers are still catering for it in this climate.

We found job sharing worked great for certain positions in our company, there was no extra spent in wages as they were paid the same per hour as someone who was full time. They covered for each other when the other was sick or on hols (pre-agreed that they would do this) so we very very rarely need a temp (which costs a huge amount & can be very poor quality) and we wouldn't get pulled off our own work to cover.

I think maybe a 3 or 4 day week might work for me when my maternity leave ends as I'll cut down on travel costs/time for the other 1 or 2 days. I'm just hoping that my employer will agree to it. He might though as there've been lots of cuts and it's not as busy.

I would use a child minder who has maybe their own kids or one or two other kids. I think I'd prefer this to a creche setting, I don't know why, presumably it would be cheaper.

Sleepy

Mink wrote: »

We found job sharing worked great for certain positions in our company, there was no extra spent in wages as they were paid the same per hour as someone who was full time. They covered for each other when the other was sick or on hols (pre-agreed that they would do this) so we very very rarely need a temp (which costs a huge amount & can be very poor quality) and we wouldn't get pulled off our own work to cover..

Even when salaries are the same, it still costs more to make a FTE out of two people than to simply hire one.:

More overhead for HR/Payroll.
More work to manage two employees than one.
Pretty certain the Employers PRSI is higher for two part-timers than one full-timers.
Two sets of statutory holiday entitlements to cover.

It can also dramatically reduce customer service, continuity in projects etc.

Then you have the fact that job-sharers are nearly always primary care-givers which increases the likelihood of sick leave or maternity leave if the employee is a woman of child-bearing age etc. (while this might be seen as sexist, it's not the fact the job-sharer is a woman that causes this issue, it's her role as the primary care giver which does)

It all leads to the situation where, tbh, the only argument for an employer to do it is if they can pay the two job-sharers significantly less than half the salary of a full time equivalent or can obtain the services of two highly capable / experienced workers for the same outlay as someone much less capable. This tends to go out the window in many of the public sector organisations where job-sharing is widespread and causes chaos as many of the people in the positions are, if anything, less capable than their more junior colleagues, they just happened to join the organisation long enough ago...

Obviously, many people may be happy to work for a lower wage than they're worth for the benefits that go with job-sharing though. Such family friendly working hours are often seen as part of the remuneration package.

Mr.Wemmick

Mink wrote: »

We found job sharing worked great for certain positions in our company, there was no extra spent in wages as they were paid the same per hour as someone who was full time. They covered for each other when the other was sick or on hols (pre-agreed that they would do this) so we very very rarely need a temp (which costs a huge amount & can be very poor quality) and we wouldn't get pulled off our own work to cover.

I think maybe a 3 or 4 day week might work for me when my maternity leave ends as I'll cut down on travel costs/time for the other 1 or 2 days. I'm just hoping that my employer will agree to it. He might though as there've been lots of cuts and it's not as busy.

I would use a child minder who has maybe their own kids or one or two other kids. I think I'd prefer this to a creche setting, I don't know why, presumably it would be cheaper.

I am sure in some workplaces job sharing is fine but within teaching it is a disaster. Having experienced it from a parent's perspective, it doesn't work at all especially in early years & primary where consistency is essential.

I am a SAHM and one of my main reasons for staying at home was poor child minders. I am sure there are brilliant child minders out there but I have had poor experiences twice now which made up my mind to stay at home and do it myself. I would go to a creche if I was trying it again: more staff and more accountability; not to mention social interaction and more activities. I found out that with a child minder you do not know how it will go until you are in the middle of it and you have no proof as to what they say they are doing to what they actually do in the day -- what your child eats, activities, stimulation etc.. I had two child minders who lied to me and when I realised that was happening, I put a stop to it. Funnily enough, my kids didn't miss them.

I would love to go back to work (for a rest ) but the expense for more than one child (like many of you have written here) no family close by for support and not great child care options have left us, as a family, little choice.

One thing for sure, my kids are happier.

Sleepy

Teaching?! :eek:

Please don't tell me job-sharing is common in teaching positions?!

deisemum

Sleepy wrote: »

Teaching?! :eek:

Please don't tell me job-sharing is common in teaching positions?!

I know it's common enough in a number of schools in my area. It can be a positive thing if your child has a teacher who's not the nicest or not the best if the nicer or better teacher makes up for it.

Gandhi

Sleepy wrote: »

Even when salaries are the same, it still costs more to make a FTE out of two people than to simply hire one.:

More overhead for HR/Payroll.
More work to manage two employees than one.
Pretty certain the Employers PRSI is higher for two part-timers than one full-timers.
Two sets of statutory holiday entitlements to cover.

It can also dramatically reduce customer service, continuity in projects etc.

Then you have the fact that job-sharers are nearly always primary care-givers which increases the likelihood of sick leave or maternity leave if the employee is a woman of child-bearing age etc. (while this might be seen as sexist, it's not the fact the job-sharer is a woman that causes this issue, it's her role as the primary care giver which does)

It all leads to the situation where, tbh, the only argument for an employer to do it is if they can pay the two job-sharers significantly less than half the salary of a full time equivalent or can obtain the services of two highly capable / experienced workers for the same outlay as someone much less capable. This tends to go out the window in many of the public sector organisations where job-sharing is widespread and causes chaos as many of the people in the positions are, if anything, less capable than their more junior colleagues, they just happened to join the organisation long enough ago...

Obviously, many people may be happy to work for a lower wage than they're worth for the benefits that go with job-sharing though. Such family friendly working hours are often seen as part of the remuneration package.

People are not interchangeable cog wheels in a machine. If someone goes to their employer and requests a job-share (or a part-time schedule or a sabbatical for that matter), the employer has to decide if the value of this particular employees' skills, experience, work ethic, and customer relationships etc. mean that the extra overhead is worth it. In some cases it will be, and in other cases it will not be.

If the person requesting is the primary care-giver, turning down their request for a job-share will not change that. Kids are not going to start driving themselves to dentist appointments because the employer turned down a parent's request for a job-share.

edellc

aren't we going way way way off topic I thought it was called "is being a stay at home parent worth it?" not "job sharing discuss the pros and cons for the employer"

okiss

okiss wrote: »

I have a number of friends who are mothers.
One of them is happier when she is working rather than spending all day every day with her children. Because of her income her children can do extra circular interests and they have traveled a lot.
I know a woman in her 30's with 2 small children who stays at home.
Due to money reasons she has nothing outside the home to go to or be involved in. All she does is talk about the children. Her oh is working but his work is not that secure and things are tight for them.
I would stay working after having a child as you will have an income and you have adults to chat to. You can also put money into a pension or save money.
Also with the way things are at the moment if your oh hours are cut or they lose there job you can still have an income coming each week or month.

I love posts like this. As if work is the only place you can have other adults to talk to! A lot of SAHMs have many and varied interests, wide social networks, and (when the kids are older) the time to devote to the interests they really love. As opposed to filling in spreadsheets.

The OP already states that money isn't an issue, so don't try and introduce it in order to support your own prejudices.

OP - do whatever you feel is right!

Gandhi

Job-sharing (or a part-time schedule) is a compromise between a full-time career and stay-at-home parenting. I presume it was originally brought up to show that it is not a binary decision.

Back onto the main topic, it could also come down to the kid's personality. Both my kids love their creche, and do all kinds of crafts and activities there that they would not be doing at home. Friends of mine had their older one in a creche and loving it, but their daughter came along and she hated the creche. The mother ended up staying home for a while and then they got a nanny.

iguana

Deleted User wrote: »

I love posts like this. As if work is the only place you can have other adults to talk to!

Yeah I do think it's a bit odd. I've worked from home for the last 3 and a half years and I still manage to talk to other adults all the time.

battleaxe88

In my opinion it's definatley worth it. My daughter is three soon and I am loving being a SAHM. The way i see it is, I can work when she's older and in school full time but I can't get back these years with her. I do find it odd when other posters say about adult interaction and conversations, being a pro when working, I have that too. There called friends. Who i meet with more now than I ever did. At the end of the day, it's whatever works for you and your family I just wanted to post to say how much I love being a SAHM.

notsobusy

Just see how you get on, you could find that you may be bored rigid after a few months and want to go back to work!

I am in the fortunate position that I work for myself so I can bring Baby to work with me when the time comes. I need to go back as soon as I am able though as when I'm not working there's no money

eviltwin

Deleted User wrote: »

I love posts like this. As if work is the only place you can have other adults to talk to! A lot of SAHMs have many and varied interests, wide social networks, and (when the kids are older) the time to devote to the interests they really love. As opposed to filling in spreadsheets.

The OP already states that money isn't an issue, so don't try and introduce it in order to support your own prejudices.

OP - do whatever you feel is right!

Yeah that's true...working full time I only ever spoke to the people in my office and that was mostly work based...it wasn't exactly friendship.

Part time with kids I have had to force myself to get out and do things with the child and have met people I normally never would. I also have more me time to do other things like hobbies etc and have met more people that way too.

SAHP's are not chained to the house

implausible

Deleted User wrote: »

I love posts like this. As if work is the only place you can have other adults to talk to!

battleaxe88 wrote: »

I do find it odd when other posters say about adult interaction and conversations, being a pro when working, I have that too. There called friends. Who i meet with more now than I ever did.]

Just want to jump in here. It can depend on a person's circumstances. For instance, when I first moved here to my husband's county, I got to know some of his friends' partners but the people I would consider my own friends were people I worked with. Luckily, that situation had improved a lot by the time I got pregnant with number 1, but I still missed work and my friends while on maternity leave and was happy to go back.

Lots of women do feel isolated when not out in the workplace, especially if they are new to an area or not lucky enough to have close friends and family living nearby.