January 28
SAHM vs. Working moms at Global Sistergoods
My sister was telling me how she spent the weekend with some other couple friends & their kids. “All of the other ladies had really important jobs, like being a lawyer or doctor. And then there was me,” she told me. Now, wait a second. You run a business, I said. That’s a job. A hard job! A job that pretty much consumes your every spare minute!
“Well, yah,” she told me, “but really, I just feel like a stay at home mom.”
Now, me. I don’t feel like a stay at home mom at all, even though I work from home. In fact, I get kind of defensive when people have suggested that my work is somehow lessened since I don’t work outside the home. Or it’s easier, somehow, than sitting in an office with a bunch of other people. Since I’m, you know, staying at home.
It intrigued me, that we should have such different perceptions of what we do. Granted, I don’t put on a suit or makeup everyday, and sometimes my daughter comes to meetings with me, and my 40 hour work week can be as few as 25 or as much as 60 and all broken up instead of 9-5. I don’t think that our work should be less valued, nor should anyone feel guilty about the choices they make for themselves, their work, their families.
Coincidentally, the Times published an IHT article last Sunday discussing the intense cultural pressure German women are under to be SAHMs…a pressure that is shifting in these economically uncertain times. German primary and secondary schools apparently have an early release, before 1 pm. This schedule dates back to the 18th C. when Prussia became the first country to make education compulsory for the lower classes; the half-day system supported the country’s reliance on child labor. Over time, thinking became that mothers, not the state, should provide additional culture to their child’s lives—mom was in charge of after school programming. This system discouraged highly educated women who wanted a career to have children. Recently, though, schools have been phasing in afternoon programs to accommodate women who work (outside the home). Not without raising the ire of SAHMs, who feel that you shouldn’t have children if you can’t take care of them yourself.
We put so much pressure on ourselves anyways, to be the perfect partner/mother/daughter/sister. I think it’s time we declare a truce on the Mommy Wars, don’t you?