I'm in!Quote:
Originally Posted by JaneV2.0
:+1:
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I'm in!Quote:
Originally Posted by JaneV2.0
:+1:
just be sure to clock in and out for lunch as every minute must be accounted for and made up some way. By friends you mean coworkers right? Most of us work miles and miles away from any real friends and their jobs, making seeing them at lunch entirely nonviable (this is NOT EUROPE with it's dense cities where you hang out for a 2 hour leisurely lunch with friends or something afterall - this is the U.S. where the pressures of work and distance alienates us from our friends further). And coworkers are really a poor substitution for friends, you can't talk to them about things the way you might friends, so it's always the same boring safe topics that bore me to death, I'd rather eat alone and do, I much prefer my own company to that inane chatter (powerball is the topic du jour for coworkers now, I am so sick of hearing about powerball I can't even say. Listen delusional idiots: you are not going to win the fricken powerball! enough about powerball already!).Quote:
I used to be so jealous of my husband when I was home with the kids and he went to work, and had the freedom to take time off and go to lunch with his friends
by the end of the day I'm far too tired to think about gyms, that's the reality for most it seems. But yes you have a tiny amount of time to call your own and it can be true me time. It seems to me the stay at home mom has far more time to call their own if they enjoy what they do because isn't time enjoyed with kids their own in a way work never can be? Isn't playing with the kids their own time in a way a job can never be?Quote:
go to the gym after work, and pretty much call his time his own
or not, most people aren't reaping a heck of a lot of recognition these days. this reaping recognition stuff is more a mythical conception of work than the reality much of the time. Near invisibility seems far more often the reality.Quote:
and reap recognition from his boss and peers while he was at it.
isn't playing with the kids free time? Doing jigsaws with them? Baking cookies with the kids? Teaching the kids stuff like sewing etc.? This very much seems like free time to me, almost the very definition of play, even though it is true it's not "me time", which people also need (hire a babysitter occasionally or I guess there is no money for that because one paycheck barely covers bills - poor suffering husband who has the entire responsibility for whether a whole bunch of other humans eat on him). Of course you can't do this playing with the kids with a screaming infant I guess, but that stage is temporary.Quote:
I had no free time (as in zero), no recognition, no lunch, no gym.
They probably shouldn't have had kids. I have no problem with them working (in fact if we insist that everyone not working lacks worth ethic then ...), but if they actively hate being with their kids - nope probably wasn't the best choice.Quote:
I've known a lot of corporate colleagues who cut their their maternity leave short because they'd rather be at work than at home with their kids.
"Modern Robber Barons" are a very popular choice of scapegoat right now.Quote:
Originally Posted by JaneV2.0
But if "stifling" some unpopular group was the solution to a nation's problems, wouldn't someone over the course of history have hit upon just the right villain to defeat?
Well it's not like I'm advocating a French-style purge of the aristocracy. But now that I think about it, that worked pretty well for the French. :idea:Quote:
Originally Posted by LDAHL
Wow, lots of stuff around the mommy wars. And why is it moms who are in this instead of parents? I know men who take a primary role or stay home. However my job is childcare so I see working parents, some without jobs who have kids come to the enrichment clubs I run.
I stayed home a long time. I had times I was jealous of my husband for some of his freedoms and times I really appreciated the role I had in the family. And yeah, I worked hard. You can be a stay home parent in many ways, one is hiring out everything possible and 'playing' ranging to cooking everything from scratch, doing taxes, lots of work keeping to strict budgets, and in my case a large DR visit load. My ex worked an hour away from home so there was no option to have him take a DR appointment now and then, but eventually they got a little healthier and I was able to ease back into outside jobs.
It's free if you can walk away at any time to go to the bathroom by yourself. It's free if you can walk away and read a book and trust that the kid won't stick a penny in a socket (which my DD did). It's free if you can say, "I'm tired of this now, why don't you just go to sleep for 2 hours and I'll see you later" and they, of course, comply.Quote:
Originally Posted by ApatheticNoMore
I'm not saying that motherhood does not have its own rewards. Of course it does. I loved being a mother. But so does work. I enjoyed work (and still do), and after I had kids and then returned to work, I used to say that I went to work to relax. I had a FAR more relaxing day behind my desk than at home.
Watching 4 kids under the age of 7 is NOT free time, no matter how committed you are to the job. Your mind is ON for at least 14 hours a day.
I saw life choices as:Quote:
Originally Posted by catherine
Motherhood
School
Work
The first two were too much work for me given the return on satisfaction and fun. I chose Work as my only path, and that was right for me.
So true, Catherine. I never realized how easy work was until I was home with my toddlers. Good God, that was exhausting. And it's not just being on 14 hours a day--there are the nights where you are up with croup, the visits to the ER, the constant vigilance. Work was much easier for me, and a hell of a lot more fun. And I adored my kids, and did not put them in day care. Who knows, maybe that would have been better for all of us.
We found the first five or six years of our daughter's life to be a sort of suicide watch. No matter how much effort you put into "child-proofing" the house, they find remarkably ingenious ways to put themselves in danger. That, and their fascination with using toilets in ways outside the intended purpose, required eternal vigilance.Quote:
Originally Posted by catherine
ApatheticNoMore,
Somebody has to raise kids (the alternative is the current generation gets very old and dies off as food production and health care end and we become extinct.
If you get paid to raise kids (nanny, coach, teacher, housemother, clergy, babysitter, tutor, etc) it's a job. If you don't, it's still a job. Some jobs are terrific. Some jobs suck. Sometimes they are the same job to different people.
I quit working to raise my kids full time. Dh and I were both happy that we had that choice. I loved that job. Not all of it, but most of it. And the best parts far outweighed the worst for me. I think my kids benefited by being raised by someone who loved raising them. My mil stayed home to raise her kids and she clearly hated it. Actually, my theory is she stayed home to clean her house and was stuck with her kids. They would have been better off if she had gotten a paying job and hired someone who found joy in calming a screaming infant and reading stories and doing crafts and projects and playing games to raise them.
My dd1 hopes her dh will raise their kids (wedding ths summer) as he'd be terrific at it, but if not, she plans to hire out most of the work, because it is not a job she would love full time. Most evenings and weekends she's ok with.
I also love the job I have now, where I get paid to help raise other people's kids. I am a great teacher. I was a great mom. I'd be a terrible, miserable corporate drone.
It would seem that If you enjoy what you are doing, that is time for you and if you hate it it is work (task done for external reward/avoidance of negative consequence?) wether you are paid or not. I would argue that there are times teaching my class is more my own time than playing with my kids was (I prefer teaching how to attach a handle to teaching how to lose or win with grace.)
Dh doesn't love his job, but he's good at it. And so far, the good parts (including company health club, lunches out with co-workers who have become his friends, and good pay) compensate him enough for the worst parts - including working 7-bedtime every day on what is supposed to be a 3 day weekend. (oh yeah, and retirement. His job has a retirement package.) My retirement package from raising kids involves having my "products" return free labor.