Is is "hard" being a sahm?

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-06-2004
Is is "hard" being a sahm?
2242
Sat, 04-24-2004 - 1:25pm
For many years now, I have heard the claim that being a sahm is the hardest job in the world. I never chimed in, because I didn't know first hand. I stayed home for 6 weeks when my twin daughters, Sophia and Stephanie (almost 4) were born. And that was hard, because I had 2 newborns. Now, almost 4 years later, I have resigned my job and am staying home again. I can god-honestly say that I don't know what's so hard about this. I personally feel like I am on easy street, but maybe that's because I haven't been at it that long. I feel like I am on vacation. It takes no longer than a couple hours a day to do the housework, and the rest of the time is free time for me and the girls. We have gone to the park, the zoo, chuck e cheeses, and I know not every day is going to be like this, but I feel like I am making up for lost time. My children seem happy and relaxed. The only hard thing about this is that they have gotten into some pretty raging fights with each other, but the fights have ended with quick intervention. I guess I am just wondering how long before this becomes "The hardest job in the world" and I start looking like a zombie, complaining that my husband doesn't help me, and so on? Or do I seriously have the choice not to turn into that? Also, do you think that at the rate I am going, I am at risk for getting bored staying home?

Pages

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-07-2004
Fri, 05-21-2004 - 6:25am
Dh has made it clear that I am to change into what he wants. He even gave me the instruction manual. I'd call that the end of a marriage if I ever saw one.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-07-2004
Fri, 05-21-2004 - 6:28am
Ok so both of my kids are just plain stupid. IQ doesn't matter. Learning to overcome your personal difficulties doesn't matter. All that matters is you enjoy what you do. Gotcha! And I wonder why we have a self indulgent society!! Listen to yourself. You declare things that are known to matter as not mattering because you don't want them to matter. Things that enhance IQ and math science ability and creative talent are to be dismissed if the child wouldn't have chosen them on their own? I don't think so. My dd wouldn't choose to go to school on her own. Should we dismiss that??

Like it or not, there are things, as parents, that we can do to stack the deck for our kids. Does that mean they'll use what we give them? No. But they'll have it to use if they need it.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 05-21-2004 - 6:57am
You're trying to turn DD1 into someone you'd like better, just like you perceive he's trying to turn you into someone he'd like better. Neither one of you wants to do it - when SHE doesn't want to do what you want, she's defeatist and lazy. When YOU don't want to do it, it's all for good reasons.

The more I read your posts, the more it sounds like

1. Your DD1 has all your negative characteristics. You hate that.

2. The characteristics she apparently didn't get from you are really great legs, popularity and sociability. You hate THAT too.

3. Your DD2 has little in common with you except that she's everything you'd like to be.

4. You don't like yourself very much, hence the hypersensitivity to perceived criticism.

5. No matter how hard she tries, DD1 is never going to measure up to DD2 in your eyes in the things you deem important (schoolwork and music). She's bright enough to have realized that long ago.

Unless you can find something in a darned big hurry that you can wholeheartedly appreciate about DD1, and make clear to her that you do, DD1 is in big trouble. Good looking, popular, and not getting positive parental feedback is a reaaaalllly dangerous combo for a girl nearing her teens.


Edited 5/21/2004 9:25 am ET ET by cocoapop

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 05-21-2004 - 7:29am
<>

Forget you ever saw the IQ scores? I don't really understand how you are using those scores. If you've got one child in the "very superior" range pulling As, and one in the "mid average" range pulling Bs, both with some reasonable effort...you have what you really should have. Don't mistake mid-averages Bs for lack of effort.

<>

No she's stuck with school and she's stuck with a very big part of her life focused on something in which she can't shine but where her sister does.

>

Its the best reason in the world to do that. Anyway, I'm not the one saying take the kid out of piano. I'm saying...keep them both in it but take a stab at finding a second activity where your other child can shine.

<>

The problem is...when they compete on their own with a sibbling they start valuing themselves in terms of their achievements as compared to their sibblings - particularily if there is only one sibbling making for constant head to head winner/loser competition and particularily if the parents are putting special value on an accomplishment where ONE excels and the other doesn't.

<>

And its something you as a parent have to take some repsonsibility for managing. Take an adult survey and find out just how many people suffered alot due to this sibbling rivalry/competition thing. Or go read some studies. It gets really bad when there are two kids and one excels in a way that please the parents and the other stuggles in the same way. I think one of the reasons its so bad in our society is that we have such small families which sets the natural insticntive sibbling battles for dominance up into a constant head-to-head winner-loser childhood defining battle. You might see yourself in your kid, but don't make the mistake of thinking thats all of your kid. Its easy to manage what you know from personal childhood experiences. Everybody does that. The harder part is accepting that your kid isn't living your childhood and that there are factors in her life YOU have no personal experience with that have to be accounted for.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Fri, 05-21-2004 - 7:37am
What everybody is trying to tell you here is that you are stacking the deck AGAINST your older dd. OP123 has several passionate posts to that effect.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 05-21-2004 - 7:39am
Ok. She's 9. You're late. You've missed 5 yrs of opportunity to FIND something for her, something she likes and does well with. Get GOING. She doesn't have to excel...she just has to do well. If you think sister is going to out shine her everywhere, then put her in something without sister. Or in a couple years, if she's as good looking as you say...she IS going to find her source of reward and recognition and a way to be the special one in a crowd, and its not where you want her to be finding her first ever source of that. You BETTER find a way for her to have a bit of that in the family before the family is no longer the crowd of interest.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 05-21-2004 - 7:45am
SHE'S OPTING TO STAY WITH PIANO BECAUSE GETTING WHERE SHE IS WITH THAT WAS TOO MUCH EFFORT AND THE ONLY REWARD SHE EXPERIENCES IS A CONSTANT SENSE OF BEING INFERIOR TO HER SISTER HERE, JUST AS IN SCHOOL. OF COURSE SHE WON'T TRY ANOTHER INSTRUMENT. SHE FIGURES SHES GOT ENOUGH THINGS SHE SUCKS AT ALREADY WHY GO FOR ANOTHER SURE ONE? OF COURSE ITS DIFFICULT FOR YOU TO GET HER TO PUT EFFORT INTO ANYTHING. HER EFFORT ONLY EVER SERVES TO CONFIRM THAT SHE IS INFERIOR TO THE SISTER. WHO NEEDS IT? SINCE SHE "KNOWS" WHAT HAPPENS WHEN SHE TRIES SHE IS PROTECTING HERSELF FROM THAT SENSE OF DESOLATION AND USELESSNESS AND HOPELESSNESS BY NOT TRYING. BETTER TO FAIL WITHOUT TRYING THAN FAIL WITH EFFORT. ITS A VERY NATURAL AND NORMAL AND INSTINCTIVE SELF-PRESERVATION SCHEME. YOU HAVE DEFINED HER UNIVERSE OF EXPERIENCE SO ITS YOUR FAULT THAT SHE VIEWS EFFORT AS THE PATH TO CONFIRMED FAILURE. YOU SHOULD HAVE SEEN THIS COMING 10 MILES AWAY. ITS CRYSTAL CLEAR.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Fri, 05-21-2004 - 7:47am
"You don't think a child who is defeated before she starts would rather do nothing?" Defeated before she starts? How does that happen with EVERYTHING? The best hope for this dd is an activity that 1)is not currently being done by her sister and 2) has never been done by you. That way she won't be compared either to her sister or to your childhood self.

Avatar for taylormomma
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Fri, 05-21-2004 - 8:00am

Apparently, you didn't read my post.


No where did I say anything about him "doing what needs

Avatar for taylormomma
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Fri, 05-21-2004 - 8:03am
Who says anything is wrong? As people are so fond of pointing out here, schools teach to the masses, not the individual. I don't consider it an issue if a child doesn't always respond to the generic.


Edited 5/21/2004 9:05 am ET ET by taylormomma

Pages