How does this relate to the debate?
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| Wed, 08-20-2003 - 7:56pm |
Something occurred to me earlier and I wanted to see how others thought it might relate to the whole "which is harder SAH/WOH" portion of the debate that crops up so often.
I think that, when you look at either group *as a whole*, the WOHs might have it harder. And this is why ...
There are virtually no SAHMs who SAH because they "have to". There are virtually no SAHMs who are forced to SAH. A woman that SAH wants to SAH.(I'm sure there's a few exceptions out there; controlling dhs who MAKE their wives SAH, disabled children, etc) A woman that SAH doesn't hate her "job", or else she'd go get a WOH job. A woman that SAH is generally getting what she wants.
There are LOTS AND LOTS of WOHMs who WOH because they "have to". A single mom, or one whose dh doesn't make enough to support the family, or one with a disabled dh, whatever the case may be ... she may long, with all her heart, to SAH, but *can't*. Many WOHMs hate their jobs, but can't quit.
Anyhoo ... just wanted to stir up something new
Hollie

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Edited 8/24/2003 11:53:00 AM ET by silverunity
Sorry dear. Add up the actual interaction time you have with your kids. Take out the time they're sleeping, the time you're doing housework and they're playing, the time they're watching tv, the time you're sitting on the park bench watching them play, etc etc etc and you'll find that interaction time is not measured in hours per day. Not by a long shot. It's been a while since I read on this but our conversations are normally only seconds long. My dd asks a question, I answer her, she asks another, I answer and she goes back to what she was doing and the whole exchange is likely to have taken considerably less than a minute. If memory serves me correctly, the average married couple spends something like only 10 minutes a day communicating when you add up all the time they actually have their mouths going and are listening and leave out all the gaps. We have a lot of dead air during our days. Dh and I are both home today.
It's 12:00 PM and I don't think we've had 5 minutes worth of conversations, lol. We had a 30 second conversation about dd#2 being so geeked up about starting school tomorrow. I asked him what part of the house he wants to clean. He informed me we have company coming for dinner. Um, never mind, make that less than 3 minutes. Our lives are made up of bits and bytes of communication not megabytes, lol. It seems like we do more because of the dead air time. If I ask dh a question and it takes him 5 minutes to formulate an answer our conversation wasn't 5 minutes long. It was a long as it took to actually speak.
Laura
Rare are the times we communicate intensely (we're usually fighting mad when we are). We usually communicate in bits and bytes in between other activities. That's just the way we live our lives. If I'm average, dh and I will have 10-15 minutes worth of conversation today. It will seem like more though because it will take place in 30 second conversations strewn throughout the day. However, the actual communication time will be about 10-15 minutes.
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