"We don 't believe in that [WOHM]"

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-11-2005
"We don 't believe in that [WOHM]"
2078
Mon, 01-09-2006 - 11:31am

On Friday, as I was driving hom from work, I stumbled across an interview with the wife of the one surviving miner from the collapse in WVa. In the course of the interview, someone asked her if she worked.

Her response was that they don't believe in that. She explained that her husband was very proud of the fact that he was the sole supporter of the family, and that he didn't need her help in supporting them. She explained that they just don't believe in women working after they have kids and husbands, and that they believe her place is at home with the kids.

My heart really goes out to her, and this post isn't about her, but about the sentiment that women shouldn't work because their place is at home. And being a real man, even if it means working in dangerous conditions, long hours, holding two jobs and being a step away from poverty at every turn, means that your wife doesn't work.

I suppose this is the first time that I've heard someone, not a movie character or a character in a book, express this sentiment. I don't understand why anyone would be proud to limit their spouse's potential. Or why be proud that you live right on the poverty line?

If they didn't see the dangers of their POV before, surely that entire community, and even the whole country, has now seen the risk that we talk about on here all the time, the risk that suddenly the SAHM will need to find a way to financially support the family. I wonder if anyone will re-think what they believe in.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 07-16-2005

Oh, don't argue the truth. It just confuses the militant wohms! LOL.

You've done a great job of debating! I can no longer play these games of cat and mouse.

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-16-2005
Apparently sahms aren't allowed to admit they sah to care for their children? I am certain I know as many (if not more) sahms than the women on this board. And I've never once heard anyone say they sah for themselves and don't take care of their kids! Yet, PKA ~ definitely not a militant wohm ~ has heard several sahms say this to her. Interesting.
iVillage Member
Registered: 07-16-2005

Your experience is so different than mine. I have 3 children under the age of 7 and there's no way as a sahm that (even if I hired a nanny) they would be as involved in activities, exercise and sports and their community if I worked. A lot has to do with the chauffering thing - I have the energy and desire to take them to places they enjoy and will learn at.

But you plan on returning to work soon, don't you? It sounds like you don't really want to sah, and maybe that's the difference in your viewpoint. Do you prefer to woh? I definitely see sah is an opportunity, but I don't think you see it that way. Do you?

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
She WAH.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
She doesn't have to get up at night with children?

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iVillage Member
Registered: 01-13-2006
you might be funny if it werent for the fact that several of the posters, my self included, who are debating with her are sahm's LOL
Jennie
iVillage Member
Registered: 01-13-2006

True our experiences are different, when i woh i really only had one who had to be chauffered around alot, because my kids dont really get involved in outside activities until they are around 5. But i now have a 15 and a 7 so that gives me two that have to be chauffered all over the place - between sports, band, bronwies, and work i spend incredible amounts of time driving them to and from places. Although next year when my oldest gets her license she will free up some of that time. but then by the next year my little one will be turning 5 and he will join the fray.

Your second paragraph has me a bit baffled, im not sure where you came up with that. Do i plan on returning to work - no, not anytime soon, if ever. Unless you count the couple of days a month i sub in my kids schools, and i only do that because they came to me and were so desperate for subs. it is basically just an extension of my volunteer work at their schools. I love sah, but i dont buy into the argument that my kids better or better off because of it. and i know for a fact that how i parent my children did not change based on my work status. do i see sah as an opportunity - as an opportunity to do what? i see sah as a choice that our family made that works for us. perhaps i see it that way because my involvement with my kids didnt change all that much when my work status changed.

what i know from first hand expereince is that my work status has never been a factor in how i parent, how involved i am in my childrens lives or the involvement of the members of our family in each others lives. what really changed from going from woh to sah is taht i have more free time for myself, my husband and i get more sleep and the times when we do things has changed a bit. one other thing that did change is that my husband now does not take off work if the kids are sick, or have a day off of school, that is something we alternated when i woh, i dont know if that is good or bad.
Jennie

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-04-1997
But that's not, by far, the only reason people get overtired. I don't have to get up at night with children, either. Sometimes I have a sinus headache and don't sleep well. Sometimes we have company and they don't go home until 11 pm and then I have to clean up after they leave. Once a girlfriend called me at nine pm because she was in a car crash fifty miles from home and her car was undriveable and her husband was out of town and she needed a ride. Sometimes I stay up too late messing around on the computer. Life happens. Except to nannies?
iVillage Member
Registered: 06-27-1998

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Huh,

PumpkinAngel

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-27-1998

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Why do you find it a sad statement?

PumpkinAngel

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