Which came first, the title or the SAHW?

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-21-2003
Which came first, the title or the SAHW?
1695
Fri, 12-19-2003 - 9:04am
Last night I attended my husband's work Christmas party. I sat with the CEO, CFO, CTO, COO (Chief operations officer, I didn't know that acronym, I had to ask), Creative Director, Marketing Director and their wives. Near the end of the evening it was just we wives chatting mostly about kids. I made the observation that even though all the wives were intelligent, educated and accomplished women, not a single one (except me), woh. They are all SAHM's.

Any thoughts on why that might be? I have my own opinion but I'd like to hear from everyone else first. Do you think they sah because of their husbands jobs or their husbands have their jobs because the wives stay home? Or doesn't it matter?

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iVillage Member
Registered: 10-18-2003
Wed, 12-31-2003 - 10:57am

Choose your friends by their character and your socks by their color.  Choosing your socks by their character makes no sense and choosing your friends by their color is unthinkable.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Wed, 12-31-2003 - 10:58am

What I don't do is yoga every day.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 06-27-1998
Wed, 12-31-2003 - 10:59am

To me it's not so much the finances as my dh makes quite a bit more than me.

PumpkinAngel

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Wed, 12-31-2003 - 11:00am
That's complete and utter bs.

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Avatar for 1969jets
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Wed, 12-31-2003 - 11:03am
I don't see it around here. I see the exact opposite. The houses where someone is home are the neighborhood hangouts for teens and preteens alike. The houses where both parents work are deserted because the parents don't want a ton of kids in the house when they are at work (I don't blame them) and of course most of the younger kids are in aftercare when their parents are at work.

Jenna

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-08-2003
Wed, 12-31-2003 - 11:04am
i don't know why you didn't think of that; you are the one who feels compelled to rest your worldview on the premise "in the same job i had before i had children." most of us can see past that without having to quit work altogether first.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Wed, 12-31-2003 - 11:05am
I have no problem with it for YOUR life.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 10-08-2003
Wed, 12-31-2003 - 11:10am
some people offer contradictory stories--you, for example. but not everyone does. and while i don't see much of anyone saying that parenting is a breeze--woh or not--i don't see a contradiction in people pointing out that it's not the universal hellhole that you obviously feel compelled to fantasize.

your sil's life is what she makes of it. the point is that my life is what i've made of it, and it is very much like what many dual-income families' lives are like--not some sort of mishmash of what your family's dynamic and circumstances stick you with, embellished with your dire fantasies.

Avatar for laurenmom2boys
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-25-2003
Wed, 12-31-2003 - 11:11am
And I live on a 50x150 lot in an approx. 1-mile square town. It takes less than 5 minutes to go from one side of town to the other. When we do schedule time for our boys to visit their friends it takes no time at all to get them together. And in the better weather DS1 takes his bike.
iVillage Member
Registered: 10-08-2003
Wed, 12-31-2003 - 11:14am
for whatever reason, i can't get a post to stick to 1175; here is my answer to it:

i know that you will find free museums in nyc and d.c. and that you won't find them in chicago, toronto, and a multitude of other cities first-hand. my children horizens and experiences are hardly limited--are in fact, probably even more broad and far-flung than yours, even though mine are younger and you live in the n.e. corridor. the fact that i don't haul them out on daily excursions doesn’t mean that they are by any means deprived—only that they aren’t exhausted.

you'll have to forgive me and others for being confused by how the specific examples, say of things that people can do (btw, you must know that commuting into manhattan isn't likely to be free, even if bronx zoo and met admission is) don't correlate with what you actually did. so we'll replace some of the two-hourish commutes into manhattan with sometimes even longer commutes to boston, nh, and other places--the difference being? variety, yes, but and improvement over regular opportunities to stay put: not for most kids. or so you made these major hauls once or twice a month but spent the other eighteen weekdays not at museums and zoos and the like, like you suggested, but only at the beach (even though your son got restless quickly with that routine); any sahp who doesn't live near a beach couldn't live this rarified version of "what sah is like" in the world according to slim; any wohp who lives near a beach could, and even the most restricted dual-income couple could pull off the same "few trips a month" to zoos, museums, and the rest that your current story seems to suggest.




Edited 12/31/2003 11:26:23 AM ET by chimera_98

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