Which came first, the title or the SAHW?
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Which came first, the title or the SAHW?
| 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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No one is saying woh can't benefit children, I believe that, especially when a second income makes a difference, but I also believe that having a calmer, saner lifestyle is beneficial to children. Happy mom, happy kids. Stressed, rushed mom, stressed, rushed kids.
I'm not going to try to beat this into you, those of us who see the benefits of our staying home don't have to prove anything to anybody, we know all too well how it's enhanced our family's lives.
1) Because I was willing to SAH for 3 years, dh was able to accept an extremely prestigious postdoc offer in Switzerland. I was not allowed to work because of visa restrictions and had I insisted on my right to WOH, he would not have be able to accept the offer. Among the tangible benefits of dh taking the position: raising his profile and bettering his publication record and a chance for us back get to Europe from the U.S. (a top priority for many reasons). I was able, I should say, to finish my Master's thesis during this time. Similar to this: my willingness to SAH for the first couple of years after our move to Sweden made it possible for dh to accept his dream job (and finally a permanent one). We moved to Sweden knowing that it would be impossible for me to work for the first year or two (arrived there pregnant and no dc takes a child under age 1). Otoh, since I started working again, dh has done everything to support my career including taking more than 50% of the sick time with the kids and a lot of the days that the school has been closed, leaving work early to pick up the kids when I needed to work long and generally being very flexible about his time at work so that I could be there for the important stuff.
2) SAH for the first several years made it possible for my children to reach the level of proficiency they currently have in English. Starting dc very early almost inevitably results in children who are passive in the home languages (I haven't met a family yet whose children started in dc before the age of 1.5 or 2 who spoke the home language...they usually could understand but refused to speak it). Note that this is not necessarily an automatic problem for dual WOHPs: I know of a couple of families who continued with dual WOH, but had relatives or nannies from the home country for the first couple of years. Those children usually ended up as active bilinguals. This was not an option for us so having me at home was crucial for their language acquisition. This is one area where there is a direct correlation between the amount of time spent and benefits gained, btw. German is the children's weakest language simply because they have had less time to speak German exclusively with their father, and both kids have gone through phases of being completely passive in German, whereas they have never refused to speak English. The benefits of fluently trilingualism for my family are pretty clear: the children have a very close relationship with both sides of the family because they can actually communicate with them. They will have a much larger choices of countries to study, work and live in. Multilingualism is known to improve reading skills and comprehension.
Those are benefits that were clear for my family, clearly not applicable for all. But then the financial argument is not applicable for all families either...I know plenty of people who make much more on one salary than we do on two. Just because our family gained clear benefits from having a SAHP it doesn't mean that kids who have gone to dc have somehow suffered harm.
Laura
I dont think it has to do with a parent's work status. How did my neighbors manage to do it even though there moms were home? Is your daughter with you at all time in the afternoon?
Oh and being in sports or clubs is certainly no guarantee either, dont kid yourself. The jocks when I was in high school were some of the biggest partiers and drinkers around.
dj
Dj
"Now when I need help, I look in the mirror" ~Kanye West~
dj
Dj
"Now when I need help, I look in the mirror" ~Kanye West~
To be perfectly blunt, our SES is pretty damn high, so I was merely pointing out to cindy that not everyone benefits from a wohm, unless of course you consider driving a hummer or wearing Prada to be of a major benefit to one's children.
And should we all never sahm on the off chance that our spouses might lose their jobs, never to find another and commit suicide?
Please.
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