Working for Lifestyle/Extras

iVillage Member
Registered: 12-22-2005
Working for Lifestyle/Extras
3621
Mon, 11-20-2006 - 11:13am

Hi Ladies :)

This is my first time on this debate board and I have been dying to jump into some of the topics, but I feel as though they are sooooo long (one in particular is over 1000 replies, yikes!) that starting my own specific one might work out better.

Anyhow, a recurring theme here seems to be what Moms should and shouldn't be going to work for. It seems some are of the opinion that is OK for Mom to work if she must to pay her bills but NOT if its to afford a nice car, house, good neighborhood. This is considered keeping up with the Johnses (who are they???) and thats bad.

Well, I want to know what in the heck is wrong with a women working to have nice things? I don't mean working and leaving baby in child care 16 hours a day, everyday...thats pretty extreme.

I enjoyed a certain lifestyle before having a child, should I have downsized that lifestyle once baby came so I didn't have to work? What about me *wanting* to maintain a certain lifestyle for myself, my husband, and my child makes me a (a) workaholic or (b) striving to keep up with the Joneses?

Don't some people (like myself) simply enjoy living in a nice place with nice things and want their children to have the same experience?

So please, anyone who thinks a women is wrong for WOH if she is not doing so to financially survive but does it to maintain a certain lifestyle...whats wrong with this?

Thanks all :)

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iVillage Member
Registered: 11-18-2005
Mon, 12-18-2006 - 11:27pm

Right, one inner city experience. That gives you justification for making sweeping generalizations about inner cities?

I have live din one most of my life. I do not claim to know all inner city areas but mine has a very good mix of people.

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-27-2006
Mon, 12-18-2006 - 11:32pm

the only problem with your assertion is that if you look at where huge numbers of the kids with these issues are, inner cities, huge numbers of them also have a sahm (ie. a mom who does not work for pay)

**I don't believe it has to do with location, specifically, but the moral values of the parent(s) you are suggesting bear the brunt. I think on another level that wohp contribute in other ways to the problem of children having problems just like those sahp who aren't paying attention.

family income is so much more a clue as to how kids will turn out than a sahm. and do you really think only kids with dual wohps come home to an empty house or have the opportunity to experiment with drugs, alcohol or sex?

**No, I don't.

what i have seen is tha tin alot of cases kids with sahm's are just as easily getting into these issues because they have moms who refuse to accept that their little darlings, who they have spent their whole lives nurturing and being there for, would dare do those things. but guess what, they do, just like kids who have dual wohps.

**I agree. I think that if someone is going to do something they will do it regardless.

you act as if sahm equals supervision and we all know that is just not so.

**I don't act like this. I act like it should be like this. It should. One would think it was, I know all too well that it isn't.

one of the problems you have is that you want to take the best of sah and the worst of woh and compare them and call them equal and sorry my friend that just doesnt wash with people with the ability to think

**No, this isn't the case. In fact, I specifically said let's go middle of the road.

"Besides this we have our living prophet, for whom I am grateful, and I hope to follow after him all the days of my life.&

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-27-2006
Mon, 12-18-2006 - 11:47pm

I have been following the discussion here on the ed. system.

which then means that, in general, the low-achievers will almost ALWAYS be with the same low achievers for pretty much their entire school career.

**I think this does mean exactly this in many school systems, unfortunately.

Generally, these kids are also unmotivated -- often times due to hyperactivity or the fact that school (and learning) is really difficult for them.

**We found that generally, our child was very motivated yet held back by the classroom environment which tends to focus on the average child and not on those above average or below average. Our child was NOT unmotivated.

What a shame it would be to not challenge these kids to do better.

**It is a shame, especially when the classroom load is too much for one teacher to handle on their own and funding is too low to place more assistance in. I think constructive challenge would be great, if there were time to meet that need.

There will be a bit more shifting with your middle and high-end kids because they most likely know how to "do" school.

**The "low-end" children know how to do school as well. Our "low-end" child recently finished reading the "Odyssey" by Homer and loved it. Has answered several lengthy essay questions on it as well as the rest of the test and is ready to send it off to be graded. Imagine my expression when my child who always said they hated to read, found out they love Homer! OMgoodness! Thrills me! What's more, by reading the essay answers on the test, it is apparent that the child actually gets it as well.

I imagine if you had one or two low-ability kids you would SERIOUSLY rethink ability grouping.

**I'd imagine! I know they would. Especially if the child(ren) were their own.

"Besides this we have our living prophet, for whom I am grateful, and I hope to follow after him all the days of my life.&

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-27-2006
Mon, 12-18-2006 - 11:54pm
n/t

"Besides this we have our living prophet, for whom I am grateful, and I hope to follow after him all the days of my life.&

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-27-2006
Mon, 12-18-2006 - 11:55pm
oh? hmmmm....sounds interesting.

"Besides this we have our living prophet, for whom I am grateful, and I hope to follow after him all the days of my life.&

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-27-2006
Tue, 12-19-2006 - 12:06am

We always paid our bills but we were always just overloaded with bills. We had so much stuff to have fun with that we couldn't save. I cringed when the thought of braces came up years ago with our first child. I put it off because I just couldn't see how we could do it.

Now, I have our two oldest in braces and they were both paid for after the initial consultation and a second opinion.

To me, when I look back, I can see where we could have gone so right had we the knowledge and the discipline to not accept everyone else's idea of what happy was and find out how to make a healthy life all the way around which to us now includes financial health since that is so much part of the foundation of relationships working well. We were completely out of debt coming out of the military several years ago. We took that as a green light to spend. It was immaturity even at our ages then and a lack of know how. His parents didn't do much with their finances except spend what it was they made. My parents just aren't the type to share financial strategies. They keep their finances to themselves for the most part. I know what I do know about their finances because my husband is the executor of their estate and as such, they have shared things with us they felt were pertinent. Even all that was hard for them to share. They just grew up in a different time and with different ideas about children and the family's finances.

Thank you for your questions.

"Besides this we have our living prophet, for whom I am grateful, and I hope to follow after him all the days of my life.&

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-27-2006
Tue, 12-19-2006 - 12:11am
What types of material things do you think your children would sacrifice if you didn't woh?

"Besides this we have our living prophet, for whom I am grateful, and I hope to follow after him all the days of my life.&

Avatar for taylormomma
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Tue, 12-19-2006 - 12:37am

<< But many people do follow some sort of formula allong those lines.>>

How many is many?

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And my point was that you failed to support yours. You haven't shown that parents who WOH are doing so for "personal satisfaction". You haven't demonstrated that children of dual WOHPs have sacrificed anything.

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What does that have to do with WOH?

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I know many more who just have a job. Then again, you have yet to show that if a parent (and why are you limiting this to women?) is fulfilled in their career, the children are suffering for it.

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Do you honestly think that anyone has children JUST to stick them in daycare? I mean, how does that even work? Are these people driving past the daycare and thinking, "Golly, I wish I had something to stick in there!"

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Sure. And children of WOHPs get that.

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-27-2006
Tue, 12-19-2006 - 12:37am
LOL! where did we put that circle icon???? It's no use. They don't want to introduce anything of interest out of fear, perhaps?

"Besides this we have our living prophet, for whom I am grateful, and I hope to follow after him all the days of my life.&

Avatar for taylormomma
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Tue, 12-19-2006 - 12:39am

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Sounds like it's all about your personal satisfaction. I thought you said that was a bad thing.

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