The
Mad Momma said she is
“putting an end to the debate”. I disagree with both parts of it – it isn’t an end to the debate, it is just the beginning. And it is not a debate until the “other” party gets to put forth their views.
Rohini has already done a very good job of putting forward the
“other side of the coin”. There was something in the post that irked me right away (don’t take it personally Mad Momma :P I guess it just means you are a very good journalist to get people to react to what you write). I think it was the fact that her post didn’t leave any place for the “other” point of view on the subject at all. It didn’t acknowledge that it is OK for two people to hold different opinions without either of them being wrong. It presented a starkly black-and-white view of a complex subject. I had been outlining this reply to MM’s post for a long time – but deadlines at work and obligations in our social circle plus responsibilities at home combined with the fact that I am pregnant and struggling to keep my blood pressure under control kept me from even beginning to write it down. Then I read Rohini’s post and the urge to air my views took hold again.
I don’t agree with MM’s outlook on the need for a mom/parent to stay at home in order to be a better or effective parent. But I do respect her views. I firmly believe what Rohini says – Different strokes for different folks. What works for me might not work for every one else. I have changed more in these 8 years as a parent than I did in the 28 years before that. The most important thing I have realized is that though I might not agree with someone else’s parenting style, there is always something I could learn from them and that everyone’s parenting – effective or otherwise – ultimately works for them (well mostly – I think I have made it clear on a few occasions that I have little tolerance for parents who don’t assert their authority).
I have a very close friend who, on a number of occasions, told me she only wanted one kid and that there were “ways to deal with an unwanted pregnancy”. Now I could never go through an abortion – that is one reason I opted not have amniocentesis done to find out if the baby has any chromosomal defects (it is highly recommended for expecting mothers my age). I knew no matter what the result, I would keep the baby. So when this friend told me about these “other ways of dealing with an unwanted pregnancy”, I told her “never say never” and that being a mom she might not be able to take the ultimate step should the need arise. As luck would have it, she did get pregnant again by accident. She thought about it but couldn’t go through an abortion and decided to have the baby. I loved and respected her for that decision because I knew it wasn’t easy for her. But had she decided to abort, I would still have stood by her even though I didn’t agree with her. I try to acknowledge everyone’s reasons for doing certain things even if I don’t understand them. I try not to judge or criticize them.
Though I don’t think I could match MM’s passion that is reflected in her post or Rohini’s calculated and composed counter-arguments, I
have to give it a try for MY peace of mind :D Through the years I have lost the compulsion to make my opinion known to one and all. If I believe in something and someone argues against it, I feel content in holding my beliefs without feeling the urge to make the other person accept or acknowledge them. But this somehow touched a nerve. So here’s my two cents…
MM says “Somehow I am amazed that people who see the need to reason with their children and not spank them, cannot see the need to spend a lot more time with them and on their upbringing. I assume educated parents are the ones who realise the importance of a good upbringing and time”. I don’t see how being a working-outside-home mother would conflict with that. A good upbringing is not based on time. In the limited amount of time that I spend with my daughter, I am still giving her good values and providing a good upbringing. Besides, in my opinion, values and discipline are what my child practices BEHIND my back. If I can get my child to behave in a civilized manner and hold true all the values that I have taught her even in my absence, I have done my job well. And being a working parent doesn’t mean I don’t spend a good amount of time with her. Maybe not as much as a stay-at-home mom, but it isn’t in durations of mere minutes either. In fact, to maximize our time with her, I and my husband have curtailed our adult-only social activities to a great degree. We try to involve her in whatever we are doing. Doesn’t mean that we are not spending alone-time together – which I believe every couple should. We try to get together for lunch during work hours, or go out for an occasional movie when she is away at a friend’s house for a play-date. Scheduling these activities at times when she is otherwise occupied at school or at a play-date allows us to spend the rest of the time with her and not feel like we don’t have any “grown-up” time left for us. A nice balance, in my opinion (even if I say so myself :D)
It is not necessary for me to stay at home all day to teach my child math through fun games, teach her colors by integrating it in my daily conversations with her or to read to her. Despite working out of home full-time, I still manage to do all this. My daughter was having problem understanding money math at school – so I collaborated with her teacher in helping her with it, found some fun math game sites where she could practice and played those games with her. Every time I give her money to buy lunch at school, I have her calculate how much change will be due her at the end of the transaction. We discuss science ideas while we are driving to her swimming practice. We often digress from our conversations and dissect a particular word for its origin and meaning. We discuss what she learned about drugs and addiction in health class while I cook. She tells me if anything funny or important happened at school either at bed time or over phone as soon as she gets home from school. I still read to her, or have her read to me now that she is becoming a better reader. I take out time every Sunday to take her to the library where we look for videos and books together. It indeed is a big commitment for me because weekend is the only time when I get the time and opportunity to catch up with the chores left over from the last week, get some work done for the next week and get some much-needed rest.
MM further says a working mother would not have the patience to let her kids try to clean up their messy rooms themselves. She would either yell at them for creating the mess or clean it up herself. Well, she doesn’t know me. I don’t do either. I firmly believe in teaching my daughter to pitch in. And I realized long ago what harm my yelling would do to her psyche. So, I reward my daughter with coupons for “Choosing the dinner menu for a night” or “Choosing a Family Game Night” for helping around the house. Or I simply praise her efforts. I ignore the mess until I can find the time to clean up with her. To me, more important than a clean room is the fact that when it
is cleaned, it is cleaned willingly, with happiness and enthusiasm. I have no trouble stepping over a pile of clothes for a week as long as I can get to spend some quality time with my family. We keep the living room nice and clean so we can entertain guests there and the dining room is kept clean too since it is clearly visible from the living room. But I don’t fret over cleaning because I believe one thing – if a good friend comes over on a day when my house is excessively messy, he/she has two choices. 1. Ignore the mess and have a good time with us. 2. Clean it up themselves!
I understand where MM’s firm opinion on this issue comes from because she mentions how her mom’s job affected her in small and not-so-small ways. The resentment might have originated from the fact that she’d had her mom’s sole attention till she was 8. After that long time, having her mother go out to work might have seemed like she needed to compete with her mom’s job for attention – which is totally understandable in an 8 year old. The first thought that comes to my mind is there is no way her mother did that willingly. Our parents sometimes have obligations that we cannot comprehend. It takes a lot of determination to leave a sick child at home to go meet a commitment. And in doing that one also teaches their kids the importance of discipline and reliability. I know because I have been in a similar situation – I came down with chicken pox, my parents took as many days off as they could afford to. But when they couldn’t stay at home any longer, they enlisted a few trusted friends who would come visit us (my brother caught it shortly after I did), read us books, feed us and spend some time with us. What I learned from it was that it is very important to have some good friends who love your kids as their own. And at the end of the day, when my mom came home with a feather collection for me, or my dad with comics for both of us, it was obvious that they
were thinking of us even when they were away at work.
I do not have to stay at home to help my daughter with homework. The after-school program does help by requiring her to finish it before she gets home, but on days that she doesn’t do it there, she does it as soon as she gets home. On top of her school homework, she has
KUMON homework too which she does by herself quite responsibly. And I am quite proud of her for that. If she gets stuck with something, she asks my husband or me to help her, which we do. But I never sat with her to make/help her do her homework. Why? Not because I don’t like doing it, but because I wanted her to develop the discipline of finishing the task by herself. Completing the homework is her job. My job is to provide her the time and an environment where she can do it in peace. She understands it too.
I vehemently disagree with the generalization that children of WOH mothers are clingy. Not necessarily. I have seen plenty of children whose mothers stay at home and they won’t come out from behind their mothers’ apron. It is not whether their mom is working outside of home or staying at home that’s the deciding factor here – it is the child’s own personality and how much social interaction with same-age children does he/she get. All children have separation anxiety at some point and how we deal with it determines how long it stays with them. When we came to the US, our daughter was the only kid in our entire social circle. The community we lived in didn’t have any kids her age either. As a result she became good at interacting with adults but couldn’t fathom how to behave when she was around kids her own age. To help her develop her social skills, we started sending her to a daycare when she turned two. Later she went to a preschool for two years – not because I wanted her out of my hair, but because I wanted her to develop her social skills with kids her own age and to have fun. And boy, did it help!! We had to consult
her calendar before we could make any social commitments :D
I don’t want anyone else to bring up my children either. When my daughter was born, my relationship with my in-laws got more strained because I wouldn’t stand on the side and let them do the parenting. This is a whole different mindset and not necessarily related to one’s working status. Accepted that I will need and take help from grandparents, daycare providers and nannies. But I will still be the parent, and not they. They will still need to go by my rules. If they don’t, I will see to it that I find someone who does. I am not saying this just hypothetically. My parents visited us in 2005 and my daughter spent a lot of her summer vacation with them. If she wanted to watch TV or eat some candy guess who she called? She didn’t just ask her grandparents (though had she done that she could have gotten virtually ANYTHING she asked for). No – everytime she would call either me or my husband and get our permission. That is the discipline that we instilled in her – follow our rules even when we are not present. Again – has nothing to do with my working status. She did this even when I wasn’t working. This year, when my in-laws were visiting us, she again spent the whole summer at home with them. My father-in-law is very much a fan of “the tube” and his idea of spending time with his granddaughter was to have her sit with him and watch television. She still asked for my permission every day and would watch it only if I (or my husband) said yes. When it comes to parenting, everyone who knows me knows that I WILL NOT BEND. Be it a very good friend, my parents or my husband’s – every one understands this - MY daughter, I MAKE THE DECISIONS and MY rules are followed.
ANY kid can be molested. Yes, when you leave your kid with someone else, there is always the risk of that happening. And I will take all necessary measures to make sure that doesn’t happen. Yes, I WILL install cameras all around the house if need be. I will make unannounced visits at different times on different days. Or I might find a licensed daycare that has webcams in all the rooms so I can watch my kid anytime I want and make sure he/she is safe. There are plenty of daycare centers around here that allow parents to walk in any time and watch how their kids are being treated. The care-providers don’t know when they’ll be monitored so there is no element of them being on their best behavior when parents are around. They ALWAYS have to be on their best behavior. I will make a thorough background check on anyone I hire. And I will require any daycare center that I might send my kid to, to do the same (they are required by law anyway).
I understand the argument that children will be happy no matter what because they wouldn’t know any better. “You hand them a begging bowl or a chauffeur driven car, they’ll adjust”. And my point is – who is to say that the happiness of a child who is having fun at the daycare center is any less genuine than that of a child playing with his mom? Why is the happiness that comes with having your mother stay at home with you more valuable than the happiness that you get from going on a field trip to a farm with your pre-school class? Happiness cannot be categorized or labeled as superior or inferior.
I have been on both sides as a mom. I stayed at home with my daughter for over 5 years and then returned to work. I took off only one year from work to be with her but things didn’t work out the way I expected them to, so I had to stay at home the extra 4 or so years. I loved being home with my daughter and watching her meet one milestone after the other with my own eyes. But I would be lying if I said I wasn’t frustrated. I would even go as far as accepting that I was UNHAPPY at home. Not for spending time with my daughter or taking care of her mind you, but because the stay-at-home choice was
imposed upon me by circumstances.
As far as children of WOH moms making the choice to stay at home because of their experiences are concerned – I don’t think that accounts for this choice. My mother worked and my husband’s didn’t. Both of us understand it is not a bad choice to work out of home. I never resented my mother for working and he never thought that staying at home is the only way to raise kids. He totally agreed that the choice was mine.
I believe being a mom is a part of my life, not a
job as many people these days like to point out. There have been many studies to quantify, in monetary terms, what mommies who stay at home do. Things they do are listed and then their monetary value ascertained based on how much one would have to pay for those responsibilities to be carried out by someone else. And, needless to say, moms win hands down because no one can multi-task like a mom. But for me, working is not only about money (well, some of it is and I say – why not??? It is this money thats going to provide a college education and a good future for my kids). It is about gaining some intellectual satisfaction over doing something that I worked hard at learning, something that I am professionally trained to do and something that I am good at, something that asserts my identity as an individual and a professional and not only as a wife or a mother. And what’s wrong with that? I don’t think wanting to do something more than being a wife and mother makes my choices inferior. Or that it puts my kid(s) at any disadvantage compared to those whose mothers chose to stay at home. As Rohini so precisely pointed out – working outside of home does not mean that those mothers who make this choice don’t want to raise their kids, don’t understand their kids well, are impatient or guilt-ridden, are neglecting their kids or don’t
want to spend time with their kids. It might be true for
some mothers, but then exceptions are always there. I knew at least one SAHM who would just go through the day waiting for her husband to come home so she could dump the kids on him to “get a breather”. She wouldn’t take her kids to any out-of-home activities and would just go through the essential tasks of feeding, changing and cleaning them. Now, having been a stay-at-home mom, I know this is just an exception and not all mothers who stay at home are like this. And, it will be equally unjustified to label all working-out-of-home mothers as women who don’t want to spend time with their kids or who don’t want the best for their kids. If at all, most WOH mothers try to compensate for their time away from their kids by spending whatever time they do get with them.
I firmly believe that having a mother who works outside of home gives kids a new level of self-confidence. I know. I grew up that way. Since my mother wasn’t home 24/7 I had to do certain things myself and that made me independent and confident. I was proud of the fact that my mom worked outside of home. I heard my daughter once declaring proudly to her friend’s mom “My mom helps people fix their computers. If you have ANY problem, you can ask her – she is very good at it”. Can’t tell you how happy that made me. Not the praise but the realization that she understood that her mother was fulfilling some other role besides that of a parent. She also understands that I enjoy my work and it makes me happy. My family has been happier since I started working – because
I am happier.
Everyone makes different choices based on their situation, personal experiences and opinions. The Stay-at-Home vs. Work-outside-home choice is not necessarily inferior Vs. superior choice (or vice-versa). They are just choices. How we deal with our choices is what’s important, and how our choices affect us and our families is what matters the most. I totally understand some women’s will and reasons to stay at home with their kids. I don’t even try to categorize these choices as “right” or “wrong” – because they are not. But I won’t stand for criticism of my choices either.
Finally – another thought. Why does it have to be ONE parent spending all the time with the kid(s) at home? Why can’t parents collaborate and co-ordinate so that both of them spend part of their day with their children so that the children still get maximum time with their parents and the parents can pursue their interests/careers too? That is what I and my husband do. He leaves for work at 7:30 am so he can come back early and pick our daughter up from school. I leave late at 9 am so she can take the bus and doesn’t have to rush through the morning to get to the before-school program. This minimizes her time away from home and reduces her stress as well as ours. I and my husband pick up the slack for each other whenever necessary. There is at least one parent with her most of the time. Parenthood, like a marriage, is a collaborated effort. The entire burden doesn’t need to be on one parent for parenting to be successful. That’s
my take on this issue.
