What made you decide - SAHM or work?

I'm writing an essay about the factors that affect a new mother's decision about whether or not they will go back to work, in today's society. I would love to get some feedback from you lovely mummies!

What factors influenced your decision, whether you were a SAHM or not? What kind of pressures were put on you - financial, expectations from friends/family/co-workers, upbringing, etc.?

Any input will be valued. Thanks in advance!

Well I have always seen myself as a SAHM (since I was little I always wanted to be a mum) and my mum was SAH and we loved it.

Also DP was quite keen for me to be a SAHM coz he believes in parents raising the kids and not a teacher IYGWIM (and this is NOT a dig at anyone who puts their kids into homebased care or kindy or playcentre or anything like that!!!!! I know there are alot of people that have differing views to mine and people that wish they could SAH but cant for various reasons and I respect everyone and their ideas... this is just our opinion and what we wanted to do/believe) (please please please no1 get sh*tty at me... its not what i came here for!)

and we are able to live on DPs wage in conjunction with the WFF tax credit. (If i had earnt more DP would have been a SAHD... but as it turns out he brings home the whole pig, i was only bringing home shaved ham on special... lol)




ETA: Im looking into working from home though so we can have a little more sanity money (we have money left over every week for ourselves....DP for his soccer and me for a coffee and lunch out with coffee group... but a little extra is always nice for a rainy day and would help out with the sudden bills (we just had to buy a new car battery for example) )





ETA again: Tayz_mummy - i never really thgought about that, but now that you mention it, the 2 times I have left Riley at mum n dads for the day (so we could paint rooms in the house) i missed him like crazy! and i miss him when he naps and i cant have cuddles or smiles or anything like that. (he is napping now lol) but that is a really good point!!!

Edited by MyLilSquishy

Well the easy part is no one puts expectations on me because I'm the type of person who will tell someone to shut their mouth and mind their own business lol.

For us we didnt' want to have a child just so it can spend the majority of its awake time in someone elses care.. especially as a baby.

well with DD I went back to work when she was 6 mths and she was in daycare pretty much full time. I did part time hours but 5 days a week. IT was very hard!

This time around I was on full time hours 5 days a week and I don't think I will be going back to work and the reasons for this are:

a. DD is now at school and it would be quite hard to juggle school / daycare drops offs and pickups to work in my hours even if I could cut down my hrs. DD would be at before / after school care which works out to be around a full time price of daycare for under 2's.

b. I catch a train to work and back and the train system is so unreliable that I would then have to ask DH to pick up kids if trains broke down etc which in his job he can't always do.

So in the short it is not economical for me to go back to work as I wouldn't earn enough to cover all of our costs.

2 reasons
1) our personal belief is that very young children benefit from family care. I realise this a contentious statement but it is OUR PERSONAL belief after a lot of research and soul searching. I'm first to admit it's not right for everyone.

2) Even though I earned a good wage ( a fair bit above average) by the time we removed the WFF and Accom Supplement grants we would get by losing my income, added in the cost of full time childcare and transport costs too and from work I ended up $5 a week better off than if I stayed at home. That was with one child - with 2 I have no doubt that I would be much worse off financially.

Personally I think this is absolutely atrocious and just shows how bloody expensive childcare is compared to wages.

Edited by Bobbie

im also surprised at the pressure to return to work im constantly being asked when i am going to work or when i am going to put DD in childcare (for socialization)

and one thing that really gets my goat at the moment is people assuming that because i choose not to put my children in day care that i am judging them - IM NOT it is a personal choice thing.

I also believe most of the time it is choice even if people say they have to return to work most choose to do so, so that they can have luxuries.

I intended to return to work after my 14 weeks were up... But I spent every night crying about the fact that my time was almost "up"

I asked work if I could work part-time, as working full time would leave us WORSE off than if I worked part time. They declined, so I did a budget and worked out that if we cut the Sky, consolidated our debt and DH worked an extra shift then we could survive. What a glorious feeling when I decided to do it!!!

I'm also suprised at how many people have asked me when or if I'm going back to work, as if I can make that decsion at this point, I can barely get dressed some days.
My boss before I left on maternity leave, came up to me and said "now you are coming back to work after the baby aren't you?" Talk about pressure, of course I said yes otherwise I don't get paid.
I went back when DS1 was 9mo old (went for an interview 2 days after my BFP), I think mainly because I was a little bored at staying at home, and I had been out of clinical work for ages so I wanted to keep up my skills (nursing) It was so hard leaving DS that first time, I cried. Not sure what we are doing this time, we don't really need the money so we will see, sorting out child care is hard work.

It was a simple decision for us .. we needed to eat, I earnt the most money .. so I went back to work (and DH stopped working and became a SAHD, now he is a student and a Dad)

My mum had me at 31 and whilst she had a great job and had already studied post grad, I was unplanned, she stayed home for her 12 weeks mat leave and then resigned and went into study for the first 3 years of my life (career change). Having been raised by my grandparents pretty much because she worked 7am-6pm 5 days a week and often went in on the weekend so she could afford me, it put me off going back to work! I plan to stay home for at least the first year, unfortunately that means us living off my savings as dp is finishing his study this year and we don't qualify for any money except our own savings.

She still, to this day works 7-6 and sometimes weekends! but we have a great relationship!

I plan to go back to study next year, but might do correspondence so I am still home with dd. DP plans to work next year so we will have some $$.

I also read it's best if you can stay at home with baby for first 1-2 years in terms of their development so hmm...