What I’m noticing from millennial high achieving moms
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Anonymous
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I’m a mid age millennial born in 1990. I went to an Ivy with very high achieving woman and these are the trends I’m noticing as we start to become parents
1. Very few stay at home moms despite high earner spouses. I’m surprised by this because many of my friends assumed they’d stay home but I’m noticing most work full time in top but flexible jobs. This makes this combined incomes super high (dual doctors, big law/surgeon, finance/ engineers). I’m sure this will put SAHM mom / single earner families at a disadvantage going forward 2. More kids. Not sure if this is a status symbol or not but lots of 3 kids back to back (again while working big jobs) 3. Traveling alot despite 1 &2 4. Need to post about how amazing their family life is (with obligatory sentence about how sometimes it’s hard) Anything I’m missing? |
Anonymous
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Marathon running and new construction homes.
-another “high credential” millennial mom (1989) |
Anonymous
| Add local, relatively young grandparents who are swooping in to do a ton of childcare (in some cases, basically full-time parenting) to make all of the above possible. |
Anonymous
How could I forget this! Yep |
Anonymous
Yes and I think this is actually related to the "high achieving" part. Often people who are very high achievers come from families where they got a lot of support to help them reach further academically and in their career even before marriage or kids. Paying for grad school or providing other support and helping with job searches or supporting them through an unpaid internship or fellowship. So it makes sense that once they have kids these parents are also ready to step in with help to ensure their daughters especially can stay in these competitive jobs. Having been through this without the family support I can tell you that no amount of paid help will ever equal the security and usefulness of having a fit and willing grandparent ready to help out. Nannies and other help you have to negotiate with and there are just limits on what you can ask of them. Whereas a grandparent in his or her 60s who is happy to move in or nearby and wants to be there with your kids AND is personally invested in your career is something else entirely. If you have that PLUS household help even better. |
Anonymous
Just wait until their kids are in high school and college and you are hearing all about them running marathons WITH their kids or attending their D1 athletics or whatever. If this is triggering for you (it is for me) you need to mute or develop a strong level of detachment from social media generally early on. |
Anonymous
| 1990 here, also Ivy grad. I've observed One And Done -OR- no kids actually. I had a kid at 30 and was the earliest one in my friend group. |
Anonymous
| Having a baby during the pandemic and being utterly alone with no support was traumatic. Not gonna go through that again. |
Anonymous
Bragging about their kids’ exclusive travel sport. |
Anonymous
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Like attracts like, people. Such high-achievers, whether men or women, are not the norm. You are perhaps most likely to run across them in educated and wealthy areas, of course, but if you're so intelligent, surely you understand that you belong to a rarified strata of society? |
Anonymous
| I’m reminded of when we lived in Scarsdale, where dual high-income families were commonplace. I was eavesdropping on some high school boys having lunch in a local deli. They were talking about another boy, and how his mom is a doctor who works overnights at a hospital so he never sees her. And they all had such genuine sadness for him over that fact. I just have to wonder what’s the point of having such a big job that you don’t ever see your kids. |
Anonymous
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Their husbands all do CrossFit, usually the 5:00am or thereabouts class.
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Anonymous
Same. It’s almost like our generation isn’t a monolith, right? |
Anonymous
Same for me, also 1990 but went to a state school. Most of the people I know who started having kids earlier and have 3+ are SAHMs. The dual lawyer/doctor/finance/engineer couples tend to have one or none. |
Anonymous
It’s not really triggering for me unless they’re smug about it (which I guess most people bragging on social media are.) the peers who trigger me are the ones who not only had everything handed to them growing up (which I did too) but whose parents now still find a lavish lifestyle as adults- gifted multi million dollar homes, have 3+ kids in private school their parents are paying for, annual international trips funded by parents etc. and have the audacity to brag about it all on social media. It would be annoying to brag if it was self earned, but it’s particularly obnoxious when they are living hand to mouth. That said, most of my close friends grew up well off, and are hard working adults just trying to balance young kids, career and some time for ourselves, and do not have parents funding the day to day. |