Housewife vs SAHM

[Anonymous]

Doesn't this debate ever get old?

[Anonymous]

My mom was a SAHM/housewife and was glad when she was old enough she could just say she was retired. Do I have to wait until I'm 65 to say I'm retired? Why don't men call themselves working husbands/dads? stay at home dads? Work at home husbands? It's stupid. We need a new name for SAHMs/wives. Homemaker is stupid title too. The Real Housewives franchise has made it so no one wants to call themselves a housewife.

[Anonymous]

You guys are all debating a stupid semantics argument that is wrong in the first point. By the time the 60s rolled around, the preferred term was "homemaker." Women had alr Andy moved past the degrading housewife label. Having read plenty of records from the era, most families said homemaker. Housewife has been outdated and inaccurate for half a century, OP.

[Anonymous]

Here's my take:

Not working and no kids = housewife

Not working and kid(s) under school age, or otherwise not in daycare or under the care of a most-of-the-day nanny = SAHM

Not working and kid(s) who are in school, daycare or under the care of a nanny for most-of-the-day = housewife

[Anonymous]

Ummm, why is this even a debate. Seems to me that a woman who is staying at home can refer to herself as a SAHM or a housewife or a homemaker or retired - whatever she chooses.

It's a little insulting to sit around picking apart her "job" title and questioning her reasons for staying home, like it's any of our business

[Anonymous]

Lawyer in early retirement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Lawyer in early retirement.

I thought about telling this to people. Of course I wasn't a lawyer, but I'm only 35, and it sounds too pretentious to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lawyer in early retirement.

I thought about telling this to people. Of course I wasn't a lawyer, but I'm only 35, and it sounds too pretentious to me.

Well, for many of us it is true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lawyer in early retirement.

I thought about telling this to people. Of course I wasn't a lawyer, but I'm only 35, and it sounds too pretentious to me.

Well, for many of us it is true.

I guess that's true. Perhaps I'm going back to the "can't wait until I'm old enough to say I'm retired" comment. Clearly, at 35, I'm not there yet!

[Anonymous]

As an expat living in another country my residency visa states "Housewife" on it.

Where we live there's no fuss over the term housewife. It is what it describes: a woman who stays home and takes care of the house. I'm not bothered by it. SAHM, housewife, homemaker, these are all just different terms for the same role. People who try to differentiate among them are only in denial (oh, I am being harsh here, but, really, what is the difference? It's only in your mind). Someday SAHM will become deemed politically incorrect and will be replaced with a newly fashionable terminology. I wonder what it'll be?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lawyer in early retirement.

I thought about telling this to people. Of course I wasn't a lawyer, but I'm only 35, and it sounds too pretentious to me.

Its not about being pretentious. Its an accurate term to describe my situation. I don't work and have passive investment income. I'm retired.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because the main work they're doing is raising kids, not prepping the 6pm martini for when their husband gets home? If a woman stays home and has no kids, I think that's a housewife. But housewife sounds dismissive of the work that goes into a SAHM's day -- she's not just doing the ironing thinking of how to please her husband.

-WOH

I don't agree with the assessment of "housewife" in such subservient and misogynistic terms, PP. My mother was a typical, suburban 1960's housewife and not the least bit interested in pleasing her husband as her goal! She cleaned and cooked and raised five kids - with no outside help - and also had time for coffee with her neighbors every afternoon. My Dad would come home and she would still be in the same shorts or pants she was in all day. And then he took over most of the kid duties happily. My mother reminds me of how my daughter runs her home and raises her children as a SAHM (although she prefers stay-at-home-PARENT)

A lot of women were stay-at-home-moms when people were still calling them housewives.

I don't think the shift in the terms housewife to SAHM was necessarily driven by women, but by societal expectations. Even though your mom cared for her children all day and didn't design her life in deference to your father, her focus in caring for her kids was probably more about doing the work of keeping her children alive (clothed, fed) rather than the more recent expectation that mothers spend their time at home making every minute emotionally and intellectually nutruing for their children.

[Anonymous]

I had an aunt who passed away. She always said with pride that she was a house wife. She worked outside the home full time as a secretary so I never understood that. If you told her she wasn't a housewife since she had a job she would become insulted because to her, she became a housewife when she got married and took care of her home. It didn't matter that she also worked. These are just words and labels. Stop debating.

[Anonymous]

Housewife to homemaker to SAHM is a change in language. College-educated white women were depressed at being "just a housewife" (read the Feminine Mystique), so "homemaker" was invented, because it sounds much more important and meaningful. You're making a home!!! But then non-poor, US-born white women started joining the paid labor force, and people started giving the side-eye to women who weren't in the paid labor force, so SAHM was invented, because emphasizes devotion to children. You're a mother, staying home to raise your children!!!

It's all a purposeful distraction from the real issue, which is, how to fix things so that people (men and women) can have paid employment if they need it or want it, and also be able to raise children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One and the same.

I agree, but at the same time, I'm a SAHM of school-aged children. It's summer so I am totally feeling the SAHM vibe - because it is all day, every day - but during the school year, I'm a housewife. Full stop.

Once the kids are on that bus at 8:45, it's me until I get them at 4pm. I'm doing stuff for the HOUSE, or stuff for me (the WIFE). There really is no "mom" in the equation for about 7 hours, unless of course someone is sick or school is out.

Agreed SAHM of school age kids is a housewife.

I respectfully disagree. After my kids go off to school, I'm still doing a lot of things that benefit my kids directly, although they are not with me. I may be volunteering in their school, grocery shopping, getting rid of the outgrown clothes and toys in their closets, mowing the lawn, taking the car to the garage for an oil change, picking up dry cleaning, taking the grandparents to doctor appointments, fixing random broken things around the house or searching for lost items, picking up books that have been reserved at the library, planning weekend outings/play dates or family vacations, taking pets to the vet, gardening ...
Both stay at home mom and housewife are misnomers. I'm hardly ever home. We need new terminology. Maybe "family manager"?