the cost of working - SAHM vs WOHM

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Daycare - $550 (550 would be from DH's portion)
Commute - Gas, wear and tear - $100
Parking - $0 no fee for mw
Cleaning Services - $125 (125 comes out of DH paycheck since he uses and likes a clean home)
Clothing - none - I don't buy work attire anymore, it's casual all the time
Drycleaning - 0 - do not buy clothes that need drycleaning
Lunches - $100 (only because I like going on happy hours for my own adult sanity)
Coffees/Breakfast on the Run - 0 -
Takeout - $150 (another 150 comes from DH's paycheck since he eats as well)

My girls watching me and learning the importance of being financially independent - priceless

My mom probably said the same thing about me watching her. Too bad what I actually saw was a stressed busy mom who didn’t seem to have enough time for me ever. I stay at home now.

My mom is a PhD and worked in research and was a professor. She is a great mom, we're very close and we got plenty of quality time with her. IMO, I see a lot of the stressed busy mom situations when the mom is working menial, low paying jobs with very little flexibility. I WFH 4 days/week making around 218K with amazing benefits and had plenty of time for mine, who are now older. I totally disagree with one of the PP who said some jobs, like medicine, are inflexible. My entire family is in medicine and my SIL is an MD and works from home PT, in a cushy position, doing research and making a ton of money. My MIL is a nurse working for the feds as a GS-15 all remote. A lot of my lawyer moms left big law and work for associations or in-house. I'm at a regulatory agency and my office just hired 2 pregnant lawyers. They will get 3 months paid maternity leave and then they will have to come back in the office once a week starting in 2023, IF they have reliable childcare.
The trick is to get a lot of valuable education, get established at work, be a great performer and then have kids and look for flexibility. The more educated one is, the better the opportunities for a flexible, well-paid and less stressful job.

My mom was a SAHM and never had “time” for me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I married an alpha male. He is fine with whatever I want - work, not work, work part time. He is an equal partner because he loves his family and wants to pamper us.

He is the right kind of old fashioned. My money is my money and his money is our money. He would not ever want me to pay any bills and he basically asked me to save and invest everything that I earned.

So happy for you. When he dumps you for a 20 yo, you will need your pennies saved.

No prenup, every thing jointly owned, we spend our time together, lots of insurance. Why would he dump me for a 20 yr old when I am good looking, educated, desirable and we have a good marriage and a good life?

All the beta men they just can't stand to pay for their wives. 50% of childcare, 50% of take outs, 50% to the cleaning lady...lol...they will not pay for their frumpy wives or their kids - and the price to being married to them is that these women pay for themselves. How desperate. + These women come home and do a double shift. Goodness, why not value your wife and pay for cleaners??

Anyone who thinks in alpha and beta terms about people IMO can't have a "good life."

just ignore, it's an incel.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where is gender equality here? If I was the breadwinner husband and if my wife decided not to work anymore, I think I would lose some respect for her. Will most of those marriages end when one of the sides hit a mid life crisis?

By our third date, my husband was telling me he only wanted to marry a woman who would continue to work after marriage and kids. I appreciate his forthrightness and as I never had any interest in SAH, we ended up getting married and being dual WOHP. My guess is that most people discuss this extensively with prospective spouses.

I didn't want to be a SAHM but I wouldn't marry that guy.

Your choice, of course. I've been married to "that guy" for 25 years.

I have been married to another “that guy” for 20+ years too. My DH explained that he wanted to build a life with a partner who would work since he didn’t like seeing his Dad stress about a job loss and his mom go out to scrape together work to pay the bills. I am sure if it were a real issue (I felt really strongly after childbirth for some reason, I couldn’t find a job in the same city, we had elder care or SN child issues that we hadn’t accounted for), we’d have had a conversation and figured things out. But having a man explain to you that his vision for his life matched your vision for your life is a good thing, you know?

What if he just got offered a really great promotion, and he wanted to work 80 hours a week and make tons of money? Or he realized that he hated his job and wanted to switch to something that was less family friendly? The only way that either of you are allowed to make a change in your life from the time you are dating until you die is having elder care issues or a special needs child? No one can just want to do something different?

Woman here with heavy work hours but also earning 50% more than the DH. When I took my new role, I promised that my home commitments would not suffer. Why can't a guy do the same thing? We have been operating 50-50 well in the last 5 years. Besides both of us spending time with the kids, my DH has hobbies and I have just extra work that I need to spend time on.

Same. Women do this all the time, you just don't see it because they aren't advertising it.

Just out of curiosity, what does your day to day look like? I would like to go back to work full time, but my husband works long hours, and I can’t really figure out how to make it work.
He typically works 7am-6pm with two days off every other week. Sometimes they fall on a weekend, but not always.
Kids are elementary school and middle school ages. Oldest has some minor special needs and homeschools.
Right now I work 20-30 hours/week, but I don’t see how I could take a time intensive job or even a serious hobby. I would like to start coaching high school again, but I don’t see how I can make it work.

Here is how we do it: We know which one of us will drop off the kids and which one will pick up for a given week based on our calendars. Usually the drop off person does not do the pick up. So, say I did the drop off, which I do around 8 am and then go to work, I usually stay at the work until 5:30 pm or so. My DH that day starts working at 7 am and does pick ups around/before 4pm. I am responsible for the breakfasts and he is for the dinners. We don't cook from scratch everyday, prepare couple dishes over the weekend and also do healthy takeaway options during the week. If the kids have a sports/arts activity after school, the person to pick up also deals with that. When it is my turn to do sports activities, I actually continue to work at the entrance/cafe area of the sportshall. I sometimes get evening meeting calls, then I leave maybe an hour early because I will spend a couple hours later in that evening call. After the kids go to bed, which is around 8:30 pm, my DH is back to his hobby and I do maybe another hour of work (30% of the time). When none of us can do a pick up, we call a couple college students asking if they can pick up the kids. This has been working for us well. And when we work from home, we usually save an hour of commute. When I travel, I arrange the pick ups by the babysitter, so that my DH's usual routine does not get disturbed.

I'm not trying to be a jerk, but it doesn't sound like your hours are really that heavy. It sounds like you have a pretty standard 8:30-5:30 M-F office job with occasional meetings or responding to emails in the evenings, and occasional travel. This sounds like a pretty typical 50 hour/wk job with a pretty good amount of flexibility.

I think you are kind of confirming my idea that a couple really cannot work more than a combined 90-100 hours/wk combined AND raise children.

Yes, you can. I'm the fed WFH 4 days/week, 40 hours only and I have flexible hours. My H works around 60 and travels for work but he has flexibility over his schedule too. As I said before, as long as you are highly educated and have valuable work experience, you can get flexibility.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where is gender equality here? If I was the breadwinner husband and if my wife decided not to work anymore, I think I would lose some respect for her. Will most of those marriages end when one of the sides hit a mid life crisis?

By our third date, my husband was telling me he only wanted to marry a woman who would continue to work after marriage and kids. I appreciate his forthrightness and as I never had any interest in SAH, we ended up getting married and being dual WOHP. My guess is that most people discuss this extensively with prospective spouses.

I didn't want to be a SAHM but I wouldn't marry that guy.

Your choice, of course. I've been married to "that guy" for 25 years.

I have been married to another “that guy” for 20+ years too. My DH explained that he wanted to build a life with a partner who would work since he didn’t like seeing his Dad stress about a job loss and his mom go out to scrape together work to pay the bills. I am sure if it were a real issue (I felt really strongly after childbirth for some reason, I couldn’t find a job in the same city, we had elder care or SN child issues that we hadn’t accounted for), we’d have had a conversation and figured things out. But having a man explain to you that his vision for his life matched your vision for your life is a good thing, you know?

What if he just got offered a really great promotion, and he wanted to work 80 hours a week and make tons of money? Or he realized that he hated his job and wanted to switch to something that was less family friendly? The only way that either of you are allowed to make a change in your life from the time you are dating until you die is having elder care issues or a special needs child? No one can just want to do something different?

Woman here with heavy work hours but also earning 50% more than the DH. When I took my new role, I promised that my home commitments would not suffer. Why can't a guy do the same thing? We have been operating 50-50 well in the last 5 years. Besides both of us spending time with the kids, my DH has hobbies and I have just extra work that I need to spend time on.

Same. Women do this all the time, you just don't see it because they aren't advertising it.

Just out of curiosity, what does your day to day look like? I would like to go back to work full time, but my husband works long hours, and I can’t really figure out how to make it work.
He typically works 7am-6pm with two days off every other week. Sometimes they fall on a weekend, but not always.
Kids are elementary school and middle school ages. Oldest has some minor special needs and homeschools.
Right now I work 20-30 hours/week, but I don’t see how I could take a time intensive job or even a serious hobby. I would like to start coaching high school again, but I don’t see how I can make it work.

Here is how we do it: We know which one of us will drop off the kids and which one will pick up for a given week based on our calendars. Usually the drop off person does not do the pick up. So, say I did the drop off, which I do around 8 am and then go to work, I usually stay at the work until 5:30 pm or so. My DH that day starts working at 7 am and does pick ups around/before 4pm. I am responsible for the breakfasts and he is for the dinners. We don't cook from scratch everyday, prepare couple dishes over the weekend and also do healthy takeaway options during the week. If the kids have a sports/arts activity after school, the person to pick up also deals with that. When it is my turn to do sports activities, I actually continue to work at the entrance/cafe area of the sportshall. I sometimes get evening meeting calls, then I leave maybe an hour early because I will spend a couple hours later in that evening call. After the kids go to bed, which is around 8:30 pm, my DH is back to his hobby and I do maybe another hour of work (30% of the time). When none of us can do a pick up, we call a couple college students asking if they can pick up the kids. This has been working for us well. And when we work from home, we usually save an hour of commute. When I travel, I arrange the pick ups by the babysitter, so that my DH's usual routine does not get disturbed.

I'm not trying to be a jerk, but it doesn't sound like your hours are really that heavy. It sounds like you have a pretty standard 8:30-5:30 M-F office job with occasional meetings or responding to emails in the evenings, and occasional travel. This sounds like a pretty typical 50 hour/wk job with a pretty good amount of flexibility.

I think you are kind of confirming my idea that a couple really cannot work more than a combined 90-100 hours/wk combined AND raise children.

Yes, you can. I'm the fed WFH 4 days/week, 40 hours only and I have flexible hours. My H works around 60 and travels for work but he has flexibility over his schedule too. As I said before, as long as you are highly educated and have valuable work experience, you can get flexibility.

60 + 40 = 100.
You can’t work more than that as a couple and raise children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Daycare - $550 (550 would be from DH's portion)
Commute - Gas, wear and tear - $100
Parking - $0 no fee for mw
Cleaning Services - $125 (125 comes out of DH paycheck since he uses and likes a clean home)
Clothing - none - I don't buy work attire anymore, it's casual all the time
Drycleaning - 0 - do not buy clothes that need drycleaning
Lunches - $100 (only because I like going on happy hours for my own adult sanity)
Coffees/Breakfast on the Run - 0 -
Takeout - $150 (another 150 comes from DH's paycheck since he eats as well)

My girls watching me and learning the importance of being financially independent - priceless

My mom probably said the same thing about me watching her. Too bad what I actually saw was a stressed busy mom who didn’t seem to have enough time for me ever. I stay at home now.

My mom is a PhD and worked in research and was a professor. She is a great mom, we're very close and we got plenty of quality time with her. IMO, I see a lot of the stressed busy mom situations when the mom is working menial, low paying jobs with very little flexibility. I WFH 4 days/week making around 218K with amazing benefits and had plenty of time for mine, who are now older. I totally disagree with one of the PP who said some jobs, like medicine, are inflexible. My entire family is in medicine and my SIL is an MD and works from home PT, in a cushy position, doing research and making a ton of money. My MIL is a nurse working for the feds as a GS-15 all remote. A lot of my lawyer moms left big law and work for associations or in-house. I'm at a regulatory agency and my office just hired 2 pregnant lawyers. They will get 3 months paid maternity leave and then they will have to come back in the office once a week starting in 2023, IF they have reliable childcare.
The trick is to get a lot of valuable education, get established at work, be a great performer and then have kids and look for flexibility. The more educated one is, the better the opportunities for a flexible, well-paid and less stressful job.

My mom was a SAHM and never had “time” for me.

My mom was a SAHM when I was little and I vaguely remember it. She became a WOHM when I was in 5th grade and my brother was in MS and we developed a nice family rhythm--my brother and I each cooked dinner once a week and got along pretty well with each other. I felt like our time with her was very good and we liked feeling like we contributed in ways that really helped our parents. When we were in HS she returned to being a SAHM again because my parents didn't need the money, and it was a real strain on our relationship. She became way too invested and involved in our lives, especially mine and she made me feel guilty if I didn't want to spend more time with her instead of friends (I was a 'good' kid though so I would usually bend to what she wanted). She also felt obligated to "do everything" around the house so we stopped cooking and doing as many chores. She now looks back on that time as a down period and regrets it and went back to work when we were in college. We have a good relationship now. I don't think SAH/WOH tells you anything about how you parent.

[Anonymous]

If you are a SAHM and do not have ant to be a WOHM, good for you. If you are a WOHM and don’t envy the SAHM lifestyle, good for you. Those who think that the grass is somehow greener on the other side are pity worthy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Where is gender equality here? If I was the breadwinner husband and if my wife decided not to work anymore, I think I would lose some respect for her. Will most of those marriages end when one of the sides hit a mid life crisis?

By our third date, my husband was telling me he only wanted to marry a woman who would continue to work after marriage and kids. I appreciate his forthrightness and as I never had any interest in SAH, we ended up getting married and being dual WOHP. My guess is that most people discuss this extensively with prospective spouses.

I didn't want to be a SAHM but I wouldn't marry that guy.

Your choice, of course. I've been married to "that guy" for 25 years.

I have been married to another “that guy” for 20+ years too. My DH explained that he wanted to build a life with a partner who would work since he didn’t like seeing his Dad stress about a job loss and his mom go out to scrape together work to pay the bills. I am sure if it were a real issue (I felt really strongly after childbirth for some reason, I couldn’t find a job in the same city, we had elder care or SN child issues that we hadn’t accounted for), we’d have had a conversation and figured things out. But having a man explain to you that his vision for his life matched your vision for your life is a good thing, you know?

What if he just got offered a really great promotion, and he wanted to work 80 hours a week and make tons of money? Or he realized that he hated his job and wanted to switch to something that was less family friendly? The only way that either of you are allowed to make a change in your life from the time you are dating until you die is having elder care issues or a special needs child? No one can just want to do something different?

Woman here with heavy work hours but also earning 50% more than the DH. When I took my new role, I promised that my home commitments would not suffer. Why can't a guy do the same thing? We have been operating 50-50 well in the last 5 years. Besides both of us spending time with the kids, my DH has hobbies and I have just extra work that I need to spend time on.

Same. Women do this all the time, you just don't see it because they aren't advertising it.

Just out of curiosity, what does your day to day look like? I would like to go back to work full time, but my husband works long hours, and I can’t really figure out how to make it work.
He typically works 7am-6pm with two days off every other week. Sometimes they fall on a weekend, but not always.
Kids are elementary school and middle school ages. Oldest has some minor special needs and homeschools.
Right now I work 20-30 hours/week, but I don’t see how I could take a time intensive job or even a serious hobby. I would like to start coaching high school again, but I don’t see how I can make it work.

Here is how we do it: We know which one of us will drop off the kids and which one will pick up for a given week based on our calendars. Usually the drop off person does not do the pick up. So, say I did the drop off, which I do around 8 am and then go to work, I usually stay at the work until 5:30 pm or so. My DH that day starts working at 7 am and does pick ups around/before 4pm. I am responsible for the breakfasts and he is for the dinners. We don't cook from scratch everyday, prepare couple dishes over the weekend and also do healthy takeaway options during the week. If the kids have a sports/arts activity after school, the person to pick up also deals with that. When it is my turn to do sports activities, I actually continue to work at the entrance/cafe area of the sportshall. I sometimes get evening meeting calls, then I leave maybe an hour early because I will spend a couple hours later in that evening call. After the kids go to bed, which is around 8:30 pm, my DH is back to his hobby and I do maybe another hour of work (30% of the time). When none of us can do a pick up, we call a couple college students asking if they can pick up the kids. This has been working for us well. And when we work from home, we usually save an hour of commute. When I travel, I arrange the pick ups by the babysitter, so that my DH's usual routine does not get disturbed.

I'm not trying to be a jerk, but it doesn't sound like your hours are really that heavy. It sounds like you have a pretty standard 8:30-5:30 M-F office job with occasional meetings or responding to emails in the evenings, and occasional travel. This sounds like a pretty typical 50 hour/wk job with a pretty good amount of flexibility.

I think you are kind of confirming my idea that a couple really cannot work more than a combined 90-100 hours/wk combined AND raise children.

Yes, you can. I'm the fed WFH 4 days/week, 40 hours only and I have flexible hours. My H works around 60 and travels for work but he has flexibility over his schedule too. As I said before, as long as you are highly educated and have valuable work experience, you can get flexibility.

60 + 40 = 100.
You can’t work more than that as a couple and raise children.

Yes you can, stop with this nonsense. I can easily work 2 more hours everyday instead of wasting time here or on Sephora (like I do now) and my H can definitely do more with less Reddit and Netflix. We don't have to, so we don't. Most well-paid jobs are results driven, unless you are an MD, so nobody keeps track of the exact hours per day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I married an alpha male. He is fine with whatever I want - work, not work, work part time. He is an equal partner because he loves his family and wants to pamper us.

He is the right kind of old fashioned. My money is my money and his money is our money. He would not ever want me to pay any bills and he basically asked me to save and invest everything that I earned.

Gross. I am an alpha female.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I married an alpha male. He is fine with whatever I want - work, not work, work part time. He is an equal partner because he loves his family and wants to pamper us.

He is the right kind of old fashioned. My money is my money and his money is our money. He would not ever want me to pay any bills and he basically asked me to save and invest everything that I earned.

So happy for you. When he dumps you for a 20 yo, you will need your pennies saved.

No prenup, every thing jointly owned, we spend our time together, lots of insurance. Why would he dump me for a 20 yr old when I am good looking, educated, desirable and we have a good marriage and a good life?

All the beta men they just can't stand to pay for their wives. 50% of childcare, 50% of take outs, 50% to the cleaning lady...lol...they will not pay for their frumpy wives or their kids - and the price to being married to them is that these women pay for themselves. How desperate. + These women come home and do a double shift. Goodness, why not value your wife and pay for cleaners??

I don't mind the double shift. It's not desperate to pay one's own way. How weird. This isn't the 1950s.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you are a SAHM and do not have ant to be a WOHM, good for you. If you are a WOHM and don’t envy the SAHM lifestyle, good for you. Those who think that the grass is somehow greener on the other side are pity worthy.

Having a choice is the best.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Daycare - $550 (550 would be from DH's portion)
Commute - Gas, wear and tear - $100
Parking - $0 no fee for mw
Cleaning Services - $125 (125 comes out of DH paycheck since he uses and likes a clean home)
Clothing - none - I don't buy work attire anymore, it's casual all the time
Drycleaning - 0 - do not buy clothes that need drycleaning
Lunches - $100 (only because I like going on happy hours for my own adult sanity)
Coffees/Breakfast on the Run - 0 -
Takeout - $150 (another 150 comes from DH's paycheck since he eats as well)

My girls watching me and learning the importance of being financially independent - priceless

My mom probably said the same thing about me watching her. Too bad what I actually saw was a stressed busy mom who didn’t seem to have enough time for me ever. I stay at home now.

My mom is a PhD and worked in research and was a professor. She is a great mom, we're very close and we got plenty of quality time with her. IMO, I see a lot of the stressed busy mom situations when the mom is working menial, low paying jobs with very little flexibility. I WFH 4 days/week making around 218K with amazing benefits and had plenty of time for mine, who are now older. I totally disagree with one of the PP who said some jobs, like medicine, are inflexible. My entire family is in medicine and my SIL is an MD and works from home PT, in a cushy position, doing research and making a ton of money. My MIL is a nurse working for the feds as a GS-15 all remote. A lot of my lawyer moms left big law and work for associations or in-house. I'm at a regulatory agency and my office just hired 2 pregnant lawyers. They will get 3 months paid maternity leave and then they will have to come back in the office once a week starting in 2023, IF they have reliable childcare.
The trick is to get a lot of valuable education, get established at work, be a great performer and then have kids and look for flexibility. The more educated one is, the better the opportunities for a flexible, well-paid and less stressful job.

This wins for most tone-deaf, privileged post.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Daycare - $550 (550 would be from DH's portion)
Commute - Gas, wear and tear - $100
Parking - $0 no fee for mw
Cleaning Services - $125 (125 comes out of DH paycheck since he uses and likes a clean home)
Clothing - none - I don't buy work attire anymore, it's casual all the time
Drycleaning - 0 - do not buy clothes that need drycleaning
Lunches - $100 (only because I like going on happy hours for my own adult sanity)
Coffees/Breakfast on the Run - 0 -
Takeout - $150 (another 150 comes from DH's paycheck since he eats as well)

My girls watching me and learning the importance of being financially independent - priceless

My mom probably said the same thing about me watching her. Too bad what I actually saw was a stressed busy mom who didn’t seem to have enough time for me ever. I stay at home now.

My mom is a PhD and worked in research and was a professor. She is a great mom, we're very close and we got plenty of quality time with her. IMO, I see a lot of the stressed busy mom situations when the mom is working menial, low paying jobs with very little flexibility. I WFH 4 days/week making around 218K with amazing benefits and had plenty of time for mine, who are now older. I totally disagree with one of the PP who said some jobs, like medicine, are inflexible. My entire family is in medicine and my SIL is an MD and works from home PT, in a cushy position, doing research and making a ton of money. My MIL is a nurse working for the feds as a GS-15 all remote. A lot of my lawyer moms left big law and work for associations or in-house. I'm at a regulatory agency and my office just hired 2 pregnant lawyers. They will get 3 months paid maternity leave and then they will have to come back in the office once a week starting in 2023, IF they have reliable childcare.
The trick is to get a lot of valuable education, get established at work, be a great performer and then have kids and look for flexibility. The more educated one is, the better the opportunities for a flexible, well-paid and less stressful job.

This wins for most tone-deaf, privileged post.

Why ever would you say that? Don’t you know how easy it is to just 1) get into a professional grad program, 2) pay for said program, 3) get out and get a cushy job where you work from home at your own hours making a bazillion dollars? I mean, I know there are maybe 1 or 2 drs that have to, you know, actually work from a hospital for long hours, but obviously we all know most doctors work from home! During school hours only!

[Anonymous]

Ughh…childcare is so expensive. When I had my second child, I was doing a fellowship at a Children’s hospital that had a daycare attached to it. Childcare came directly out of my paycheck, and between that and taxes it ate up my entire check. I think I made something like $200/month.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Daycare - $550 (550 would be from DH's portion)
Commute - Gas, wear and tear - $100
Parking - $0 no fee for mw
Cleaning Services - $125 (125 comes out of DH paycheck since he uses and likes a clean home)
Clothing - none - I don't buy work attire anymore, it's casual all the time
Drycleaning - 0 - do not buy clothes that need drycleaning
Lunches - $100 (only because I like going on happy hours for my own adult sanity)
Coffees/Breakfast on the Run - 0 -
Takeout - $150 (another 150 comes from DH's paycheck since he eats as well)

My girls watching me and learning the importance of being financially independent - priceless

My mom probably said the same thing about me watching her. Too bad what I actually saw was a stressed busy mom who didn’t seem to have enough time for me ever. I stay at home now.

My mom is a PhD and worked in research and was a professor. She is a great mom, we're very close and we got plenty of quality time with her. IMO, I see a lot of the stressed busy mom situations when the mom is working menial, low paying jobs with very little flexibility. I WFH 4 days/week making around 218K with amazing benefits and had plenty of time for mine, who are now older. I totally disagree with one of the PP who said some jobs, like medicine, are inflexible. My entire family is in medicine and my SIL is an MD and works from home PT, in a cushy position, doing research and making a ton of money. My MIL is a nurse working for the feds as a GS-15 all remote. A lot of my lawyer moms left big law and work for associations or in-house. I'm at a regulatory agency and my office just hired 2 pregnant lawyers. They will get 3 months paid maternity leave and then they will have to come back in the office once a week starting in 2023, IF they have reliable childcare.
The trick is to get a lot of valuable education, get established at work, be a great performer and then have kids and look for flexibility. The more educated one is, the better the opportunities for a flexible, well-paid and less stressful job.

This wins for most tone-deaf, privileged post.

Why ever would you say that? Don’t you know how easy it is to just 1) get into a professional grad program, 2) pay for said program, 3) get out and get a cushy job where you work from home at your own hours making a bazillion dollars? I mean, I know there are maybe 1 or 2 drs that have to, you know, actually work from a hospital for long hours, but obviously we all know most doctors work from home! During school hours only!

PP, you make as many assumptions as the others. How do you know that this person paid for the schools or programs she was in? There are a lot of scholarships available for the people who are willing to study. These jobs are not cushy, there are many jobs where couples can balance the home/kids stuff well between each other. The discussion here is about having the mindset where men and women respect each other and support each other, where each party sees the other one as an equal contributor. What's wrong with that? The working moms here are saying that it is doable, it is good for your future benefits, don't give up and just push your partner to be an equal home/kids partner. Otherwise, this society will only be run by men, decisions taken by men and women can continue receiving the second class citizen treatments...

[Anonymous]

PP, it was sarcasm...