Can Mormom women have "regular" jobs?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a Mormon friend who is a top level executive at Marriott. Definitely possible.

Is your friend married? Does she have children?

Marriott is a Mormon company. Different situation.

[Anonymous]

I have a friend who is mormon and in AZ. She is a therapist and quite well educated. her priest (what do they call them?) visited them at their house recently and is pressuring her to quit to stay at home with their three kids.

They are now looking for her husband to transfer to another state so she can get away from that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is not an attack on the faith. I had many friends growing up who were Mormon. I just recall that all of my friends' moms were SAHMs, which made sense because they had large families. Since then, I realized I've never met a female Mormom doctor, lawyer, business exec. My circle may be small. Is there something in church doctrine that forbids women from having careers? Just curious.

It encourages women to have many children. It is against premarital sex which means getting married and having children at a young age. Would be very challenging to already have two kids while in law or medical schools. There are exceptions, but having kids young really limits a woman professionally.

This. (And tbh, in addition to going out into the world and converting the masses to LDS--which their two-year missionary programs are designed to do--encouraging families to have LOTS and LOTS of babies is probably the MOST effective strategy for spreading any religion like wildfire!) It's in the doctorine that babies are spirits in heaven that are waiting to join your family...and your hghest calling as a mormon woman is to give those angel babies LIFE on earth. And that just doesn't leave a ton of time for a career. Plus, the way their communities are structured, there is plenty of social reinforcement for staying at home, just as other PPs have stated.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have a Mormon friend who is a top level executive at Marriott. Definitely possible.

A Mormon founded and run company.

[Anonymous]

I know one who is an attorney at a big law firm but you would have to know her well to be aware of her religion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One of my law firm partners was a devout Morman woman who went to Harvard Law. You aren’t looking hard enough, and yes you sound like a bigot asking this question.

Why?

NP, but I think it's you who sounds like a bigot for taking OFFENSE at the question! Because it's clear that you think being a SAHM is somehow a less desirable option than choosing to work outside the home. OP was just curious if women were actively discouraged from doing that/encouraged to stay at home as part of the religious teachings..or not. It didn't sound like a judgement. But it would be to someone who looks at staying at home as an insult to women.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a Mormon friend who is a top level executive at Marriott. Definitely possible.

Is your friend married? Does she have children?

Yes. Married with two kids. I’m pretty sure she makes way more money than him.

[Anonymous]

I am a Mormon mom with a job outside of the home. I know lots and lots of Mormon women (married, single, with and without kids) who have jobs. Doctors, lawyers, dentists, engineers, architects, teachers, HR, therapists, etc. I also know lots and lots who stay home. (I stayed home when my kids where young.)

Now, growing up in the church 30-40 years ago, there weren’t as many but things have changed.

[Anonymous]

My Mormon friend went to Harvard Business School and is COO of a well-respected (non-Mormon) company. She is unusual in that she has never married (late 40s now). She is a wonderful, loyal friend and kick-a*& at her job.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have a friend who is mormon and in AZ. She is a therapist and quite well educated. her priest (what do they call them?) visited them at their house recently and is pressuring her to quit to stay at home with their three kids.

They are now looking for her husband to transfer to another state so she can get away from that.

They don’t have priests. All adult males are Elders. If her DH supports her working, he’s the Elder she’s most likely to listen to.

[Anonymous]

One of my professors in college was Mormon. PhD in English literature from Duke. We were close, but I only knew of her religion because she went to BYU, and then I saw on her LinkedIn profile she was a member of a group called "Washington DC Area LDS Network". (I didn't go to school in DC, just using it as an example.)

But I also remember reading an article from the NY Times or some such on motherhood where she described turning down her "dream job" at a prestigious R1 to work at our smaller, less demanding LAC because she didn't think she could be the kind of Mom she wanted while working at the other school. So there's that.

[Anonymous]

I am not Mormon but was in a social group with a lot of Mormon women at one time. My experience was that they would talk about someone who was an amazing mother of eight sweet and bright children whom she managed to feed, clothe, and educate on her husband’s police officer salary with tremendous awe and respect. Kind of like people on DCUM might talk about someone who is a top executive or went to HYP.
I didn’t get the impression that anything was explicitly said about having lots of children and staying at home. Just that everyone had grown up with that idea of what an awe-inspiring, amazing woman looked like.
Kind of like no one had to tell most of the posters on DCUM that we should aim to go to a top college and graduate school. We all just grew up with that image of what a successful person looked like.

[Anonymous]

I know several mormon wives and none of them have jobs outside of school hours, and most stay home completely. One is an ESL teacher (once youngest went to school) and other is a speech/language pathologist and only works Pt during school hours. Admittedly all the Mormons I know are affluent (the husbands all went to law school with or work at a law firm with my DH.)

[Anonymous]

I know they exist, but I haven't met any personally. When I was in government I worked with many male Mormons with SAHM wives. Like one of the PPs, I always sort of wondered how they did it. One working parent and 5+ kids on the same salary I had as a 26 year old living in a group house.

[Anonymous]

Yes! I know several Morman woman. They have a bunch of kids, but are otherwise attractive and funny and cool. You’d be shocked if you knew they were Mormon.