What I’m noticing from millennial high achieving moms

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op here. I wanted to clarify some things. At my ivy, I was part of a religious group and many, many of the women assumed they would stay home so I've been surprised by how many have continued to work while having several kids. There are two waves of child-bearing- the more religious are ahead of the curve and are on baby 3 or even 4.

My more nonreligious friends are just starting but I anticipate will likely end up with more in the next few years (in talking with them they want big families). Even the nonreligious people I was friends with had kind assumed it would be very hard to balance a career with their future husband's high profile job and the common understanding was that they may need to take some time off when their kids were young. Now the people making those comments have like 1-3 kids and work full time (one is a CEO!). I think the flexible work arrangement is a big part of this.

I do think that if you are SAHM w/ a rich husband (prior goal/ status), you are at a disadvantage. I'm estimating that most of my friends have dual incomes exceeding 250 but I assume most are making between 300-500k + combined.

I also assumed id stay home because my mom did, while she had young kids. But so far I haven’t, because I a) had maternity leave (this was far less common for our parents generation) 2) I have a more flexible work arrangement (also didn’t really exist for corporate jobs in our parents generation) and 3) while my partner is a somewhat high earner, he’s not biglaw type earner and staying home would be a financial sacrifice. Life is more expensive and competitive these days. Our generation likes to travel, do travel sports, have tutors for their kids if needed, private schools or expensive school districts etc. cost of living was not as high when we were growing up, “feminism” was in its infancy, and single earner families were more common amongst the UMC.

I also ran with a religious circle in college. I’m Jewish. Not personally so religious anymore, but I’m also in two worlds- the one where many of my childhood friends who are somewhat religious were married by 23/24, having babies by 25/26, three by 30/32. In this crowd, some women have demanding careers, but most chose more flexible or traditionally female careers like education, OT, speech therapy, physical therapy, nursing anticipating a more traditional household structure.

In my current world, more secular, most people started having kids in their early thirties or later. A lot of my friends a few years older than me who had kids in their 30s say they would have had a third if they’d had more time- they didn’t feel up to it in their late thirties. The ones who did have three or more had them much closer in age, or are having their third kid in their mid to late thirties with 3-4 year age gaps. The women who work have more corporate or professional jobs (law, medicine, finance, marketing etc.) but there are still many SAHMs who either stopped working once they had kids or never really intended to work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: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.

That's because they're still young. 34 means they can clearly have kids or more kids.

I am a 1982 millennial & "high credential" and agree with a lot of OP. Except no one I'm my circle talked about being a SAHM when we were younger.

[Anonymous]

I’m a 1982 millennial and I seem to know a ton of couples who are one-and-done. Are these 3-kid families not in urban areas I wonder?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
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?

I agree about like attracts like. The OP has a group of friends who are all very similar. At the same time as her friends are working day and night to keep up materially, there are at-home super moms out there who had no intention of working full time when their children were born. That’s my “cohort”. We occasionally travel together, we take our kids to do things they wouldn’t be able to do if we worked. We carpool in the summer when a lot of our kids go to arts camp. We live our lives in a way that feminists scoffed at. OP and her friends decided to work and have children which is not unusual.

Looks like the OP is trying to make “high achieving millennials” happen as if it’s some new phenomenon.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m a 1982 millennial and I seem to know a ton of couples who are one-and-done. Are these 3-kid families not in urban areas I wonder?

You are in your 40s and some millennials are still in their 20s. That would be the same as lumping you in with 56 year old mothers. It’s Too big a gap to use the term millennial.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m a 1982 millennial and I seem to know a ton of couples who are one-and-done. Are these 3-kid families not in urban areas I wonder?

Give me a break you’re old

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m a 1982 millennial and I seem to know a ton of couples who are one-and-done. Are these 3-kid families not in urban areas I wonder?

You are in your 40s and some millennials are still in their 20s. That would be the same as lumping you in with 56 year old mothers. It’s Too big a gap to use the term millennial.

No, I think millennial is the generation that begins with 1980.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: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.

Yup and doing everything.

[Anonymous]

So many people are having 3 kids, I’m glad it’s being mentioned! Among my work colleagues and friends, the most common number of kids to have is 3. Maybe 3 is the new 2?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
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?

I agree about like attracts like. The OP has a group of friends who are all very similar. At the same time as her friends are working day and night to keep up materially, there are at-home super moms out there who had no intention of working full time when their children were born. That’s my “cohort”. We occasionally travel together, we take our kids to do things they wouldn’t be able to do if we worked. We carpool in the summer when a lot of our kids go to arts camp. We live our lives in a way that feminists scoffed at. OP and her friends decided to work and have children which is not unusual.

Looks like the OP is trying to make “high achieving millennials” happen as if it’s some new phenomenon.

Op here to be clear I’m specifically talking about classmates from my Ivy League. I don’t see many SAHM- def some but overwhelmingly working top, flexible jobs. Just curious if you are finding that your SAHM moms are all from ivys or similar? Many of them I’m not even close with but still Facebook friends and can see their job posts/ family posts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So many people are having 3 kids, I’m glad it’s being mentioned! Among my work colleagues and friends, the most common number of kids to have is 3. Maybe 3 is the new 2?

In your dreams butterball

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Cost benefit. Depends how invested they are in their careers, how deeply involved the mother wants to be in their children’s lives. Even if you have a flexible wfh job, you will still not be able to spend as much time with DCs as a SAH. I like to spend my time in each aspect with my kids (tutoring, making sure they’re high achievers in school and activities, taking my time to make them healthy meals, etc) and pass on everything I know to them, so SAH works. Others need a job to be fulfilled so their choice works for them. I personally think my mode of SAH confers more advantage for my kids, but to each their own.

This is actually the #1 reason I choose to work. I could quit tomorrow and we would be just fine financially, but then I would be tempted to make my children my new "project". Better to model high achievement than to snowplow your way to it.

[Anonymous]

I say teamwork makes the dream work

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: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.

I’m a mom who works overnights in a hospital so that I CAN be there for my kids. I’m sleeping, but home during the day if there is any kind of emergency at school or sick child who needs to stay home. I pick my kids up at school every day, drive them to extracurriculars, help with homework, make dinner, and read them stories before bed. Then I take a quick nap and go in to work at midnight.

Working nights is not a “big job.” No one is working nights and doing hospital administration or getting big research dollars. Doctors working nights are taking care of sick people who need emergent care. I don’t know how you can’t see the point of that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: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.

I’m a mom who works overnights in a hospital so that I CAN be there for my kids. I’m sleeping, but home during the day if there is any kind of emergency at school or sick child who needs to stay home. I pick my kids up at school every day, drive them to extracurriculars, help with homework, make dinner, and read them stories before bed. Then I take a quick nap and go in to work at midnight.

Working nights is not a “big job.” No one is working nights and doing hospital administration or getting big research dollars. Doctors working nights are taking care of sick people who need emergent care. I don’t know how you can’t see the point of that.

Sorry about the rant.

I agree with you, OP. My sister is 10 years younger than I am, and she is about your age. I have noticed that there are very different expectations of her husband at home. I’ve seen this with my residents too. I’m not a surgeon or in any high intensity field, but over the last 10 years or so, I’ve started seeing expectations shift, and men with kids are expected to take leave when their babies are born, to need to leave on time, and to take occasional sick days to take care of children. 10-15 years ago, the expectation was that men had no responsibilities outside of work, and their wives (or someone?) would handle everything.