What are the best years to stay at home (SAHM)?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is a reason young people have a mental health crisis in high school and early college years. Their emotional needs weren't met properly due to today's busy lifestyles. That goes for both at home or outside parents. Make time for your teens. Making them logistically independent makes life easier but there is more to do for their emotional wellbeing.

No way. Parents spend more time with their children now than any generation. Perhaps you can blame the over scheduling. But if you want to blame parental time spent with kids, you’d need to blame the fact parents now spend more time with their children.

Truth is that kids want to hang with other kids. I can’t help but think kids playing with other kids in the neighborhood while mom is busy is way better for mental health than some anxious mom breathing down her kid’s neck every afternoon and treating the child like a FT job.

This. Parents are with their kids way more, and give them way more supervision nowadays. Even in the past, those of us with SAHMs were often allowed to roam the neighborhood, out of our mothers' watch, plus families were bigger. Now parents watch kids like hawks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is a reason young people have a mental health crisis in high school and early college years. Their emotional needs weren't met properly due to today's busy lifestyles. That goes for both at home or outside parents. Make time for your teens. Making them logistically independent makes life easier but there is more to do for their emotional wellbeing.

No way. Parents spend more time with their children now than any generation. Perhaps you can blame the over scheduling. But if you want to blame parental time spent with kids, you’d need to blame the fact parents now spend more time with their children.

Truth is that kids want to hang with other kids. I can’t help but think kids playing with other kids in the neighborhood while mom is busy is way better for mental health than some anxious mom breathing down her kid’s neck every afternoon and treating the child like a FT job.

The problem is that either other kids are over scheduled and never available to hang out, or that they don’t live in the same neighborhood and they can only get together if an adult is available to drive them. I’m not needed so I can hang out with my kid, I am needed so my kid can hang out with friends.

[Anonymous]

This depends on if your kid is in travel sports, gymnastics, hates after-school activities... I would stay home 4-8 or 3-7 if they are social enough to make friends
and find carpools.

[Anonymous]

Some anxiety in parents is nature's way of keeping children safe. Just look up how many children get molested and multiply it with 10 because most cases aren't reported.

[Anonymous]

We're in an elementary school district that doesn't even end until 4:15 PM so most kid activities here lean pretty late. I chose to take a very flexible job where i can leave early so I usually have some time to run an errand or two and still do kid stuff.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some anxiety in parents is nature's way of keeping children safe. Just look up how many children get molested and multiply it with 10 because most cases aren't reported.

It’s not the Uber driver molesting the kids. It’s a trusted adult like an uncle or stepdad. Not sure how being a sahm would stop that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some anxiety in parents is nature's way of keeping children safe. Just look up how many children get molested and multiply it with 10 because most cases aren't reported.

It’s not the Uber driver molesting the kids. It’s a trusted adult like an uncle or stepdad. Not sure how being a sahm would stop that.

Or an older child like a stepsibling or cousin

[Anonymous]

0-10.

[Anonymous]

l think the posters disagreeing with being a SAHM during the teen years are missing a few points.

1. Teens are SO different. Someone upthread said that the ideal life for teens is hanging out with neighborhood friends while the mom works. I personally don’t know any teens who do this. A lot of teens don’t live in a neighborhood with people they would want to hang out with, and a lot of teens these days don’t even have friends they hang out with outside of school hours. I let DD do whatever she wants after school—with the exception of isolating in her bedroom with a device—and there are many times when she chooses to chat with me.

2. A lot of people are saying that the key is having a flexible job. Of course a flexible job is ideal! But that pay decently are not available to all of us.

3. Being home with a teenager doesn’t mean breathing down their necks. If you assume say that, you’re conversing in bad faith or generalizing based on some bad parenting you’ve seen.

4. Mental health today is worse and it’s a parents job to do what they can to help a kid navigate this. Maybe that means working full-time, maybe it means being more available to the child. As I said before, all kids are different.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:SAHM to 5 kids 7-15. I’ve been home all along, but I can honestly say my middle and high schoolers have benefitted tremendously from me being home. So many things they wouldn’t have been able to do if I wasn’t available. They also need a lot more emotional support. I didn’t really expect this to be honest. The needs just change as they grow.

I work at a school. I’m literally available more than my kids because they do after school activities. Being home while they are at school doesn’t benefit them. It’s fine if you want to do it, but as long as someone is available after school, it doesn’t matter if they work during the day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most parents underestimate how much care, guidance and supervision teens need.

They actually don’t need that much compared to younger children. It’s just that over parenting has become the norm now, to the detriment of the well being of teenagers and the process of trying to become independent adults one day.

There is a post today on this forum from someone who wants to know if their 14 year old can take Uber. Think about that. A parent wanting to put their underage child in a car with a stranger so the stranger can drive off with them.

That was my post. I am a SAHM of 3 kids wanting to go back to work. While it is somewhat easier to put my younger kids in all day camp, my future freshman in high school will need a ride to fall sports that starts in late July. I don’t know what time these sports will be but I know it is not all day and definitely won’t line up with my future potential work schedule.

My youngest is 6 and oldest is 14. I will have 3 kids in elementary, middle and high school this fall. Right now I am childfree 9-2.

My husband has a very demanding and also high paying career. I would like to go back to work and I feel if I don’t go back now, I will never go back.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most parents underestimate how much care, guidance and supervision teens need.

They actually don’t need that much compared to younger children. It’s just that over parenting has become the norm now, to the detriment of the well being of teenagers and the process of trying to become independent adults one day.

There is a post today on this forum from someone who wants to know if their 14 year old can take Uber. Think about that. A parent wanting to put their underage child in a car with a stranger so the stranger can drive off with them.

That was my post. I am a SAHM of 3 kids wanting to go back to work. While it is somewhat easier to put my younger kids in all day camp, my future freshman in high school will need a ride to fall sports that starts in late July. I don’t know what time these sports will be but I know it is not all day and definitely won’t line up with my future potential work schedule.

My youngest is 6 and oldest is 14. I will have 3 kids in elementary, middle and high school this fall. Right now I am childfree 9-2.

My husband has a very demanding and also high paying career. I would like to go back to work and I feel if I don’t go back now, I will never go back.

Good for you. There’s never a great time to go back to work and if you want to do so then you have to make it happen. Not having a job because of an extracurricular activity is nuts and that’s why you’re looking for a solution like Uber. Can you imagine a conversation 20 years from now where your child asks why you didn’t work and your response is “because you had soccer every Monday”?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most parents underestimate how much care, guidance and supervision teens need.

They actually don’t need that much compared to younger children. It’s just that over parenting has become the norm now, to the detriment of the well being of teenagers and the process of trying to become independent adults one day.

There is a post today on this forum from someone who wants to know if their 14 year old can take Uber. Think about that. A parent wanting to put their underage child in a car with a stranger so the stranger can drive off with them.

That was my post. I am a SAHM of 3 kids wanting to go back to work. While it is somewhat easier to put my younger kids in all day camp, my future freshman in high school will need a ride to fall sports that starts in late July. I don’t know what time these sports will be but I know it is not all day and definitely won’t line up with my future potential work schedule.

My youngest is 6 and oldest is 14. I will have 3 kids in elementary, middle and high school this fall. Right now I am childfree 9-2.

My husband has a very demanding and also high paying career. I would like to go back to work and I feel if I don’t go back now, I will never go back.

You are fine. Ignore the PP. I was a longtime SAHM and have nothing against them, but some on this site will use literally any excuse to avoid working. And they must shoot down and solutions given, because then their justification goes away. I know at my DD’s HS, they are very cognizant of working parents, and also many of the coaches have non-school jobs and therefore practices in the summer often don’t start until 5:30 or later. Maybe ask a friend or neighbor with older kids if they know how it works.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:l think the posters disagreeing with being a SAHM during the teen years are missing a few points.

1. Teens are SO different. Someone upthread said that the ideal life for teens is hanging out with neighborhood friends while the mom works. I personally don’t know any teens who do this. A lot of teens don’t live in a neighborhood with people they would want to hang out with, and a lot of teens these days don’t even have friends they hang out with outside of school hours. I let DD do whatever she wants after school—with the exception of isolating in her bedroom with a device—and there are many times when she chooses to chat with me.

2. A lot of people are saying that the key is having a flexible job. Of course a flexible job is ideal! But that pay decently are not available to all of us.

3. Being home with a teenager doesn’t mean breathing down their necks. If you assume say that, you’re conversing in bad faith or generalizing based on some bad parenting you’ve seen.

4. Mental health today is worse and it’s a parents job to do what they can to help a kid navigate this. Maybe that means working full-time, maybe it means being more available to the child. As I said before, all kids are different.

DP, and one who does disagree that the teen years are most critical for a SAHP:

Sure, teens are different, but MOST teens do shift their primary support from family to peers as part of the developmental process. That doesn’t mean they don’t enjoy or need their parents - they absolutely do - but most of them don’t regularly prefer their parents’ company over that of their peers.

It’s true that job flexibility isn’t an option for many, but it’s also true that many people don’t ask for it. Same with part-time work.

When people say that “teens need their parents most,” they almost never reference the fact that teens are in school ~six hours a day and often have other activities that take them out of the home. When developmental experts describe how teens need their parents, it’s as being emotionally available and aware of what their teen is doing and present for those moments. Lisa Damour’s column in the Post the other month about the bedtime conversations is a great example of that. But it’s hard to take the idea of a full-time SAHP for teens seriously when the fact that teens are out of the house often isn’t mentioned.

The mental health crisis in teens is very problematic. Part of it is driven by increased pressure on kids, much of that around achievement. Scaffolding teens’ appropriate independence is useful. So, yes, many teens do need specific supports for their mental health, but assuming that means they need a SAHP seems disingenuous, at least for most kids.

Ultimately, the all or nothing perspective isn’t helpful. Working full-time doesn’t have to mean 60+ hours per week. *Many* more people work from home now, have flexible arrangements, etc. - those aren’t going away. But thinking that working parents can’t support their teens as much as they need is misguided, frankly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:SAHM to 5 kids 7-15. I’ve been home all along, but I can honestly say my middle and high schoolers have benefitted tremendously from me being home. So many things they wouldn’t have been able to do if I wasn’t available. They also need a lot more emotional support. I didn’t really expect this to be honest. The needs just change as they grow.

I work at a school. I’m literally available more than my kids because they do after school activities. Being home while they are at school doesn’t benefit them. It’s fine if you want to do it, but as long as someone is available after school, it doesn’t matter if they work during the day.

+1. I telework from 8-4:30. I have plenty of time with the kids after school, and take them to all of their activities.