Reply to Are you offended when someone says they “didnt want someone else to raise my kids”?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]To be fair, women who aren't motherly or patient by nature, wouldn't their kids be better off getting raised by fathers, grandparents or hired help?[/quote]

Just don’t call it raising. It hurts too many feelings. Call it something like “spending significant awake hours with” and you have to assume almost nothing happens during that time.[/quote]

That doesn’t work because some SAHM think being there during nap time is significant to their kids lives and some colder so they are literally in bed with them.[/quote]

Working mom here and I actually do think there is value when kids are very young (babies) to being near or with parents when they are napping. My sister is a developmental psychologist and turned me onto both attachment theory and the idea of "co-regulation" as a way to teach kids how to regulate emotions. The safety and security of sleeping in the vicinity of a parent as a baby may have real value to the parent-child relationship, and babies who learn to calm by co-regulating their bodies (breathing, heart rate) with a calm adult may do a better job calming themselves as they grow older due to modeling.

I was able to cobble together a European-style maternity leave (4 mo paid leave from generous employer, 1 week stored vacation and sick leave, 4 mo unpaid leave, and a 3 month "on ramp" where I started with just two mornings a week and then built back up to 32 hours adding both in-office and WFH hours) and I'm a real believer in the value of being physically present for very young children. And I stayed at 32 hours so even now I have a ton of flexibility-- if I didn't I'd probably seriously consider being a SAHM at least until my kid was older. But I recognize this is not a realistic option for most parents, including my DH who wanted to take a longer leave (and we could have afforded it even if unpaid) but his employer gave it a hard no. I was extremely fortunate to do what I did.

I wouldn't blink or be offended if a SAHM told me she wanted to stay home because she "didn't want someone else raising" her kids. I get it. I think in an ideal world you wouldn't have to choose but in the US you often do. I view it as a criticism of US's lack of supports for the parents of young kids and poor options for childcare. Work culture in the US is generally very anti-family and anti-child specifically. We have done very little as a family to enable families to engage in "best practices" in terms of early childhood development.[/quote]

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