Is That All?

If you are like me, you get frustrated when people ask what you do and you say, "I am a stay at home mom," and then they say, "Is that all?" IS THAT ALL? We stay-at-home moms do dishes and laundry all day long. Our house can be spotless and five minutes later, our kids have managed to make our house look like a twister hit it. We have days where we are breaking our back cleaning out closets, bedrooms, bathrooms, wiping snotty noses, cooking, helping out neighbors, washing the sheets, paying bills, not sitting down for a minute to rest. 

It is inevitable that on those days our husbands will ask, "Well, what did you do all day?" Because somehow he has had a memory lapse and forgotten how the house looked before he left and that it is now  a hundred times better. I have had the "my job is harder than your job" argument so many times with my husband. To me there is no argument. I am sure his job is very difficult but my job is more physically challenging and I do not get paid for it.

I don't get company perks or hour lunch breaks. I do get the self fulfillment of somehow believing that since I am staying at home with my children and nurturing them, that they will grow up to be better individuals because of it. I like staying at home with them and doing what my mom did. I have always wanted to stay at home with my kids, it just seems like the most  honorable thing to do.

I think we stay at home moms deserve a lot more credit than we get. I know most of what we do does go unnoticed, but that most of our husbands do realize how much we actually do, and they are very grateful and respect us. Even though they like to act all macho and say they work harder, they would not want to be in our shoes, knowing how hard it really is. I want my kids to grow up being grateful to me for spending so much one-on-one time with them. I know that moms who have to work full time hardly ever get to see their kids, and I know that has got to be hard.  To work all day and still have to come home and throw a meal together and be civil, and not let your children see you too overworked and stressed out, since you only have a few hours with them anyway.

I know most people say that they have to work.  I would rather live on a  tight budget and have some type of stay at home job than to expect my kids to be raised by a day care provider I hardly know. To me the whole point of having kids is to raise them yourself, not pay someone else to do it! My husband's father was a workaholic. He was always gone, trying to
provide for his wife and five kids. My husband says he was a great dad when he was home, but he was rarely home when the kids were awake. My husband swore to himself that he would not do that to his kids. 

My husband is an artist just like his father. No matter how good that sounds on paper, I have come to realize he will never be happy unless he is pursuing his dreams, just like his father. Unfortunately that means he has to travel a lot and be gone a tremendous amount.  It is a hard life to commit to. With our kids having one parent gone a lot, there is no way I could ever leave them all day long with a day care provider and then only see them a few hours every night. It is so sad that so many people have to do that! 

I know after the tragedy of September 11th, many people have rethought a lot of things about their lives. For me, it just solidifies the fact that I need to be at home with my kids, raising them, loving, and nurturing them. This is a horrendous world they're growing up in, and although I cannot shield them from all of those things, I can lay the groundwork for them to understand and deal with it better.  I can teach them that family and love are far more 
important than a paycheck and a job. My kids mean more than that to me!  

Most kids will grow up fine, regardless of whether they have stay- at- home moms, or not.  But for me, I don't trust other people to raise my kids, and I want to spend all the time I can with them in this precarious world.