In Your Shoes

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Stay At Home Parents

Hello Stay at Home Parents!

I feel like sort of a cheat since I'm back to work now. But I did take a year off to raise my daughter and in many ways it was one of the hardest years of my life- so so so much change.

What's your stay at home story? What's it like for you? I'd love to hear other full time parents share their stories.

Here's a link to mine:

community.greatschools.net/advice/35/Staying-at-Home-with-Your-Kids-Can-Be-Rewarding-and-Isolating

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Parent Replies to "In Your Shoes"

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I've been home since I my son was just about 3. When he was 10, my daughter was born. My son is now 17 and my daughter will be 7 next month. I took a degree in English and a few continuing education courses and started working as a freelance copyeditor and proofreader. Now I'm doing more permissions work, but thanks to the Internet, it's a great job where I can make my own hours and send emails at any time of the day or night. After several corporate acquisitions, I became really concerned for my husband's job security as a textbook editor, and after a concerted effort to pay off our home, I encouraged him to work from home as well.

The income isn't always predictable, buying our own health insurance isn't fun, but having both of us home and spending time as a family has been worth the occasional frustration. Our children have grown up knowing that family comes first and money isn't everything (although security is a big bonus).

We can both make every water polo play off game, every holiday musical program, and help in the classroom at any hour.

As my son has been getting his acceptance letters and I realize we're down to just 6 months of his living at home, I know we made the right decision. We'll be able to enjoy the next ten years with my daughter knowing we spent every moment we could with our son.

I have 2 kids, 10 & 2 1/2 - and tjlove's right about it being a wonderful thing to be able to stay at home and about the flipside of being isolated.
I never was great friends with people from work, so once I left the workplace no longer associating with those people wasn't a problem.
But my non parent friends both working and not slowly began dropping away until I only had friends through my husband, and they weren't people I could go to lunch with or speak to on a regular basis. I truly was isolated.
When my daughter and I joined a homeschool play group (when she was in 1st grade) I began to make new friends and I'm still friends with 2 of them. The funny thing is that coincidentally when I decided to put her in a Montessori school those 2 friends did the same, and at the same school and since then we've grown to be even closer friends. But even at that, they're not "great" friends who I could rely on.
Over these years of being at home I've learned that making lasting friends is difficult, and I now have a very good friend who I speak to on a regular basis and I'm expanding my circle of possibilities through my home-based business which is geared toward women who like to cook and entertain and naturally includes a lot of at-home moms.
I like being an at home mom, but I miss being in the work place.
Because I have a chronic illness that prevents my working full or even half time, going back to work is never going to be an option, so having my own business that allows me the freedom to control my health and spend quality time with my family is wonderful because it's brought me a little bit of that socialization that I desperately needed back in my life.

My son is nine and I've always been at home with him. I wouldn't do it any other way. It works for me, for others it doesn't. We do a lot of things together and if he needs help with homework or at school I'm able to help him. I feel very lucky to be able to share this part of his life with him. At times it gets frustrating but all in all I wouldn't do it any other way, unless I had to. A lot of parents aren't able to do it due to work. I've been a stay at home mom for 22 years. My eldest child is 22 and my middle kids are 20 and 18. They are all on their own now and it's just the little one at home. It's great but tough sometimes but I really think it must be so much harder for moms or dads who must work and then come home and do all the things I do every day! They must be exhausted. I have a lot of respect for working parents.

I was a working mom before I became a SAHM. My husband and I were working different shifts and I worked around his hours so we wouldn't have to take them to daycare or hire a babysitter (we really couldn't afford it.). I found that I missed seeing my husband and I missed the boy's terribly. I was miserable being away from them so my husband and I talked about it and we decided I would be a SAHM. The boy's were two years old and six months old when I became a SAHM. It was really hard to make the adjustment in the beginning but I don't even look back now. The boy's are now almost eight (in March) and one that just turned six on Jan. 3rd. We've had to budget things a little more since we are only on one income but for our family it was a good decision.

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