Disagreement about third child

Ericka Kammerer wrote:
bizby40 wrote:


No, but shopping is one of my duties,

I know that sort of things works for some families, but
it always sticks in my craw to hear stuff like that. I have
jobs around the house that I typically do because it makes sense
for me to do them, but I never feel like any particular household
job is my "duty."

I've WOH most of my adult life, with a few years when I didn't. When I
wasn't full-time WOH or WAH, I was surprised to find I also felt that
running the house was "my job."

There are folks I was close to who were rather like that: They had a
distinct sense of separate spheres. Rather well-defended separate
spheres, I might add, and not necessarily the traditional ones.

OTOH, some others have situations where each spouse feels fully
empowered to be involved in the other's sphere. Sounds rather nice and
equitable, but it can be a pain. One person's "help"is another's
"interference"

Rupa

In article ,
Ericka Kammerer wrote:

SAHPs of babies and toddlers have the least autonomy of
anyone I know, in the workplace or out (perhaps barring certain
kinds of jobs).

I think I had less autonomy about schedules when my kids were around 9
until they were around 16. For a while, I was living with 4 teens, and
the amount of time I spent driving to rehearsals, school, therapists,
doctors, and other miscellaneous events whose timing was not entirely
within my control was downright staggering! There were individual days
when I might spend as much as six hours in the car (some of that was
waiting for one of the kids to get done with an appointment -- and I
could read a book or do a crossword puzzle -- but it was still time that
I was stuck on someone else's schedule.)
--
Children won't care how much you know until they know how much you care

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In article ,
Ericka Kammerer wrote:

SAHPs of babies and toddlers have the least autonomy of
anyone I know, in the workplace or out (perhaps barring certain
kinds of jobs).

I think I had less autonomy about schedules when my kids were around 9
until they were around 16. For a while, I was living with 4 teens, and
the amount of time I spent driving to rehearsals, school, therapists,
doctors, and other miscellaneous events whose timing was not entirely
within my control was downright staggering! There were individual days
when I might spend as much as six hours in the car (some of that was
waiting for one of the kids to get done with an appointment -- and I
could read a book or do a crossword puzzle -- but it was still time that
I was stuck on someone else's schedule.)
--
Children won't care how much you know until they know how much you care

"P. Tierney" wrote in message
news:vhQae.12012$c24.2499@attbi_s72...
"Circe" wrote in message
news:_VPae.18093$%c1.10674@fed1read05...
"P. Tierney" wrote in message
news:CBGae.15454$r53.2741@attbi_s21...
"Ericka Kammerer" wrote in message
...
P. Tierney wrote:
It may not be to that person if that person were doing it.
It's an individual perspective. Whether or not one considers
what I do work, not really work, or whatever from her or his
point of view doesn't matter a whole lot to me. It isn't
*necessarily* denigrating.

Well, I wouldn't really give a rip what Joe Blow off
the street thought of what I did, but if my partner thought
that I was on vacation all day every day such that I didn't
really need a break during a family vacation, it sure as heck
*would* bother me.

I don't see that one who might considers it "less work"
would be akin to a "vacation all day every day".

But we were discussing a situation in which the WOH partner does seem to
view what the SAH partner does as "not work" and therefore that the SAH
partner *is* on "vacation all day every day". THAT'S a problem, don't
you
think?

Sure, but this has branched out into other areas related to that
issue. Were it only about that one narrow situation, then the thread
would have ended a long time ago, I think.


Well, yeah. But I think this one situation raised a broader discussion
precisely because it's not an especially unusual situation. I don't think
it's at all uncommon in families with one WOH partner and one SAH partner
for the WOH partner to believe that what the SAH partner is doing isn't
really "work" because it doesn't bring in a paycheck. And, while I think a
lot of credit has been given by both sides of this discussion to the value
of what the SAHP does, I *do* think the fact that we are continuing to
debate the degree to which SAH parenting is "work" is confirms my belief
that bizby's situation is hardly unique.

What I find most fascinating in these discussions is the degree to which the
modern industrial workplace along with feminist ideals about work and
careers and about *not* dividing labor based on gender have probably
*undermined* the position of SAHPs in the familial "economy". When the
center of economic production is the household (remember, the word economy
is derived from the Greek "oikos", which means house!), I doubt anyone
involved in that household is ever left with the impression that his/her
contribution to the functioning of the family doesn't have an economic
effect. My father was raised on a dairy farm in Minnesota in the '30s and
'40s, and I *know* no one in his family would have dreamed of suggesting
that his mother didn't work as much as his father! What she did was
*different* than what his father did, but it was all part and parcel of
ensuring the economic survival of the family. (Of course, the kids
contributed, too, by doing many of the chores essential to running a farm.)

Anyway, what I'm getting at here is that I think the family *is* the basic
economic unit. The idea that what a SAH spouse contributes to the family is
in any essential way different from what the wage-earning spouse contributes
troubles me. I think both partners are making an equal contribution to the
functioning of the economic unit. The fact that there are personal and
emotional concerns as well doesn't change that as far as I'm concerned.
--
Be well, Barbara
Mom to Mr. Congeniality (7), the Diva (5) and the Race Car Fanatic (3)

I have PMS and ESP...I'm the bitch who knows everything! (T-shirt slogan)

dragonlady wrote:
In article ,
Ericka Kammerer wrote:


SAHPs of babies and toddlers have the least autonomy of
anyone I know, in the workplace or out (perhaps barring certain
kinds of jobs).


I think I had less autonomy about schedules when my kids were around 9
until they were around 16. For a while, I was living with 4 teens, and
the amount of time I spent driving to rehearsals, school, therapists,
doctors, and other miscellaneous events whose timing was not entirely
within my control was downright staggering! There were individual days
when I might spend as much as six hours in the car (some of that was
waiting for one of the kids to get done with an appointment -- and I
could read a book or do a crossword puzzle -- but it was still time that
I was stuck on someone else's schedule.)

;-) I don't have four teens (and won't!). It's pretty
busy with two school aged kids and a toddler, but I was discounting
the school-aged kids activities because they are optional for the
most part. In other words, they had to get my agreement to do them,
and I could have said no without doing horrible and irreparable
damage to them ;-)

Best wishes,
Ericka

"Banty" wrote in message
...
I look at it this way - the household is a unit - family, extended family,
couple, single. The *point* of the household unit is to fulfill the needs
of
the members and to strive to fulfill wants as well. Some portion of the
available resources - energy, time, knowledge gets hired out by most
because
there aren't resources already. The job and income is but a means to that
end.
Everyone's role is important. But the household is a *personal* unit, and
it's
only as economic as it needs or wants to be.

And I'd argue that the household is the basic economic unit. (As I already
said elsewhere in the thread, let's not to forget that the root of the word
economy is "oikos", which means house.) A household can be more or less
"economic" to the extent that it can make choices about how much it must
earn to function (though even there, the choices can be limited or expanded
by many factors), but it must earn *something*: it cannot survive on air.

There are happy functioning families living off the land with only
sporadic
income - I've met them.

Perhaps you are confusing money with income g? Families who are "living
off the land" are earning an *income* whether they ever have a dime in their
pockets or not. By definition, if they are "functioning", they have enough
to eat (and they are getting that somewhere, I presume), a roof over their
heads (I won't ask how they pay the mortage/taxes/etc. if they have no money
at all, but the point stands), and clothes on their backs. They wouldn't be
functioning if they weren't. But if they get all of that stuff without
money, they *must* have income.

I'm not saying we should live like them :-) But there's the essence.
The
household is personal.

But in the case of the family who's living off the land, there's no argument
over who's "working" and who isn't, is there? Presumably, such a family is
doing some form of subsistence agriculture and, as such, the household *is*
the workplace and the workplace *is* the household. There's no distinction
between the place where the economic unit ends and the personal unit begins.
--
Be well, Barbara
Mom to Mr. Congeniality (7), the Diva (5) and the Race Car Fanatic (3)

I have PMS and ESP...I'm the bitch who knows everything! (T-shirt slogan)

"Banty" wrote in message
...
In article , bizby40 says...
"toto" wrote in message
.. .
He couldn't pick that up on the way to or from work?

There are 24 hour pharmacies that carry these things, so I don't see
that you needed to get this for him.

No, but shopping is one of my duties, and he's tired enough on the way
home
not to have to go out of his way and go to a crowded store to get
something.
I did tell him I had a busy day and didn't know if I could get it, and he
said he thought he had some in his travel bag. And then I did manage to
squeeze it in since I had to go to town anyway. So it all worked out.

The poor, poor dear. So tired at the end of the day.

And you fall for it hook, line, and sinker.

You know, my husband *is* tired at the end of the day when he's left for the
office a little before 8am, fought an hour's worth (or more) of traffic to
arrive there, worked 9-10 hours, then fought another hour's worth of traffic
to arrive back home. I don't want him to take another 15-20 minutes to stop
to get something on the way home; I want him *home* and he wants to *get*
home! He's gone long enough every day, thank you very much, and we both want
to be together as a family.

So, in a case like this, I might be a little annoyed to have such an errand
sprung on me at the last minute, but it would be much less an imposition on
me to do it than for him. If push came to shove and I simply didn't get a
chance, then I might well call him and tell him I didn't get to it and
suggest he stop on the way home if it really couldn't wait until the next
day. But that would *really* be the solution of last resort!
--
Be well, Barbara
Mom to Mr. Congeniality (7), the Diva (5) and the Race Car Fanatic (3)

I have PMS and ESP...I'm the bitch who knows everything! (T-shirt slogan)

Circe wrote:

Anyway, what I'm getting at here is that I think the family *is* the basic
economic unit. The idea that what a SAH spouse contributes to the family is
in any essential way different from what the wage-earning spouse contributes
troubles me. I think both partners are making an equal contribution to the
functioning of the economic unit. The fact that there are personal and
emotional concerns as well doesn't change that as far as I'm concerned.

I would agree. The life of a family is enabled by all the
individuals' input in a multitude of areas--whether it shows up as a
line item on the bank statement or not. It's an interdependent system.

Best wishes,
Ericka

"Banty" wrote in message
...
In article 804be.4199$WX.1818@trndny01, Donna says...
Here is what I haven't seen discussed (but I've been in and out of this
thread, so I may have missed it): Regardless of whether the primary
caretaker of the family is working outside the home or inside the home,
how
does that person *ever* get a vacation from those responsibilities? DH
and
I are planning to rent a house for a week on the ocean with the kids at
the
end of the summer. I've asked (well, decided, actually) that we will
hire a
cleaning service to clean the house at the end of the rental so that I
don't
have to, but beyond that, I know that there is no way that I will be
relieved of the (primary) responsibilities of cooking, daily tidying,
child
care, scheduling, etc, etc, etc.

Why not?

Well, who's going to be doing those things during the vacation if Donna
doesn't?
--
Be well, Barbara
Mom to Mr. Congeniality (7), the Diva (5) and the Race Car Fanatic (3)

I have PMS and ESP...I'm the bitch who knows everything! (T-shirt slogan)

"Donna" wrote in message
news:804be.4199$WX.1818@trndny01...
Here is what I haven't seen discussed (but I've been in and out of this
thread, so I may have missed it): Regardless of whether the primary
caretaker of the family is working outside the home or inside the home,
how
does that person *ever* get a vacation from those responsibilities? DH
and
I are planning to rent a house for a week on the ocean with the kids at
the
end of the summer. I've asked (well, decided, actually) that we will hire
a
cleaning service to clean the house at the end of the rental so that I
don't
have to, but beyond that, I know that there is no way that I will be
relieved of the (primary) responsibilities of cooking, daily tidying,
child
care, scheduling, etc, etc, etc.

For me, the primary difference between going on vacation and being the SAH
parent is that when we are on vacation, there are *two* adults to do all of
those taks you just listed instead of just one (me). My husband is more than
willing to take on a lot of those responsibilities while we're vacationing,
so while I might not get *complete* break from the primary tasks of
parenting, I get enough help doing them that it seems like a break!
--
Be well, Barbara
Mom to Mr. Congeniality (7), the Diva (5) and the Race Car Fanatic (3)

I have PMS and ESP...I'm the bitch who knows everything! (T-shirt slogan)