Pros and Cons regarding staying home as opposed to working full- or part-time:
Pros:
- More time with babe
- More time with The Bee
- Our boundaries for where to buy a house would be easier to define (The Bee and I work about 20 miles away from each other, in opposite directions of the major cities. Me leaving my current school would make living near his office more logical).
- When I am ready to go back to teaching, I will have an area near our home/The Bee's job to focus my search
- Time to pursue my own art again
- Grocery shopping during the day with the babe (instead of after work in the dark with the babe)
- More time for whole foods, home cooked meals
- Daytime used for some house work so evenings can be spent with The Bee
- Story time at the library (for some reason I am really sad that I never get to do this with the babe)
- The Bee coming home for lunch
- Less car/commute time for all of us!
- Play dates with cousins and friends
- Trading daycare with my sister so I still get a little time for my sanity
- In the words of a co-worker, our school is a "sinking ship." I can bail out now before things get really bad.
- I would be home when the babe was sick...no more scrambling to get sub plans done at 4am or arguments about who needs to adjust their work schedule (this was a disaster in December when the stomach flu hit. I was home with the babe for 3 days in one week. The following week, she couldn't go to daycare due to illness at my sister's house so The Bee stayed home with her in the morning and then the babe came to school with me in the afternoon...thank God it worked that day due to special events so I was not teaching regular classes!)
- I would be able to take the babe to doctors appointments without having to miss work/make sub plans
Cons:
- Lapse in my teaching license
- Lapse in employment
- Isolation of being home instead of in the working world
- Losing touch with the real world (this doesn't happen to all SAHM's, but I know a few who are so out of touch with everyone/everything except their own little families)
- Less income
- No breaks (at school right now I get 50 minute lunches 2 days a week, 25 minute lunches 3 days a week)
- Long stretches without adult conversation
- No more Caribou and Starbucks giftcards at Christmas from students (Ha - I am seriously going to miss this! We haven't had to pay cash for coffee out for the last 5 years. Mind you, we maybe go to coffee shops once a month, but it is still a perk I will miss!)
- Missing teaching. I do find some real joy in making art with my students.
So I agree with your pros and cons about staying home - basically sometimes it sucks being alone with small children and no adults, but that's why we stay busy and schedule lots of activities with other moms/kids throughout the week. I also love being able to get most chores/errands done during the day so we don't have to waste nights/weekends playing catch-up, like you pointed out. In the end, for me, the sacrifice of money and adult time is totally worth it for me - you can't get these years back, right? I know it would be a big change, but I don't think you'd regret it for a second :) good luck!!
ReplyDeleteI have done both and while I loved staying at home when my kids were super little but once my youngest was 1, I got bored and became unhappy. Also our lifestyle suffered while I was a SAHM. My husbands makes a good living but we had to cut back on dinners out, vacations, new clothes. I know - I am materialistic. Now I work part time, about 20 -25 hours per week and I love it. I feel like I get the best of both worlds. I work in the am and I am home in the afternoon. I have a 6 year old in Kindergarten and a 2 year old in MDO. I won't lie - mornings are hectic getting two kids out the door to separate schools. I still get plenty of quality time with my kids and I have time to make dinners, take care of my family, and stay on top of household chores. It is also nice to get out of the house and interact with adults and have a extra spending money. The extra money is so nice to have now that my kids are getting older and their activities are increasing with increased cost. I mean swim lessons, gymnastics, ballet, soccer are all much more expensive than I imagined. I think your pro and con list is pretty right on. I don't think there is an wrong decision. I have friends that love staying home and friends that love working. Both choices come with some sacrifices. Just know that what you decide now, is not the decision for the rest of your life. You know what it is like to be a working mom and you could try staying at home for a year or two and see how it goes. One friend told me to try living of my husbands income only for three months and see if our lifestyle was comfy for us before I took the plunge and quit my job. sorry for the novel. Good luck with your decision. By the way, I am a friend of Allison and Amanda. Not just a crazy random blog reader.
ReplyDeleteThis is a really good list!! But your point about your school being a 'sinking ship' is really compelling-- if things start going super downhill there, then suddenly working could add a whole bunch of cons all in itself...if it starts being super stressful, you have to cover extra classes/lose planning and lunch periods...it really could be even less worth it.
ReplyDeleteHere is an article that explains how I feel about that whole "teaching" thing. If you can still call it that. I know you are an art teacher but this all still has to hit you as well.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.courant.com/news/opinion/hc-op-natale-teacher-ready-to-quit-over-common-cor-20140117,0,6264603.story
If you decided to stay home, could you teach a private art class one night a week so you could still have a little independence of your own to maybe satisfy that part of you that is still questioning wether or not to quit?
I am an artist / art therapist and currently a SAHM so I can speak directly to being able to work on your art as a SAHM ... It's not going to happen unless you get someone to watch your kid. I don't know your schedule right now, but likely the only days you are home all day with baby is when your husband is also home, but when you are solo home all day those nap times are not as productive as they should be. At least, this is the case for me. I need to relax and they aren't long enough for me to fully unwind and then get started working on a project. The only times I have made anything recently have been days when I had a babysitter or when my husband took the kids for an entire Sunday and I went out to my friend's studio to work.
ReplyDeleteLong stretches without adult conversation are wearing me down in weird ways. Like the last several months I only get to see friends maybe once or twice a week (the other days I take the kids to classes but I'm not really friends with the moms there). I kind of feel like my social skills are declining a little? Like I space out while people are talking to me because I am thinking about logistical things (groceries, upcoming travel prep, etc) even when I am not around my kids. AND lately I have been feeling awkward because unless I avidly read the news or whatever, I feel like I have nothing to talk about in non-baby-related social situations.
I am looking at going to work part time, hopefully starting in the spring. And also creating a real studio space - with a door! - in the house, so I can leave my supplies set up on the table and not have to clean up after 5 minutes of art making (makes me feell ike it's not worth getting started!) I also took an art class in the evenings for a couple of weeks, it was invigorating.
I am a blog reader of Erika's who randomly clicked over to your post tonight and thought I would give my two cents!
ReplyDeleteI became a SAHM last April when my son was 7 months, so I'm getting close to having this under my belt for a year now. Getting to become a SAHM mom was a dream for me. Just having to go to work was one major con for me, I was so sad to have to send my son to daycare. There are definitely some loooooooong days, but there is no way I would trade these days for anything. Find yourself a MOPS group, or friends at church who have kids the same age and schedule play dates! Do fun stuff a few times through the week to help break up the days.
I would suggest being realistic about what all you will get done during the day. I read somewhere that you are a stay at home MOM, not a house cleaner, chef, etc. While there are some days that go according to plan and it's picked up when dad gets home and I have dinner ready at a decent hour, it doesn't usually always happen that way. I can get a meal done, but seems as if as soon as my son wakes up from nap he destroys all of the cleaning I just did! :) I do try to do as much as I can, but I give myself a lot of slack on the days when my mom duties kept me from accomplishing anything else!
I think you will probably love it, but I've had friends who only made it 6 weeks before they realized they were better working and their kids did better in daycare. They're happily working again now, so it wouldn't be the end of the world if you wanted to go back to work!