Clean
or Messy Houses
When moms working out-of-the house
leave their homes, they stay clean or messy, the way they were left. The
kitchen is not being used, the kids are not being fed in that house, because
someone else is watching them; paid or unpaid.
When stay-at-home moms stay home –
especially with small children – they are at home preparing a meal every 2-3
hours and messing up the kitchen. The kids (if healthy) will mess up the
house – constantly. And since she’s home, mom decides she should
take care of various household chores, tasks, and projects, creating more mess.
Schedule
and Structure vs. Utter Chaos
Working moms’ days are more
scheduled and structured – they simply cannot change their day, or drop
everything to tend to someone else’s needs. No one thinks working moms
“don’t have anything better to do”, so they are not asked as often to
drop everything to stop at the bank, or pick up the dry cleaning in the middle
of their important scheduled work time – So less interruptions and falling
behind with work.
Stay-at-home moms can go from
cooking to cleaning to running errands to sitting in a pediatrician’s office
for hours. It’s very hard to keep a schedule when everyone, including the
working mom thinks, her job is not that important. It can be done later,
let’s help everyone else.
Helping
Hands
Husbands of working mothers are more
likely to help as well, because of the same thing – the working mom is busy and
needs help. I hear it all the time; they help in the kitchen more
often, bathe or tell kids bed time stories. Hey, some even help with
homework!
But why would stay-at-home moms need
help, anyways? They stay home and do nothing all day! Sometimes
they clean house, but how hard is that, right? Even some grandparents and
other friends and family tend to think along these lines. Although
stay-at-home moms have the privilege to stay with their kids and raise them
themselves (and it is a privilege), that doesn’t mean its endless bliss.
Grown-Up
Time
When away at work, working moms get
to socialize with co-workers, be it a good thing or bad. They get to
interact with other adults – people who think on their level. When they
get home, they start fresh, anew with their lovely kids and change pace – mom’s
happy to see them because they’ve been apart all day. Then, at the end of
a week or two, they get a check; be it large or small – it’s a check, even if
they pay bills with all of it, it’s their own money.
Stay-at-home moms deal with children
all day, many of whom never seem to tire of fighting, yelling, arguing, and
throwing fits. Kids want attention when mom is trying to do her chores or
work on something important. Stay-at-home moms hardly get to watch the
shows they want to, since baby is watching Sprout, or the kids have cartoons
after school, or their husband wants to rule the remote when he gets home from
work.
Achievements
vs. Laundry
Working moms get to partake in
projects and assignments that, while challenging and even irritating, actually
accomplish something in the end. This can be anything from contributing
to a presentation or landing a great client for the company – the fact is, she
gets to see some kind of progress.
Stay-at-home moms have jobs that are
redundant and never ending, so they don’t get to feel self-actualized until the
babies are older – IF they did a good job. There’s always the guilty
feeling of, no matter what you do ALL day long, “Did I really spend enough time
with the kids?” just like any working mom.
Compensation
No matter how many years they work,
or how much over-time they put in, stay-at-home moms do not get any physical
checks – not even a measly little one. Every bit of money spent, the
stay-at-home mom knows, came from her husband. Although not right, this
type mom will never feel the money is 100% hers.
A lot of working mothers tease,
thinking they have it worse, but at least they have a schedule, a place to go
and some self-actualization.
In the end, being a mom is a
challenge, no matter how you approach it. Stay-at-home moms should got a
little more credit and respect for the work they do; it is, in no way at all,
the “easy way out” of working – in fact, it’s probably the most work you’ll
ever do, and definitely among the most underappreciated.
Moms have to be chefs, managers,
event coordinators, mediators, counselors, decorators, accountants, and even
other miscellaneous tasks, like music teachers and seamstresses. There is
virtually no way to train for being a mother, yet society tends to look down on
these women as “not doing anything with their lives” – not doing
anything? How about shaping the mind and heart of a human being so that
they can be a powerful, contributing factor in society?
Moms do hard, hard work, whether
they go into an office every day or stay at home. It’s important that
everyone – including mothers themselves – recognize how hard a mom works and
appreciates all the big (and little) things that moms do every day .
Wanna be a mom???
