Did you regret quitting your job to be a stay at home mom?

Best decision I ever made! I could never imagine having a complete stranger raise my children. Sure we struggle a bit more finacially, but I’d rather have no money and my kids know their mother and enjoy life so much more, than to have all the money in the world and not know my own kids.

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not for one second

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Not at all. I love being home with my kids. I worked for a while when my youngest was about 8 months old. It was awful! I missed being with them so much. I’m glad that I’m home again with them!

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Well I didn’t quit, I was fired from my job 3 days before I had my son because my boss didn’t want to deal with maternity leave. I was planning on returning to work as soon as possible, then I held my little boy.

I am and have always been a fiercely independent woman. I was raised believing that women are SUPPOSED to work and that staying home to raise your kids is lazy. It honestly took me about 2 whole years to settle into being a SAHM. I felt like I lost my indentity, my freedom, my independence. It was very difficult for me to adjust and I fought it for a very long time which only made matter worse on me.

I finally decided to sit back and realize what I was doing for my kids, what advantages I was giving them and agreed to sacrifice all of my wants and desires, all of my personal issues, to give them the best life possible. I am now perfectly at peace with being a SAHM and I love what I do. It’s not easy and if you try to hold on to the person you are now, it will make it even more difficult on you.

It is a LIFE changing decision. You have to be willing to completely lose yourself in your children and live for them and for them only. We are such a selfish society anymore and the stereotypes of SAHM’s don’t help at all. You have to be completely willing to sacrifice your life for that child. My 4 year old starts Pre-K in a few months and I’m gonna be devastated. I have 2 more years for the little one to go though. We are doing a wonderful thing for our children and they will be so thankful that we took this time for them. That is the payoff.

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I did when it got to winter and I was stuck in the house. That was the first year. Now my son will be 2 soon and we are expecting another one and I don’t regret it at all. Make sure you do occupy yourself with different activities and get out and meet other moms that stay home. Helps you to have a support network when you have bad days and feel lik eyou are climbing the walls. It was a big adjustment in the beginning, mostly because I didn’t have a lot of adult interactions but I joined kindermusik and my library has a free storytime weekly and that made it a lot better. And nothing compares to seeing every cute thing your child does and getting to witness all the firsts. I don’t like to share my son with anyone, even daddy, so I think I wouldn’t be able to handle someone else taking care of him. I might just be a crazy mom but staying hom was the best decision.

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You need to consider the big picture when making this decision.

My wife and I both work and we have two kids in daycare. There are times when we wish one of us could stay home. Trying to manage a career, our kids, and keep the house up is very difficult and draining physically and emotionally. If one of the kids is sick, we take turns staying home with them.

The Pros of working are:
- Reduced financial risk. If one parent loses a job, not all of the income is gone.
- Increased financial security – you can save money to meet your family’s goals…college funds, retirement, reduction of debt, etc..
- You can continue advancing your career and being marketable. You can take advantage of 401k plans, annual pay raises to increase your earnings, etc…

Cons are….
- It can be difficult to get doctors appointments that work for you and your job. Seems like they always have doctors appointments in the middle of the day…rarely at the end of the day or early morning.
- It’s difficult to manage your job and take care of the kids when the kids are sick.
- There are times when you feel you are missing out on the kid’s early years.

We have a great daycare with low teacher turnover rates and a phenominal center. We are confident that we made the right choice. Had we placed the kids in a lesser center, I might have more reservations. So, it’s important to find good quality care.

I will also tell you that sometimes, stay at home mothers on our block give us the cold shoulder or snide remarks about how they don’t need to send their kids to daycare and how they are going to raise their own kids. We write these comments off due to insecurities on their parts.

Our kids are doing great. We couldn’t come up with as interesting or as creative projects for them to do. They are socially advanced and learning things at a much earlier rate than my wife and I did at their age.

We want our kids to be able to go to college and we don’t want them to be completely in debt when they get out. We also want to show them that both mothers and fathers can have careers and be successful in business. We also want them to learn. We have made the best decision for our family. Ultimately, its up to you to decide what is best for you and your family. You can always try going to work and see how things go and you can always quit later.

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I just had my first in March….I quit my job when I first found out I was pregnant. I love staying home with him. I could not imagine leaving him at daycare and taking the chance of missing his first word….or him rolling over for the first time. It would eat my heart away knowing someone else seen his firsts before me. Also all the work and time he needs plus house work…if I was still working I think I would go crazy!! And you don’t have to stay home 24/7….we go places all the time…out to the park, walk around the mall..etc. I am 24 and was working at a grocery store part time….if I was still working my whole check would go to pay for day care. So why even work when i can watch him since I would not have the money anyways. guess that makes sense?? lol….My husband is the one that works and granted we aren’t rolling in money up to our ears but we are happy and that is what matters. If you are happy to stay with your baby so be it…if you would rather work and put him/her in daycare then so be it. It is a big decision to make…but there is always other jobs…may not be the same one but if you ever wanted to work again you could find work elsewhere. Just make a list of your pros and cons and see which one wins! But I do not regret leaving work at all….I hear how miserble everyone else is that still works there and I do not miss it! Best of luck to you and your decision and good luck with the baby.

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I struggled with the same decision. I had put myself through college, eating Ramen noodles and drinking water. By the time my husband and I were expecting our first child it was a little hard to just “let it all go” to stay at home. BUT, there was a part of me that really wanted to be a full time mom too! My husband was supportive either way so I decided to become a SAHM.

I LOVED it for the first few weeks. Then I HATED it for a few months. But I have to blame myself for that. I allowed myself to begin to feel “worthless” and “unneccessary”. I began to resent the fact that my business suits were collecting dust in my closet and that I was basically a “walking napkin” for my little girl. To top things off, I got pregnant again when she was only 4 months old…so I really felt BAREFOOT, PREGNANT, and STUCK IN THE KITCHEN….as they say.

That was 8 years ago. I am STILL a SAHM and I LOVE IT. I’ll try to save you alot of anguish and heartache by telling you how NOT to do what I DID wrong.

1. Don’t think that you have to be perfect right away! It’s going to take a little while to “get into your groove”. I thought I could keep a nice smelling baby in cute pink outfits 24/7 as well as a clean house, with supper on the table by 5pm…all while looking like I did when I worked professionally. HA! Didn’t happen! When it didn’t happen, I thought I failed and wasn’t any good at being a SAHM…..but what it REALLY was….I just hadn’t found my “groove” yet. It took a couple of years for that!

2. Don’t lose YOURSELF! When my daughter was born I lived around HER schedule. Then 13 months later my son was born and I had a newborn and a 1 y/o to chase after. I forgot what I liked. I lived on poptarts and Barney! NO WONDER I FELT LIKE CRAP! haha People would tell me “you just need some time to yourself”. But I thought that was being a “bad mom”. I couldn’t leave a newborn and a 1 y/o…..for goodness sakes…they NEEDED ME! So, I burned myself out and ended up hating being a SAHM, though I wouldn’t admit it. I finally decided if I didn’t get some “ME TIME” there wouldn’t be much “ME” left. So I let the grandparents start watching the kids on weekend nights occasionally while my hubby and I went out. It was hard at first, but after awhile I was even calling Nana to watch them so I could grocery shop on my own! The breaks really made a difference in my attitude.

3. Still do what you ENJOY! It will probably be awhile before you will have time or before you will even WANT to pick up your old hobby or start a new one. BUT, once the kids are old enough to play on their own, give them a little space and do something that YOU enjoy. Read, draw, write, play an instrument, craft……whatever it is…..don’t live day to day JUST doing things for everyone else. I tried that and it ended up making me CRAZY! I still love taking care of my family. BUT, I take care of them BETTER when I take care of myself too.

Enjoy being a SAHM. Being a mom really is the most rewarding job in the world! Just take care of yourself too.

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There are ways to cheat. You can get involved in things where you can take your child. Volunteer for things in your town. Get a part time job that has hours outisde of your hubby’s for maybe 2 days a week. Get a job at a gym that has daycare.

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Read the book, “Home by Choice: Raising Emotionally Secure Children in an Insecure World” by Brenda Hunter, Ph.D. It drastically changed how I look at being a stay at home mom.

There will be days when you wonder why you are wasting all your talents being at home, making pb&j sandwiches and wiping little rear ends. But the work that a mother puts in at home has more enduring, long-term and influential results than ANYTHING else she can do.

“Any woman who gives her child her heart, her time, and her presence is giving him a priceless gift. She is shaping her child’s self-concept and teaching him lessons about love and intimacy that last a lifetime.”

“The relationship a young child has with his mother is unique, without parallel, established unalterably for a whole lifetime as the first and strongest love object and the prototype of all later love relationships.”

“There are mothers who are home by choice, providing their children with their continuous presence and love. These mothers are home because the know that they, and not a child-care provider, can best nurture their children and give them a sense of home. They know that children thrive in their mother’s presence and suffer greatly if they are too often absent.”

“A child needs to be intensley loved and cared for by someone who won’t pack up and leave at five o’clock. That someone is the child’s mother.”

Really, read this book and you will NOT regret staying at home to mother your baby. She talks a lot about the effects of separation on babies and the long-term effects of infant daycare. You will see your at-home mothering as THE MOST VALUABLE thing you could possibly be doing. The investment in your child will be worth every every every second.

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