From Tech [[The reality is, that most men not only have this feeling that they are the keepers of bringing home the bacon (society still has yet to disprove this theory, it’s a manly thing) but men, for the most part make more money than women do.]]
In many households, including mine, this is not the case. Anyway, for the sake of accuracy I think it’s time in many cases to change the language from “mother” to “parent.”
I’m not sure I understand why those things have to be mutually exclusive. Who says you have to give up an income because you stay home to raise your children? There are plenty of things you can do to bring money in, even if you don’t hold down a full-time job outside the home.
Especially given that you’re using the internet and posting this message on an internet website, I can’t believe no one’s yet mentioned all the ways you can make money on-line. My mother used to create crafts and gift items and sell them through consignment shops and boutiques. You could do that and sell stuff on-line. Start out selling things on one of the on-line auction sites, then eventually you could have your own site where people can just order directly from you.
Learn how to do HTML and start your own website design business. The hours are as flexible as you want them to be. You could work on graphics, page design, search engine submission, etc. while your kids are napping or asleep for the night - the internet’s open 24 hours a day. 
If you don’t want to create websites for other people, create one for yourself and get advertisers to place banner ads on your site. A friend of mine created a soap opera message board that gets hundreds of thousands of hits every week and he makes between $40,000 and $50,000 a year just from the advertisers!
There are other ways you can use your computer to make money as well. Start a resume writing business or do medical transcribing.
If you’re really concerned about socializing your child, do daycare for other children in your home. Then you’d be making money and having your child interact with other children in a daycare type environment, but you’d be in charge.
And if you want to expose them to other children, but not have to be the caregiver to other people’s kids, there are a ton of things you can do outside your home that will serve that purpose as well. Join the YMCA (or YWCA) and bring your child to swimming lessons or any of the other myriad activities that they have designed for kids to participate in. Find out who the other parents are in your neighborhood, or find other members of your church/synagogue who have children and start a “play group.” Your kids will have other kids to be with and you’ll be with other adults at the same time.
The bottom line is, you don’t have to forego an income or be hermits, locked inside your house in isolation, just because you choose to raise your children full time instead of working outside your home.
Good luck with whatever you decide to do.
“How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.” - Anne Frank
Jill,
I agree with you whole heartedly. Good to see that in your household, the roles of parent are just that, parental responsibilities not just up to the mother to be the parent.
Even after all these years of change, the collective still views the role of parent to be the mother, not the parents as a team in raising their kids. Thankfully this view is slowly changing.
No woman should ever be looked down upon because she chooses one path or another. We each have our own individual circumstances by which a woman or a couple makes the decisions they do.
I think, if you can afford it and you want to stay home then stay home. If you can afford it and you want to only work part-time then that’s your path. If you can’t afford it then there are a few things to look at. Do you say you can’t afford it because you want the 30 grand SUV and the 55 inch screen TV or is it because you simply would go nuts if you stayed home. I make no judgement call on either of these scenarios, it’s up to the person as to what they want in life.
It’s a reality, many couples have to work full-time jobs in order to make minimal standards of living. Then there is the single mom that has no choice in the matter, it’s either work full-time or go on welfare.
To me, it’s what your heart desires as a couple. If meaning staying home full-time is something you believe in then by all means go for it.
I agree a lot with what Jill said in re “the olden days”. The “mom at home with the 2.3 children” is a 20th century western phenomenon, now apparently a 21st century one and not so successful a phenomenon at that. Many of our mothers/grandmothers generation were addicted to pharmaceuticals (eg Valium, Bex/?BCP) to take the edge off their desperation and isolation. Sure most may not have felt like that, but enough did for the problem to be recognised at a clinical level.
The only wrong thing you can do is resent your child because you stayed home for him/her and are bored witless; or because you needed to return to work and couldn’t and are financially strapped; or because you put the child into care, returned to work and feel guilty. You might have a child and want to go back to work - many women do return from choice. I have friends who intended to stay home and discovered that they needed to return to work for their own sake, and friends who intended to return to work and have decided to stay home and have more kids. You just don’t know how your preconceptions will stack up against your reality until it happens.
But for me, whichever choice gives you the space to love and be joyful about your child is the right option - whether it’s working or staying home. The choice is one for you and your partner to make together, cos either one has implications for you both.
Best advice a friend gave me was that there was no right time to have a child - there is only this time. There is always another job opportunity/party/trip/expense/mortgage/whatever on the horizon after you have achieved the current milestone. And another after that.
For childcare, the situation in Aus is different to that in the US, I think. The centres (family day care in someone’s home or child care in a dedicated centre) are licensed and audited by a government department with regard to physical safety, and for day care at least, for qualifications and skills of the carers. A good day care centre here will have learning plans for the kids, and focus on their physical/emotional/social skills that need attention - not in a classroom situation but as part of the normal interaction of young children playing with dolls, trucks, sandpits, painting, macaroni necklaces etc.
What you find comfortable in a childcare situation is fairly personal - some of the people I work with find the extended family feel of family day care suits their needs and desires for their childs environment, whereas I prefer a childcare centre with lots of kids interacting. Some prefer an ordered and sanitised place, I prefer homemade and secondhand toys, with plants and dirt.
I am always happy to see that my child is really grubby when its time to go home - paint and dirt mostly washed off but fingernails and clothing a giveaway! To me it means the kids had a good day being kids.