My First Post....

Well here I go....and I'm sorry to say it won't be light material...but its on my mind and so here goes!

"Whatever the brief period between the end of WWII and the 1970's when sole full-time mother care was the social expectation or aspiration meant to children, it meant isolation and discrimination to many of their mothers and hastened it's own ending by helping to power them into the woman's movement....looking regretfully over our shoulders at a rose-tinted past stops us from making realistic assessments of the present or looking forward to how we could make a better future."

OK...so am I the only one who thought that the June Cleaver mother image (which I am held up to BTW) was longer standing than 30 some odd years??? I know my maternal grandmother worked but I though it was soley because my maternal grandfather was on disability. I also know my paternal grandmother worked but they owned a family deli so its not like my paternal grandfather was going to cook. So if this "ideal" of women leaving the workforce to raise children is only 30 years young...why does it feel like an old inflexible notion?? I am SO glad that my husband and I have the financial ability to live on one income and that I desire to stay at home raising my kids...please don't misunderstand. I just think that women or men should be supported by society, government, their families, and other mothers/fathers to choose what is best for their family and they should not be penalized as we now are no matter what choice we make. If a woman/man stays home and raises kids, she/he sacrifices both short term and long term financial gains, professional gains, personal goals, and sometimes social connections. If a woman works outside the home, than she is trying to juggle work and home demands, worries about her child's care and development in someone else's hands, sacrifices personal time to spend as much time with her kids as possible, and rushes always rushes. In our current societal climate, we can't get it right no matter what we choose.

"Although many women of your mother's generation found full-time mothering limiting and frustrating and that played its part in the woman's movement, their mothers and grandmothers had stayed at home as a matter of course...the experience was very different and far less isolating. Families used to be bigger, there were a surplus of women realitives living with you, and even poor families had servants."

So here again...June Cleaver defiantely did NOT have a big family, servants,or live-in female relatives sharing in the household chores and mothering tasks!! So how the hell did she get it all done? Maybe she didn't...it was TV after all (yes I do know reality from TVland...but come on!). Lets be honest...doesn't it make you feel inadequate when you can't keep up? I know I do...and now it seems it was a farse. A FARSE I tell you!!! And now lets reflect on how staying at home to raise kids (even if its what you want) can be isolating, frustrating, limiting and how that then makes a person feel........So here is where I give a gigantic shout out and thank you to my husband and mommy friends for keeping me sane!! Hallelujia for all of you! So it makes sense that stay at home moms (or dads for that matter also) really need a social network. Without one, well I don't think they would continue to stay home or remain happy for very long. So thank you again social network! I am so glad you are a part of my life.

Both excerpts taken from "Child Care Today" by: Penelope Leach, a book I have borrowed from the library and thus far have enjoyed reading.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/20/AR2009022003579_pf.html

http://www.nj.com/parenting/peggy_ocrowley/index.ssf/2009/02/parenting_guru_penelope_leachs.html