[rday]

I'd really like to see a study specific to female happiness with children. I live in the US, and I think men and women's experience with children is entirely different.

When my wife worked, she missed our kids tremendously. Almost 75% of her take home went to day care. She was pretty miserable.

Now she stays home. She gets a lot of off-hand comments from other friends with kids about "how bored they would be if they stayed home". Or from friends without kids about "how they feel like they are doing something with their lives".

Now she feels like she isn't doing enough with her life.

Maybe she needs thicker skin, or maybe the societal pressure for women is immense.

Men working is expected by society. IME, the dads I know who stay home get more of an "awesome bro!" type response when they say they stay home.

I just feel like no matter what I do, I will feel happy with kids. No matter what my wife does, she feels like it isn't good enough.

[Edit: so many links to books! I've exhausted my audible credits for the month. Thanks for the support!]

[balls187]

Societal Pressure on Women is immense.

Societal Pressure on Women in the work place is immense.

Societal Pressure on Mothers is also immense.

They combine to make it exceptionally tough on Women. But mad props to those who have persevered despite that pressure--like my Mom and many other mothers out there.

> IME, the dads I know who stay home get more of an "awesome bro!"

If you are independently wealthy, sure. Otherwise, IME, you are considered a failure for not being able to provide for your family.

[DominikR]

> If you are independently wealthy, sure. Otherwise, IME, you are considered a failure for not being able to provide for your family.

Even then I'd say that many men would face thinly veiled criticism or even ridicule behind their backs.

[ericd]

That's a problem with our culture, then, because early retirement (in the sense that you work on whatever you want irrespective of money and spend more time with your children) can be much more fulfilling than the vast majority of office jobs. Financial independence should be a goal of everyone's.

[sosuke]

No data to back up my feeling that most of the pressure stay at home women get is from other women. My wife stays at home and we buck any negative comment together to keep those feelings at bay. We show we are proud of it, not ashamed by it and we aren't willing to let anyone else belittle our choices.

Any negative comment, any off-hand comment needs to be squashed immediately. Same thing happens with self-esteem issues I think. If the negative comments don't stop from 'friends' you have to make the sometimes tough choice to find better friends. I make sure to say with force how much she does, how helpless I'd be or what a mess I'd be without her help at home.

I think like yourself my mental state is strong enough that I choose lowering myself to lift her above the haters.

[inanutshellus]

It seems there's no "bright" side. There are some stay-at-home moms in my wife's family and they were... defensive... when my wife went back to work.

So either way, you find a way to be resentful or ashamed.

Go back to work and miss your child's first steps/words/laughs. Go back to work and someone else raises your children. Someone else uses your child to teach their child how to be a leader. Someone else (accidentally) gets called "mom".

Stay at home and barely manage to tread water financially compared to your dual-income friends. Stay at home and watch your career disappear (unless you chose one of those "never need to skill up" careers that're considered "safe" for women, like teaching). Stay at home and prepare for a lifetime of resentment about men being further ahead than you career-wise. Stay at home and propagate stereotypes.

I guess though, in the end, there's no doubt that someone that chose their career will regret it at some point in their lives, where you might be able to escape without regret having chosen to stay home.

[sosuke]

You can have a bright side if you can shake off the judgement of others. Some folks seem better equipped at this than others and I'd like to figure out how to "skill up" that trait!

The dual-income and DINKs (dual-income no kids) families will always win when appraised financially. Home, car, health. You have to work twice as hard for the same output on one income.

"Stay at home and propagate stereotypes" feels wrong these days. The stereotype and expectation seems to have both parents working and having one stay at home is bucking the trend.

All of the negatives seem to center around the individuals valuation of themselves based on outside opinions.

I'm too close to giving real opinions so I'm bowing out of the thread. ARRGGHH!

[ams6110]

tread water financially compared to your dual-income friends

Screw that. Don't judge your life by how others live.

My newest car is 12 years old. I have a wife, kids, and a good job and could easily have new cars every few years but instead I have no debt other than mortgage and I put the money into my retirement and college savings. I don't begrudge the choices of my friends who like to buy a lot of new things but I also don't feel any obligation to live the way they do.

[linkregister]

Clearly you don't live in the Bay Area or you bought in before the house price jump.

Treading water financially is an accurate way to describe life in the Bay Area for families with a stay-at-home parent. The modest standard of living you describe about yourself significantly exceeds what could be expected for the median software developer in the Bay Area. Families with incomes below that would not be able to sustain their cash flow without a commute that exceeds 90 minutes or exposes them to unacceptably high levels of crime.

[dwaltrip]

Maybe more people should move out of the bay area? Especially if they have kids? It's so much cheaper essentially everywhere else. Even with a salary cut I would imagine it's worth it in many situations.

[linkregister]

Yeah, I'm not disagreeing that the economic unit versions of these families would move to a place with a better salary/cost-of-living ratio. Moving takes time; the advent of eye-popping living costs in SF is less than 4 years old. Moving a family is a big deal. There is data that suggests that moving children in their teens more than doubles their risk of mental illness and criminal behavior. Certainly the U.S. has the lowest barriers to relocation, but it's not a trivial undertaking.

[bigtex]

I can confirm that it is pressure from other women because my wife has heard the same. It seems that a woman can choose any profession she wants just not to stay at home with the children.

[jseliger]

I'd really like to see a study specific to female happiness with children

All Joy and No Fun: The Paradox of Modern Parenthood discusses this (https://www.amazon.com/All-Joy-No-Fun-Parenthood/dp/00620722...), among many other interesting topics.

I'd also observe that there are probably time-sensitive issues; much of the day-to-day stuff with small children is dreary, but the long-term prospects are quite good. I've heard lots of older people say that having adult children is great, because they're self-sustaining and yet emotionally close / connected.

Many long-term projects (probably including startups) have somewhat crappy day-to-day moments but high long-term satisfaction. And many short-term satisfactions (like eating ice cream) may have negative long-term consequences.

Bryan Caplan's book Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids: Why Being a Great Parent is Less Work and More Fun Than You Think is also good on these topics, and he points out that much of the supposed happiness research is overblown or misused.

[exstudent2]

I think this is sadly a cultural thing. My wife comes from a culture that really values being a stay at home mom. She gave her career up to be at home full-time to raise our child and I've never seen her happier (but more tired :).

Our peers are for the most part American born and have a very different view. The moms obsess about missing out on their previous careers and living life as they did pre-children. They seem much less happy (as do their children).

In large parts of the world raising kids is "doing something with their lives", just not in the US.

[nostrademons]

When I was growing up, my dad stayed home to take care of us and my mom worked. And he eventually felt devalued by the rest of society, socially isolated, and (as we grew up and needed him less) missing a sense of purpose and accomplishment.

I think it's an individual thing. Healthy boundaries are a good thing to have regardless of gender. It's important to learn not to give up things that are important to you regardless of the messages society sends, and that if society has a problem with that, that's society's problem and not yours. Society is pretty big, after all, and there's bound to be some portion of it that will accept your well-considered choices.

[munificent]

> maybe the societal pressure for women is immense.

It is. I think feminism left our culture with the belief that it is OK for a woman to opt in to do anything she wants. But we didn't also get the message that it's OK to opt out.

Want a career? Great! Want to raise kids? Great!

Want to not have a career? Bad! Want to not raise kids? Bad!

It's unfair. I've watched almost every single woman I know in my age bracket (late thirties today) struggle with this dilemma in her life at some point. Instead of feeling that they can do anything, they feel they have to do everything.

[brightball]

I've observed the same. My wife is happy working while simultaneously feeling like she wishes she could be home with the kids. She works with a number of women with master's degrees and they consistently opt to stop working as soon as maternity leave is up if they are able to.

Our kids go to late stay programs at school because we both work, which means that if they want to do an after school activity like soccer, dance, scouts, etc that it's a "rush from late stay, change as fast as you can, go to activity."

We aren't trying to overload them or anything either, just aiming for 1 after school activity a couple of days a week.

I think 90% of the pressure is people trying to justify their life choices or requirements.

If you are working mom and you have to be for income sake or to pay student loans, you'll see stay at home mom's with a "must be nice" attitude.

If you're a working mom and you don't have to be, it's a "I'd be so bored" or "What do you do all day?" or "My job gives me purpose" because it reinforces your own life choices (whether you believe it or not).

If you're a stay at home mom because your job would just be paying for day care, it's going to be a feeling that you should be doing more.

If you're a stay at home mom because you choose to you should feel nothing but contentment with it because you made the choice.

This is a hard lesson that a lot of people, myself included, are experiencing because we've all been sold a different bill of goods our entire lives. There's even a book on it called The Two Income Trap.

The simplest way to filter out negative chatter is to identify whether somebody is trying to make themselves feel better about their own choices or not. That's 90% of the negative chatter that I observe.

[softawre]

Wow, I have a very similar experience to yours. My wife worked, same thing, now doesn't work, and she feels lonely and like she (1) isn't contributing and (2) has no adult conversation.

I try to help her by mentioning how great she is with the kid, and by taking the kid places by myself so she can go see and do adult things.

It is tough, good luck.

[JoeAltmaier]

Good point. No matter how you arrange it, its important to have respite, regularly. Back when the boys were babies I'd come home Wednesday night, she'd shove the youngest into my arms and head out the door for a night off with the girlfriends. Every Wednesday night. Just her time. It made everything else endurable.

[brightball]

A huge part of that is the lack of OTHER stay at home moms that would previously create an entire social group for each other. It's socially awkward to mix in a stay at home dad into that type of group for a number of reasons.

Add in moving away from home and family to the mix as contributors for the lack of adult conversation too.

[jules]

I think the idea that you aren't doing enough with your life if you are just raising kids is wrong. Educating kids is one of the most important jobs. They will grow up to be full human beings, so the positive effect you can have on the world through them can easily be greater than the positive contribution at a job.

[sliverstorm]

Any opportunity for working part time, or working from home? I've always wondered if that was the ideal solution.

[sosuke]

It the worst of both worlds I think. Pressure from the home duties and from work. Doing less than your best at both.

I have made it a point to suggest to my wife, if she ever chooses go out to find work at whatever point, that volunteer work would be the best. No financial pressures.