Culture shock -- East Coast vs. West

Parents Forum
121

<p>"Why does it matter if you go to HYP if you're doing the same things as the rest of the population who went to generic U? Rhetorical questions, please don't try to debate them, just pause and think about it for a minute."</p>

<p>I think the point is they won't be doing the same as the rest of the population who went to generic U. Generic U can lock one into working for minimum wage (take me for example).</p>

<p>I know a couple who earned their money in their 20s/30s. They quit to stay home with the kids in their 30s/40s. Both mom and dad graduated from Harvard business school and retired at 40 with a million dollar plus home outside San Fran - and a second home in Tahoe. H was good to them.</p>

122

<p>Honestly, Wis, this is becoming insufferable. </p>

<p>Your loaded question assumes as fact your own dogmatic prejudice against a good part of the population: well educated SAHM’s.</p>

<p>People, including women, quite often do what they do for unique and profound reasons. These things make them who they are…no matter their income, job title or executive status. </p>

<p>Perhaps a well-educated and well-cultured woman is a well-educated and well-cultured mother, neighbor, community activist/volunteer, friend etc, etc; or, horror of horrors, a profound well educated woman who does what-she-damn-well-pleases because it pleases her, get it?…and she couldn’t give two terds about other women or men’s job titles, incomes, med-schedules or, more to the point, opinion of her life...she's liberated from their dogma, which is of course your dogma, you see. </p>

<p>Edvest stated--as categorical--a belief that being a SAHM is preferred to its alternative. Later, Edvest amended that view to say, preferred for someone like him/her self. Still, Edvest was barbequed for it…the whole herd of individualists offended (a sensitive herd, to be sure)…or more apropos to a particular loose bull in the herd, put to the burning timber of truth for the old fashioned sin of apostasy. </p>

<p>You, Wis, seem to get a pass by these torch-bearers.
I suppose, they believe you are right.
But you are wrong and so are they...now back to you huddle, the hays still in the loft.</p>

123

<p>StickerShock -- Your post about the Halloween decorations reminds me that it's time to take down the "Happy Spring" wreath from my front door! (no, I'm not kidding...) :*)</p>

124

<p>Did any of you ever accidentally cut your strings of electric Christmas lights with your electric hedge trimmer while you were trimming your bushes in July? My husband's idea that year was that we were already more than half way to the next Christmas and hadn't yettaken down our lights, so why bother when we would be putting them up again so soon !!!!</p>

125

<p>"Perhaps a well-educated and well-cultured woman is a well-educated and well-cultured mother, neighbor, community activist/volunteer, friend etc, etc; or, horror of horrors, a profound well educated woman who does what-she-damn-well-pleases because it pleases her, get it?…and she couldn’t give two terds about other women or men’s job titles, incomes, med-schedules or, more to the point, opinion of her life...she's liberated from their dogma, which is of course your dogma, you see. "</p>

<p>To FountainSiren, From Always-Worked-Full-Time-Outside-the-Home-Mom:
AMEN, SISTER.</p>

126

<p>


EK, you may say that you lack a formal education, but you are one of the smartest people who posts on CC. Your life experiences have brought you wisdom.</p>

<p>FountainSiren -- you go, girl! :)</p>

<p>(From one "woman who does what-she-damn-well-pleases" to another!)</p>

127

<p>Love the rock-n-rolling rhetoric here, but I would like to make a plea for a little charity on both sides. In my experience, this is an area where EVERYONE feels anxiety and guilt. SAHMs are the backbone of every functioning community I know, especially school communities, and the intelligent, organized ones do hundreds of intelligent, organized, valuable things on a regular basis. But all of them feel sometimes like they have sold themselves short. Sometimes they admit that, sometimes they are just a little more aggressive in justifying the choices they have made. And, of course, on the other side 100% of working women I know worry about whether they are shortchanging their children, and feel put down by the SAHMs, and respond defensively to that, too.</p>

<p>Kids have no mercy on this. For years, my daughter insisted that most of her classmates' mothers didn't work, until one day we sat her down and went through her class family by family (about 25% of the mothers were SAHMs, and another 10% worked part-time). The SAHMs were much more visible to the kids, though.</p>

128

<p>
[quote]
But all of them feel sometimes like they have sold themselves short. Sometimes they admit that, sometimes they are just a little more aggressive in justifying the choices they have made.

[/quote]
You don't see this as patronizing and passive aggressive? I don't feel that you can speak categorically for all SAHMs. From your comments, it doesn't sound like this is a choice you've made -- I don't feel you should be speaking for anyone other than yourself. I could just as easily remark about the guilt working mothers seem to feel and their need to rationalize their choice, but the truth is that I think a variety of options work for different families. I've worked full time, part time and no time, and each has its benefits and drawbacks -- both for the kids and for me</p>

<p>Most posters seem to have a "live and let live" approach to this -- that seems to be a more reasonable approach. Actually, it's only on CC that the "mommy wars" seem to live -- I don't run into these debates in real life. Most people are just too preoccupied with their own choices to care what anyone else does.</p>

129

<p>I know "working" moms who are super involved, I know SAHMs who do little with the school, me, whatever floats your boat, whatever works for your family, whatever the needs are, so long as people are kind, caring, and there for each other during the good and the bad....working or not working isn't important</p>

130

<p>sjmom: I am a SAWD, not a SAHM. I have had lots of contact over the years with SAHMs, though, because (a) I have done most of the nuts-and-bolts child stuff in my family for the past several years (my wife works about 100 miles away from where we live, tends to be very rigidly scheduled, and comes home only on weekends), and (b) I have talked with a lot of women about their decisions to leave work or to resume it. I was a SAHD for about a minute 19 years ago, and my wife spent 2 years at home and worked part-time for 1 year when our kids were very little.</p>

<p>I'm sorry if I came across as patronizing, and I will admit to having over-generalized from my own experience. But I will stand by my experience: All of the mothers I know, working and nonworking, go through bouts of anxiety about their choices. Each type (sometimes, not always) feels threatened by the other and (sometimes, not always) engages in over-passionate defenses of her life. Men, by and large, don't go through this much. I don't.</p>

131

<p>I'd have to agree with JHS. In my experience, fathers seem to worry much less about raising children. Not that they care less, but just that they worry less. They seem to have more faith that the kids will be fine. That is my experience with my father and my husband, anyway. I worry less now than when my kids were younger because yes, the kids are, in fact, fine. Better than fine. If I could have known that all along it would have been really, really nice.</p>

132

<p>JHS, I agree that moms worry about the consequences of their choice more than dads.</p>

133

<p>Perhaps dads never see it as a choice.</p>

134

<p>JHS said though that he was a SAHD & I know men who are at home with their kids/have more flexible schedules-and tempramentally it works
obviously it is a choice for them</p>

<p>But some women don't feel like they have a choice either- for instance no matter how much I make- my H, doesn't do housework and didnt' do the bulk of the child rearing-
I would have prefered many times- to be employed more out of the house- but I was not prepared to work 40 hours plus 80 hours at home-</p>

<p>I do agree that women angst more- I think that it is because women tend to pay more attention to details that men overlook- sometimes they don't matter- but sometimes they do.</p>

<p>The parent that jumped off the bridge to teach his daughter not to be afraid of heights for example- was anyone surprised that it was a dad?
;)
I happen to think that less worry over details can be a great thing- I just am not wired that way.</p>

135

<p>"JHS said though that he was a SAHD "</p>

<p>Actually he typed SAWD.</p>

136

<p>
[quote]
”But all of them [SAHM’s] feel sometimes like they have sold themselves short. Sometimes they admit that, sometimes they are just a little more aggressive in justifying the choices they have made.”

[/quote]
This is likely, and I believe few would dispute it, not even those who adamantly believe that SAHM’s are somehow superior parents in some factual or ephemeral way.

[quote]
”And, of course, on the other side 100% of working women I know worry about whether they are shortchanging their children, and feel put down by the SAHMs, and respond defensively to that, too.”

[/quote]
…well, maybe where you work, but not here on cc; I haven’t heard a hint of doubt from the “I’m a career woman and SAHM’s are unmotivated slackers” crowd…not even a moment of self-reflection or worry in any hard charging careerist here. I have read, throughout, nothing but ideological ‘commitment to the cause’ and righteous indignation from those who are undone by the idea that there are women out there that believe a child is better raised, on balance, by a parent than by hired help.</p>

<p>I believe the above distinction cuts to the core of the debate here on cc: for the ‘SHAM-is-beneath-me’ ideologue to even consider the possibility that their children might have benefited from more of them is not even worth passing consideration--it’s ridiculous even to consider--their children would laugh at the prospect. Neither is it worth considering in general for the children of people in general. That someone would hold the opposite view is not only shortsighted, but for those committed to the cause, “offensive.”</p>

<p>The SAHM’s, on the other hand, tend to acknowledge that they may have had something else to offer society--other talents and skills--if it were not for the fact that their children got in the way of their careers. The ideologues on the other side harbor no such misgivings about whether or not they may have had more to offer their children…maybe they are right; how would I know.</p>

<p>Sorry…no guitar or drums this time around (though I do here cow bells off in the distance…getting closer…getting louder--look out below…).</p>

137

<p>Equating shortchanging your children to shortchanging yourself is nowhere near an even exchange. Lets have both sides admit to shortchanging their children and shortchanging theirselves. I was a SAHM for 17 years. Did I shortchange my career? Gladly. Did I shortchange my kids? Well they did with less and will not go to an elite private college...but no, I was doing what I thought was best for my kids. I went to work a year ago, am I shortchanging myself? Yes, I am doing menial work for minimum wage (engineers out of the workforce for 17 years are not in high demand). Am I shortchanging my kids? Well I'm not home on their school holidays, I'm not always there when they are upset, sad, etc.....but no, I am doing what I think best for my kids so they can attend public U. We do what we feel best for our kids.</p>

138

<p>well, I moved from GA to SoCal, and I have been dealing w/ culture shock, you could say. There turned out to be a lot more so cal kids at the school I'm at than I originally thought there were. And the So Cal population at my school is highly visible/stands out, if you know what I mean. I'm sure many of you can guess what school I'm at. But there is a lot of superficiality, and people here are more extroverted than ppl on the east coast, in general, but extroverted in a "look at me" sort of way. It's hard to generalize b/c everyone has their own experience, and a lot of SoCal ppl don't fit the mold, but the culture shock has been hard to deal with, and I wouldn't have been able to predict this last year.</p>

139

<p>
[quote]
Equating shortchanging your children to shortchanging yourself is nowhere near an even exchange

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Working parents are not shortchanging their children because they work outside the home. </p>

<p>If you want to stay at home with your kids, fine. But I am really tired of this bogus claim that my children were in any way "shortchanged" because they were in high quality, supervised day care settings or preschools when children of stay-at-home-moms in our neighborhood were allowed to roam the neighborhood and play unsupervised on the streets, or to sit around their houses all day watching t.v., or fed a diet of sodas and take home food from fast food restaurants, or all of the other things that I have seen going on in their homes. </p>

<p>If your choice to stay at home also involved focusing all day long, every day, on providing structured, age-appropriate activities for your child, or making sure that there was always an adult present to directly supervise unstructured play time, and preparing healthy, nutritious meals and snacks..... then that's terrific. I'm happy for you. </p>

<p>But if you are the parent in my neighborhood whose 4-year-old is out riding her trike up and down the block while you are indoors watching Oprah ... then spare me the lecture about who is being shortchanged. </p>

<p>Working moms in low income families sometimes have to make do with short-cut solutions to childcare because they have no realistic economic choice. But they need to work to feed and clothe their kids; they are not shortchanging the kids by working to support them.</p>

<p>Among women who have a choice as to whether to work or stay home: I've never met a highly educated, professional working mom who did not devote considerable time and attention to making sure that the child spent his days with well-qualified caretakers in a safe environment. The more highly educated and more highly paid, the higher the expectations for the caretakers and the caretaking environment.</p>

140

<p>There's an enormous range of daycare arrangements and facilities, from the barely adequate to excellent, just as there is a range of SAHMS from the glued to the TV mom to the fully involved.<br>
I just looked up the current fees for our old daycare center about which I have very fond memories. One year, five days a week from 8am to 6pm: over $21k. Yikes. But parents can send their child 2, 3 or 4 days a week or for half-day. The classes were small, the caregivers all had degrees in early childhood education, the facilities were wonderful and well equipped and included a large yard with sandbox and a parking lot so that parents could stay and ease their kids into the daycare routine in the morning and stay and chat with teachers and other parents in the evening, or, as was often the case, gently persuade their kids that it was time to go home and that they would see their friends again the next day.</p>