katliamom, there is financial aid and state health insurance for those whose families run into unexpected misfortune.
I find this whole thread interesting partly because I assume there are many different ages and generations represented. When my oldest was very young, the Wall Street Journal could still publish an editorial with the author describing his gratitude for a wife/mother staying at home, and detailing the benefits. Just five years later, when my youngest was the same age, this was unthinkable.
The change in culture, partly driven by the economy and partly by gender politics, made this kind of editorial unthinkable in just a short span. Welfare reform further normalized working and stigmatized staying home. Kindergartens went to full-time everywhere, and the benefits of kids experiencing care from others were extolled.
Of course, working mothers are not a new phenomenon. What was new was that the well-educated, relatively well-off women, stayed working when they had kids. This was not always for financial reasons, especially since having a few kids meant high day care costs for working parents. Fulfillment and continuation of career options was now a big factor, as many have stated here.
I am most likely one of the older posters here, though I have kids in their early, mid and late 20’s still. My ingrained role models were most likely my incredibly literate aunties, who wrote letters that could be published but never thought of being a :“writer”, who raised kids and dogs , took care of elderly neighbors, and maybe volunteered at the hospital . Their husbands were variously in business, or academia, or law, and came home on the train at 5:30, the kids jumped up to hug them and the mother got a break for an hour and cooked two dinners. Cheever territory with a cultured twist.
I graduated from high school in the late 60’s at the cusp of some major social changes, at least for those who could contemplate the lifestyle I just described, financially. (A large percentage of women have, of course, always had to work, hence the term “working class.”) I felt a lot of pressure to be successful for the sake of my gender (and the reputation of my new school) and in the chaos of the 60’s, turned my back on it for awhile.
I have read that now many well-educated, or Ivy-educated women are now opting to stay home, and use their skills in the community or schools (where their hard driving intelligence is not always appreciated !). However, one of my daughters did go to an Ivy and none of her friends want kids, they are all career-focused, and if they do want kids it is assumed they will have nannies (Upper East side crowd, not us, not us at all).
In my working class town, many many women are home. The ones who are not home have high powered professional jobs. Some of the women “at home” picking up kids work nights so that one parent is home all the time. There are so many models. Welfare isn’t available anymore so some people work low paying jobs and have relatives take care of the kids, even new babies. (I hate to see women be forced to go back because they have no maternity leave.)
For warrior daughter, the issue you raise is very complex. My own daughters are struggling with this as well. In fact, for one in the arts, none of the residencies that help advance career mention kids being welcome, though significant others sometimes are. All of my kids want kids, and in that, as I said, they are outliers in their group.
I have no idea how they are going to make this work but sons and daughters both have been advised to find a spouse who will take on what needs to be taken on, or hang around the Ritz bar and meet someone rich (joke, um, sort of- they are in the arts so let’s just say that would be alternate funding).
I find that feminine roles in general have lost respect in our culture, which is too bad. Much of what women used to do, even into my 20’s, has been professionalized, hence the rise of day care, pre-k, assisted living for the elderly, and so on.
My sincere wish would be that EVERY woman, regardless of income, could experience the kind of flexibility some on this thread of described as their good fortune. As it is, women generally end up doing most of the work at home AND working outside the home. Some see work outside the home as a plus, but for many with less interesting jobs, our societal expectation that women work means two “shifts” (as in the book “Second Shift”).
If there is enough money, staying at home with kids can be wonderful, but it does mean giving up certain kinds of personal fulfillment for a time. Though there are creative ways around that over the course of the children’s growing up. Some of the posters have given ideas on that.
Good luck with your decisions. You can make it work. I think it’s great that you are thinking ahead and my own daughter might wish you were in her women’s group!! Right now, her maternal drive is going into teaching undergrads.