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Single Parents
bellaleanne
member
Ladies...Where Did We Go Wrong?
bellaleanne
member
I posed this question in my blog, because this issue is litterally eating at me.
I have no career aspirations. No, seriously.
I feel like we are living in a time where we need to say "I'll settle down after college" or "I'll have kids when I establish my career"
I have found out only recently that I'm not the only one who grew up feeling like I was lying every time I said those things. Some of my girlfriends have confessed, in hushed tones, that they feel scared to admit that they want to settle down...that the looks that they have gotten from friends and family are like they have just confessed they have grown horns.
What's going on, ladies? How did this happen? And WHY have we let it happen?
This discussion has been closed.
Re: Ladies...Where Did We Go Wrong?
I'm a little confused as the the question you are exactly posing.
Since I was younger, I've always said I wanted to be a mom. When I was a senior in hs I wanted to do my senior project on being a mom, although apparently that isn't a career choice you're allowed to pick. I went to college for 2 years and realized it wasn't what I wanted to do. My career goal would be in sales, I love people and negotiating people onto my side. Being a single mom, I need to work, but had I the choice, I would be a full time mommy and I'd love every moment of it.
But I'm not sure if this is where you were going with your OP.
Well, that's actually exactly what I'm getting at. Being a mom isn't seen as a valid choice. It isn't seen as being a job, or a life.
I could do any number of things to make money...but none of them are my 'dream job' or 'career choice' because having a family and a home are ultimately the things that matter to me, and work is just a means to an end.
I'm wondering why we live in a world where women who want a family first feel embarrassed to admit it...where staying at home is socially acceptable, but where young women feel pressure to be more like men...to have an education, then a career...and then a family. I'm wondering why it seems like we have a choice...but we're brought up with society pushing us away from being a wife and mother, so we're having babies so much older.
Yeah I was a little lost too! But I wanted to be a police officer when I was younger, but knew I would join the military. After I joined I worked with computers/satellites, but still got my degree in Criminal Justice. Now I am ok with working with telecommunications for the rest of my life. Being a police officer doesn't appeal to me anymore. I was never the type of person that wanted to stay home. Not saying that it wouldn't be cool but I like interacting with a lot of people throughout my day. My son will be with my sister at her house during the day and then we will be together when I get home until he gets old enough for school. Thats about all I want in life now!
I wanted to add, honestly I never wanted kids (call be horrible), but I was a career person from start to finish. But once I found out I was pregnant I immediately fell in love. It has only gotten better as he has grown!
I know what your saying.
I have always wanted to get married, have kids, and be a stay at home mom. My biggest struggle with going to school is not knowing what to go for. I am still not 100% convinced I want to be a nurse, but it one of the few things that I think I may like for years on end.
Though we may feel this way,there are tons of women who have fought for the chance to go to school, to have careers and be moms too.
I don't think there is any one answer to this. Everyone is different and everyone has their own wants and dreams.
It's like bf and ff, there is never going to be one right or wrong way,everyone has their choice to make and that's that.
I wish people in general people weren't so judgemental. But I can admit that obviously I'm judgemental about things myself.
I do wish I had gone to college, just for the simple fact that had this still happen, I wouldn't be in the financial struggle that I am in.
I have to remind myself on a daily basis that everything happens for a reason.
I never wanted to be a mom. I love kids but I can always get rid of them when I feel like it because they weren't MINE. It wasn't until a few weeks after I found out I was pregnant that I actually started liking the idea of having a kid of my own. I'm super excited to be a mother now.
Anyways, I've always wanted to travel the world and join the Army. Clearly those plans are shot to hell now, but I stopped caring. It just doesn't seem to matter anymore. I'm doing things ass-backwards. I'm having a kid before I settle down and before I establish my career. Who cares though? Right now I'm not ready to settle down and be a wife. I want to focus on my schooling and my daughter, a husband can come much later in life. I've always been the type that wanted to marry young and visit all of these romantic places with my hubby, I don't see that happening anymore. I've changed and grown into a completely different person and wouldn't have it any other way. I could careless what other people think about me at this point. This is exactly where I want to be in my life.
Haha! I didn't even read this until after I posted but geez... we sound exactly the same!
DON'T DO IT!! I'm just kidding, being in the Army has been great. I think being a single parent might be the hardest challenge for a mom in the military I think. I love traveling and I don't think I want to completely STOP when I have my son. I know its wishful thinking, but since I became pregnant I imagined taking my son to visit exotic/awesome places. Maybe it will happen, maybe it won't I'm ok with it though. We all dream!!!!
LOL! I would love to bring my LO around the world to travel, but I'm not sure a single military mom would be the best thing for me right now. Maybe later on in life when she is a lot older I'll join the national guard or reserves. I can't see myself in active duty though. It would be too hard being away from my LO.
Yeah, I never wanted to be a mom, either.
I have two undergrad degrees and am working on my masters. I had intended on working my way up through the school system (teacher, instruction coach, assistant pricipal, principal, district office) - but now, I'm not sure that will happen.
Many many women want to be a mom first and foremost.
Which means they need to provide for a child. For most women, that means working, dating, and hoping to meet someone they want to start a family with. That takes time, and in the meanwhile they need to live, so it means work. When they are ready to start a family, some have the option to stop working, some don't, and still others don't want to.
****************************************************************************
There are a lot of jobs that suck a person's will to live. When you are stuck in those jobs it is hard to imagine the joy and sense of accomplishment work can bring you, even if it isn't nearly as important to you as your home life.
I love my work, but I work to live well. I have ALWAYS wanted to be a mom first and foremost.
Being a parent includes the responsibility of being able to provide for a child, and since my marriage ended, I had been saving to be able to have a child on my own. (My life plans have continually been derailed in a tragic yet comical fashion. Now I am planning to get married again.)
When I am a mom, I will continue working, though not as many hours. I would get bored as a stay-at-home parent and the child would sense my frustration. I think a child benefits from having happy and confident parents, and work is a piece of that for me.
Whether or not you have a career, the days of being able to rely on social security are over, and I don't want my child to have to pay for my polygrip when I am old and toothless.
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I know exactly where I went wrong. I have lived my life out of order. After I graduated high school, I worked two jobs, and then worked my way up to one full time job. I found myself managing a pizza place at 18. When the store closed, I was offered a position else where, but I took this opportunity to take the lay off and start school. I went back to school, while in a toxic relationship, and got pregnant. Now that I have a daughter, it will make going back to school quite difficult, but certainly not impossible. So I will be saving up once I start working to buy a house for Aubrey and I to live in. Eventually, I do want to get married.
I understand that your question was more, "Why do we not value the roll of a mother as much as the roles of doctors lawyers... etc? Why do we need to have a full time career if maybe all we want is for that career to be motherhood?" But, I didn't want motherhood. Meghan said she didn't want children until she found out she was pregnant. I wasn't sure I wanted children while I was still pregnant, but I knew that the alternative to keeping the child were not choices I could live with. While I was pregnant, I did what was right for me and for Aubrey. When she was born, I was too. I became a mother in the moment she left my body and was put on my chest. Now, all I want is to be her mother. In quite a few years, I do hope to be married and in a house of my home, looking to make my family bigger. But I never would have wanted children if it weren't for Aubrey, I think.
Maybe I was in the mindset that you're talking about... that motherhood isn't as important as whatever other role I could be playing in society. After having Aubrey, I've learned not only that it is important, but that it is most important.
Sure, Aubrey changed my life. It would have been impossible for her not to. But, what I didn't expect, was for her to change me and how I define myself. I never, ever, thought that if someone asked me who I am, my first response would be, "a mother."
And, I totally got emotional and cried while writing this. Hah.
Says the woman with PPD, a history of psychiatric illness, who has dated a string of worthless men/women, and lives with her mother.
And who sounds like a sexist 22 y/o with no experience in life and who thinks she knows everything.
You are using motherhood as an excuse for your lack of motivation and apathy - which I am sure existed prior to you getting pregnant.
Parenthood is not a career choice. It's not 'employment' in any sense of the word. You can reproduce till you're blue in the face; you just have to be able to feed, clothe and shelter those children. That's where the paying jobs come in. It is unreasonable to think that, because parenthood is a necessary and valuable function in society, that you should somehow earn as much or more than a doctor or lawyer, from some unnamed and unknown source.
It is a valuable thing to be able to more easily afford to feed and clothe your children by virtue of being prepared to provide for them economically with job training and education prior to reproduction; but if you don't choose this route then you're stuck in some low paying job whining about how motherhood is so much more important than some job the income from which you wish you could have.
It is, further, a valuable thing that the women's movement has made accessible to women those positions that, until recently, were not open to them. Like, for example, medicine, law, engineering etc. Law school, for example, was not open to my mother in the state I grew up in, until the year before she died. It was, however, open to me, 10 years after she died. Remarkable, no? All the women's movement. And due to the efforts of this movement I can afford to work a reasonable number of hours a week and still raise my own children and pay for their needs and wants. I, and many countless others, stand on the shoulders of giants.
Don't slam the women's movement because you didn't avail yourself of the gains it made open to you. No one said you cannot be a mother; you just have to be responsible for yourself and your child.
Golf clap for Sue_Sue. I wasn't organized enough in my thoughts to get there.
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I'm laughing. What nonsense.
What. The. ***.
When did getting an education and a career become something that is "like a man?" I would like to come up with some jokey response but this is just insane.
Just like a man to make a joke at a time like this.