Stay at home moms

This article at msn.com is just a short little note on what the 2007 census showed stay at home moms to be. I was never able to be a stay at home mom; I could not afford to keep a roof over my family’s head, nor food on the table if I had not worked for a living. My husband also worked.

We were barely able to provide for our family with two incomes. I cannot imagine having a single income, and trying to keep up. Life is hard enough without having financial troubles as well. And these women, these stay at home moms who, according to the census are younger, less educated and more likely to have more children, have an envious position in my opinion.

As I look back over the life I gave my children, I always wonder how it would have been if I had stayed home to take care of them, instead of always hiring day care centers and baby sitters so that we could have material things. Granted the material things were not luxurious, they were most definitely needs, but still, one cannot help but wonder “what might have been.”

If any of you have read my paper number one for the English class we are in, you will know that the family life that was provided for me and my children was not at all an easy one. Part of my thought process on this “stay at home mom” thing is this: Could it have been better? If I had joined the ranks of all the stay at home moms, of whom a large number are on state aid, would things have been better? I would most definitely would have had to be on state aid, would that have been better? Would raising my family on state aid make them think that they wouldn’t have to work for a living? That they can just keep having babies, and letting other people pay their way?

Would they have still grown up to be the responsible adults they are today? Would they have grown up with a better attitude toward life, if I had been home to love them? None of the answers will ever be found, as all these things are “If only’s”. I do not dwell on them. However, I do occasionally wonder…..