Strollerderby : stay-at-home moms

Should Moms Be Paid to Stay Home with their Kids?

Hannah Tennant-Moore — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 22:45:00 GMT

Australia’s senior child policy official is convinced the answer is yes. Gillian Calvert is encouraging the Rudd government to pay women to stay home for the first two years of their baby’s life.

Calvert argues that babies’ brain development can be impaired if their mothers work early in their lives, disrupting the normal connections between mother and baby. For instance, Calvert argues, “Because a baby finds the stimulus of its mother’s voice pleasurable, it turns towards the sound; if the experience is aversive, the baby will avoid the experience.”

Sounds to me like that’s an argument against leaving your children with abusive caretakers. I would hope that babies enjoys more voices than just their mother’s—say, oh I don’t know, maybe their dad’s? Or grandparents'? It’s even possible that the voice of a loving babysitter does not make babies turn away in disgust.

Still, I can think of quite a few mothers who would love to get paid to stay home with their children. But I can think of quite a few fathers who would like the exact same thing.

Photo: Mercola

Someone Owes Moms $117K

Jen Chaney — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 18:02:00 GMT

According to a "study" released by salary.com, stay-at-home moms would make close to $117,000 a year if they were compensated for their work. That figure was calculated based on the salaries of 10 jobs -- including housekeeper and CEO -- whose duties share something in common with motherhood.

Working moms, on the other hand, only earn $68,405 for their kid-rearing efforts. Because, you know, they're just mothering "part-time." These figures are slightly higher than the ones quoted in Brett's recent blog post about New York moms, who apparently are only worth $70K per year even when they're working the maternal shift full-time. (Don't they know how high the cost-of-living is in New York? Momma needs to pay the rent and buy a new pair of shoes, you know.)

It's fun to speculate about how much money each of us could earn if only we got paid for running a family.But it's also a depressing reminder that women in general, whether they are mothers or not, still aren't compensated at the same level as most men. And as a society, our attitude toward ambitious women is still pretty conflicted. (No, I'm not referring to Hillary Clinton, overtly or covertly, with these comments. But someone will probably assume I am, so whatev.)

It would be nice if SAHMs, working moms or even working women period actually were paid the money they deserve. Until that day comes, well, we always have another survey from salary.com to look forward to. Next time, I'd like them to look into how much money moms deserve to spend on their non-existent corporate credit cards. I think we have another pretend-$10 Grand coming our way.

Gywneth Paltrow's Tips on Kicking the Baby Blues

Hannah Tennant-Moore — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 17:00:00 GMT

In the past 24 hours, the blogosphere has been flooded with reports that actress Gywneth Paltrow suffered postnatal depression. In an interview in the May issue of Vogue, Paltrow was uncharacteristically revealing about several aspects of her life, including her social life and body image. But the “revelation” about feeling depressed after the birth of her second child is the one that seems to have sparked the interest of the masses. This hubbub makes me glad that Paltrow was so open about her struggles as a new parent, since the emotions she describes—“I felt really disconnected. I felt really down; I felt pessimistic”—are hardly rare among new mothers. Between 50 and 70 percent of women suffer from “baby blues,” fits of sadness or irritability during their child’s infancy, and up to 25 percent of women suffer from postnatal depression, a more severe, longer lasting sense of gloom. To a lesser degree, postnatal depression also affects new fathers.

What is most interesting about Paltrow’s admission is that she is not affected by most of the risk factors associated with postnatal depression—poverty, young motherhood, an unhappy marriage. (Paltrow’s mother and friends have stated that rumors of rockiness between Paltrow and husband Chris Martin, Coldplay’s frontman, are completely false.) Rather, she believes she got depressed because she was simply working too hard at being a mom and not taking enough time for herself, giving up lead roles in movies and indulgences like acupuncture. She feels she got over the depression in part by taking on a starring role in Iron Man—and then, once the filming was done, spending the summer at home with her family.

Granted, this is not exactly a standard depression buster, but striking the right balance between work and social time with hands-on parenting time is an inescapable issue for every parent. For those of you who can’t afford a nanny and personal trainer (both of which also proved helpful in getting Paltrow back on track emotionally), how do you manage to be a parent and a person? Any dads out there who have suffered from postnatal depression?

Image: hollywoodbackwash.com

The Truth About the Fighters of the Mommy Wars

Jen Chaney — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 15:32:00 GMT

Meg Wolitzer has written a new novel called "The Ten-Year Nap," the story of several stay-at-home moms who, a decade into the gig, begin to question their lifestyles. In this interview with Salon, Wolitzer insists she is not taking sides in the so-called Mommy Wars and genuinely wants to show what life is like for women who opt out of the workforce.

I have not read "The Ten-Year Nap," although now I am certainly intrigued. But I do want to draw your attention to a point on page two of the article, which notes that most of the women guiding the whole stay-at-home-mother vs. stay-in-the-office-mother debate are writers who have always worked from home. Wolitzer admits she falls into that category, and that her husband works from home, too.

Of course, that doesn't mean she is unqualified to write a novel about the full-time momma experience. But it is an important reminder that some of the people stirring the pot on this controversial topic -- one that has been known to drive wedges between friends and fire up hateful comments on blogs -- have never been forced to make the stark choice between full-time work or no work at all. I can think of plenty of people (me! me!) who would be happy to make a reasonable living by working at home full-time with their husbands doing the same. If only all of us were so lucky.

Photo: Random House UK

When to Ignore the Pediatrician

Madeline Holler — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 15:02:00 GMT

Is it ever a good idea to ignore the pediatrician's advice? After all, they're the experts, right?

Wrong!

A handful of doctors were interviewed, and here's what they say about some of their own advice: ignore it, sometimes. Here are five instances when it might be a good idea to nod politely and then carry on as usual:

1. Don't pick up your baby in the middle of the night. Can't stand the crying? Then don't -- if you can stand that.

2. Baby should be at home with Mom. Not only is this so far from reality, it's also never been shown to be harmful. It's a personal choice, not a medical one.

3. Don't give your baby triple nipple confusion. Breast, bottle and pacifier aren't necessarily bad in combination. If you think it's a problem, take away one or more of the nipple types. But there's little evidence to show that nipple confusion is guaranteed.

4. Your baby must eat solids by 6 months. If they're not interested, why push it?

5. Take the paci away! Doctors have their own opinions about age and pacifiers. It's good to remember, these are opinions. Unless the pacifier is interfering with speech and tooth development, there's no need if the kid (and you) aren't ready.

That's what the article says. What about you? What advice did you ignore? Here, I'll start. I ignored the doctor's advice and didn't give my breastfed daughter's iron supplements. And guess what? They're not anemic!

Photo: Guardian.uk

Are Dads 'Nice' For Acting Like Parents?

Madeline Holler — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 22:28:00 GMT

A blogger mom over at Slate's XX Factor is in a twist about one of the central tensions inside the Mommy Wars: the role of fathers.

The Slate blogger, Melinda Henneberger, transcribes a conversation between her -- a mom who works at home -- and another woman, whom she calls, quite carefully, a non-salaried mom.

Non-salaried Mom says Hennberger's husband is "nice" for agreeing to pick up the kids since Henneberger was bogged down and on deadline the day of the conversation.

From Slate:

N: Well that's awfully nice of him. I hate for him to have to do that.

M: It's not nice; he's their dad.

N: But, you can't come?

Henneberger asks when this conversation will change. The transcription feels truncated and we don't know the nature of the two moms' relationship, so it's difficult to answer her question. But I assume she means to ask when people will stop thinking a dad is nice for being a parent or else start thinking of moms as being nice whenever they pick kids up from school.

My guess is the conversation will change when Henneberger's husband picks the kids up even when she's not on deadline.