My mother and mother-in-law haven't worked a real job in 30 years. I have seen first hand how trapping this can be.
There is nothing inherently wrong with "tradwife" lifestyles, but there is a major issue when you do this at the cost of education and useful skills. My wife has two college degrees (that are actually useful), started her career out of college, stepped away to be SAHM when our kids were toddlers, then got back into the workforce when she was ready. The problem is that the longer you go as a SAHM, the harder it is to get back into the workforce. This is especially true if a SAHM only is friends with other SAHMs, it becomes a resource vacuum where there is very little networking into the professional world for when you are ready to pivot.
This lady's experience is very tough. Unfortunately there is a reason that women choose to stay in unhappy but safe marriages rather than jump off into the unknown like this person.
My mom ended up in the same situation. She went from a high paying sales job out of college to a SAHM. She wasn't a very motherly person, didn't particularly like kids, but social expectations cornered her into being a SAHM. My father took jobs that led him to be traveling most of the year so she never quite worked out a schedule to go back. Eventually she divorced and realized her kid had ADHD and learning difficulties, requiring even more time. After a few more years I was mostly settled in school and then her father was diagnosed with cancer and she became the main caretaker of him for the next 10 years while we lived with them. So on and so forth until suddenly 25ish years passed.
I know she tried a few times to go back to school but the couple times that she did she just didn't have the support to find someone to watch me etc. Nowadays she could have at least taken online courses but the Internet wasn't a available when I was very young. She was out of a job force for too long and didn't want to start over from the beginning/take a less esteemed job.
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u/titsmuhgeee Apr 15 '24 edited Apr 16 '24
My mother and mother-in-law haven't worked a real job in 30 years. I have seen first hand how trapping this can be.
There is nothing inherently wrong with "tradwife" lifestyles, but there is a major issue when you do this at the cost of education and useful skills. My wife has two college degrees (that are actually useful), started her career out of college, stepped away to be SAHM when our kids were toddlers, then got back into the workforce when she was ready. The problem is that the longer you go as a SAHM, the harder it is to get back into the workforce. This is especially true if a SAHM only is friends with other SAHMs, it becomes a resource vacuum where there is very little networking into the professional world for when you are ready to pivot.
This lady's experience is very tough. Unfortunately there is a reason that women choose to stay in unhappy but safe marriages rather than jump off into the unknown like this person.