I think so often about what you said about feminism being equated with extricating ourselves from the work of the home and all the implications of that. I LOVE the book Essential Labor. I wish more people talked about these things and I want to talk about them more myself.
As a full time caretaker/home educator/parent in a pretty progressive community, I find people so often are not quite sure how to think of me. I don’t fit any of their boxes/stereotypes. I also receive comments at times like, “oh wow! Good for you! I could never do what you do. I’d lose my mind!” And while it’s couched as a compliment, I find it a bit insulting - both to me and to children.
I also used to live in a much more conservative community where being a stay at home parent or home educator is more lifted up, but for reasons that are pretty in conflict to my values and reasons for making these decisions. I guess it’s also a bit disorienting to me at times to feel like I don’t fit well into hardly anyone’s expectations. In one sense, I actually love that. In another, it’s quite tiring.
Yeah I can relate. I don't want to fit the conservative idea of a homemaker.. clearly that's not what I'm about! And, I also don't subscribe to the idea that feminism means career success and wealth.. that's also equally messed up! So I'm with you that there doesn't seem to be a place for us, and that even seemingly progressive people in our communities make comments like the one above, which clearly is also a veiled insult about how impossible children are and how thankless the work of caring is.. to the point that the goal is avoiding them and it as much as we can!
My older kiddos are usually up past me. It took some time for me to adjust, and to trust that they would be ok without me up with them. Giving them freedom of figure out their own boundaries with screens with me asleep was also a challenge, but we have great conversations about their bedtimes and they talk about wanting to improve their routines and ideas they have for how to help themselves get to be earlier or remember to brush their teeth etc. I’ve realized it’s all rich learning - learning about themselves, what makes them tick, figuring out screen boundaries.
With D&D, my kids played with their dad for a while, and it’s a pretty fun role-playing game - character development, working as a team and negotiating how to handle challenges in the story. It’s actually pretty awesome! (From someone who was told it was evil growing up 😂)
All your points about kids in the US and Europe are spot on. I’ve heard Europe is more kid friendly, but kid friendly is not the same as respecting children as full people. And the lack of openness to homeschooling is off-putting as well. Guess we’ll have to keep putting up with the US - sigh.
Haha I guess we will! And yeah - late nights have a lot of their own joys and challenges. I like that mine are getting used to putting themselves to bed, but that’s also fluctuating a lot so we’re in a period of change.
The late nights are definitely hard! I miss when my kids went to bed early and I had me time before I went to sleep. My kids don’t sleep very late yet, I’m trying to adjust to staying up and bring available later since they will need this as teenagers, too. But it is tiring!
So many good points about kids in Europe vs US, and the way care work isn’t valued.
I think so often about what you said about feminism being equated with extricating ourselves from the work of the home and all the implications of that. I LOVE the book Essential Labor. I wish more people talked about these things and I want to talk about them more myself.
As a full time caretaker/home educator/parent in a pretty progressive community, I find people so often are not quite sure how to think of me. I don’t fit any of their boxes/stereotypes. I also receive comments at times like, “oh wow! Good for you! I could never do what you do. I’d lose my mind!” And while it’s couched as a compliment, I find it a bit insulting - both to me and to children.
I also used to live in a much more conservative community where being a stay at home parent or home educator is more lifted up, but for reasons that are pretty in conflict to my values and reasons for making these decisions. I guess it’s also a bit disorienting to me at times to feel like I don’t fit well into hardly anyone’s expectations. In one sense, I actually love that. In another, it’s quite tiring.
Yeah I can relate. I don't want to fit the conservative idea of a homemaker.. clearly that's not what I'm about! And, I also don't subscribe to the idea that feminism means career success and wealth.. that's also equally messed up! So I'm with you that there doesn't seem to be a place for us, and that even seemingly progressive people in our communities make comments like the one above, which clearly is also a veiled insult about how impossible children are and how thankless the work of caring is.. to the point that the goal is avoiding them and it as much as we can!
My older kiddos are usually up past me. It took some time for me to adjust, and to trust that they would be ok without me up with them. Giving them freedom of figure out their own boundaries with screens with me asleep was also a challenge, but we have great conversations about their bedtimes and they talk about wanting to improve their routines and ideas they have for how to help themselves get to be earlier or remember to brush their teeth etc. I’ve realized it’s all rich learning - learning about themselves, what makes them tick, figuring out screen boundaries.
With D&D, my kids played with their dad for a while, and it’s a pretty fun role-playing game - character development, working as a team and negotiating how to handle challenges in the story. It’s actually pretty awesome! (From someone who was told it was evil growing up 😂)
All your points about kids in the US and Europe are spot on. I’ve heard Europe is more kid friendly, but kid friendly is not the same as respecting children as full people. And the lack of openness to homeschooling is off-putting as well. Guess we’ll have to keep putting up with the US - sigh.
Haha I guess we will! And yeah - late nights have a lot of their own joys and challenges. I like that mine are getting used to putting themselves to bed, but that’s also fluctuating a lot so we’re in a period of change.
The late nights are definitely hard! I miss when my kids went to bed early and I had me time before I went to sleep. My kids don’t sleep very late yet, I’m trying to adjust to staying up and bring available later since they will need this as teenagers, too. But it is tiring!
So many good points about kids in Europe vs US, and the way care work isn’t valued.