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The Struggle of Choosing to be a Stay at Home Mom

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If you’re reading this, you are probably a mom who chose to stay at home to look after your kids. You can’t help wondering if you made the right decision when you face another day of exhaustion, no meaningful interaction with other adults and no time to call your own. I can’t tell you that I have any answers for you, but I can tell you that you are not alone.

Being a stay-at-home mother can be lonely. Everyone else seems to be working and you’re facing another day in the company of your kids with constant demands for your attention but no meaningful conversation. When you go to the park with your child, you’re hoping some other mother will start a conversation just so you can talk to someone who might be able to understand.

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You can never get anything done. Sometimes when your husband walks in the door after work, the house looks as though you didn’t lift a finger to clean, although you felt you spent the whole day wiping crayon marks off the walls, picking up toys and tidying up.

Your child’s nap time was used to pay bills, wash clothes and prep for dinner. The ping of the microwave announcing your food was ready coincided with your child’s waking cries and so you didn’t eat all day.

Some people will tell you that you’re blessed to be able to stay at home with your child and that they wish they could do the same. You may feel guilty if your decision to stay at home was largely an economic one and not just a matter of choice.

Child care is often so expensive that it doesn’t pay you to work just to cover its cost and your commute. What caused you to make your decision doesn’t matter much in the long run. Either way, you become a teacher, companion, cook, protector and playmate for your child – which can feel thankless at times but is often rewarding too.

Making that decision to stay at home often means struggling to pay bills with only one salary coming in. There are ways to supplement one income if you’re struggling, such as contacting junk car buyers and selling an old car or selling old books online. If you have internet access, there are many ways to make a supplementary income.

You aren’t a bad person for longing for those days when you dressed carefully every day, put on makeup and went into the office. You look in the mirror and all you can see is the bags under your eyes and your unwashed hair. You are not the only person who has questioned at times whether being a stay-at-home mom was the right choice.

No-one needs to tell you that there are moments in your life as a stay-at-home mom that you wouldn’t trade for all the money in the world. You hear your child’s first word and see the first tentative steps. You read stories that evoke happiness and enjoy spontaneous dance sessions. You eat cookies together and laugh. You experience the world afresh as you see it in all its wonder through the eyes of your child.

You may be someone who loves every single moment of motherhood and that’s great, but if you feel discouraged at times, don’t feel guilty. If you’re struggling, there are plenty of other mothers out there like you who can relate to your struggles and your mixed emotions. You may just look back on your time at home with your children as one of the most rewarding times of your life, in spite of its many challenges.

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