Just a stay at home mom

"[Women] are taught from their infancy upwards that it is a wrong, ill-tempered, and a misunderstanding of 'woman's mission' (with a great M) if they do not allow themselves willingly to be interrupted at all hours." -Florence Nightingale, from Cassandra

In my 11 years of being a stay-at-home spouse, I have received no awards or respect for my job. That's usually when people laugh at me-- when I say job.

"Your job? You stay home all day. With kids."

People have said that to my face. And they mean it.

From a young age, I wanted a big family. I mean, a lot of kids. I honestly wanted 10 kids. I still want 10 kids, but I lost my uterus after birthing baby #5 so we are not having anymore. I know there are other ways to have children and we haven't ruled them out, but my body is officially out of commission.

I also knew that I wanted to have my kids young. I wanted to start having a big family when I was young-- a newlywed. Not just to get the ball rolling towards big family goals, but also so that I would be young as my children grew and possibly when they started having children. My logic was, if I have a baby when I'm 20, I could be 40 when my first grand-babies were born. I will be young and, hopefully by 40, established, and I will actually be able to travel and do the things I want to, when I am also old enough to really appreciate them.

I have goals. I want to write a book. I want to work in publishing. Those are my modest goals. I want to change the world too. I want to raise the next generation of leaders. I want to inspire the people around me to push harder, dream bigger, be bigger. I want to lead a grassroots revolution where collectively, as women, we know our rights and the people around us-- men, women, old, young-- agree. I want moms to lift each other up-- to support different styles, abilities, for working moms and stay at home moms to be a community.

Those are some of the things on my mind.

But I guess you could say it all started when I met my E-3 sailor. We fell in love in a whirlwind romance. I moved across country, which meant dropping out of the my California college. We didn't have a lot of money so I started working at Starbucks and Barnes and Noble. We started our family and I decided to slowly work on my degree, a class or two at a time. That fit with my family goals and career goals. I wanted to be home raising babies, so it didn't feel like much of a compromise to do that and slowly work on my degree. Since my husband is in the military, we move every 1-3 years. This worked for 2 duty stations.

When he was an E-5 he got picked up in an officer program that sent him to college to get his degree, our 3rd duty station. The program was contingent on him maintaining a certain GPA as he got his mechanical engineering degree in 3 years, so we decided for the first semester, at least, that I would take a break from my classes-- because we had a baby and a were moving, etc.

Then I got pregnant with twins and we pretty much decided that I would take a break from my degree at that duty station. The officer program was a really good opportunity for our family and I wanted more babies and it felt like the right call.

We moved again (4th duty station) and yet again my husband had busy schools. We had another baby (baby #4). At that duty station I also homeschooled our oldest because we were moving and traveling a lot. We lined everything up so that at our next duty station, I would dive back into college.

Of course life threw a kink in our plans. My health took a turn and we were faced with a surgery that required a hysterectomy or "going for" our last baby a lot sooner than we wanted to. When baby #4 was only 6 months old, we started trying for our 5th and final baby, pushing the surgery off until after baby #5 was born. It took us almost a year to get pregnant with our 5th baby. We were at our 5th duty station by then. My husband had already deployed once. The pregnancy was a nightmare. I had so many health complications. My family had health problems-- our two sons with asthma were having a lot of issues, my grandmother had a stroke, my mom completely severed her Achilles' tendon. We were living across country from our friends and family and my husband's Navy schedule was very demanding. Our kids had a really hard time with the move. I ended up on bedrest. With all of that, my degree once again took a backseat.

For a long time, I have felt like I was supporting my husband in his career-- an active role. I felt like I was investing in our future. His career moves were very good for our family and had a positive impact. He has come so far since being lower enlisted on our wedding day; now he's an O-3! He is accepted into another program where he will get his master's degree from a prestigious school.

Recently, I realized that I am empty handed. I have no degree. But, really, I chose family over career and have nothing to show for it. I chose my husband's career over my degree. I can think of several times where I almost pushed for my degree, even if it was hard or a financial burden, but I thought, "I don't want to add stress. We move all the time. What will I do with my degree right now anyways?" I thought, "I am investing in us."

Really, I put all my eggs in his basket.

I get asked what I do all day.

At a party one time, this gal came over and complimented my style. She started chatting with me and I asked her about what she does and she was very animated telling me about it. She was young-- early 20's. I was late 20's, 4 kids deep. She returned the question and I coyly answered it. I have found people find it off-putting when I drop how many kids we have, like I am one-upping them just by divulging that aspect of my life. She looked surprised that I had so many kids and spluttered, "But you look so young!" I accepted the compliment and swung the conversation back around to her work, since she was clearly passionate about it and I found it interesting (she worked in publishing). Instead of answering my question, she bluntly asked, "So, you just, like, stay home, then?" I laughed and said, "Presently, yes, I am a stay at home parent." Her whole demeanor changed and she conversed a few more minutes with much shorter and less enthusiastic answers before slinking away to the arm of her man, where I heard her loudly mutter, "Who am I supposed to talk to here? There are so many stay at home moms. What do I have in common with them?"

I know that is how people see me.

Just a stay at home mom.

Just a military spouse.

Have you heard how people talk about military spouses? Us military spouses are LuLaRoe wearing slobs, slinking to and from school pick up with top knots and spending our husband's money, glad when they are deployed because we are only with them for the paycheck.

When people make disparaging remarks about military spouses to me, they quickly correct it by saying, "But you aren't like that. You always look nice every day." "You are always doing things." "You clearly care about your kids."

I hear the same thing when people talk about being a stay at home mom, "I mean, you are different because you have 5 kids. I don't know what moms of 1 or 2 do all day." "You are always really involved with your kids. Some women stay home just to watch TV all day."

Or when I meet a working mom and she says, "I just couldn't stay home because I needed to use my brain during the day."

Or when I talk to a man-- parent or not parent-- and he says, "I give you females so much respect. You have so much more patience than I do. I couldn't handle kids all day."

Does anyone see how frustrating these comments are?

In order for me to accept the compliment about being a stay at home parent, I have to insult a whole variety of stay at home moms "with only 1 or 2 kids." Or I have to agree that I am an acceptable military spouse because I tend to not wear leggings out much (because, clearly, a female's value rests entirely on her personal taste in clothing). In order to bridge the gap with a working mom, I need to accept that I choose not to use my brain all day. In order to talk to the man, I need to accept that my gender gives me more patience with children.

No. No. NO. NO. NO NO NO NO NO NO

One hundred million times no.

I was a stay at home spouse before I had children.

I was a stay at home mom when I had one kid and I thought it was hard.

I was a stay at home mom with three kids and I thought it was hard.

I was a stay at home mom with four kids and I thought it was hard.

I am a stay at home mom with five kids and I think it is hard.

I have been a military spouse for 11 years and I think it is hard.

I have been married for 11 years and I find it beyond irritating that at this juncture, with the amount of work that I have put in for us that I have no degree. I find it so frustrating that my husband has never had to choose between his degree or his career path in order to have children. I never intended on working in the early years of parenting-- from the start-- but I did think that around now I would be working. I did think that I would have my degree by now. I didn't think everything would be such a compromise.

I know that as a military spouse moving every 1-3 years that my situation is a little different than other stay at home mom's situations. We do not have a community that we have built up over the years or long standing friendships or relations when we move. We have to start new every duty station. 

But what I don't think is that my situation is unique.

Men are applauded for being a stay at home parent. They are seen as revolutionary and their spouse's get to hear what great husbands they have. And Lord help us if they make dinner. The praise is never ending. Those families are so modern that the man is willing to put in the time and effort to raise the kids and help in that way.

In our house, it is all me. No one thinks it is revolutionary. I have been told to my face that I cannot be a feminist and a stay at home mom.

Here's what I want to know: how does a feminist have a big family then? Who is going to do all this work? Because I have some pretty bad ass feminist friends who work and have fancy degrees (and PhD's) and the problems that I have in my household sound familiar to the problems they have in their household. The problems they have as women in their workplace sound a lot like the sexist remarks hurled at me as I push that ginormous bus cart through Target (you know the one). 

This work has to get done. I have the uterus and I have the breasts and so I'm the one growing the babies, feeding the babies, and then dealing with the consequences and physical toll of growing and feeding babies. I'm the one with the shredded, sagging stomach, the deflated breasts, and the scars and stretch marks. I'm the one who still needs more surgery-- not to look better, but to function. We both decided to have a big family. We both agreed we wanted more children. We always jokingly say that the only one of our kids that was an accident or a surprise was Twin B because we planned each of our pregnancies. We were trying to get pregnant to have our big family. This is our joint work.

And our house has things that have to get done. We have dishes, laundry, yard maintenance, trash to take out, homework to get done, school projects, book fairs, special assignments, swim lessons, preschool, playdates, meals to cook, lunches to pack, errands that need to get run. We are a military family so we have paperwork to fill out, a house to prepare to sell, a move that needs to get planned, our next duty station needs to be researched-- where we want to live, what schools are good, what kind of houses we can afford, etc. These are all things that have to get done in our home. Someone has to do them-- whether that is me or my husband.

The military aspect makes that a little different, as my husband is very willing to carry a lot of that load, but his schedule is very unpredictable. Even if he thinks he can be somewhere, it changes all the time. So we tend to plan things just in case he can't make it. I only let our kids sign up for as many activities that I could manage without a second parent available. Our house is kept on a schedule that works if I am the only parent home. We stagger our errands and housework so I can handle doing all of it. All of it falls on me.

My husband is helpful when he is home, but can I count on him?

And I have counted on him for all these years and what do I have to show for it?

I think it is an atrocity for women to tear down other women. For women to look at someone and see only a military spouse, or only a stay at home mom. All women have had to make choices. A kick ass woman pursuing her goals and her dreams and her career choice also has to make choices.

It is an atrocity that men and women view it as "helpful" when men do these tasks. Women are expected to get all of their "extras" done plus the house, meal, and child responsibilities. They are the ones delegating the tasks and the schedules and the work load and their men are praised when they "assist." Why is this not joint marital responsibility? How have I felt that I was being helpful to my partner and my family all these years and the world doesn't see me that way at all? These are responsibilities humans should share and are not the burden of women alone. Men are not helping women by doing these tasks. A stay at home dad is not better than a stay at home mom-- it is a person who is willing to put in that time and willing to trust their partner that this time is an investment.

I can't say that I would do it differently... or maybe I should say I don't know what I would do differently. My pregnancies weren't easy and some required bedrest. I wasn't surrounded by a community that supported me through most of them. I carried myself and my kids through those times. If I had chosen my degree or my career or whatever it is I wanted to do, I wouldn't have the family that I do now. I can't change the past.

What I can say is that it is hard for women to choose.

It is unfair women have to.

It is unfair that the work that has to get done is thrown on women and that we accept it so willingly. That we think of ourselves as people. That I have this idea of who I am and what I am doing and how I am making a difference.

It hurts to see how the world views you.

Because I am just a woman. Who has too many kids. Mooching off my military husband's paycheck. And no career goals.

There is more to every woman's story.