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monica
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| Posted: Nov 23 2007 at 7:17am | IP Logged
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i had a thanksgiving day phone conversation with my parents where both of them were asking when i would go to grad school. my mom pretty much offered to be the child care provider so i could go back to school. for a little background, both my parents have pHds and teach at the university and graduate level. my older brother just finished his doctorate and will be graduating next month. so higher education is a "given" in my family. i went to college, got a degree in elementary education and taught for 2 years. my parents always assumed that i would just go on and get more schooling and eventually go back to work. my mother worked since we were young and they just dont get that i WANT to be doing what i am doing. they are afraid i am not living up to my potential, that i am wasting my life on diaper changes and dishes. i think they also worry about financial security if i dont have a way to be employed if something were ever to happen. i am very confident that being a mother is my vocation, but after i got off the phone yesterday, i worried that maybe i should get recertified to teach "just in case" so i would have a way to provide for my kids. how do you moms deal with the temptation to worry about "what ifs"? and how to you come back to the security of Gods call on your life to be mothers? sorry if this is long and rambling. i dont know if anyone out there will relate, but i didnt know who else to ask
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guitarnan
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| Posted: Nov 23 2007 at 7:26am | IP Logged
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I can relate, especially since I've always wanted to get an advanced degree.
I throw myself at the feet of Jesus when these worries invade my peace. I always ask God to show me His path for my decisions, His plan for my life. Answers come, although sometimes they come in roundabout ways.
In this day and age, being able to stay home is a blessing most people can't afford...so I try to point out to my critics that I want to be home, I want to spend my time with my dear children, and that I am happy.
Most of the time the critics come around to my point of view, or they at least leave me alone.
Rely on God. Ask the Blessed Mother for her powerful prayers. It will all work out.
I don't know where you live, but where I live, teachers are in short supply and you can recertify on the job. Maybe your parents aren't aware of this fact...you probably could land a teaching job quickly if you needed one, with your initial certification and experience.
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Nancy in MD. Mom of ds (24) & dd (18); 31-year Navy wife, move coordinator and keeper of home fires. Writer and dance mom.
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Mary G
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| Posted: Nov 23 2007 at 7:30am | IP Logged
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I have been in the what-if situation -- my 1st husband died when my older two were little (3 and 1); I was already working but I have to say that I actually STOPPED working and came home to raise the kiddoes! I gave up a GREAT corporate-ladder-climbing job to come home and BOY, did I get grief from many corners about that. You'd have thought I was putting the kids and me on the streets instead of the big ol' suburbia house we were in! After all, I have an MBA, so I kind of understood the economics of the whole thing ..... My second dh, whom I met when we moved and I started teaching at the parochial school where my kids went, had also baled from an extremely lucrative biotech company that he helped start so he could teach in the Catholic schools. A priest friend calls it Rick's "Franciscan moment" and we've been embracing "poverty" (by American standards) ever since. But, we firmly believe God provides whenever the situation arises and that we're doing what He wants us to do.
If I were you, I would pray and try to discern what GOD is calling you to do .... not what your parents or family expect or THINK is what you should do. We can't know what is in the future but we can know that God will be there to guide us if we let Him.
I'll keep you in my prayers for discernment and peace. It can be tough when the ones you know and love make you second-guess yourself.
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MaryG
3 boys (22, 12, 8)2 girls (20, 11)
my website that combines my schooling, hand-knits work, writing and everything else in one spot!
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Cheryl
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| Posted: Nov 23 2007 at 7:59am | IP Logged
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We have bought life insurance so that if my dh passes away, we will be able to continue with this way of life. I don't worry about my dh leaving me as I used to before I was married. I trust that if something like that happened, God would take care of me.
I understand how conversations with people whose opinions matter to you can really shake you up. I have found that God is the only one who can take away my fears.
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Cheryl
Wife to Bob ('97)
Mom to Matthew 13, Joseph 11, Sarah 10, Rachel 6, Hannah almost 4 and Mary 1
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Elizabeth
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| Posted: Nov 23 2007 at 9:45am | IP Logged
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Monica,
You're not alone. Read what this Ivy League grad has to say..
God bless you!
__________________
Elizabeth Foss is no longer a member of this forum. Discussions now reflect the current management & are not necessarily expressions of her book, *Real Learning*, her current work, or her philosophy. (posted by E. Foss, Jan 2011)
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Barbara C.
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Sometimes when parents express these "concerns" it is because the feel guilty about their own choices. Some of my friends have run into this with their moms. Their mom sees their daughter's choice to breastfeed and stay home as an indictment of their own parenting.
I don't worry so much about what would happen if my husband died. I believe that things would all work out somehow. But sometimes the doubts about being able to pay our bills right now creep in. Sometimes my husband gets discouraged by our financial situation and starts talking about me going back to school and getting a Master's to teach community college, but then we really sit down and look at the financial and emotional costs of me working full-time outside the home it never really seems worth it.
I'm sure that if some of my former teachers and classmates learned that I was "just" a stay-at-home mom they would have thoughts about me "wasting my potential". After all, I was the nerdy, valedictorian. I thought I would really like to be a high school teacher, which everyone discouraged as being below my potential. I didn't like the hoops you had to jump through to be certified, though. I happened into medical billing after college graduation. I never really thought I would be a stay-at-home mom, but God gave me a wonderfully challenging little girl who wanted to nurse all the time and had her days and nights mixed up.
It took me a few years to adjust to and embrace full-time motherhood. And then, I discovered homeschooling. I knew that not only would it be the best for my children, but I knew that it would enable me to live up most fully to my potential. I always knew that I had the potential to be a good teacher, and now I have a personal stake in being the best teacher that I can be.
So in those times when I feel discouraged or others question my choice to be at home with my kids, I remember that success and potential achievement are not necessarily measured by how much money or how many degrees you have. And I just discovered a wonderful quote by Jackie Kennedy Onassis, "If you bungle raising your children, I don't think whatever else you do matters very much."
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Barbara
Mom to "spirited" dd(9), "spunky" dd (6), "sincere" dd (3), "sweet" dd (2), and baby girl #5 born 8/1/12!!
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vmalott
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My mom was a working woman from the time she graduated high school in the 50s. She took a brief break from full-time work to be "mom" and went back part-time once I started Kindergarten. When I went to Middle School and my brother started college (there's nearly 8 years between us), she began working full-time again.
She used to give me grief for a while after I dropped out of the doctorate program (which coincided w/getting married and starting our family), thinking I wasn't really "living up to my potential" (I have a degree in philosophy, so whatever my 'potential' is is open to debate, lol). And honestly used to think that way myself sometimes.
However, since starting homeschooling over 7 years ago, I think I'm living up to my potential more. What I mean is, I'm more engaged as a parent, and my mind is more engaged. I'm more motivated to continue learning for its own sake (which is why I wound up w/a degree in philosophy in the first place). And if things get to a place where I will need to work outside the home, I'll find a job, somehow, somewhere. I trust God will take care of the details.
Valerie
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Valerie
Mom to Julia ('94), John ('96), Lizzy ('98), Connor ('01), Drew ('02), Cate ('04), Aidan ('08) and three saints in heaven
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lapazfarm
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| Posted: Nov 23 2007 at 2:47pm | IP Logged
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I have been in your shoes. Still there, to some extent, though my Mom is softening as the Alzheimer's kicks in. (But that's another story)
The thing I have to tell myself is that my Mom was raised in a different era and a different culture. For her, it was a sign of her independence from her parent's generation to be a career woman. Womens lib was powerful and pervasive in her formative years and she absorbed that mindset down to her very core. For her, to be a wife and mother is a step backward to her parent's time, which her generation spent so much time and energy fighting to Iremove themselves from. And it WAS a struggle and took much courage (though misguided in many ways)so women of her era had to really band together and draw strength from each other's convictions that what they were doing was right. or they would never have succeeded against the odds they faced. This was true of women who tried to succeed in the corporate world, and also for women who tried to enter the upper echelons of academia.
So, I can understand how my Mom sees my choice as weak and backward, while choosing a career shows strength and modernity.
What SHE doesn't realize, though, is that OUR generation has it's own struggle. Ours is to take back our femininity and our God-given rights as keepers of the home. We are not shirking responsibility. Rather,we are wrestling it back from the institutions set up by our parent's generation to assume those responsibilities they abandoned in favor of the work force.
Like our parent's generation we have an uphill battle against mighty odds, so we need to draw strength from others who are fighting alongside us. We need to remain strong and convicted and know that we are doing God's work, not the work of the world, who would have us abandon our young to the care of others.
Like I said, it is a clash of cultures, as much so as the clash that happened when our mothers left the house and entered the working world. Their mothers did not understand them, and ours do not understand us.
I don't know if all of this is useful at all to you, but when I finally realized this and accepted it, it made my Mom's comments much easier to deal with.
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Theresa
us-schooling in beautiful Fairbanks, Alaska.
LaPaz Home Learning
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mathmama
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Unfortunately, this is a topic that is close to my heart  I have a Phd in mathematics. When I defended my thesis I was about 3 mos pg with our first child. I get the comments all the time about wasting my degree. These comments hurt most when they come from family members, in particular my mom. She has always been a career woman and was a single mom who worked hard so that I could get a college education. Because of this, she sees my staying home as a waste of her money I have always maintained that I got educated for education's sake (not just to get a job and make money), but that seems to upset her even more, like I let her pay for part of my education under false pretenses. On top of this, I was a very good athlete and my mom is convinced I should be coaching. She once told me that it would "be a sin if I didn't coach" .
I also get comments from non family members and right after they express their shock that I have a Phd and am not working they always say "well, once the kids are in school, blah, blah, blah" at which point I bring up homeschooling and open a whole other can of worms 
So, I have dealt with this by saying that dh and I believe that this is the most important job that I could be doing, and that it is the right choice for our family. As for getting recertified, I agree with others that it is something that could probably be done on the fly and that God will provide. You already have the degree, so you are in no way being negligent of the "what ifs".
I have to say that as time has gone on my mom has backed off a bit. I don't know if she has just given up or if she is starting to see value in what I am doing. Either way, I am grateful for it because I am now more relaxed around her. And I got a great boost this fall when I visited my thesis advisor. He knew when he took me on as a student that I would be staying home to raise our family when we were blessed with children. His wife, who has a Phd, had done the same until their youngest was 10. Anyway, on my visit this fall he was all positive about the girls and then he asked "have you thought about homeschooling?" When I told him we were going to do it (my girls are still young) he was so enthusiastic, basically saying it is the only good choice for children these days. He went on and on about how the schools today are so bad for our kids morally. What a boost it was for me 
So, hang in there. And while your mom may be able to do a wonderful job with your kids, you are their mom and they need *you*. Also, if she offers again, I would thank her, and say, if something ever comes up that you need to get recertified (such as death of dh, or his inabilibity to work, etc) then you will take her up on the offer. And as for the temptation to not trust in God, just think of the Blessed Mother, raising our Lord. Joseph was a poor carpenter, I am sure they didn't have savings or anything, and she didn't run off to school "just in case" 
Good luck and God bless,
Beth
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monica
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| Posted: Nov 24 2007 at 5:48am | IP Logged
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you all have been such an encouragement. i knew i wasnt alone in this struggle. some other stuff has been going on and i think my parents comments got me at a particularly vulnerable time. the mantra i keep saying is "i can go back to school anytime, but my kids only have one childhood" and i want to be there for it!! thanks again. please keep praying.
monica
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4Real Forums : Tea and Conversation
Topic: family thinks im wasting my life- help!
