The Stay-at-Home Dilemma
By Brian G. Smith
So, I’m not actually a stay-at-home mom…in fact, I’m not a mom at all. But I’m happily married to one, and a stay-at-home one at that! Six years ago, when my wife was pregnant with our first of three sons (yes, three strapping boys), we decided that she would take the road less traveled and leave her elementary school teaching career.
As I’m sure you’ve felt, she desperately wanted to be home with our kids, to be there when they needed her, and to enjoy every waking moment of our children’s lives. And after spending all day long teaching 30 of everyone else’s kids as a fifth grade teacher, she was more than ready to turn her attention to her own.
One of the biggest reasons we decided to have her be a stay-at-home mom, and one we’ve held all along, is that money can’t buy our parenting. There is nothing we can spend on a daycare that would give us the peace of mind that our kids have been raised properly. Raising upright and intelligent kids is a legacy we put the highest priority on, and leaving the job to some daycare that is qualified to raise our kids and can’t give our kids the personal attention we could was anything BUT the way to go. Yes, it was a sacrifice to yield that extra wage, but it was a sacrifice well worth it as our attention turned squarely towards our new family, and raising our kids.
But, I have to admit, as my wife has persevered raising our three very “active” boys (5, 3, and 1), I’ve realized that my wife has sacrificed more than just a nice salary to stay at home with the kids…she sacrificed a normal lifestyle.
Almost in an instant, her social life, friends, intelligent conversation, and anything resembling contact with a normal adult (outside of me, of course) disappeared from her life completely. Sure, there are always the neighborhood moms, and the church we attend, but as you probably know quite well, neighborhood mommy politics and play dates can be just as frustrating as office politics, and more so even, as everyone vies for position in the neighborhood…it’s the G-rated version of Desperate Housewives.
What it’s come to is a life full of answering the ever-so-enjoyable unending series of “Why” kiddie-questions and surviving Nick Jr. reruns (Is it just me, or did they literally film only 3 episodes of each show, and now run them, in succession, EVERY DAY?) instead of the normal adult life that so many working women get to enjoy.
My wife yearns for anything resembling an adult lifestyle, whether it’s making some money or just having an outlet to talk to someone about something other than “Why you have to eat all your vegetables BEFORE you can have a cookie”. And yet, her priority on being with the kids often tips the balance so heavily in favor of the mommy-side of her life that there’s no room for anything else. We’ve thought about a part-time job, particularly while I’m at home at night, but that would mean less time with the true love of her life, me (yes, I’m biased, but I’m humble too!).
It’s been a real Catch-22 for us. Recently I’ve been looking into stay-at-home working options for her. I’m sure you’ve heard of them, jobs that have women working in the comfort of their own homes so they can work on their own time and not sacrifice attention to the little ones. In particular, I’ve looked into Medical Transcription. Apparently, medical offices are continuously behind in their medical reports and they need people to type out what the Doctors say (and usually record onto a tape) about a patient’s diagnosis and treatment. It’s flexible work you can do at home.
Maybe you’ve looked into medical transcription, but this is my first experience.
It seems easy enough. Places like Allied Schools teach you the medical terminology, how to increase your typing speed, and then you take a test and they line you up to work with a medical office in your area. I’ve heard that transcriptionists can make anywhere from $20,000 to $45,000 a year working at home in only a few hours a day.
I’ve looked into a number of schools, and what I’ve discovered is that the best way to get your training is to go with an online, independent school. Community colleges and traditional schools offer extensive training options, but according to what I’ve heard from medical offices, they don’t train you for what you really need to know, and you end up wasting thousands of dollars in the process. A quick Google search on “medical transcription course” will give you a pretty long list of potential schools, though I’ve found the Allied Schools program (www.MedTranscriptionCourse.com) to be fairly comprehensive and they can easily get you paying medical transcription work right after you finish.
The one thing I like about the idea of doing medical transcription is the balance it provides. You get actual contact from “the outside world” AND you get to make a little money doing it.
In the end, it all comes down to giving my wife the life she deserves. More than anything, I want my wife to be happy and lead a normal adult life, and I can’t stand to see her sacrifice a lifestyle she had before our kids were born while I spend my days bringing home the bacon and living the life she gave up.
B. G. Smith
