What’s a job? [reblogged]

I first posted this as a guest post at HuesofMaple / WordAllure one year ago and I think this deserves a renewed attention now that I’m once again a stay at home mom.

In a modern country like Norway, people often expect the men and women to have equal (not balance) responsibility.

Whenever I tell that I’m a full-time housewife, what follows is, “So you don’t have a job?”

What?

Did I not just say what my job was?

What makes housewives (or househusbands) less of a job than 9 to 5 office work? In fact, being a full-time stay at home parents is a 24h duty.

I read an article once of a man speaking to his marriage counselor.

The counselor asked: “So you think it’s unfair because you mean that you’re the only one with a job?”
The man: “I am the only one with a job.”
The counselor: “What does your wife do when you wake up in the morning?”
The man: “She makes breakfast, prepare lunchbox for me and the kids and drive them to school. Because she has no job.”
The counselor: “After driving them to school she goes home and relax?”
The man: “No, she usually gets the groceries, because she has no job“
The counselor: “Then she relaxes after that?”
The man: “She cleans the house and does the chores because she has no job.”
The counselor: “And what does she do in the afternoon?”
The man: “She fetches the kids and prepares our dinner because she has no job“
The counselor: “At night. Does she go to bed with all of you?”
The man: “No, she usually stays up and do the dishes, and do some advance preparation for the next day, because she has no job“

At this point, I stop reading the damn article because I might punch my computer out of anger. In the story, it was a woman, but I’m sure it happens to men too.

They criticized my uncle as a bum for being a househusband. I always defended him (including from my mother) because god, the man does all the work in the house and raise his three kids with a little help from his wife!

Salute to all stay-at-home mom and dads out there.

Thank you for reading!