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Title: And What Do You Do?: When Women Choose to Stay Home by Loretta E. Kaufman, Mary W. Quigley ISBN: 1-885171-40-4 Publisher: Wildcat Canyon Press Pub. Date: June, 2003 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.25 (20 reviews)
Rating: 2
Summary: Not why I chose to stay home
Comment: I purchased this book after seeing the authors at a book store lecture and book-signing event sponsored by my local Mothers and More chapter. Even then, it left some lingering doubts, but reading the book increased my doubts and brought up many more criticisms.
I don't disagree for a second that it is a worthwhile endeavor to be a full-time parent and raise your child(ren). I am a veterinarian and worked half-time after the birth of my first child and left paid employment altogether for 18 months after the birth of my second. What disturbed me about this book were the generalizations the authors made about women who do the same thing or the opposite and why women can and should make this decision.
I really doubt that most women stay home after they have children in order to support their husband's career, but the authors seem convinced that this is a primary motivator. They also discuss the myriad of activities these women are engaging in to the point of not being at home. I must be missing something, because with a preschooler and a toddler, my volunteering opportunities are pretty limited. This corresponds quite well to other reviewers' comments that the women selected are not particularly representative of working women as a whole. In fact, many of the women interviewed are in highly selective fields such as runway modeling or the wives of very public or well-off men, such as professional athletes and coaches, Cabinet members, or world-renowed surgeons.
I also felt that the authors failed to address an important societal/political/economic issue - that being why only women are expected to be and allowed to be full-time parents. While they mention that it just doesn't seem acceptable for men to take advantage of parental leave options, they don't even suggest that this may be something requiring change. Nor do they address the fact that only women seem to face significant economic costs imposed by child-bearing and -rearing.
They also do not address very well the difficulty in staying home for those in highly technical and rapidly evolving fields. Anyone in medicine or other scientific areas knows that keeping up with new developments is very challenging and it is almost a given that you will have to bring your technical skills back up to speed after time away.
Finally, after I finished the book and was comparing my thoughts to those of others who wrote reviews here, I was surprised to see at least 2 of the reviews written by women who were surveyed and interviewed for the book, and yet that fact was not mentioned in their rave reviews.
Overall, while I am glad that the authors have highlighted and praised the option women have to leave paid employment and raise their children, I found their other conclusions less edifying.
Rating: 5
Summary: I chose to stay at home.
Comment: I think this is an excellent book. It profiles lots of different women who have chosen to stay home and take care of their families. I can assure you that none of the women profiled is "lazy" as one cusromer reviewer put it. As one of the women interviewed for this book, I would like to say that I am certainly not. I work very hard. In fact, I work harder now than I did when I had a full time job outside of the home.
I think the book is well written and has helped me reconfirm my belief that I made the decision to stay at home full time for now to be home with my young children.
Rating: 2
Summary: If you need an inferiority complex, read this book!
Comment: All of the stay at home moms in this book are very affluent, and either had very successful careers high on the corporate ladder or in acting or modeling, or their husbands are very wealthy (ceos, doctors, sports stars, actors). While it would be interesting to read a few stories of women who formerly had great careers and decided to interrupt them to stay home with their children, most stay at home moms are not like that. This book made me feel like I have never done anything with my life. Just not very useful to the normal mom, although if you are a millionaire CEO you might get something out of it.
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Title: Staying Home: From Full-Time Professional to Full-Time Parent by Darcie Sanders, Martha M. Bullen ISBN: 0967035902 Publisher: Spencer & Waters Pub. Date: February, 2001 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: What's a Smart Woman Like You Doing at Home? by Linda Burton, Janet Dittmer, Cheri Loveless ISBN: 0963118811 Publisher: Mothers At Home Pub. Date: March, 1993 List Price(USD): $5.50 |
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Title: So You Want to Be a Stay-At-Home Mom by Cheryl Gochnauer ISBN: 0830819223 Publisher: Intervarsity Press Pub. Date: August, 1999 List Price(USD): $10.00 |
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Title: Reinventing Ourselves After Motherhood: How Former Career Women Refocus Their Personal and Professional by Susan Lewis ISBN: 0809223759 Publisher: McGraw-Hill/Contemporary Books Pub. Date: 01 April, 2000 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Flux : Women on Sex, Work, Love, Kids, and Life in a Half-Changed World by PEGGY ORENSTEIN ISBN: 038549887X Publisher: Anchor Pub. Date: 21 August, 2001 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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