How did you make being a SAHM a reality?

[allthewiser]

I've read every post and you stay at home mom's are the real heroes.

It's not unlike the decision to send your child to school with you thinking it might be to early. If you think it might be to early then it is. I am sure you've heard of people who regret they sent their kid to early but I bet you've never encountered a parent who regretted holding Johnny back another year.

Same holds true with being a SAHM. There are plenty of moms who regret giving their children up to daycare but contemplate how you've never met a SAHM who regretted the decision to stay home and not send her children to daycare.

My wife was a SAHM and while we did without a lot of material things we never once regretted our decision to have her stay at home.

I couldn't imagine the pain it would cause dropping off your brand new baby.

One thing we did that helped was to become a one car family.

While some wives make serious dollars most end up working for a car so they can work to make money for daycare so they can work.

As far as material things I can assure you all your baby wants is to be with mommy.

[Jilly50]

Let me add this (sorry this is a bummer to say but...)....keep up your job skills if you stay home. I occasionally worked temp jobs to earn money and keep up my computer skills. I had the unfortunate experience of going through a divorce after 28 years of marriage and had to go back to work. (My children are grown now) If I hadnt had the computer skills I'd have been in trouble. No one thinks this will ever happen to them and life has its unexpected events.

[kabin63]

I am a SAHM and have been for 15 years now. I ocassionally work part time to help out, but for us it was a no brainer. Just couldn't afford child care or the thought of someone else raising my dd. Now she is a teen, but I still find I need to be available for her.

[Kaos Kitty]

I should've clarified...I will still be teaching an online class for a local college so we will have a little money coming in, just not as much as what I make working full-time now.

I think if you can manage to be a SAHM and still keep your hand in your field by teaching online classes that would great. Somehow when we have less money we always find a way to make do, and when we have more money we always find a way to spend it!

You may have checked it out already, but most Universities and Colleges have on campus daycare. So if you're not 100% ready to make the transition yet, having your child on campus with you while you teach may allow you the time to play/spend time together during your lunch hour or break times between teaching. It was an option that I checked out and the campus daycare was very accommodating to this idea.

Of course there's always the number crunching, that with the cost of daycare, if it's worth working full time. I'm sure you'll get it worked out!

[crunchycon]

DH and I work for a large employer here in our SE US city. We have no kids, but that's another story for another time. Our company does hire a lot of young people that make good money for our neck of the woods. Nothing makes me sadder than overhearing a young woman freshly back on the job from maternity leave saying "I wanted to stay home, but my husband made me come back." Whether or not there's another story behind that statement, I'd hate to think that the couple just couldn't do some of the things you all are suggesting in this thread.

[purktoni]

This is a topic close to my heart, so I wanted to chime in also.

First let me say that it is most certainly a possibility, however, are you ready for all the sacrifices that come with it? I see on your signature that you have goals for 20 days no spend days and 20 days no eat out days, well, if you become a SAHM that may turn into 30 no spend days and 30 no eat out days! Your "extras"- entertainment, new clothes each season, gym memberships, girls night outs, etc... will all have to be cut back if not sacrificed all together.

I don't want to be the negative Nellie here... but honestly it is hard to do, especially if you're used to two incomes.

Now, if you care to know where this synical attitude is coming from, here's my story.

When I had my first son 14 years ago, I was employed full time. I cried every day at lunch time when I called my sister who was babysitting him for me and I wouldn't stop crying until I got home to see him. I was only back to work for 3 weeks before I quit. I was a SAHM for the next 12 years and three children later! Then, since my husband had a great job and we had outgrown our small rental home, we decided to buy our first home. I knew with our new purchase that I would have to help out. I thought my at home business would be enough... then the economy took a turn and my at home business is not making ANYTHING to contribute.

So, now after 12 years of being a mostly SAHM, I am back to work and still not getting the hours/pay I need to keep us going. We are short by $500 every month and being frugal has become a necessity to keep going rather than a way to save for something else.

I guess what my life has taught me, is that being a SAHM is very rewarding and I highly recommend doing it if you can. But at the same time, things do change and if they do and going back to work is your only option... don't feel like you failed or like you've done something wrong. Keep your lines of communication at your job open and friendly in case you need to go back.

That's my 2 cents.

[frugalnana]

I agree with others start living off one income now. Sit down figure up all your bills and what you both are willing to give up to make this work. In the long run it will benefit all of you. Less money on gas, clothes for work and more homemade meals.
I remember when many times when I had to work because of finances or being a single mom and I missed so much. When my youngest started having problems and my current dh and sat down and decided that it would be best. I have never regretted it. I do without sometimes for myself so that others can have more, but it is worth it. Now that I have health problems it is for the better.

[AspiringToBeFrugal]

Thanks for all the input!

Actually, I am the saver in our relationship! We don't spend a horrible amount of money on extras--no gym membership, I don't do "girls night out", we don't do much in the way of buying new clothes each season--I'm still wearing clothes I bought when I was in college five years ago. We really do put one of our paychecks in savings--it happens to be DH's which is bigger than mine but comes in one lump sum one time a month--so we live off mine--every two weeks--for the most part.

I think we will definitely try it and see what happens. I have wanted to be a SAHM for a long time. I have a Masters degree but I can't think of anything that would make me happier, despite my education, to do for the next few years than this.

Thanks again for all the input! I appreciate it and I'm sure others who read this thread do too!

[MyMelody]

This is a topic I think about a lot, because I very much want to be a SAHM one day, too. To make this more of a reality, I'm building frugal habits now and I'm determined to get my student loans and a few necessary home repairs done before dh and I start a family. We're nowhere near a "dress rehearsal" yet (where we'd pretend my income wasn't, ah, incoming!), but this is definitely something I could see us trying.

[nvmommyx6]

I agree with the poster on practicing before you quit working...I retired from bartending 13 months ago now, we both wanted me to stay home with the kids.
I was working 2 jobs (one really part time one) and one graveyard full time. The kids were raising themselves and doing a crappy job at it!
So, I came home, we tightened the belt straps right away! I went into frugal freakish mode and it has take some time but we have got it worked out in our favor!
One thing to think of is the $ you wont be spending on work clothes, transportation to and from work, eating out, car insurance.

It is hard sometimes but it is well worth it.
I'll tell you, there are days when I miss that $3-500. a night in tips though!!

[old_lady_in_the_shoe]

Yes, we did it too, about 6 years ago...I wanted to quit my job, but hubby said, if you can find a way to lower the bills by $1000 per month, then I say yes...we, I am the last person to back down from a challenge, kwim

so I started off with a good run down of our bills and 1st I decided that if I wasn't working than I didn't need a new car, so I sold it and that was my first $350 per month, then I dropped the insurance on it and raised the deductable on the other cars and saved almost another $100. Since I was "working" on insurance, I took a look at our homeowners and reworked it, raised the deductable and save another $15 per month. my hubby and I both had seperate cell phone plan, and my contract was up, so I ended my plan and added a line to his and saved another $49 each month. I lowered my budget on food/grocerys by $125 per month since I would be at home and could cook from scratch and clip coupons. I also took a hard look at our phone bill and lowered it by dropping caller Id and message service and dug out our old answering machine. Then I lowered our dish network from $59 to $29, payed off a few small credit cards and closed them, then I refinanced the house and I was home free!!!

I just took a good hard look at everything we paided out and lowered it and decided if I could live with out it or not. It was much easier to do that I suspected and I got what i wanted in the end.

It has been 6 years now and I love it!

Other things to look at,
cost of clothes you have to purchase to wear to work
any dry cleaning because of clothes
extra gas in the car for work
more money spent on convience foods to cook and eat out
taxes from you pay check...
daycare or babysitters
extra activites that you pay for, for kids

it all adds up and when you subtract all these things, it may actually pay you to stay home! Good luck!

[forHISglory]

We have done this twice. First, I quit teaching when our son was born, and did not work outside the home for 5 years. The second time was recently when I retired,and now we live off Hubby's pension.

Each time, we planned for a year in advance. We tracked every penny of spending and put it into categories so that we could see exactly where the money went. Then we made decisions on where to cut. Having it down on paper really helped us see clearly what our situation was.

Fortunately, we have usually been frugal minded, so our cuts did not make us squeak too much. And each time, we were pleasantly surprised on how we could do this and still have great quality of life.

[elphie]

When we decided last spring to homeschool our kids for the following school year it was a little scary, especially because dh works construction which isn't exactly bulletproof in times of economic downturn. My suggestion is baby steps if you can. We didn't give everything up at once, we started with eating out and cooking from scratch and when that became second nature we scaled back our satellite service, adding (or subtracting I guess) things gradually made the transition much easier.

I was a teacher and have always had the school divide my salary into twelve paychecks instead of nine so I still had 5 paychecks plus my extra duty pay that we recieve in June. We decided to immediately start cutting back the easiest things and see what we still needed from my paycheck. When we had those numbers we were then able to see what else needed to go, and even now we still modify and make changes. For example we initially just cut back our satellite service to the cheapest plan but a few months ago we decided we would rather spend that money in other places.

To get started I read The Tightwad Gazette and Miserly Moms. I also detailed exactly how we had spent our money over the last several months- I meticulously went through the checkbook register and we started using checks/debits for ALL purchases for a couple of months because its easy to forget where and how you spent cash. Armed with that information and the tips from the books I was able to create a budget. That budget is a living, breathing document that gets revised on a regular basis.

Good luck!

[C@rol]

Yes, we did it starting in 2005. I manage our
finances so I just sat down with everything
and trimmed as much as I could. We stopped
eating out as often because we were to tired
to cook. No more dry cleaning for me and weekly
runs to the mall for stockings, outfits and all
the other things we think we need for work.

It took some time but once we got use to it
we saw the trickle down benefits of me being
home. My husband loves it.