If your child wants to be a SAHP....

[icunurse]

I don't see this any different than my 12 yr old wanting to be professional soccer player. My answer is thats great but you need to go to college first and get an education and then you can be what ever you want to be. I am a SAHM but didn't with my first 2 children I worked full time. I don't want to crush his dreams but I need to inject a little reality in a way that doesn't seem like Im against his goals.

Completely agree with this. I hope both of my children have dreams, dreams that they can accomplish all by themselves if they don't find their partner early in life (or at all). I want them to feel the accomplishment of getting a degree, of doing/buying something all on their own because of their own hard work, travel on their own dime. I don't mind if my DD ends up being a SAHM, but I first want her to experience life and independence and a job, as well as have options for her future. Her spouse may not make enough for her to be a SAHM, she may marry a man that dies or results in a divorce, they may have a child with huge medical bills....any number of situations. I want her to have options and freedom to do what is best with her and, potentially, for her family, whatever that decision is.

[maestramommy]

I'm a SAHM, but I'm friends with and have family who are SAHM or WAHM. Very occasionally dd2 had brought up that she wants to be a mother, along with all the other occupations she's interested in, lol. I just tell her luckily she has a long time to decide what she wants to do.

Right now my kids love the things I do as their Mom, without realizing a lot of it is possible because I am a SAHM. but I don't think it's important to tell them that, they're too young. What I would tell my kids the same thing I truly friends who WAHM and have guilt, or SAHM and have guilt: there's a tradeoff for either choice, with sacrifices made no matter what. The important thing is to own your choices, otherwise it is to easy to get stuck agonizing over whether or not you made a bad choice. Plus these kinds of choices can be fluid, if for no other reason than we never have total control over the trajectory of our lives.

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[baymom]

Off topic, but both of my kids have said they'd like 4 kids when they grow up, and for *me* to live near them so I can watch all 8 grandchildren while they go and be a professional soccer player and a "famous" architect!