To Work OR To Not: Am I Being A "Good" Mother?
“Being employed is not going to harm the children, it entirely depends how mothers’ balance their life”
Attitude towards working women is in no way different than that towards housewives. A working woman has to manage her home also in addition to her work. A woman has no choice but to manage both the home and the work front otherwise she is held guilty. Since most jobs only offer maternity leave for the first four to six weeks of a child’s life, the reality is that mothers are generally back to work when their child is still an infant. Early maternal employment is found to be associated with either financial challenges or as the result of being single-parent families. The bulk of families can no longer afford to live on one wage. Despite women's greater participation in the workforce, most men have yet to increase their share of domestic duties. This means that the majority of working mothers are also responsible for housework and looking after their children.
Children thrive in nurturing relationships with parents. From the parent view, raising children can be hard. So is building a career. Children and careers often collide given the overlap of child bearing and career setting years. Decades of attachment and developmental research and newer Neuroscience findings firmly establish that a child’s early years form a lifelong base. First relationships with parents and caregivers are foundational. But, the moment we become mothers- identities formed through careers are forced to incorporate the new role of ‘mommy’. Identity-turmoil gets sparked; Am I a career woman? ambitious person? mother? This can be followed by a path of ‘Who am I?’
Mothers who have to go back to work are not happy leaving their child at such a young age. They feel guilty and anxious and their anxiety is transmitted to the child. The mother will phone home ten times a day to find out what is happening and try to give instructions over the phone. This can make the whole family develop neurotic tendencies. When a mother is anxious, she makes everybody anxious. Often working mothers succumb to children's demands very easily because they feel guilty. They feel that they can compensate for their absence by giving their children money. But a child's needs are not material. Children want warmth and emotional security.
Mothers often worry that their babies will forget them once they return to work. But they need not fear because babies recognize their mother's voices right from birth and are not going to forget even if their mothers are away for the whole day. The question then is when is the best time to go back to work? Ideally, a working mother should only return to work when her baby is at least one year old. Otherwise, there is a danger that the baby may develop separation anxiety. Experts feel that mothers should wait till they have bonded with the baby and feel confident in their new role as mothers.
Working mothers definitely have less time to spend with their children than the mothers who are at home. But it's not that a housewife is a better mother than a working mother. Even if the working mother is pressed for time, as long as she spends quality time with her child it is enough. Sometimes mothers are around the house the whole day but they don't even look at their children. They provide them with food and other facilities, but their involvement with the child is minimum. It is quality time and the way you interact with your children that makes the difference. Even fathers get more concerned in child rearing in the absence of mothers. The outcome is that child gets attention from father and father also realizes his roles and responsibilities towards his child.
Recent researches suggests that full-time maternal employment begun before the child was three months old was associated with significantly more behavior problems reported by caregivers at age 4½ years and by teachers at first grade. And children whose mothers worked part-time before their child was one year old had fewer disruptive behavioral problems than the children of mothers who worked full-time before their child’s first birthday.
While these findings point to the need to consider the impact of full-time maternal employment on children, particularly before they are three months old. I would like to share and appreciate about the cultural benefit that mothers can have in our society is that mothers can avail maximum advantage for their child rearing issues in our culture as majority of our families structure is extended type which I believe is the best opportunity for mothers to keep their children in safe hand of family member like grandparents or relatives and it also gives satisfaction and confidence to mothers that their child will be safe in their absence.
