A New Acronym: SAHGM

Sometimes, I love to hop over to BlogHer and use their wonderful monthly prompts to write in my daily journal.September's theme was OPINION. The first prompt was: Do you have strong opinions? Tell us one of them. Do I have strong opinions? ME? Haha! Here you go:

I will never quite understood why an acronym for being a stay-at-home-mom was created. It's not like this is a new path from which to choose. Mothers have been staying at home to raise their children for centuries. It's not new. Neither is staying at home to provide care for grandchildren.

There was a time when families helped each other out in ways that involved things other than monetary aid. They lent a hand. It seems that there are those who think grandparents staying home and providing care for their grandchildren is a new trend. It's not. However, since I am doing that with my grandlove, I am going to dub myself a SAHGM- Stay At Home GrandMa. That's right. If moms today get an acronym so should grandmas.

Warning, this part is quite opinionated (ok, judgmental): Now, what will this acronym get me? As far as I can tell from the SAHM acronym it gives me nothing but a certain status and the belief that I deserve some sort of trophy. I'm thrilled to be a SAHGM but I'm not sure I'd like being a part of the SAHM team these days. This is a whole new breed, for the most part. These SAHMs seem to be more interested in keeping their own agendas rather than actually raising their children. At least, I've witnessed evidence suggesting this to be the trend around here.

Warning, again: The trend appears to be moms without jobs outside the home having someone else raise their kids while they go out and attend fitness classes and spend money. They either have someone come into their homes to raise the kids or they plop them in daycare. Am I wrong? I thought the idea of staying at home with the kids was to avoid the daycare trap.

I guess Dylan had it right- the times they are a changin'.

Giving attention to your kiddos is one of the most important things about being a SAHM. Or it used to be. If someone is out and about running from store to store and class to coffee shop while their kid is in daycare or home with the nanny, that's not really being a SAHM in the traditional sense of the word. Perhaps that's what we've come to at this point in time.

Of course, there are exceptions to this apparent trend. There are a couple of moms I know personally who do, actually, stay at home and raise their kiddos. They spend time with their children. The ones I know who do have jobs still make every effort to make that time to spend with their children.

I'm not knocking what SAHMs do or saying they don't love their kids. We all have our own ideas about how to raise children. I'm just saying that, if you're not staying home raising the kids but hiring someone else to do it or putting them in daycare even though you do not have a job outside the home, that's not really being a SAHM.

There may those who feel the choice of being a SAHM is archaic. I'm someone who does not feel this way. Maybe the definition of SAHM has changed. If so, fine. But I'm sure glad I did my staying at home as a mom before this happened. And I'm sure glad I'm a SAHGM now. Because this:

Ok, now that I've stirred the pot in this issue: What are your thoughts on today's SAHMs?


Peace, Peeps!