Thank you for this piece! You have put into words what I have been thinking about for a while, especially as I take a huge step back from Instagram - all these accounts like Dr. Becky Kennedy (who I used to follow, by the way, and bought her book, though I never read it) offer a “solution” to a lack of a village. Monetizing parenting. But isn’t that our whole culture these days? Nothing is worth doing if you can’t monetize it? (Including parenting, apparently). Your #2 footnote is such a good point! I feel like I should read the article now…
Thank you for your writing! This is my first time reading Nuclear Meltdown. I'll be following you closely and looking back at your archive.
My husband and I have finally settled into stable careers and sat down to start talking about what it would look like to have kids. We both grew up with a "stay-at-home" parent and have agreed that it would be nice for me to spend a few years doing that. Plus, it'll save money on childcare.
The thing is - we can't. Housing in our mid-size midwest city has just become too expensive. Together we make 6 figures, but neither one of us is a particularly high earner. We each for local institutions - what we thought we respectable middle-class jobs when we chose them. Even if one of us steps back to go part-time, that's still not enough to cover a 2-bedroom home or apartment plus part-time childcare. So we're forced to both work full time and fork over $1600 a month for childcare. If we want two kids close in age, then one of us will have to seek a higher-paying job because we can't afford two kids in childcare at our current level of earning.
Realizing this has been incredibly angering, and I'm brought to many of the realizations that your Substack seems to be about. It's so obviously heinous to me that I'm "forced" to spend exorbitant amounts on childcare and I don't have the freedom to just raise my kids myself. We need to be doing something different. I don't want this individualistic, constantly striving society to be what I pass down to my kids. It might be too late for me in some sense - the ship of being a stay-at-home parent might have sailed. But we can name it and recognize that it's messed up and color outside the lines where we have the chance.
The push for free/cheap childcare is frustrating, too, because it just reinforces this professionalization of raising kids. Whatever money is offered to the daycare center if I send my child there should also be offered to me if I choose to raise them at home.
Anyway, thanks for letting me soapbox in your comments for a little while. Thank you for your sustained writing on this topic.
Great piece. I know plenty of mums who follow a Dr Kennedy style approach and hire sleep coaches, potty training coaches etc. I’ve always found it slightly bemusing that they spend so much money to get advice that is usually easy to find for free, but hadn’t thought much about it. I personally rely heavily on my mum for advice and for occasional childcare, and I also have two sisters who are local and happy to help out if needed. I also was the second eldest of 6 kids so I got a lot of practise with babies and small children as a young adult, it still felt like a huge shock when I had my own, but perhaps less so than for others.
I wonder if part of the decline of teenage babysitters is not just access via a community (like church) but also a community where learning to care for others is standard (um, like church?). I started babysitting when I was 11 and was angry that I wasn’t allowed to start at 10 when I was asked- by a mom who saw me volunteering in the Church’s nursery. If lots of people are having lots of kids, and the community is pitching in to help, it’s normal that teens learn how to care for babies. But if no one has more than 1 sibling who is only 2 years younger than they are, let alone being surrounded by lots of kids, of course teens won’t know even the basics. I’m always shocked when I meet adult women who don’t know how to care for babies. But they didn’t grow up doing it, so how would they know (unless they signed up for a course or something)?
It's my personal experience that parents and children need families (extended not just nuclear) and then those families can become a village. It feels like so many around me have lost the connection to their own families becoming atomized nuclear units. This is due to a variety of factors, mostly children move away then have their own children then realize, wait I need a support system and I'm sure most build up where they are, I'd imagine it's hard. We've relied on our extended family, all the way to the great grandma and great great uncle. And then we have friends from our church and military community so it feels like a decent village.
On babysitters, I've been a nanny, and would prefer a qualified, credentialed adult watch my children if it's not family. My son is only 2. Sites like care dot com help you find people and I'd rather pay a stay at home mom than a teenager.
That #6 footnote is important! I think there's really just people for whom they *would* rather pay a fee than have communal or relational strings attached, as a true village does. (Which bleeds into childcare/eldercare and the like).
Thank you for this piece! You have put into words what I have been thinking about for a while, especially as I take a huge step back from Instagram - all these accounts like Dr. Becky Kennedy (who I used to follow, by the way, and bought her book, though I never read it) offer a “solution” to a lack of a village. Monetizing parenting. But isn’t that our whole culture these days? Nothing is worth doing if you can’t monetize it? (Including parenting, apparently). Your #2 footnote is such a good point! I feel like I should read the article now…
Thank you for your writing! This is my first time reading Nuclear Meltdown. I'll be following you closely and looking back at your archive.
My husband and I have finally settled into stable careers and sat down to start talking about what it would look like to have kids. We both grew up with a "stay-at-home" parent and have agreed that it would be nice for me to spend a few years doing that. Plus, it'll save money on childcare.
The thing is - we can't. Housing in our mid-size midwest city has just become too expensive. Together we make 6 figures, but neither one of us is a particularly high earner. We each for local institutions - what we thought we respectable middle-class jobs when we chose them. Even if one of us steps back to go part-time, that's still not enough to cover a 2-bedroom home or apartment plus part-time childcare. So we're forced to both work full time and fork over $1600 a month for childcare. If we want two kids close in age, then one of us will have to seek a higher-paying job because we can't afford two kids in childcare at our current level of earning.
Realizing this has been incredibly angering, and I'm brought to many of the realizations that your Substack seems to be about. It's so obviously heinous to me that I'm "forced" to spend exorbitant amounts on childcare and I don't have the freedom to just raise my kids myself. We need to be doing something different. I don't want this individualistic, constantly striving society to be what I pass down to my kids. It might be too late for me in some sense - the ship of being a stay-at-home parent might have sailed. But we can name it and recognize that it's messed up and color outside the lines where we have the chance.
The push for free/cheap childcare is frustrating, too, because it just reinforces this professionalization of raising kids. Whatever money is offered to the daycare center if I send my child there should also be offered to me if I choose to raise them at home.
Anyway, thanks for letting me soapbox in your comments for a little while. Thank you for your sustained writing on this topic.
Great piece. I know plenty of mums who follow a Dr Kennedy style approach and hire sleep coaches, potty training coaches etc. I’ve always found it slightly bemusing that they spend so much money to get advice that is usually easy to find for free, but hadn’t thought much about it. I personally rely heavily on my mum for advice and for occasional childcare, and I also have two sisters who are local and happy to help out if needed. I also was the second eldest of 6 kids so I got a lot of practise with babies and small children as a young adult, it still felt like a huge shock when I had my own, but perhaps less so than for others.
I wonder if part of the decline of teenage babysitters is not just access via a community (like church) but also a community where learning to care for others is standard (um, like church?). I started babysitting when I was 11 and was angry that I wasn’t allowed to start at 10 when I was asked- by a mom who saw me volunteering in the Church’s nursery. If lots of people are having lots of kids, and the community is pitching in to help, it’s normal that teens learn how to care for babies. But if no one has more than 1 sibling who is only 2 years younger than they are, let alone being surrounded by lots of kids, of course teens won’t know even the basics. I’m always shocked when I meet adult women who don’t know how to care for babies. But they didn’t grow up doing it, so how would they know (unless they signed up for a course or something)?
It's my personal experience that parents and children need families (extended not just nuclear) and then those families can become a village. It feels like so many around me have lost the connection to their own families becoming atomized nuclear units. This is due to a variety of factors, mostly children move away then have their own children then realize, wait I need a support system and I'm sure most build up where they are, I'd imagine it's hard. We've relied on our extended family, all the way to the great grandma and great great uncle. And then we have friends from our church and military community so it feels like a decent village.
On babysitters, I've been a nanny, and would prefer a qualified, credentialed adult watch my children if it's not family. My son is only 2. Sites like care dot com help you find people and I'd rather pay a stay at home mom than a teenager.
That #6 footnote is important! I think there's really just people for whom they *would* rather pay a fee than have communal or relational strings attached, as a true village does. (Which bleeds into childcare/eldercare and the like).