Daily prayer

I've needed to add regular daily prayer into my life for a long time. This is gaining especial importance now that the girls are becoming old enough to actively pray with me (and prayer is becoming easier - it's so much easier to do something "for the children and family" than "for myself").

Enter this website: Daily Catholic Prayer. Simple, but good.

I've been trying to remember to say grace before meals, at least at home. The girls are eager to join in the ritual of prayer, even though they do not fully understand it. Children are so eager to say, "Thank you!" I need to add prayer in before bed as well, but ritual prayers alone do not feel right to me.

I think examination of concience is perfect, however. The girls are so eager to be polite and "nice". "Thank you", "I'm sorry", and "Please" come naturally to them. Saying one of each before bed, to God, seems so natural and . . . right. And ageless. These words are appropriate at all stages of life - they are limitless in their capacity for sophistication and expression, and grow as we do.

Maybe someday we'll be ready for daily Mass or Rosaries, but for now I'll focus on a humble foundation. This temple for worshipping the Lord is not yet ready for a steeple.

My favorite gem: A prayer for work.
"Direct, we beg You, O Lord,
our actions by Your holy inspirations
And grant that we may carry them out
with Your gracious assistance,
That every prayer and work of ours
may begin always with You,
and through You be happily ended.
Amen."

What kind of job I'm looking for

First, my background:
- I have a BS in Computer Engineering from the University of Washington, which is a pretty good school for CS (it's often ranked next after Berkeley - around the 5th / 6th best school in the country when I graduated).
- I have 6 months experience as a software development engineer intern.
- Since graduation, I have worked in the test discipline.
* Nine months as an Software Test Engineer contractor at Microsoft (MS) (working for Volt)
* One year as a Software Development Engineer in Test (SDET) contractor at MS (working for Volt)
* Eight months in current position as MS SDET in Internet Explorer
- I may be making a career switch to development - but need to conduct some informational interviews first to learn what QA outside of MS looks like.

I'll post a link to my resume once I get around to updating it.

So the first thing I actually need to do is to conduct informational interviews at various companies to see what their 1-2 years experience test development and entry-level software development work is like. I've heard that testing outside of MS is very different, and I'm not sure I'm interested in a test career outside of this company.

Right now, what I need most is contacts for informational interviews with software development professionals and software testing professionals in a variety of companies. I will not be looking for a job in these interviews - rather, I will be trying to decide what kind of company I am interested in working in, and whether I want to continue my career in software testing or make a career move to software development. If I spend time on unemployment, I will *need* to make contact on specific jobs, so I should use this time to figure out the big picture information I will need to make those contacts useful.

I am especially interested in companies that match any of the following points:
- Are in or very close to Everett
- Have great benefits, especially health benefits
- Are concerned with making the world a better place, either by directly working towards that goal (like Catholic Charities . . . but I don't think they're hiring for my role right now) or by taking steps to give as a company and encouraging giving and volunteering by their employees (MS does a great job with this)
- Are full of enthusiastic, active people who really love what they do
- Have room for flexible schedules for employees (like 7 to 4 schedules instead of 8 to 5, or "just get the work done and be here from 10 to 4" - like at MS)

I'm still working out what my needed and desired salaries are. I'd prefer full-time work with a great company, but contract work at a company that I *think* is great would be OK if I can find a good, small, personal contracting agency.

Yeesh. Re-reading this post is giving me the shakes. It's very real. The only thing I've been through in my life that had a similar emotional impact was finding out that we were expecting twins. Of course, my first reaction there was happiness - but then I started reading about the health risks and challenges, and I was really roller-coasting emotionally for a while, between excited anticipation and fear. Here, the first reaction was being upset - but the roller-coasting is pretty similar. As long as I keep pushing forward when I'm feeling optimistic, I should be able to coast through the down-periods and just focus on prayer until I'm ready to get back to work again.

I know other people who have been through similar problems before - so that's an advantage over the twin pregnancy. I can talk to friends who have been through this before. Obviously, it's not the end of the world. The really scary parts of job loss are fairly far down the road - a lot of things have to go wrong before we're really in trouble.

More of an update on the job issues

I have a bit more information about what will be happening with my job. It's bad and good. I can say that I expect to be working at another company in the near future, and I don't expect to be fired.

I'm almost looking forward to things changing now. If I ignore how much my knees are shaking, that is. I'm trying to figure out what I want to get out of this change - dreams I was putting off because things were just settling down and I wasn't ready to change things up again - and this situation is also giving our family a much-needed shake-up. Our family seems to struggle with luxery and comfort. We hang together much better in tough times.

Please pray for us to be given to from the gifts of the Holy Spirit, espceially fortitude. And give thanks to St. Ignatius for that wonderful truism, "Pray as if everything depended on God. Work as if everything depended on you." I may be paraphrasing - I've never read the original text, just others quoting him. But those words describe very well what I need to be doing right now.

I'm on the clock right now, so I need to get back to work (I guess this is my 15 minute break - I don't usually take those, I normally blog during lunch or just before or just after work). I'll post on what kind of job I'm looking for during lunch, in case anyone has any practical help to offer - and also because I need to firm it up in my own head.

Thank you for your comments and prayers. I can't tell you how much they help.

Prayers please

I have good reason to think that if I don't start doing better at work, I may lose my job, and I'm feeling very scared. I don't know if I can deal with yet another round of changes while I'm still feeling exhausted from moving and all the family stress. I don't have much optimism left right now. Logically, I know we'll get through this one way or another,that God is there - but emotionally, I'm just tired.

I'm hoping I can pull everything together enough to keep this job. I suspect I'll actually feel better once I get through the shock - although it shouldn't have been such a shock. I knew things were going badly. In a way, it's good to have my intuition confirmed.

I was hoping to have a little energy to start looking at the presidential candidates. Guess I'm not going to get that for a while.

I'm trying to pull myself together enough that I don't break into tears on the bus. I cry very easily, so that's going to be tough. I'm feeling a little bad about feeling so bad - a friend of a friend recently learned that she had cancer,then learned that it could be contained. I know people go through harder challenges, but I just wish I didn't feel so darned guilty for putting my family into *this* challenge.

Got a lot done this weekend!

This was a great weekend - lots happened, lots got done.

We started out taking a walk as a family to the local produce store. They give major discounts for cash but we only had $15 in bills, so it was kind of fun to pick out the best values and get the most possible for our money. We walked out with four nectarines, four yellow apples, 2 lbs. grapes, two bananas, 10 lbs. potatoes, a coconut, 4 baby avocados (cute, but turned out mediocre), and 2 mangoes. I was pretty happy with that haul :-)

We went home, ate fruit, and the girls napped while DH and I did a few chores and then played an online MMO for a bit. When the girls woke up we just hung out for a couple of hours, but tempers started fraying as we headed into the evening. Finally we just packed up, gassed the car at the cheapest local station, grabbed food from the AM PM, and went to the beach for an inpromptu picnic. Everyone had fun and came home tired.

This morning, we dropped the girls off at the grandparents, then went out for pho (cheap Vietnamese soup - wonderfully delicious). We talked a bit about how to organize things a bit better now that DH is in charge. He said he'd be interested in me making a regular meeting agenda, so I'll get around to that when I get a little time. We're doing our meetings twice a month, the 1st and 16th.

Then we went to Mass, and got the wonderful treat of praise and praying without being distracted by our children or by accusatory glances from older members of the congregation. After Mass, I planted the five tomato plants and pepper plant that the grandparents had given us - after first uprooting a huge patch of daisies and clearing out a little more of the evil "corner of weeds" growing up behind the shed. When the girls came home, we watched a couple episodes of "The Adams Family" together (nursing . . . sigh) while DH cooked spaghetti squash and hotdogs, with cheese on the side - and then headed back out so I could get in another hour of weeding. The corner of weeds is now almost done, and it was impressive - containing no less than 5 weeds over 6 feet tall, most of which had fallen over under their own weight, as well as a multitude of other random plants. I found a few surviving flowering plants hidden under the vines, milkweeds, and grass, too!

And now DH is cooking a little extra food for us, enough that I will be able to take some of it in to work for lunch tomorrow! I am quite happy indeed.

When the rain stops, God sends rainbows and roses

We all know the old saying, "When it rains, it pours." I want to add my own addendum to that - the title of this post. When it rains, it pours, but when the rain stops then God sends rainbows and roses.

I've been telling myself that lots of parts of life are going through waves - they have their upturns and their downturns. Normally things are heading downhill in just one or two areas at a time, and I feel buffered by the upturns. This time, I felt like there were gradual downturns pretty much everywhere. But when you get to the bottom of the downturn, you usually hit an upturn. And since everything went down at the same time, now everything is going up at the same time, for at least a while.

So we're getting rainbows - the natural fallout from a storm. There's the joy of rebuilding a strained relationship (because relationship building is more fun than maintaining). Free and easy smiles look much prettier when they haven't been seen for a while. They are our reminders of our wedding vow to each other that things will never get so bad that we try to wipe out the past in a flood of rain and misery (what else can divorce be?) and start over - we can always keep working from where we are, and will always keep trying again "until death do us part".

Then there are the roses - the fresh, good things that come up as a result of the storm, that would not flower without the rain. DH's growing pride in our home, still seeming a touch fragile, but definitely sprouting. The clean home from the maid service that cleaned for the first time yesterday (but the pre-cleaning we did - led by DH - was the real win). There's my deeper understanding that even meddling that someone else says they wants - is still meddling, and is still getting in the way of them doing it themselves. Sometimes even a marraige needs tough love (oh, dear, that means it'll be my turn some day . . . LOL).

The rain analogy continues further - the mess and debris that builds up in our heads is cleared away a bit more after the storm, like dust washed away from leaves and rocks, and the world seems fresher, cleaner, somehow better defined. We can see better the things we care about, and even the air is clearer - allowing us to see further, to view mountain peaks in the distance and grasp better the bigger world around our little niche of life.

True, the ground here is still a bit soggy, and will stay that way for a while. However, that's no reason not to go outside in my bare feet, soak it in, and marvel for a bit.

And now - it's time for me to put my metaphorical shoes back on, take one last look around - and metaphorically head back inside my all-too-literal office and get back to my very literal work.

Getting organized

I'm starting to finally make progress on the pile of disorganization in my life!

I'm using a system called "Getting Things Done" (GTD), described in the book by the same name by David Allen. I like it because it gets to the heart of what I like about most organization systems, and because it works well with computerized tools.

What I like about the basic structure of organization - the list - is that it gets things off of my mind - but until I read GTD, I didn't realize that fact. What I normally don't like is that I don't follow up with my lists, because it's so hard to find the information I need without reading the whole list and sorting through it mentally. GTD has some ways to handle that. and with an online system like "Toodledo" to help, I'm now able to look at my to-do list and, at the top, always see the things that are most important to me right now. With computer features like filtering and sorting, GTD becomes very, very powerful.

For example: The main question I ask at work is, "What should I be doing right now?" I look at my GTD list, and filter by context (work), date (I don't want to see anything that can't be started until tomorrow), and actionability (I have items in my todo list that can't be started until something else is done, and they are labelled to reflect this). Once I have all the actionable items I can do today at work, I sort them by due date and priority (Toodledo rolls these together into one concept called "Importance", and so I just use that), and then by how long the work will take. I do the shortest tasks first, just to get them off of my mind.

The flip side is that I need to regularly add items into my list. I handle this by writing everything down in a notebook when I am away from my computer, and then adding it into my system once a day (I have a repeating top-priority todo for this that is automatically added every day for me by Toodledo). The final part I haven't done yet, but it is to go through the system once a week or so and make sure the list is in order - delete outdated items, readjust due dates, and generally clean house.

So far, this system looks good. Someday I'll read back on this post with 20/20 hindight, and know if it really worked for me or not - maybe I'll leave myself a comment?

Hrm, a benefit to the online diary: I can write notes on my entries when I look back at them from future years. That's a fun idea.

I need to write more on WOHPs - what does a good WOHP look like?

This blog is starting to become the diary I've always wanted to keep, but never felt motivated enough to maintain. I love the perspective I get from the comments - not just support, but also subtle questioning about my thinking. Hence three entries today - I'm going through a shift in thought, and documenting it in my diary.

This post is my thoughts about how giving up on responsibility at home has a flip side - I need to start living up to and thinking about my responsibilities at work. Until this point, I've been stressed about home and family. It's more important to me, and what I really care about, so it's what I've been writing about. Home is still important to me, but I've made a decision to conciously spend less time on caring about it. A SAHP is someone you can trust with the things that are most important to you in the whole world, and that is what I am trying to do. I've given myself permission to be disappointed with my husband, and that seems to be important. But while I was focusing too much on things that aren't my job, my actual job has slipped badly. I need to spend some time being disappointed with myself :-) And think about how I can be supportive and encouraging for myself, too.

If this blog is going to be my diary, it's a great place to get myself back on track. A diary doesn't have to just reflect my state of mind - I can use my diary as a tool to actually change my state of mind. Right now, I want to be thinking more about work. When I think about home, I want to be thinking about how I can appreciate and support my spouse and love my children, not about how to fix problems. Why is fixing the operation of our home my responsibility? It's not.

When I think about work, I should be investing the same kind of passion and active involvement that I was putting into my home life. True, I care less about work than about home. Nonetheless, it's my job and it is important. The fact that my work is less important than caring for children and preparing them for the world is no excuse not to do my best. My job is a critical part of my husband's work, giving him the resources he needs to feed, clothe, and care for my children so he can focus on teaching them how to live and on making a home out of our house. So expect more posts on my efforts to be a better employee as a WOHM who can (hopefully) rely on a SAHD, and fewer posts about how to get a reverse-traditional home to function.

While writing this, I had an interesting twist in my thought direction. Because of my desire to encourage and motivate DH, I've been thinking a lot about how important SAHPs are, and how difficult their jobs really are. I need to look at the other side for a bit, now. I want to keep talking about how cool the things DH does are, but I also want to start looking at the WOHP role in our home and in general, and I want to get a better understanding of it. I hear so much about WOHPs who treat their spouses like slaves and never do anything to help out, who are condescending and unfair. But what does a good WOHP look like? What do they do - and what do they not need to worry about, because they are entrusting it to the SAHP?

While writing this, it just hit me that I have very few models for this. I've never really lived in a home with a WOHP (Work Outside the Home Parent) who relied on a SAHP. No wonder I've been getting overinvolved. I really wonder what SAHPs expect from WOHPs. I don't want to be a female version of that wretched, crude, unappreciative WOHD figure at one extreme, but I also don't want to be living like a single mom - trying to "do it all" - either. Yes, I've asked DH for his take on what I should be doing and shouldn't be doing - but he doesn't have a good answer, and I suspect he doesn't really know either. He has said that he doesn't think I should be responsible for any of the work around the house, but I really don't think he should be expecting to do it all without help.

Hrm . . . maybe I should ask for a little help from those who read this blog? In your family, what are the responsibilities of the WOHP? What do you think WOHPs, in general, need to do better? What does a great WOHP look like? Feel free to use WOHD or SAHM (the normal gendered Dad / Mom versions of WOHP, SAHP) or whatever terms work for you - I'm not hung up on being PC.

Agreeing on responsibilities isn't enough

Before we actually had DH stay home, we had an agreement about how we wanted things to work. We both agreed that we wanted the kids to have lots of time with me when I was home, and we agreed that this meant that I would be doing less housework. The idea was, I would be primary parent when I was home and when I was home DH would do most of the housework that he didn't get done during the day. I would help him out after the kids went to bed, and during naps on weekends.

We have always had similar views on what housework needs to be done: Very little. I need clean clothes for work, but otherwise we just need to be covered and not making anyone uncomfortable. I do care about nutrition, but cooking can be minimal - steam the veggies, cut some bread and cheese. Clean dishes for eating do matter - reusing dishes from the previous meal bugs me. The clutter should be managed well enough that we aren't constantly losing things we need, like unpaid bills or favorite toys. Any cleaning or repair work needed to avoid permanent damage to our house or valuable property should be taken care of. Clean, clear surfaces for cooking are a major nice-to-have because I do like to cook at least on Sundays. We had a list of who did what, and chore schedules.

In short, we actually had very clear expectations. However, we didn't do one important thing: We didn't designate who was in charge of enforcing this agreement. So things kept falling back into the "old way" that they used to work - because things wouldn't get done so I would do them, or would nag Bjorn to do them, or would try a new schedule of chores but (again) wouldn't tell Bjorn that he needed to manage the schedule and make sure it happened. I still felt like everything was my responsibility, but I couldn't actually do the work - and yet we both knew Bjorn was supposed to manage things, so at the same time it felt like he was failing. We were both taking responsibility for the failures, but not taking responsibility for organizing things to avoid those failures.

I finally realized that it wasn't the work at home itself that was getting to me. It was the stress of being responsible for the work, and for everyone's attitudes. I was still carrying that responsibility from back when I was the main homemaker. So no matter how much work DH does, it won't matter until he's doing the thinking and managing work as well. No matter how little work I do at home, it won't make any difference until I quit worrying about everything else that needs to happen but doesn't at home.

Agreeing on the responsibilities - the labor responsibilities - isn't enough. You need to agree on who will manage the responsibilities as well. And that's where we messed up. The working parent shouldn't be managing the home life, but without a specific agreement on who managed things, this work defaulted to its prior owner: The wife. Me.

We don't generally acknowledge that nagging, reminding, and encouraging other family members to be involved in the home life is work - sometimes it's exhausting and stressful work. It's part of a huge heap of work SAHPs do that we don't acknowledge. They MANAGE. Social calendars, budgets, attitudes, goals . . . someone needs to organize these things, watch over them, make sure they don't go sour. We missed it. Oops.

My two new favorite phrases :-)

"Why is this my responsibility?" and "So, honey, what can I do to help?"

Weekend 1 of "risk acting like a jerk" went great. DH seems much happier, despite the eye-rolling every time I say "Why is this my responsibility?" or, "Why are you asking me? You're in charge of that." I thought I overdid things at one point, but then going back over the conversation in my head, the point where it went sour was - when I bit my toungue. When I finally said the thing I had thought was too harsh (but true), the conversation got back on track. It turned out I had misunderstood him. Gotta trust DH, gotta remember that I don't need to baby him.

I was very liberal about shirking any decision-making responsibilities related to the home. I did occasionally bring up things that were bothering me - like prepping for the maid this Thursday - but tried to focus on making sure that everyone knew it wasn't my responsibility. Nothing stinks as much as thinking someone else is handling a situation, only to find out that they had no clue and thought you were doing it. Plus this way, I'm not worried that someone will be disappointed in me - which makes it easier to say, "This is DH's responsibility. It's your work to relax so you can do well at your job."

Then after the kids went to bed, I didn't do any of the chores I care about. Instead, I asked DH to tell me what to do. From now on, he gets to figure out what is important. It's a difficult exercise in relaxation to look at a mess and say, "I shouldn't feel guilty about that. It's not my responsibility." All I'm responsible for is the small, precise tasks that Bjorn assigns me - and I refuse to take on "thinking" work, things like "Figure out what we should do."

I'm really looking forward to just doing what I'm told for a while. Every time I start thinking about something that isn't getting done at home, however, I need to carefully pull myself back and ask, "Why is this my responsibility?" Nine times out of ten, it isn't.

I can't do it all, and I'm not gonna try. If DH doesn't do things that needed to happen, I'm going to ask him how it's going to get done, so I don't have to worry about it. But the focus is on me not having to stress about it - getting the information I need to relax and trust that it will be taken care of eventually, before anything really bad happens. I will keeping asking questions and seeking answers until I can relax - and then I will stop, and trust DH.

Thanks for the support, and thoughts on my role going forward

This is a thank-you for the great, supportive comments people have left on this blog. I get very scared blogging about my personal life sometimes - afraid that I'll reveal something horrible and shallow about myself.

The funny thing is, things at home seem to often improve after I lose my temper. This time was no exception. Rather than sparking a response of defensiveness, DH responded to my temper with kindness and by rising to the occasion. This is despite lots of conversations, effort to be supportive, encouragement - yet screaming and crying for a couple of days made a difference.

This leads me to think I've actually been too patient. I am both proud and insecure - a combination which makes me scared to criticize others lest they cease to love me, and willing to try to "do it all" rather than confront them (because I can do ANYTHING, I am all-powerful! I am independent and don't need any help! Oh, wait, I was wrong, and now I'm exhausted and can't even handle my own share, plus I'm screaming at you like a harridan - oops).

There's a subtle compliment in straight-forward criticism - it says, "You are capable of better, and you are open-minded enough to listen to what I say and use that information to do better." Conversely, there's a subtle insult in saying only encouraging things when you both know one partner is falling short. I do think DH has been depressed, and I think that undermining encouragement - from me - is part of the problem. Especially combined with the obvious signs of strain and the increasingly frequent breakdowns from me. Compared to the mixed messages I've been sending in an effort to avoid putting "too much" pressure on him, screaming and yelling was probably refreshing honesty. But I can do better than that.

I guess the lesson I'm taking from this is that I shouldn't underestimate DH's ability to handle criticism about his failures. Nor should I be afraid to treat him the way I would want to be treated when I let down someone I cared about. I would want that someone to let me know I disappointed them (and I'd want to know how badly), but I'd also want to know that they still love me. If they speak up, I get more control over my life because I am more aware of the consequences of my actions - and I can change them, and become a better person. I would want that.

Right now, the question in my mind is, "What do I do if this starts to happen again?" I'm very scared DH will slip back into laziness at some point, and now I know I should speak up and trust him to listen with charity and humility. But losing my temper isn't right, either. I need to find a better way to tell him when he's not living up to his responsibilities.

I guess I'm going to need to risk being a jerk to DH on a regular basis, and practice giving him meaningful criticism even though I know I'll get it wrong sometimes. I need to be less careful and start trusting him to love me enough to listen to criticism, and I need to trust him to be strong enough to defend himself if I get it wrong. Of course I'll be encouraging and congratulatory when he deserves it too - that's the fun part! Celebrating accomplishments together!

And I need to quit thinking that I'm capable enough that I don't need my husband to act like an adult. That's not patience or kindness. That's believing that I'm better than him. And I know I'm really not.

More cool things from the home front

Some more things about home life that are putting a smile on my face:

- When I came home, Iliana was able to tell me about something fun that had happened clearly enough that I could understand it. Apparently, she and her sister ate cheese outside, at the little table (a toy picnic table set that was a gift from their grandparents)! She was very happy about the novelty.

- DH just helped me realize that I could combine a work task with a home task, and save a little time.

- A friend sent out an email about a subject she cares about strongly, which I also care about - but disagree with her about. DH sent out a simple, well-worded, fact-based reply that was far better and more graceful than anything I could have written, focused on sharing more information and fostering discussion rather than on "arguing a point".

Wow. I'm so glad I couldn't find the words now. What I wanted to say sounds arrogant and shallow next to his simple, to-the-point response. Best of all, he left plenty of room for reply - he didn't assume that what he said was the end of the discussion, but rather ended with a question. I think the question will be difficult to answer, but maybe there are facts DH and I don't have. The important thing is that now there is a discussion, and everyone is going to have a chance to learn a little bit more about the issue (drilling at ANWR).

So not only did DH do something I wanted to do even better than I could do it, he also modelled a virtue I crave (humility) and a skill I desire (fostering healthy discussion of important issues).

*Swoon*

5 things that give me the warm-fuzzies about DH

I've written a couple of posts where I refer to the frustrations I've had lately because DH has really been struggling with his basic job. And yeah, it's frustrating, but at the same time I really believe it's worth the frustration. Right now, things really aren't completely "working" again since moving shook things up, but things are starting to fall into place and I'm regaining my optimism. There are a number of little signs that things are getting close to working that just make me feel warm, proud of DH, and a little less vulnerable (I'm not used to depending on someone like this).

1. Seeing his name, not mine, on the utility bills that come in the mail (he's taken over paying them!).
2. Coming home to a hot dinner, timed to be done shortly after I arrive! (I know that this takes planning and organization - so if he is using these skills for dinner now, soon he'll be using them in other places too :-)
3. Seeing new chalk scribbles on the brick patio outside, and even the crayon scribbles in the house - it's neat that he's teaching the girls to draw, even if the result is abstract, avant-garde colored-wax decor in inspiring new locations - like the toilit lid.
4. Having DH "nag" me about my chores. Because it means he's managing *my* responsibilities at home now, instead of the other way around.
5. Having DH remind me about focusing on my job via IM while I'm at work. Because it means he cares and values what I do at work and wants to make sure I'm doing it (I've been having trouble focusing lately - bad me!).

I think part of the frustration for me lately has been a feeling of vulnerability. For the first time in my life, I've allowed someone else to take over the primary care of the things I care about most in this world (our children and our home), and I'm scared that he's not going to rise to the challenge. I believe DH is capable, I'm just afraid at some level that maybe he doesn't care enough to do the work. That maybe he doesn't love the girls and I enough. Yeah, I know - I'm a really insecure individual.

:-P

And yes, I know this post is rather intraspective and diary-ish, but I always said that this blog was more of a diary than a web log. I don't care that much about my own reactions, I get those every day while I'm musing and driving to work :-) But if someone reads this and has a thought to share with me, I always love that! And if no one has time or interest - well, I can't blame them. It's my life, after all, and the things on my mind - I'm not making an effort to write for other's interest.

I guess I just want to say, if anyone reads this and thinks, "geesh, this is boring, why does she even bother?" and feels bad - don't. As a diary, the main audience here is actually myself. You should feel free to be bored, or think that this is a bit silly and angsty and that other people have much bigger problems.

But if you *do* read this and leave a comment, you'll make my day! ;-)

Monetary value of a SAHP to their family - specifically, my DH

I was running through the numbers of how much DH saves us in dollars by being a SAHP, and how much value he provides - as well as thinking about how much a SAHP *can* provide. There is a point to this, besides simple number-cruching - but I'm going to show that point at the end.

DH has been a SAHP for 13 months now. Calculations suggest that he's saved us $18,066 in childcare expenses so far (we've paid for part-time care for much of that time). I've also been out of the house more recently due to falling behind in work and a longer commute, resulting in him providing another $1,137 or so of care that is added value - totalling $19,203 of value for childcare alone.

On average, I'd say our grocery bill has dropped by about $100 / month and the quality of our meals has risen by $100 / month. So that is another $1,200 of savings and $1,200 of added value, totalling $2,400 for food.

We went without a car for 9 months, something we never could have done on two incomes. We saved $2,500 up front in repairs and another $400 / month or so in budgeted car expenses (maintenance, insurance, gas), so $9,600 for transportation savings without a car. We also were able to buy a cheap, unreliable car when we wanted a car after moving, rather than spending more for a reliable vehicle - but I have no estimate to calculate savings from. Savings: $9,600 in transportation costs (and then some).

We pay less for our benefits, since we no longer have the two-company's-benefit-plans penalty. On my old job, this would have been around $100 / month, and at Microsoft that would have been $75. Savings: $1,100 in health benefits.

I'm not including housework, because I don't think DH has provided value in this area above his basic responsibilities as a parent and spouse (doing half of the necessary work - so I'm talking about a very low bar). Quite frankly, I think DH has failed in this area at many points in time, and his failures offset his successes so far. In general, our house has been messier, not cleaner, since he started staying home, even at points where I was doing more housework than when we both worked (since I had more free time). However, any housework above 1/2 of the necessary minimum work to keep a household running and healthy is added value that a SAHP often provides. I don't count the housekeeper we are hiring as an expense of our SAHD structure, since we probably wouldn't have done that cleaning as a two-income family and would have instead just lived with the extra dirt. Rather, being able to afford a housekeeper is a luxury that DH is earning for us through the money he saves us in many other areas by staying home. Savings: $0 in housework (broadly defined)

Other ways many SAHPs add to the value of a home include: homeschooling (what is the cost of an equivalent private school? plus the priceless flexibility and direct control over the curriculum and schooling style), building a social circle (what is the value of a rich social life and supportive friends?), gardening (providing the value of the food or flowers grown minus expenses), raising animals for food (many SAHM friends have chickens for eggs and the occasional broiler), small income streams, time-consuming and money-saving shopping at garage sales and thrift stores, repairing old clothes rather than buying new, and generally taking on well over half of the adult responsibilities of the home such as bill-paying and noticing what needs to be done and organizing it (this is more work than you may think!).

So what is the total that my DH has provided for our family in the past 13 months as a SAHD? $32,303 of pure, untaxed value. At a 15% tax rate (about how much he paid in taxes as an employee), that is the equivelent value of $38,000 income in 13 months, or a salary of $35,076 a year. Note that this is just the monetary value - it doesn't capture priceless value, like my daughters spending over 40 hours per week more with a responsible, loving parent instead of in a day care.

Which brings me to my point: DH has been hearing a lot from me about my frustration with his failure in his housekeeping responsibilities as an adult and parent lately. And yes, there is a problem there that he needs to address. Then he gets to have the fun of getting me to address my own problems that have built up while covering for him :-) So basically, he still has a lot of work and room for improvement, and not all in the good way. But even with these shortcomings, he still has provided our family with the equivelent of a $35,076 salary plus other priceless value. And this is in his first year after a major career change, without much in the way of prior training. He never went to college to be a SAHP, nor did he do many of the chores and childcare activities I did growing up. He had just over one year of experience as a working dad - which is a lot like going into a field that normally requires a BA with a single year of college, and still earning a normal entry-level salary.

Wow. That's pretty cool. But what if it's not enough? What if he wants to give our family more value? What if he, well, wants a "raise" and a "promotion"?

A SAHP is his own boss, manager, business, etc. ("His" since this is geared towards DH, even though most SAHPs are mothers). There are many ways he can give his family more value. He won't be able to show the number on a paycheck, which is why maintaining a list and doing a calculation like this occasionally might be a good idea. Sure, having our kids and family happy and healthy is a great reward - but it's also a little intangible. Sometimes a tangible black-and-white number is motivating, even if it doesn't capture everything. To get a "raise", he just picks new activities that can provide more value to his family and adds them to his work week - whereas an employee has to first talk with their boss to get new responsibilities. Yet another intagible benefit of being a SAHP: The ability to manage one's workload flexibly, doing more when you have more energy and less when you are overwhelmed, rather than being constrained by the business' needs.

For example, doing an additional 3 hours of housework or family management work a week (above and beyond the half that falls under "basic parental responsibilities that you would do in an two-income family") is probably worth about, oh, $60 a week, or $260 a month. Instant raise of $3,120 a year, or 10%, in untaxed value. Your family will either feel the benefit as a little more time for your spouse (if it's work that she would have done), which can be spent instead doing more housework, relaxing, or doing something fun with you or the kids, or else will be felt as less mess and stress (if it's not something your spouse would have done).

And if he doesn't like doing housework? Well, maybe he can engage in higher quality childcare - taking the kids outside the house, doing pre-school like activities to help them learn and develop interests, reading up on parenting and applying what he learns. He could easily raise the value of his parenting to $15 or $20 an hour, with a huge boost in value provided to the family - and an increase in the priceless value of such wonderful modeling. He could get over a 60% raise, with enough interest and creativity! That's the equivelent of a $62,500 salary (pre-tax) - plus an amazing example of a parent for our kids. And a lot of fun, hopefully - nature walks, museums, parks, homemade toys and crafts, and more. To get more of a "raise", teach the kids skills like housework and gardening that provide additional value to the family and get raises for both.

And yes, if DH provided more value in other areas, I wouldn't be sore at all about taking on more than 1/2 of the housework. The issues we've been having aren't really about housework. They are about an uneven split of responsibilities as adults in our household. We don't need to "earn" the same amount of money as each other, but we should both be feeling the rewards of our hard work. I don't care if the "earnings" are split equally, but I would like the rewards split to be closer to equal.

Newspaper estimates of the value a SAHP provides top $100K. The reason it is so much higher than my estimates here is that they include the value provided just by being a responsible parent and spouse - one half of the necessary housework, including paying bills, managing housework duties, tracking them, laundry, cooking, and necessary cleaning and repairs. You can probably all see how this could easily cost $30,000 apiece if we tried to outsource all of this work at fair market value.

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One more note, specifically to DH, and on something of a tangent:

Please, please, please tell me about your day. Let me know what challenges you faced, what annoyed you, and what accomplishments you've managed to fit in between the potty-training, snack-making, and endless small crisises. Tell me the cute things the girls did, and the surprisingly smart things they said (and talk about the temper tantrums, too). Even though I can't share in the family work during the day, I still want to be part of the team. Hearing about your day (and the girls' day) after being gone for eight hours reassures me that I still matter. I think telling me about your day also really helps you realize how important your work is, even if sometimes it seems to you like nothing happened or it was all really trivial stuff.

When you don't know what to say, just give me the chronological summary: what time they got up, what they ate for breakfast, what they did between breakfast and lunch, what they ate for lunch, when they napped, what they did between nap and dinner, when they last used the potty, and if they've eaten dinner yet. Then I can understand a bit more about how they and you are acting - I can tell if you are annoyed with me, or just tired because the girls have been throwing tantrums all day, and I know if they are dancing strangely because it's fun or because they really really need to go pee but don't realize it yet. I know I've asked this in person many times, but I also know you read this blog :-) Seriously, hearing about your day is the high point of my day. No exaggeration.

With love,
Your Wife
Who posts openly about our personal life in a public diary, and is grateful that you allow me to do so :-)