Stay At Home Mother in a Job

As per the picture above, stay at home mother is a job.  It is unfair that the Domestic Purpose Benefit penalises mothers who desire to care, nurture and teach their preschoolers. Firstly, for some of us mothers, we are on the DPB not by choice but by circumstances where our supposedly reliable husband abandoned us.  With the new change effective 15 October 2012, those of us who are on the DPB are required to put our children in a childcare to return to work force on a part time basis.  What I cannot understand is why is the Government paying 20 hours of free childcare to an institution rather than paying that 20 hours for a mother who is willing to sacrifice her lifestyle to stay home to care and teach her child?

Face it, most of these childcare educators are young graduates who do not even have children of their own.  They do not nurture the kids as their own children but rather do it like a job.  The more independent kids will benefit with more attention whilst the more ‘troubled’ kids are left alone because they do not want to accidentally make the child cry.  These educators will not go beyond their call of duty to teach and discipline the child, the way a mother would.  As an example, if a child in the childcare does not want to do puzzles or eat their veges, the educators will not coerce the child to do so because they fear the child will throw a tantrum.  But as a mother, we will do whatever we could to ensure the child eats healthy and does stimulating brain exercise. 

I am from a multicultural background and my preschool boy could speak Malay, Chinese and Englsih.    As we know, preschool age is the best age to teach languages and could my child get this if he goes to a childcare/kindergarten?  Would he get the one on one attention he gets now?

To be honest, if a stay at home mother is to be paid the minimal $14/hour wage, we should be getting at least $154/day in wages (giving the minimum of 11 hours work when most of us actually work round the clock!).  Instead of forcing our child to a kindergarten or childcare, I think there should be an ‘organisation’ that pays women who SACRIFICE their lifestyle for the love of their child. 

My honest opinion – parents who ‘dumped’ their children in childcare is actually taking the easy way out.  Try spending a whole day taking care of a preschooler, from chauffeuring them to playgroups to cooking for them, putting them to bed and teaching them, most would rather choose the easy way out of leaving the ‘job’ to supposedly trained young graduates with an ECE degree.