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Lori Alexander talks the expense of children


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Lori knows fuck all about anything.

I couldn't be a SAHM. Just couldn't, unless I go on welfare. My wage just about pays my rent, council tax, power, and internet/telly. No, I don't have a huge flat screen TV like the welfare stereotype, I have a tiny telly which doesn't work very well. For any extras, I rely on borrowing money. I have to pay money back, so that reduces my wage again.

If I was married and had multiple kids, we'd either both have to be signing or hubby darling would have to be earning multiple times what I do now. Since one of these examples is highly unlikely (earning more than me in a recession) and the other I would not like to do (sign on again) the path of being an SAHM isn't open to me.

If you support capitalism, you support women being so poor that they have to work. That's the bottom line.

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We lived in a summer resort town but we were the only kids there who weren't allowed on the beach or the boardwalk during the summer

Sorry - am I to understand that you had to pay to go on the beach?

(and yes, relative poverty is not enjoyable. I never went hungry but I did have to eat cold lamb fat on occasion)

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  • 3 weeks later...

Sorry - am I to understand that you had to pay to go on the beach?

(and yes, relative poverty is not enjoyable. I never went hungry but I did have to eat cold lamb fat on occasion)

Yup. In our town (and most in the area), where there were lakes, you had to belong to the club and pay annual dues. In New Jersey, you also have to pay to use most of the beaches at the shore. People from the West Coast are always flabbergasted.

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I get so sick and tired of the either or argument. Working mothers have just as much value as stay at home moms. My mother and father both worked. I grew up in a stable, loving, home with two parents who were comfortable sharing in the household and parenting responsibilities. Her comment that "women who don't go after higher education and careers are looked down upon" is baloney. There is an entire segment of our society who think women should be barefoot and pregnant and whose sole role should be as wives and mothers.

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I get so sick and tired of the either or argument. Working mothers have just as much value as stay at home moms. My mother and father both worked. I grew up in a stable, loving, home with two parents who were comfortable sharing in the household and parenting responsibilities. Her comment that "women who don't go after higher education and careers are looked down upon" is baloney. There is an entire segment of our society who think women should be barefoot and pregnant and whose sole role should be as wives and mothers.

This is an artificial "war" that has been going on since at least the late 1960s--classic divide-and-conquer tactic. If you get women sniping at each other (and strangely, the women in the before-blog days who did the sniping had public careers) they won't look at what's really happening.

Funny how the anti-"feminists" forget that it was the woman's movement that fought for the rights of SAHMs to, for example, be entitled to Social Security payments even if their hubbies left them after years of service, to have credit in their own names, to have legal recourse in the case of spousal abuse or rape...

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Yup. In our town (and most in the area), where there were lakes, you had to belong to the club and pay annual dues. In New Jersey, you also have to pay to use most of the beaches at the shore. People from the West Coast are always flabbergasted.

Someone has to pay for the clean-up and maintenance of the area, plus lifeguards and toilet facilities if you have either of those. There are several ways to go about this, but generally it's either through taxes or for the people who visit to pay a fee. One way or another, those things have to get done and you have to pay them. I tend to prefer the tax method - if taxes are collected fairly in first place. But sometimes the operation is just too big to be covered or managed under taxes alone.

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Guess what Lori I have 0 kids and do not live lavishly. My car is over 15. My computer is ten years old and I piggy back the neighbors internet- that is if they aren't out. I don't own ipads or HDTV. I have no cable. I would really love things to be newer. Hubby laid off unemployment and my freelance writing money barely helps us survive. I too see nothing wrong with wanting better and limiting family size to do it. Quiverfull types get a kick out of self made poverty for some reason and it's the kids who suffer. Kids deserve much better. I find the ones who complain about the poor the most like Lori or the Romney's have never been poor.

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I'm a SAHM with school age children. I have 4 kids (several of whom have special needs) and being at home gives me the freedom to be able to tend to all their needs--in the summertime someone has to take care of them....daycare x 4=ain't happening. I am also here to deal with sick days (x 4) and chauffer them to the zillion doctor/therapy appts they have. My being home allows my husband to focus more on his job and less on home stuff...like cooking, cleaning, errands, homework, and kids. Being at home is something I do for the convenience of my whole family. It would be much more chaotic and expensive if I worked outside the home.

That being said, I would love to work outside the home. However at this point in my life it's just not feasible. It's sad to see the judgment (I was lol inwardly at the person who thought she wouldn't have anything to talk about with a SAHM--please. Many SAHMs are college educated and smart and could talk circles around anyone). ALL MOMS WORK. It's fine for moms to focus on their own needs, too (I think that's actually a really great thing, as SAHMs can lose themselves trying to meet the daily/hourly/minutely needs of their families). Whatever makes a family run smoothly and keeps the kiddies healthy and happy is good in my book.

As far as volunteering---these SAHMs who volunteer many hours at school are to be commended. I know many women who work fulltime FOR FREE by volunteering at their kids' school. Thanks to them my kids have had great school parties, organized activities, and they have enriched my children's lives in more ways than I can count. A lot of gratitude is owed to them for what is otherwise a pretty thankless job. It takes a village, and those people are your children's village.

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I think one of Lori's problems (besides a husband who sounds like he is a jerk) is that she sees everything in black and white. There is no better or worse between being a SAHM and being a work outside the home mother. There is no better or worse with having children or not having children. It all comes down to individual choice. If you are comfortable with your choice then you will not belittle or besmirch people who choose differently - as Lori seems to do on a daily basis. I think that she is likely depressed or has such low self esteem that she has no choice but to take the positions she does. If she does not then I think that she fears that her life will have little or no meaning.

I used to get angry at her posts. Then I started to pity her. Now I am sliding towards apathy.

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It seems to me that all fundies see the world in black and white. I guess that's because there is no grey in what they are being taught about God and religion.

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As crazy as Lori's post was, I hear remnants of her arguments in today's discussion on the the mother's place in the workplace. There is a certain belittlement towards working mothers; that she must be working towards extravagance; that she's sacrificing her children's happiness for material wealth. It's not just fundies like Lori who argue this. Plenty of mainstream people also believe this.

Even in my elite college, I heard whiffs of the "mommy wars" amongst my female friends. Girls who are otherwise liberal-leaning have huffed about how they would stay home when the kids are young because they want to "be there" for their kids etc. While fundies diss working mothers for moral reasons, my college friends did so for reasons of class. To them, there's an unspoken understanding that if the parents can't afford a SAHM, then they can't afford kids. The Mommy Wars starts young and can be seen by people of all persuasions. Lori and her ilk are just more blatant and fringe about this topic, but I actually know smart, liberal girls in college who would agree with aspects of Lori's reasoning.

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I don't know what other women do while their kids are at school

Here's what my day looks like. Ds is 11, he's my only, and I'm a SAHM.

I get up and make his lunch. He makes his own breakfast, because his tastes and appetite vary wildly throughout the week, and him making his own breakfast is a better solution than me pouring a bowl of cereal or making a bowl of oatmeal, and then he decides he's not hungry, or he's not hungry for that (all of which happened when he first went to school two years ago- he was homeschooled before that). I continually remind him of everything he needs to do- brush teeth, glasses, deodorant, do you have this and that in your bag, etc, while I'm eating breakfast. He'll be out the door for the bus at 7 am this year.

This year will be a little different, since he'll leave at 7 and dh doesn't leave until 7:30, so I'll have 30 extra minutes to spend with dh. Once he leaves, I'll be out the door for my morning walk, weather-permitting. As long as it's above 45 degrees, I walk three miles. This is non-negotiable, to keep up my cardiovascular health, to get me doing some weight-bearing exercise in order to stave off osteoporosis (of which I have a rich family history), and because it helps my back. Walking helps me keep being able to walk, and so it's something I have to do every day. This usually takes about 45-50 minutes or so, and then I'm back home.

I chill for a little bit, checking Facebook and drinking some water and cooling off, and then I start on the day's cleaning. I have a cleaning schedule and it's different every day, so I do what that day's task is. Bathrooms take about an hour or so, laundry is an all day thing, etc. If I need to run to the store, I do it usually around 10 am, but I try to plan my shopping out so that I'm only going out once a week or so. Saves on gas. I get dinner prep stuff started around 11 am- chopping veggies and whatnot, so that it's ready to be thrown in at dinner time, so I don't have to be doing all the dinner stuff when ds needs homework help. I eat lunch around 11, do whatever cleaning needs to be done in the living room and kitchen, and then I head into my afternoon projects. Sometimes I read (I've read 94 books so far this year) or hang out online, depending on what I feel like doing, but oftentimes this is when I do my knitting/crocheting/sewing (most of which gets given away as gifts to other people. One day I'll make myself something...). If dinner is in the crockpot, I bake in the afternoon (and I make my own bread, so that's happening at least once throughout the week, depending on when we run out).

Ds comes home and immediately starts on homework. This year, he'll also have instrument practice so I'll be supervising that as well. Then it'll be dinner time and I do all of that. Ds and I often watch something on TV, he likes Chopped and Biggest Loser, and I enjoy them when I'm on my stationary bike. Then it's shower and bedtime for the kiddo, and then I can shower and relax with my husband.

Trust me when I say I keep busy all day long. I thought things would be a lot more relaxed when I decided to stay home, but this past year really was not. Of course, I spent a LOT of the year going to different doctors' appointments for my back and stomach (and a LOT of my time was eaten up by the constantly exercising I have to do in order to remain upright- if my weight is stable, because it tends to drop a lot, I also bike ten miles in the evening. Another 30 minutes out of my day, plus my nightly physical therapy exercises. Yeah), so that made things a lot more hectic than I would've liked. Hoping for calmer this year! Ds also has asthma, and while it's not bad, if he gets sick, his asthma flares up majorly, which leads to a lot of sick days during cold and flu season. This alone makes being a SAHM worth it (did I tell you about the time I had to run to my school at 8 am, give a 15 minute theater monologue final, then fly home to my sick child, with whom I'd been up since 2 am because he couldn't stop coughing? Yeah. That was fun. I got an A, btw).

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There are different factions/groups within SAHMs and working mothers. I liked shaylahc's post a lot. I also know a few college educated SAHMs who I have a lot in common with and friends with. People become SAHMs for different reasons and sometimes it is only temporary. I'll admit that the fundie SAHMs sometimes annoy me because they cut down working women quite a bit. I also get annoyed with some of the fundie SAHM bloggers who talk about not having money for food, home repairs, and other expenses. I sometimes wish I could scream at them to get jobs.

Lori Alexander is different from a lot of other fundie or fundie lite bloggers. Her husband's business seems to do well and he has clients in several states. She only had four kids. She lives a very privileged life compared to Zsu, Kelly C. and several others. As I mentioned before she and her family travel a few times a year. It seems they go to Hawaii every year. Many fundies don't take trips like that at all. Some of the fundie families we discuss here do take handouts from churches and certain social circles. Lori never had to do stuff like that. She praised the Duggars and Bates on her blog and mentioned how they have never been on government assistance. The reality is that the Duggars and Bateses were never able to completely support their families on their own. Boob and Mullet admitted in interviews that their old church used to help them with food and clothing donations. I'm also willing to bet that Lori never shopped from thrift stores for her kids. I'm not cutting down thrift store shopping. Lori would only fit in well with the fundie lite SAHMs who come from middle or upper middle class backgrounds.

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Canelle, I am curious. If you clean every day, does your husband ever do any cleaning? It should not take hours every day to do half the cleaning that a house requires. If you're doing all the cleaning, that seems a bit unbalanced.

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It isn't just moms who work. The single and/ or childless woman is the most abused woman on the planet. During my single years, I was the one expected to take care of elderly. It happened somewhat after I married. My DH and I were the ones called upon simply because it is believed you have plenty of time on your hands when you are childless. Feminism forgets about the childless in the fight for workplace rights. I havent read her blog but Lori obviously does seem to see things in black and white. When you have lived one way all your life. it is all you know. Like someone mentioned this happens in the secular world.

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There are different factions/groups within SAHMs and working mothers. I liked shaylahc's post a lot. I also know a few college educated SAHMs who I have a lot in common with and friends with. People become SAHMs for different reasons and sometimes it is only temporary. I'll admit that the fundie SAHMs sometimes annoy me because they cut down working women quite a bit. I also get annoyed with some of the fundie SAHM bloggers who talk about not having money for food, home repairs, and other expenses. I sometimes wish I could scream at them to get jobs.

Lori Alexander is different from a lot of other fundie or fundie lite bloggers. Her husband's business seems to do well and he has clients in several states. She only had four kids. She lives a very privileged life compared to Zsu, Kelly C. and several others. As I mentioned before she and her family travel a few times a year. It seems they go to Hawaii every year. Many fundies don't take trips like that at all. Some of the fundie families we discuss here do take handouts from churches and certain social circles. Lori never had to do stuff like that. She praised the Duggars and Bates on her blog and mentioned how they have never been on government assistance. The reality is that the Duggars and Bateses were never able to completely support their families on their own. Boob and Mullet admitted in interviews that their old church used to help them with food and clothing donations. I'm also willing to bet that Lori never shopped from thrift stores for her kids. I'm not cutting down thrift store shopping. Lori would only fit in well with the fundie lite SAHMs who come from middle or upper middle class backgrounds.

The no welfare thing doesn't make you special. Families close to the Duggar size used to raise kids without it and without reality TV. Most of them refused to take handouts and embarrassed if they had to. The Duggars would be no where close to this lifestyle without a show. Fans do not want to admit it.

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The single and/ or childless woman is the most abused woman on the planet

So true! I'm single and childless, work full-time and commute 1.5 hrs/day. I know many working moms do this and raise their families too, which I *hugely* respect - but many people act like the rest of my time consists of lounging around. My mom always asks why I'm cleaning since I live alone. Because in her mind, dust does not a accumulate if you live alone. Nor do you ever need to do laundry, clean the bathrooms, run errands, cook, pay bills, clean and vacuum floors, clean up massive pet messes, take care of every little thing around the house by yourself, etc. Plus I do volunteer work but according to my family, I live on easy street.

I really don't get why so many women attack each other's choices. Being a female - regardless of children, marital status, job/no job - is difficult enough. Why must we make things worse by judging those whose lives differ from ours?

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Life is difficult enough without women tearing each other apart. I think a lot of it is perpetuated by culture. Things are so geared for consumerism that we are inundated with messages that make us feel we are not enough and we should feel guilty about our choices.

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Delurking to reply to this one 8-)

I'm a SAHM (I do work two nights a week at a local restaurant) with a six year old. Trust me the days aren't usually long enough to fit everything in!

My days go like this: 7am, get up and get dressed. Depending on DH's work schedule I might be up in time to kiss him goodbye. Sometimes he's already gone. I have a coffee and make son's lunch.

7:30, wake the kid up if he's not already up. Let the dog out. Pack son's bag. Chase him around the house to try and get him to eat breakfast, get dressed, brush teeth, etc, in time to get on the bus. Darn kid is like a squirrel on crack first thing in the morning!

8:30, Put kid on the bus. Drive down the road and feed the horses that belong to the therapeutic riding centre I volunteer at. This takes half an hour or so.

9:00, Do whatever shopping needs to be done, pick up the mail and whatever other errands need to be done.

10 - 10:30, Arrive back home. Spend 15-20 minutes on the computer, checking Facebook, then start on the housework. If it's a monday I've got a weekends worth of cleaning to catch up on especially if son has had friends over. Double storey house, two bathrooms, three bedrooms.....

3:00, Get son off the bus. Make him a snack, chat about his day, unpack his bag, etc

4:00, Start dinner. Watch as son trashes the clean house. Argue with him about picking up his toys before dinner. (He does it, it just takes a bit of negotiation, lol)

4:30ish, DH comes home.

5:00 Dinner.

5:30 - 6:00, Clean up the kitchen, get son bathed, warn him that bed is soon, deal with the tantrum about going to bed.

7:30ish, drag son to bed. Spend half an hour to an hour getting him to STAY in bed. Once he's in bed I talk to DH for a while until he goes to bed, then I collapse on the couch and watch tv/ stuff around on the internet until I start to doze off, then I have a shower and go to bed myself.

Wednesdays I volunteer at the therapeutic riding centre nearly all day, so tuesday is a REALLY long day because I try to get everything done, including dinner in the slow cooker, the night before.

No, DH doesn't do ANY of the cooking or cleaning. It's something we agreed on before we had our son. I WANTED to stay at home with son and in order for me to do that and still pay a mortgage and all the bills DH has to work a difficult job with long hours. More often that not he works weekends and public holidays. I have a beautiful house to live in and a comfortable life. In my mind, the least I can do is make sure there's a hot meal and a clean house for my DH to come home to.

That's just how we do things. I have no judgement or opinion about how other people work things. I do laugh hysterically when people ask what I do all day!

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The no welfare thing doesn't make you special. Families close to the Duggar size used to raise kids without it and without reality TV. Most of them refused to take handouts and embarrassed if they had to. The Duggars would be no where close to this lifestyle without a show. Fans do not want to admit it.

You're right; the no welfare thing doesn't mean anything. It's actually a bad thing when parents will let their kids starve rather than use the resources that society has made available to feed those kids. It's all a matter of pride and I'd much rather see a healthy kid who is properly cared for than someone who is too holy to accept a certain type of help.

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The no welfare thing doesn't make you special. Families close to the Duggar size used to raise kids without it and without reality TV. Most of them refused to take handouts and embarrassed if they had to. The Duggars would be no where close to this lifestyle without a show. Fans do not want to admit it.

The Duggar fans will never admit it. There were some dumb ass fans a few years back who were sending the Duggars clothing and other things for the kids because they actually believed that the Duggars weren't being paid by TLC. I remember last year there was a woman on the 19kac FB page who claimed that the Duggars make enough money from real estate and businesses and that they donate their entire TLC salary to charity. That is a lie and anyone with a good brain could tell that the Duggars are likely keeping most of the TLC salary. In addition to money, TLC gives the Duggars other perks like trips and maybe clothing and stuff for the house. I was annoyed when Boob bitched in NYC about paying for subway tickets and ice cream for the kids. We all know that he really wasn't paying for that stuff.

Another misconception with some Duggar fans is that many think the Duggars have gotten mega rich from the show and books. Years ago on another message board, I got into with a Duggar fan. I mentioned something that is possible for the Duggars to face financial problems if they had a special needs child that had something like Down syndrome or something else happened to a family member. The Duggar fan told me that those were "ifs" and "that the Duggars will always be fine finacially because they make money from DVDs and books". I laughed at that. The Duggar DVD sets aren't huge sellers. I think it is only the very hardcore fans who buy the sets. I have only see Duggar DVD sets in a retail store once. The books have sold well, but they aren't huge non-fiction sellers like Laura Hillenbrand's or Jon Krakuer's books. The Duggars are definitely living comfortably because of TLC, but they aren't mega rich like actors and actresses from scripted TV shows or families like the Kardashians.

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So true! I'm single and childless, work full-time and commute 1.5 hrs/day. I know many working moms do this and raise their families too, which I *hugely* respect - but many people act like the rest of my time consists of lounging around. My mom always asks why I'm cleaning since I live alone. Because in her mind, dust does not a accumulate if you live alone. Nor do you ever need to do laundry, clean the bathrooms, run errands, cook, pay bills, clean and vacuum floors, clean up massive pet messes, take care of every little thing around the house by yourself, etc. Plus I do volunteer work but according to my family, I live on easy street.

I really don't get why so many women attack each other's choices. Being a female - regardless of children, marital status, job/no job - is difficult enough. Why must we make things worse by judging those whose lives differ from ours?

I don't either. Why does life only matter when you are chasing toddlers all dau? I see the single and childless no different than empty nesters or the larger families who use their older kids as practically slaves. We are likely busier or as busy. Michelles letter to Jubilee really infuriated me on this level. Of course kids aren't career interupters or problems when you have a show and built-in nannies. But according to Boob we would rather have debt than kids.

The Duggars have perhaps sold all the media they can. The Duggar girls book wont likely be a huge seller. Their audiences are limited and hundreds of thousands still don't know who they are. Rental properties aren't always signs of wealth. Boob only made $700 a month from them.

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Dont forget about the product placement in their show. I am sure there are some nice items in the house thanks to that.

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I don't either. Why does life only matter when you are chasing toddlers all dau? I see the single and childless no different than empty nesters or the larger families who use their older kids as practically slaves. We are likely busier or as busy. Michelles letter to Jubilee really infuriated me on this level. Of course kids aren't career interupters or problems when you have a show and built-in nannies. But according to Boob we would rather have debt than kids.

The Duggars have perhaps sold all the media they can. The Duggar girls book wont likely be a huge seller. Their audiences are limited and hundreds of thousands still don't know who they are. Rental properties aren't always signs of wealth. Boob only made $700 a month from them.

I also don't see the Duggar girl book being a huge seller. The people buying it will probably be the same people who liked Boob and Mullet's books. I think the reason the Duggars have never gotten a huge devoted audience is because they really don't have mainstream appeal. I predict that the Duggar girl book may open some people's eyes to the dark side of the Duggars' beliefs. I can see people reading that book and wondering more to why the girls don't have more freedom.

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I am a SAHM and I always thought that I would go back to work when my kids are in school, but now I see that may not be possible. School is often out for days or a week or a week and a half at a time, and my older son is on the autism spectrum, so getting childcare is not easy. There are also IEP meetings, etc. Plus, when the school calls if the kids are sick, they probably don't want to hear that you can't get out of work, and will be dropping them off, sick, at school the next day because you can't find childcare. People with families who can help don't have to worry about these things, but we do.

I do some freelance writing, and I plan on expanding that once they are both in school to bring in extra income.

I am rather surprised that people thing that I have nothing to talk about and that they could not have an intelligent discussion with me, even though I was a lawyer and have an advanced degree, simply because I stay at home.

I actually would LOVE to work outside of the home, so I have a challenge for all who wonder why moms still stay at home when they have kids in school: find me a job. After dropping and picking up, I can only work from 8:30 to 1:30. I will need all school holidays off. I will need off for IEP meetings. I will need to be able to leave on a moment's notice if either kid is sick. Please let me know about any places that will hire me, and I will check them out once both boys are in school. It is so hard to find a job that accommodates a school schedule that there is a waiting list here in NYC to be a lunch lady at the schools.

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