Commenting on past homemaking posts

I've written a lot over the years about homemaking and choosing to stay home to raise and homeschool my children instead of taking a paid job outside the home. For the most part these are older posts, written before social media influencers were even conceived of, much less being such a societal force. And they were definitely written before the whole trad wife thing. Sometimes when I notice older posts are being viewed, I'll go back and read them to see what I said. Sometimes current me needs to chime in, particularly on parenting posts, to explain I know more now and don't listen to clueless younger me. 

Recently, I've been seeing those older homemaking posts having a lot more views than is typical. I'm thinking current me needs to go and add some disclaimers lest anyone mistake my writings as being in support of patriarchy and the less than healthy trad wife thing. Because I'm this my thinking hasn't changed, but how I might now go about wording it would be very different. 

I still believe that creating a home is important. I still believe that no one should be defined by how much money one earned. I still believe that it is good for communities to have people available to help others, be present in neighborhoods, to have more flexibility that just outside the 9 to 5 hours. 

If I were writing them again now, I would want to add or clarify a few things. 

1. For nearly all the years I was home and raising children, I owned my own business teaching piano. My income made the difference in our budget so that I could continue to stay home. I made enough that the IRS required quarterly tax payments. I am not against women earning money. I still own my own business, I am just doing different things. 

2. Staying home was my choice. J. was supportive, but at no point did I stay home because it was "Godly" or because J. insisted. That would not have gone well. I am a fully functioning adult who can make their own decisions, and J. and I make decisions that affect each other and our family jointly and as equal partners, which is what we are. 

3. Creating a home and raising children is not (or shouldn't be) gendered. Men can (and do) do this as well. 

4. I am not against working moms and I will not play into the mommy wars. Every family is different and every person is different. There is no one right way to be a family. I am fully aware that what was good for me and my family would not be good for someone else. Usually my posts were advocating for this choice and not making one better or worse than the other. Plus, there is actually a whole spectrum of how parents make earning money and raising children work; hard-line dichotomies tend to not be healthy for anyone. 

I am more than a little disturbed at the whole performative, social media influencer, trad wife phenomenon. Raising a family is not a competitive sport. Raising a family is not something that should be monetized. Raising a family is not best done on full view all the time. None of it is healthy or good for the children involved.