Benefits of Being a SAHM

Benefits of being a SAHM essentially present a perspective on which I based my decision to leave my profession and be at home for my kids and with my kids. 

And with this post, I am in no way trying to provide a comparison between a SAHM and a Working Mom to prove the benefits of one over the other.

Because I believe the decision to be a SAHM or a working Mom is something that should rest in all its entirety with the mom in question You, me or anyone else should not be judging her for that decision. 

Benefits of Being a SAHM

To start with, let me confess that the subject of being a SAHM is something that is very close to my heart. I have lived through the ups and downs of a SAHM life for almost 13 years now.

So you would find me spilling a lot of my mindshare & thoughts in this post. And I know that many of you moms would resonate with these too. Because after all, this is OUR story – the story of every SAHM.

And if for some reason, you have different opinions, I would really respect that. Please feel free to share those with me and let us try and have a healthy discussion around the subject. The only intention behind the discussion must be to be of help to fellow moms who are yet to take the decision for themselves and their kids. 

Ok, now without much delay, let us dive straight into the UnSpoken Benefits of Being a SAHM.

1. Being a SAHM, You Are Always There for Them

Since you are at home being a stay at home mom, you are raising your kids in front of your eyes. You are not leaving them to go to work and are available & accessible to them when they might need you.

While this is true that you are always there for them, I as a SAHM always worked towards raising independent children. So, in my home especially now that my kids are grown up enough, I am accessible to them in slots. 

So I am available to my kids but I make sure that I take out my me-time or my work time out which is a no access time for them unless there is something critical & urgent that I need to address.

However I still have my younger one who is 6 years coming to me for nothing important at times, but those are a few times which we both manage with a quick 2 min talk and a hug. Those are just attention-seeking behaviours that I try and manage through warmth and affection. 

2. You Have Your Kids With You Always

Because you are there for your kids, you are also never alone. This is something I really enjoy. The attention, love and adulation that you get from your kids is so heartwarming that I just love being the centre of their lives. So this is one of the benefits of being a SAHM and if you don’t like being alone this is one of the big ones. 

3.  You Are Raising Them Yourself as a SAHM

Working Moms do need to depend either on child care services or the grandparents to take care of her kids when she is away for work. In fact, a well-developed support system where she can depend on entirely for her kids is imperative for any woman to even think of stepping out for work. 

However, being a stay at home, you are independent because you are raising your kids yourself. And this is a huge benefit I feel. This keeps me away from a lot of anxious moments and insecurities related to my kids. 

4.  You Help Your Kids Shine Academically

Research has time again shown that while you are there to support your kids academically, the kids are more liable to perform better and score better too. The only fact that you have the time, energy, and mindshare to invest in your child, works in a big way, in having a positive impact on your children too. 

5.  You Can Cater to Their Emotional Needs | Benefits of Being a SAHM

This one is simple. Because you are involved and engaged in your kids’ lives for almost every time of the day, you are available to cater to their emotional needs too in the moment of truth. 

And this is important for kids. When they know that they have a parent whom they can talk to or even throw a tantrum on at times, they are calmer and emotionally intelligent. 

One of the biggest benefits of being a SAHM is that I am available for my kids when they need me. When they had a fight with their best friend, or when they could not clear the basketball trials, I was there with them.

6.  It Saves a Lot of Costs Like for Child Care & Tuitions

Often there is a stigma attached to being a SAHM that they are not contributing anything to family finances. This is so untrue. Having a deeper look at their lives, they are instrumental in huge savings to the home expense statement. 

Saving on the child care costs, House management help salaries, and also expenditure on take away meals is just few of the expenses that she helps save, and just to say it out Loud, these expenses are HUGE. SO in a way she is contributing to the family finances, if not by directly adding but helping save and invest. 

7.  You Are Not Always in a Hurry

You can take the liberty of being at ease with the time since you don’t have to rush every morning to the office and come back only by the end of the day. Being a stay at home mom, you are much at ease and can define your own pace and priorities

8.  You Are Investing the Time in Creating a Stronger Bond With the Children

Being a SAHM, you can invest your time and energy on all the small and big things of your kids and hence enable building stronger bonds of affection with them. You are there to witness their milestones, their wins, and their disappointments too. 

9.  You Positively Impact the Quality of Life for Your Entire Family by Being a SAHM

While you are staying at home to take care of your kids, this decision does have a significant positive impact on the entire family. You are cooking more at home, investing time & resources in house management, spending quality time with your spouse and kids, and also spending energies on improvising things at home.

All of these go a long way in having a smooth functioning of the home and hence the kids and your spouse can concentrate on their academic & professional goals without having to worry about lots of things that you manage. 

10. Your Spouse Is Better Able to Concentrate at Work

No one can take better care of your kids than the parents. And if one parent is overlooking the kids at home, the other one can focus all his energies and concentration at his work without being distracted. Interestingly, this one is a huge benefit of being a SAHM.

I say this based purely on my experience. it is not easy to concentrate on work when your mind is worrying about how your kids would be doing at the child care centre. 

11. You Are Less Anxious About Kids’ Safety

Once you are at home as the primary caregiver to your kids, you are less anxious about their safety because you yourself are taking care of the right?

12.  You Have the Freedom to Choose Your Routine as a SAHM

This is a very significant benefit as far as being a stay at home mom is concerned. Because you don’t have to go to work at a particular time and spend requisite hours at your work, you are free to create your own customised routine for the day.

You are free to have your own schedule and manage the chores and other priorities at your will. And then who does not love to have the freedom to do what they want when they want?

13.  You Do Get Time to Follow Your Passions Alongside

Being a SAHM does not really mean that every minute of the day must go on doing something with kids or for kids. In fact one of the critical habits of happy SAHM is that they take out time for themselves and indulge in Self Care.

So if you want to thrive as a SAHM, follow your passion or indulge in a hobby that can act as a Boredom Buster too. 

14.  You Can Develop Various Life Skills in Your Kids

While living your everyday life, you would be able to impart amazing Life Skills lessons to your kids when you are spending time with them as a SAHM.

Things like managing daily stress, taking care of your own self, how to make friends and how to solve everyday challenges are easier learnt when the kids can see you living them rather than just talking about them. 

15.   You Can Enable Stronger Bonds Between Your Kids and the Extended Family

This is one thing that is very important fo me. While I was working, I could hardly get time to speak to my parents or my parent in-laws with demands of the Job and an infant in m lap. I felt the increasing gap in my bonds with them and my siblings too.

While I decided to be a SAHM, this reduced deliverables on my platter and I started taking out more time to bond with my family. And now my kids enjoy warm strong bonds with their grandparents and aunts and this is something I am really proud of.

16.   You Can Invest Time in Play Dates and Develop Social Skills in Your Kids

As a working mother, weekdays usually go at work and the rest of the time running to complete the daily chores, kid’s homework and other essential & critical activities. And the weekends are meant for moving out of the home to get in the groceries and then having the entertainment time with the family.

It was very difficult for me to even think of things like playdates, sleepovers and casual get-togethers with kids and their moms. But being a SAHM, I had the free mindshare to think and plan for these extra things and support my children to make their core group of friends. 

17.    You Can Focus on Your Health

Since you have your routine in your hands, you don’t have any more excuses of no time at hand for exercising. You can focus on your health better and work towards being a healthy & happy mom.

18.  You Can Focus on Holistic Development of Your Child

When you have some free time during the day when you are not running. The race to finish everything for the day, you would take that time out to think how to improvise things. I do see sometime every week to think of how the week went by and how could I improve anything and add more value too what I am doing.

Most of the time I also try and read about new activities and researches on parenting and child behaviours too. Sometimes it is about how to feed nutritious food to them and sometimes I just learn about new apps and technologies kids are using on their phones. All this helps me in my holistic parenting approach and I find myself better equipped to manage the modern-day challenges of parenting my kids. 

19.   You Don’t Have Work-Related Stress in Your Life

Another very important benefit of being a SAHM is that you have less stress in your life. And hence you are a happier person. 

SAHM or Working Mom – What is Better?

Being a SAHM or a working Mom does not really change the bond of love that every mother has with her child. While most of the benefits I have listed above are usually for a SAHM, these can very well be incorporated by a working mom too if she mindfully and intentionally focuses upon them.

I want to say that motherhood is a precious and extremely cherished phase of a woman’s life. And in my opinion, we should not be discussing being a SAHM or a working mom with an intent to get the judgment out on what is the best way to be a mother.

Agreed, that the information about the pros and cons should be available but it should purely be the decision of the mother whether she wants to be a full-time mom or a working mom.

If you would want to read more of my views on this subject, read it here on Quora. Follow Mom Chipper on Quora to read more interesting stuff on Moms, Parenting, Lifestyle and a lot more.