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What Is a Full-Time Mother?

Anna T.
Anna T.

Most mothers are full-time mothers. Regardless of whether they stay at home or go to work each day, their responsibilities usually do not change that much. Even mothers who have jobs that keep them away from their homes for several hours every day may consider themselves to be full-time moms. In a more general sense, the term full-time mother is most often used to describe stay-at-home moms who have no other job but mothering, running errands, and tending to their households.

Up until the early 1960s, most mothers were full time. In most cases, the men of the family were the ones who held full-time jobs, while the women stayed home. After the advent of women’s revolutions, more and more women started leaving their homes to pursue careers of their own. A study conducted by Stanford University in 2006 indicated that 65 percent of mothers with children of approximately preschool age were employed outside the home either full or part time. If the results of this study are accurate, it probably reflects that only about a third of all mothers during that time period were considered to be full-time stay-at-home moms.

A full-time mother may wash dishes and do other tasks around the house.
A full-time mother may wash dishes and do other tasks around the house.

The job of a full-time mother is generally considered very difficult. In many cases, these women do not get enough sleep, averaging only about five to six hours every night. Many women who stay home full time are also much less likely to visit doctors regarding various health problems that come up than men who work outside the home.

Some of the chores that full-time mothers do may include shopping, preparing meals, and various household duties such as laundry and washing dishes. In many cases, stay-at-home moms tend to feel more pressure to excel in these areas, possibly because they are not working outside the home. A full-time mother might often find that, because she does not hold an outside job, expectations for her performance are higher than that of mothers who are employed.

Mothers looking for part-time work should list their availability on a job application.
Mothers looking for part-time work should list their availability on a job application.

During 2010, a study was conducted to try to determine what a full-time mother would earn if she were actually paid for her work. The study indicated that most full-time mothers would earn a yearly paycheck of around $120,000 US dollars (USD). This study did not include all of the hours worked each day by full-time mothers and instead took into account the amount of time spent on the 10 most common household and mothering duties.

Discussion Comments

Reminiscence

I was thinking the other day about the difference between the full-time mothers who raised a lot of us and the modern mothers who are more like multi-taskers. When I was growing up during the 60s and 70s, most of the mothers in my neighborhood stayed at home all day. The mothers in TV commercials in those days also stayed home. The mothers in most sitcoms stayed home and waited for their husbands to come home from work and their kids to come home from school. That's just how it was.

A lot of my female friends are now mothers, and I rarely find them at home during the day. They still pack lunches for their kids and watch their husbands leave for work, but they're also going to their own outside jobs or working on hobbies. They aren't always doing housework or watching soap operas, like a lot of our own mothers did. Their kids seem to be doing well without them playing the traditional role of "mom". I sometimes miss seeing full-time moms in action, but I also like the idea of women realizing its okay to have a life outside of the home.

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    • A full-time mother may wash dishes and do other tasks around the house.
      By: Subbotina Anna
      A full-time mother may wash dishes and do other tasks around the house.
    • Mothers looking for part-time work should list their availability on a job application.
      By: Karen Roach
      Mothers looking for part-time work should list their availability on a job application.
    • A full-time mother does chores, like laundry, while simultaneously caring for young children.
      By: JackF
      A full-time mother does chores, like laundry, while simultaneously caring for young children.
    • A full-time mother might have trouble balancing all of the household duties at once.
      By: Brebca
      A full-time mother might have trouble balancing all of the household duties at once.