People always get in hot water in this topic, and I do not want to offend anyone,but time and again I noticed that, whether people like it or not, somebody has to be the Mom. If neither parent will be, a nanny (or grandparent) will take that place. I liked being the mom, my husband often had to work weekends, so I worked part-time, if at all, for the first 15 years and we had a babysitter we paid full time but generally used 1 or 2 days a week. This ended when the kids were all in school and we made it work around their school schedule. I am gratified my kids do not even have a recollection of me working when they were small. Because I strove to be home, I did not miss out on the first step, the first word, whatever. Those were saved for me. I am now making the transition to thinking of myself as something other than a mother. I feel good about getting involved in some things for myself now, but I hated it whenever work caused conflict or even momentarily threw our family out of whack. I have no regrets whatsoever about the time I spent at home. People have to understand this for the sake of the kids, but the neglect does not happen with working mothers alone. We had a nanny in training living with us at one time. She would have what I called Nannies Anonymous meetings. The nannies would fret about the doctor's wives or whoever who did not work at all, but were out nonetheless from 9am-6pm or later with social activities almost every day. The reality for our kids is they do not know or care whether we were away working, saving the world, basking in a spa or serving as a socialite. They just know we were not there. I always said I would rather be known as a good mom who one day could be a good professional than a good professional whose kids are really screwed up. At the end of the day, there is nothing more important in terms of what we are accomplishing on earth. I hope this encourages people. I do not mean to be anything other than encouraging to people questioning the utility of staying home.