Catherine Durkin Robinson: Why most women should work outside the home

Back in the 1950s, my nana squeezed out her sixth kid and decided to get a job. Without even a high school diploma, she enrolled in nursing school and made it happen.

This was a radical thing to do.

But Kitty Durkin was a radical chick and didn’t care that her neighbors and friends thought she was nuts. She thought they were nuts. In fact, when bored housewives congregated around the front stoop to gossip and compare pot roast recipes, she often told them:

“Get a job.”

Nana insisted this was the key to a happy home.

In the 1970s, my mother squeezed out three children before the age of 30 and stayed home with us for a little while. One day, she was on the phone with her sister, complaining a little too much about how no one liked her soup and my aunt offered the same piece of advice:

“Get a job.”

More recently, when my children were young, I stayed home with them for three years. My sons were, and are, the most important people in my life, but I still had to spend several minutes each day screaming into a pillow. Those were the days when Elmo and an overeager washing machine were my only entertainment and competitive moms who cared way too much about raisins were my only friends. I was living in suburbia, stuck between Weber grills and Confederate flags, where stimulation often meant online chat rooms and restraining orders.

It didn’t take long to get the same advice that helped Mom and Nana avoid pharmaceutical intervention.

I got a job.

And here’s why you should, too.

Self-worth: Sitting at home is depressing, watching television geared toward an audience either injured in an auto accident and who might want to earn their degree online. Of course you feel like a loser! And if you don’t watch television and instead just stare at the ceiling and wonder what happened to your life? Congratulations, you’re now in the same demographic as meth addicts. When my husband came home from work, I’d ramble for a good half hour about the merits of mulch vs. rock, and he’d say, “Kate, have you been thinking again?” Get a job and get paid to think. You’ll smile more.

Cheaper than therapy: Earning a paycheck is better than continuing to drain the household budget complaining to a professional who couldn’t care less about your five-year plan and how the roses in the backyard respond better to your sister-in-law. (Everyone responds better to her. She can talk about something other than roses.) Get a job and earn enough to hire someone to garden for you — wouldn’t that be nice?

Grown-ups work: Spare everyone your rationalizations about how tutoring is work when it’s really a hobby. That scrapbook is not fulfilling or you wouldn’t need a bottle of wine to get through each evening. Don’t get me wrong, I remember a time when my snarky blog made me a “freelance writer.” Sure. Get a job and lose yourself in service of others. Focus on something bigger than you and your thighs — like deadlines and expense reports.

Benefits all the things: Your spouse and children will be relieved when you no longer live vicariously through them. The kids can start playing sports for fun — and your spouse can stop looking online for a new wife. Family should always be number one, right? That usually means there is a list of other interests beneath them.

Healthy living: Do you scowl at happy pictures on Facebook or obsessively track how many fewer “likes” you get than the rest of the planet? Do you complain to your partner that he isn’t expressing enough interest in the potty habits of your children? Yeah, you’re going to need to go ahead and get a job. Your blood pressure will thank you.

Working outside the home doesn’t mean a 50-hour a week, high-pressure career with little time for anything else. The key here is balance, so don’t trade one crazy for another. You want a way to be less miserable and more fulfilled? Sometimes the answer lies in finding satisfaction in something other than what came out of your uterus. A full-time job will do that for you.

And it also might allow you to be a better mom in the process.

Catherine Durkin Robinson is a political advocate and organizer, living in Tampa. Column courtesy of Context Florida.