Resume Of A Stay At Home Mom

One in five American parents stay home after having children and mothers are roughly four times as likely to be the stay-at-home-parent. I created “Resume of A Stay-At-Home-Mom”, a series of images, to dispel stereotypes and show the depth of the stay-at-home-mother role. The images display ordinary moments that capture the solitude and sacrifice stay-at-home mothers experience and catalogue the myriad of skills used daily forcing people to re-evaluate their assumptions about the role and reminding mothers that their strength, grit, and resilience gained from their experience is indispensable to our society.

 

When the time comes to re-enter the work force, mothers are discouraged from sharing their role of primary caregiver during their gap in employment. One study from American Sociological Review says stay-at-home mothers are half as likely to get a job interview than unemployed mothers. Employers said they viewed stay-at-home parents as less reliable, less deserving and less committed to work than unemployed parents.

 

I chose to put my camera on a tripod and use interval shooting to capture candid self-portraits with my children to show a realistic view of my experience as a stay-at-home mom unlike the curated views we see on social media. The process of editing the images and choosing a title that corresponds to a skill on a resume made me feel seen and valued in an often invisible and thankless role. I’ve been a stay-at-home-mother for over 10 years and never felt like it was enough. I was always ashamed when asked “what do you do?”. I’d share about my hobbies and volunteer roles but leave out my primary role of taking care of my children. After creating this series, I proudly share I am a stay-at-home-mother.