WHEN Taryn, 28, imagines her wedding day and married life, it’s not just the white-lace dress, rose bouquet and happy tears she pictures. It’s packing her husband’s lunch, making the bed every morning and even cleaning the bathroom that she dreams about.

Taryn, an account manager and contestant on Channel Nine’s The Farmer Wants a Wife, says that she has always wanted to be a stay-at-home spouse. “Although a career is important, it’s never been my main priority in life,” she explains. “I’ve preferred to focus on finding the right person, settling down, getting married and having at least two or three kids.”

She’s not alone. A recent study published in the Psychology of Women Quarterly found that while females of Generation Y are more accepting of working mothers, there is an increased desire among them to stay at home, compared to the generation before. Thirty-two per cent of millennials in the US believe men are best suited to be the breadwinners and women the homemakers. This figure is up from 27 per cent in the 1990s.

In Australia, there is a similar subset of young people with traditional attitudes towards the role of women in the household and workforce. Dr Jennifer Baxter of the Australian Institute of Family Studies (AIFS) reports there is a significant portion of 15-29-year-olds who agree with the statement: “It is better for everyone involved if the man earns the money and the woman takes care of the home and the children.”

Sophie, 25, and her husband Leon came to an agreement very early on in their relationship that she would stay at home while he worked full time and studied. She is proud to be called a housewife, but admits, “These days, it’s a bit of a dirty word. Stay-at-home wives and mothers are very underappreciated.” Despite the ‘stigma’, Sophie sees motherhood as “the most important job anyone could have” and is happy raising her one-year-old son, Charles, at home.

Belinda, 25, is also happy for her husband Nigel to be the breadwinner in the family, while she looks after their children, Alexis, five, and Brock, three. “Let’s just say he doesn’t have much patience and gets bored very quickly,” she laughs. “He is happy working and I have always wanted to be home with the kids.”

Kirsty, 29, is another millennial grateful to be in a position where she can stay at home with her children, Isla, three, and Axel, one, while they are young. She describes motherhood as her true calling and says, “I’ve always been a very maternal person, even when I was a little girl.”

It’s curious that a subset of young women in 2016 — a time when females are so strongly encouraged to get a university education, join the workforce and climb the corporate ladder — would rather be at home than in an office. So why are these Gen-Y women choosing to stay at home and nurture the future generation?

Experts suggest it’s a reaction to being raised by Gen-X mothers, the first generation of women who were empowered to have both a family and career. That’s the case for Taryn, who says her desire to be a stay-at-home wife and mother is a result of her own childhood. “I grew up with a single mum and it was hard to spend time with her because she worked a lot,” she says. “I’d go into after-school care on a regular basis because she was on a single income with four kids.” Seeing her mother struggle to work and raise a family cemented Taryn’s decision to instead choose the domestic option.

Dr Margaret Henderson, author of Marking Feminist Times, agrees the swing back to traditional gender roles is a reaction to millennial upbringings. “They’ve seen their parents’ marriages break up and [have grown up with] working mothers and [seen] the pressure that puts on the family,” she explains. “And so they think staying at home is the easier option.”

Kirsty laughs at the idea of staying at home being easier. “I don’t ever get to sit down. I’m constantly doing jobs: cleaning, washing, cooking meals…”

But while it’s not any less difficult, staying at home is increasingly seen as an alternative to the harsh reality of the workplace by some women. Dr Henderson describes a culture of retreatism in young women. “We bring girls up saying that they can do anything with their lives, and then they go to university and get a job and find out the workplace is tough,” she says. “The home is becoming this haven from a bad, tough old world.”

Sociologist and feminist Eva Cox cites a different reason for their desire to stay at home; she thinks it’s a reaction to workplaces failing to accommodate the needs of women who are juggling a career and children. “Changes to workplaces have not really made it easier for women to manage both over the last 20 years,” she says. “And I think for a lot of younger ones, they’re thinking, ‘Why should I kill myself trying to do both roles?’”

According to a 2013 AIFS report, many mothers are choosing to avoid that stress, with 57 per cent of couple mothers opting out of a job. Dr Baxter confirms: “Australia’s female employment rate is lower than the OECD average through those childbearing years.”

While Belinda sees herself going back to work at a later stage, she says the benefits of her staying at home outweigh those of joining the workforce right now. On top of saving money on childcare (fees can be as high as $160 a day in Sydney and $120 in Melbourne), she talks about the joy of watching her children grow up. “I get to raise my kids the way I want, without relying on others to teach them the things I want them to learn,” she says.

However, even though most non-employed couple mothers may not want a job, some don’t have a choice. The financial demands of having a family can outweigh the desire to stay at home. Sophie recently had to return to work in the childcare industry two days a week to contribute to her family’s budget.

Kirsty, too, is planning to go back to work “for the sole reason we need to financially”. Despite wanting to have more kids in the future and enjoying her role as a stay-at-home mum, she feels she needs to get a job to help her family get ahead, save for a home deposit and maybe a holiday.

In a society where being called a housewife could be considered an insult, is choosing to stay at home instead of pursuing a career a rejection of feminism?

Sophie says no. Strongly. As a proud feminist and housewife, she sees feminism as having the choice to be whatever you want to be, whether that’s a homemaker or a hydrometeorologist.

Cox sees feminism as not having to make a choice at all. “The whole point of feminism is to not be forced into making choices according to one’s gender.”

We should be able to have both a career and children, or one or the other, or neither. That’s everyone’s prerogative, after all.

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