'I'm a stay-at-home mum, and I'm scared my husband is losing respect for me.'

That sentence feels dangerous to say out loud. 

Not because it's dramatic, but because it's soaked in shame — touching something many women feel, but rarely admit, especially after becoming mothers. 

"I'm a stay-at-home mum." 

Watch: Sarah Marie Fahd answers a listener's dilemma on returning to work after being a stay-at-home-mum. Post continues below.

It's a deceptively simple statement, yet it carries a thousand unspoken judgments. Sometimes they're said aloud — '"You're so lucky. It must be nice not having to work". Other times they arrive quietly, with raised eyebrows or polite pauses after someone asks, "So, what do you do?"

As though our answer determines our worth. 

For a long time, my work defined me. I was ambitious. I wanted to climb, build, earn — to prove something to myself, to my family, to the world. I wanted to be proud of who I was becoming. 

When I met my husband, he loved that about me. He admired my drive, my work ethic, my hunger for more. 

Then I had a baby. And everything shifted. 

People love to say being a stay-at-home mum is "the hardest job in the world", and while I believe that's true, it's not because the hours are long — they never stop. It's hard because motherhood quietly dismantles who you were and asks you to rebuild yourself while keeping everyone else alive. 

It's a mental, emotional and spiritual upheaval no one really prepares you for.  Society tells us our value lies in our income. For a while, mine was strong — comfortably above average. Now, on paper, it's close to zero. 

My husband is kind. Supportive. He tells me, "I couldn't do this without you. You're an amazing mum. You're making such a sacrifice for our children." And most days, I believe him. 

I know I'm lucky to be home. I know these early years matter. I don't want to miss them. But something has changed. 

The conversations we used to have — about work, money, ideas, the future — once felt equal. Energising. Like two adults building something together. Now, they feel… different. Smaller. As though my voice carries less weight. 

Maybe it's not even him. 

Maybe it's me. 

Maybe I've internalised the idea that because I'm no longer earning, my opinion matters less.

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Some days, I feel the pressure to justify my existence, to explain what I did while he was at work. That pressure doesn't come from him — it comes from the identity I lost and never had time to grieve.

Motherhood doesn't give you space to process the transformation. One moment, you're growing a human. Next, you're birthing, feeding, soothing, witnessing first smiles, first steps, first foods. The voice that once asked, What's next for me? goes silent. In its place: Am I doing enough? Enough learning activities? Enough stimulation? Enough cuddles? Enough presence to ensure they grow up feeling safe, loved, and secure?

And then there are the moments that sting unexpectedly.

The Zoom calls with professional women — polished, articulate, uninterrupted — while I sit there with yoghurt on my shirt and tomato sauce on my face, my hair scraped into the universal messy mum bun.

And I wonder, quietly and painfully: Does he ever miss the woman I was? Does he wish I were still that driven, put-together version of me?

I hate the envy I feel. But it's there.

On the hardest days, the thought creeps in — Is my husband losing respect for me? Even when he insists he isn't.

Because when a society teaches women their worth is measured in dollars, stepping away from paid work can feel like stepping away from value itself.

And motherhood, for all its beauty, doesn't come with a payslip to prove your contribution. So how do we redefine our worth when it's no longer tied to income?

Maybe this is the real reckoning of motherhood — not the exhaustion or the sacrifice, but the identity shift no one warns you about, perhaps because no one can completely explain it or put it to paper.

So, when the payslip disappears.

When ambition is rerouted.

When contribution becomes invisible.

As a stay-at-home mum, when you ask yourself – What am I worth now? How do you define that worth when the world no longer gives you a number to validate it? When a whispered "Mum, I love you" doesn't register as income on a bank statement?And maybe the harder question is this: 

What if our value was never meant to be measured in dollars at all?

Feature image: Canva.