Being A SAHM Is Something I Still Think About

Every now and then, the thought comes back.

What if I became a stay-at-home mum (SAHM)?

Don’t get me wrong. I enjoy being part of the workforce. I like doing meaningful work. As editor-in-chief of The Singapore Women’s Weekly, I get to grow and engage our audience on parenting issues while riding the waves of the ever-evolving media landscape.

Having a job adds another dimension to my life outside of being a mum to my two kids. It gives me identity, independence, and a sense of moving forward. And of course, my own income.

But motherhood has a way of making me question time.

Very soon, my Primary 5 and Primary 2 children will become teenagers with lives of their own. How much more time do I have to bond with them, guide them, and shape them before that happens? Will I regret not spending more time with them now, while they still want me around?

In this episode of Too Tired Mums, I said that I don’t rule out becoming a stay-at-home mum one day.

And I meant it.

What I didn’t fully get to say in the episode is how layered that thought actually is.

I first felt it strongly after I had my first child and returned to work after maternity leave. The jarringness of toggling between two completely different worlds hit me hard. One moment, I was at home with a baby, dealing with milk and diapers. The next, I was back in the office, surrounded by people whose lives seemed to be business as usual.

Except mine had changed completely.

There was also an unspoken pressure to prove that I was still capable, still committed, and not a “liability” to the team just because I had been away and became a mother.

And it had only been four months.

Back then, I did entertain thoughts of quitting my job to look after my firstborn. But leaving the workforce didn’t feel realistic. I was 28 and still building my income. So was my husband. We had a 4-room BTO to pay off and a new human to raise. My bank account was also still recovering from pregnancy checkups, baby products (breast pumps, strollers, cute clothes), and postpartum massages I had optimistically signed up for.

So I stayed. I carried on.

And somehow, 10 years have passed.

The baby years may be behind me now, but this stage of motherhood — parenting primary schoolers — also requires presence. Just a different kind.

On a typical weekday, I get about two hours with my children. That includes dinner, homework, spelling, parent’s-signature duties, school admin, and trying to keep up with… (hold your breath) Parents Gateway, ClassDojo, SLS, Koobits, eZhishi, school events, consent forms, and whatever else I may have missed.

That is already a lot demanding my attention. And it does not even include properly catching up with my kids on their non-school life, or doing anything particularly fun with them.

Most days, we only manage to get the bare minimum done before it’s bedtime. Fun and games are pushed to the weekend and school holidays.

And that is why the thought of becoming a stay-at-home mum still comes and goes.

I’m constantly wondering what it would feel like to have more space for motherhood — to be there for my kids right after school, through the ordinary hours I usually miss, instead of squeezing it into the margins of an already full day.

At the same time, I know that even being able to wonder about this is a privilege.

For some families, staying in the workforce is not a personal preference. It is a financial necessity. Two incomes may be needed to cover the mortgage, groceries, childcare, school expenses, insurance, medical bills, transport, and the general cost of raising children in Singapore. And that’s before the extras like enrichment classes and holiday trips.

Not every mother gets to ask: “Should I continue working full-time, go part-time, freelance, or become a stay-at-home mum?”

For some, there is no real choice. There is only what the family needs to survive.

That awareness matters to me, because the working mum versus stay-at-home mum conversation can become too simplistic, too quickly.

We often talk about working mums and stay-at-home mums as though they are two completely separate camps. As if one woman chooses ambition, and the other chooses family. As if one earns money, and the other does not. As if once you pick a side, you must stay there forever.

Real life is much messier than that.

Even the label “stay-at-home mum” can be misleading. It does not always mean a mother has stopped working or earning an income altogether. Many stay-at-home mums freelance, run businesses, or build something of their own while still being the default parent at home.

The difference lies in how visible, structured and protected that work is.

Similarly, many working mums are not “career women” in the neat, glamorous way people imagine. Some are working because they need the income. Some are working because they cannot afford to lose financial independence. Some are working because they are afraid that if they step away, it will be too hard to return.

The truth is, our roles are more fluid than we make them out to be.

A full-time working mum can become a part-time working mum. A stay-at-home mum can return to the workforce. A mum can leave her job, freelance for a while, start a business, go back to employment, or completely change careers.

Motherhood does not freeze us into one identity forever.

For me, the question is really this: what kind of life would allow me to be the mother I want to be, without completely losing the parts of myself I have worked so hard to build?

I don’t have the answer yet.

What I do know is that motherhood keeps shifting. The demands change, the guilt takes new forms, and the kind of presence our children need from us looks different with every season. And we are allowed to evolve too.

Maybe we can want different things in different seasons. We can take pride in our work and still wonder what it would feel like to slow down. We can love our children deeply and still want something that belongs to us. And we can change our minds without treating it as a failure.

So when I say I still think about becoming a stay-at-home mum, I say it as a question I am still living with.

What does it mean to be present? What does it mean to provide?

And what does it mean to build a life where motherhood, work, identity and ambition do not always have to compete for space?

I’m still figuring that out.

Watch the Too Tired Mums episode here.

Too Tired Mums is The Singapore Women’s Weekly’s original talk show series that gives motherhood its most honest voice — where real mums open up about the things we don’t always say out loud, reminding us that we’re never truly alone.

Host: Estelle Low
Guest: Kelly Ang
Producer: Maya Eman
Art director: Michelle Lee
Videography, studio setup and editing: Studio+65
Makeup: Dorcas Yam, using Dior
Hairstyling: Pattama Phumriew, using Schwarzkopf Osis+
Fashion styling: Angela Chu
Outfits: All stylist’s own