There are a lot of misconceptions about the "stay-at-home mom," or SAHM for short. You may think that stay-at-home moms spend all day cleaning. You may assume that staying at home is a luxury rather than a necessity.
You may even wish that you had all day to sit around and watch TV just like stay-at-home moms are probably doing. The truth is that a stay-at-home mom is not a maid. She's not lazy.
And she's certainly not doing things for herself all day long. In fact, she's more likely to be doing things for other people all day long. A stay-at-home mom is simply someone who works inside her home without a salary.
Earlier in the 20th century it was generally expected that in heterosexual couples, the woman would stay home and take care of the house and the kids while the husband went off to make money at his day job. But that dynamic has been changing as family structure and work demands have evolved over the years. Let's take a look at the past, present and future of the stay-at-home mom.
, an etymology expert and University of Minnesota professor, tells TODAY.com that the term " " first appeared in print at the beginning of the 19th century. Unsurprisingly, it simply referred to people who didn't venture outside.
Even from the beginning, it had some "negative coloring," he says, because "the idea of staying at home presupposed provinciality, parochiality, being limited, not seeing enough of the world and having a restricted view." A century later, women entered the workforce .
