TL;DR: got any witty comebacks for people who look down on house spouses/“stay at home” parents?
Background: “elder” millennial, living in the US. Accelerated student (graduated with BA&BS at 20), fueled on anxiety and hyperfocus. Been married decade+, have worked decade+ too, frequently with multiple jobs and/or long hours. The past couple of years we’ve been discussing wanting to foster/adopt as we’ve slooowly been stabilizing finances and working to improve mental health.
We still have a ways to go, but our goal is for me to transition to house spouse in 3-4 years. The short window of COVID stay-at-home-for-real gave me a taste for the satisfaction real focus on “managing the home” when I can do it /well/ and not exhausted mentally gives me. Not just cleaning/tidying but tackling the maintenance, getting a tiny garden going, finding ways to make our lives more self sufficient and doing what we can for our community. Spending leisure time on learning for fun and creating and improvements instead of chores? Yea, that’s a BIG quality of life improvement. Similarly, my spouse experienced how much their career is part of “their calling” and they feel best when pursuing it whil balancing in home/rest/social time.
Here’s why I’m posting. I know there’s gonna be some “concern” that the “smart/promising/gifted” person “is giving up” to “just house spouse.” While there are a few people it’s worth my time to have the conversation with, what suggestions do you have for dealing with those who irk me with this sort of judgement?