When I tell you I have always dreamed of being a stay-at-home-mom, I am dead serious. As a little girl, I was always playing with baby dolls or treating my stuffed animals as if they were my own babies. There may have been a baby bunny that I adopted as my own, named Snowball, and would put into my baby-doll bed. (Snowball wasn’t mine to keep, but we did give him to my favorite cousin because I loved him so much!) Every year my pediatrician would ask me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I would simply answer, “A mom.” She would smile and admit that she was not surprised.

When it came to dating, I was always very upfront about what I wanted to be and about what was important to me. My oldest brother told me I was going to scare away all the boys with talk of babies. Luckily, I didn’t want a boy. I wanted a man, and that’s what I got.

My now husband, Jordan, did not shy away from my baby talk at all. He has only ever encouraged my mom-aspirations. I worked through our five year relationship before getting married. I continued to work after becoming an official Rodriguez. I knew I had to put in my time before I could reach my goal of being a stay-at-home parent. Jordan and I are a team, and we do what needs to be done to keep this family afloat. However, it did not take long for my dream to become reality.

Three months before giving birth to my second daughter, Laura, I quit my job in ABA therapy. I had planned to work until she was born; however, we were still in the throes of the COVID pandemic. My husband and I decided that we were financially stable enough for me to leave my job immediately to avoid further unnecessary exposure to the virus.

Both of us were so proud of this accomplishment. It felt completely surreal. We had talked about this for our entire relationship, and we had finally made it happen.

You Really Can Be a SAHM

If you find yourself relating to my story, I’m going to let you in on the steps we took to get us to the point where we could afford living as a single income household. The remainder of this post will address the effort, persistence, and sacrifice needed to make becoming a SAHM your reality.

First things first: Put in the Work

As amazing as it would be to be able to just make the decision to stay home with your babies and quit your job today, that’s typically not feasible. I worked a grand total of nine jobs before landing my dream career as a SAHM. These ranged from babysitter, to custodian, to waitress, to behavior technician. Some of these I certainly enjoyed more than others but each helped to prepare me for the daily tasks I would be taking on once becoming a full-time Mom. These jobs kept got me through high school, college, and my first years of marriage and motherhood.

Have a supportive partner

Simultaneously, your partner will need to be putting in serious work also. If they want you to be able to serve your family as a SAHM, they need to work towards being the financial powerhouse of your family- The Bread Winner. This means they will need to land a stable career that allows for growth and then work their way up the ranks.

Being a stay-at-home Mom is not possible without a supportive partner. It is vital that you are on the same page with this. Hopefully, you won’t need to spell out the importance of this role you will be taking on to your partner, but incase you do… Staying home and sacrificing your career and independence is not something to be taken lightly. This is a huge trust-fall you are taking with your partner. You will be entirely dependent on them for income, health insurance, retirement plan, etc. He will be entirely dependent on you for childcare, housekeeping, scheduling, etc. If either of you decides to dip out on the other, serious adjustments will need to be made.

Make A Plan

There is going to come a point where you feel that you are living more comfortably than before. For us, this was right around the time I became pregnant with Laura. We began to reminisce about the year our first daughter, Elaina was born. We thought back to how we had no wifi at home and laughed thinking about how we would watch tv shows, waiting for them to buffer every five minutes.

At the same time, there was a key event that finalized our decision to implement our “Make-Hannah-A-SAHM Plan.” Jordan got a new supervising position at work and the rest of the pieces quickly fell into place. All the work he had been putting in for our family was paying off in ways we really could not have imagined would have happened so quickly. I may be biased, but if there is one thing that cannot be denied about Jordan, it is that he is an outstanding worker. I have no doubt that his superiors recognized this and that’s why he was able to advance in his career as quickly as he did.

It was maybe a month later that I discovered I was pregnant with Laura. We knew that we wanted me to be home with our girls by the time Laura was born. So we made our plan and put it into action. Here are the exact steps we took.

SAHM Financial Action Plan

1. Set aside your paycheck: Once we decided we were going to be a one income household by the year’s end, we lived from that moment on as if I brought in zero income.

2. Pay down debt: After setting aside any money I made, we used it to pay down debt. We would pay the minimum payments on our debt from Jordan’s income. Then we would throw my entire income at our debts.

3. Learn about couponing: Finding ways to save money and cut corners is vital to affording the SAHM life. I installed coupon extensions on my computer such as capital one and swagbucks. I collected coupons from fliers we got in the mail and at the grocery store check out. I love looking for coupons on amazon. It all adds up!

4. Cook more than you Takeout: Most entrees at a restaurant are around $20 a pop. I can easily feed our family of four an entire meal for less than that. Even fast food is not as affordable as you can make your home cooking. Try cutting out takeout for a week and you’ll see what I mean.

5. Shop at ALDI: Unfortunately, ALDI is not available in every state. (There are no ALDI locations in Alaska, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Maine, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington, or Wyoming.) If you live in an ALDI-less sate, I am sorry! BUT- hope is not lost. Do your research and find the most affordable grocery store in your area. Walmart is usually ALDI’s runner up in the area of affordability. Shopping at ALDI brought our grocery bill from approximately $600/month to right around $200/month. This was life saving!

6. Become a one car household: This doesn’t work for everybody. However, one good thing that came out of the pandemic was an increase in work-from-home jobs. Jordan was one of the lucky ones and works from home all but two days out of the month. We had no reason for two cars. We traded both our cars in and got a bigger one that would suit our growing family’s needs for the same monthly payment.

7. Budget: Live and love your budget. Write out all of your monthly expenses. Get rid of the ones that are not necessary. Then once you’ve subtracted your bills from your income, do not spend more than your excess income. Allot a certain amount of your excess income to gas, groceries, and fun. Then, live within your budget! There’s also the matter of savings… I’ll let you know when I figure that one out!

8. Prioritize and Sacrifice for the SAHM life: Once you are in it, you will see that having one income means that you do not get to splurge on new clothes, books, or entertainment for yourself. You will have to settle for more at home date nights with your partner. It may mean accepting every offer of hand-me-downs you receive. There are sacrifices you make to be able to do this job. You are probably going to feel unappreciated some days. You are going to clean up the same messes every day, multiple times a day. There is no end to your workday. Think about it? When you worked in a classroom all day, did your students come to your bedroom and ask you for help with their math homework in the middle of the night? Didn’t think so.

Remember why you want to be a SAHM

In these moments where you feel that being a SAHM is too hard with no tangible compensation for the endless work you do, remember all the reasons you dreamed of living this life. Being a SAHM means that you get to raise your kids. You do not need to worry about what might happen to them in the care of a daycare teacher you barely know. You get to comfort them when they are hurt and teach them the values that are important to you. You get back those 40 hours a week that you would otherwise be at work. (For me, I would be a teacher, spending more time with other peoples’ children than my own. That just doesn’t sit right with me.) You get to beam with pride as you watch your children reach each and every milestone. Being a SAHM opens the door to opportunities like homeschooling, where you get to take charge of your child’s education and upbringing even more. You are saving on the cost of childcare, transportation, housekeeping, and eating out. This is not an exhaustive list of the benefits of being a SAHM, but many of these benefits you can’t put a price tag on.

This blog post would never end if I covered it all. My point is, you can totally do this, and it is going to be so worth it. If becoming a SAHM is your dream, go for it! Cut down your spending and unlock the beauty that is life raising your babies at home and caring for your family full time. Because as much as there are days where you feel isolated and unappreciated, there are more days where you feel pure joy and fulfillment in being the heart of your family. There is no greater calling than motherhood.

Aim high, Momma