The Mommy Track More Professional Women Opting Out of Work Force to Raise Children

Summary

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Michelle Atherton was working as a transportation engineer in Connecticut when she and her new husband moved to Bucksport in 2001. Within five months, she joined a local engineering firm but decided to quit six weeks into the job because of intense morning sickness.

Now Atherton, who is 35, stays home with 1-year-old Maggie. "I wasn't sure whether I'd go back to work after I had a child. I wanted to stay home for at least a year but it was open to discussion. Mike and I thought I would stay home if resources allowed. But going back full-time was never in the cards," said Atherton, who has an undergraduate degree in civil engineering and a graduate degree in technology education.

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The Mommy Track More Professional Women Opting Out of Work Force to Raise Children

Highly educated and professionally driven, Atherton has joined the trend among women in their 30s and 40s who choose to stay home with their children rather than continue in their jobs. While the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that three-fourths of all mothers worked last year, a growing number of two-parent households have a stay-home mom. In recent years, the question of working or staying home has become a national issue, with cover stories in Time magazine and The New York Times magazine, a Web site for The Mothers Movement, an...

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