Is It Impossible for Full-time Homemakers to Live with Confidence?

The Yomiuri Shimbun

14:42 JST, October 5, 2025

Dear Troubleshooter:

I’m a homemaker in my 50s. I have a family of four — my husband, our son who just graduated from high school and our junior high school daughter. Since getting married, I’ve never managed to hold down a part-time job for more than a year, largely due to my own lack of perseverance. Honestly, I have absolutely no confidence in my ability to work.

But I’ve always devoted myself wholeheartedly to watching over my children. I still have endless worries about things like their next level of education.

However, when I go out to eat with my friends who also have children after not seeing them for a while or chat with friends from my student days, I realize I’m not currently employed. So, I feel somewhat inferior. I even wonder if I cannot be confident of myself as a full-time homemaker.

Is living as a full-time homemaker included in what is recognized as diversity in women’s lifestyles?

— X, Yamaguchi Prefecture

Dear Ms. X:

Regarding your question about diversity in women’s lifestyles, it is only natural that people’s ways of living differ. There is no single “best” way to live.

However, that decision on how to live your life lies with no one except yourself.

There was a time when it was considered natural for women to marry and devote themselves to housework and childcare.

For decades during the postwar period of rapid economic growth, that economic development was achieved by men focusing on work while women took care of the home and family.

Working women, shouldering the burden of balancing work and family alone, often felt small as a minority. Now, however, with many women working, we frequently hear voices like yours expressing guilt about being a full-time homemaker.

While it’s somewhat inevitable that life choices are shaped by the social conditions of the time, you should not mindlessly drift along but proactively make choices. Now is the era when that is possible.

To reiterate, what kind of life you choose and what meaning you find in it are things you decide for yourself. This isn’t just true for women. It applies to men as well.

It’s also very important for couples to discuss things together, ensuring that one partner’s chosen path does not narrow the other’s options.

— Masami Ohinata, university president