‘Why are people calling Steph Claire Smith's parenting 'unnatural'’

Some of her 1.5 million followers are being extremely vocal on this point.

Image: Instagram/@stephclairesmith

Co-founder of Keep It Cleaner, Steph Claire Smith is loving every moment of motherhood, but some of her followers think she threw herself into work too soon.

Steph Claire Smith has had the journey of a lifetime welcoming her first son, Harvey, with husband Josh Miller 18 months ago.

The influencer and co-founder of fitness company Keep It Cleaner took her recovery from birth slowly – both in regards to the type of exercise she was doing and the amount of work.

However, as the face of her burgeoning brand, along with partner Laura Henshaw, Smith made the decision to head back to work four days a week, nine months after Harvey’s birth, with husband Josh Miller to be the stay-at-home dad.

It is this arrangement that has some of her followers majorly criticising her parenting, calling it ‘unnatural’.

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Speaking with 9Honey, she shared her annoyance at this kind of feedback.

“It's very frustrating. I can't believe there are still people that have it stuck in their minds that this is unnatural and shouldn't be done," she told the publication.

“I really don't understand it. He's an incredible dad. He's doing a fantastic job… he's immensely proud that he can be a stay-at-home dad."

While women's place in the workforce has come a long way in Australia, domestic decisions about who stays at work still largely sway to the man. Just four per cent of couples in this country have the wife return to work while the father stays home to look after the children, based on the 2011 census.  

Yet, there are a plethora of reasons that families may choose this model; it may just be that that the woman feels fulfilled in her career and doesn’t want to give it up, that she is the ‘breadwinner’, or even just that the father has always dreamed of hands-on-parenting.

Given how much women have had to fight for their right to work and think independently, it would be nice to think that they could also make discerning decisions about family life without being ridiculed. 

Steph Claire Smith is certainly not the first mother to be torn apart for having multiple priorities, while still loving her child whole-heartedly.

Is it not up to the parents to ensure their child is cared for in the way that best suits their lifestyle and shared goals? Who are anonymous people on the internet to comment on such things?

Smith’s plight wasn’t helped by the fact that she returned to work reasonably quickly after giving birth.

By the time Harvey was a few months old she was on work-related Zoom calls and worked her way up to some days in the office. By the time he was nine months old, she was back four days a week.

“I was so ready to be so deep in motherhood and I embraced it all, but at the same time when you run your own business that's your first baby, so I wasn't okay with completely stepping back," she explained.

Smith wants to see the assumptions about parenting change, adding that just as she has the right to want to return to work, fathers should also feel empowered to want to stay home.

She referenced the absence of ‘father’s groups’ as a key sign that it is not the ‘done thing’.

"It's hard for him [Miller] and super isolating because when you look at mother's groups, more often than not there are zero dads in them," she explained.

“And if there are dad's groups, they're traditionally for the dads that also work, so throughout the week it's not like he can catch up with them."

"It should be that way in every relationship, heterosexual or not, that there's a conversation about who's going back to work, when that is and those sort of things," she finished.

Steph, we couldn’t agree more.

Originally published as ‘Why are people calling Steph Claire Smith's parenting 'unnatural'’