A British Trad Wife says that people have thanked her for ‘giving them permission’ to be a stay-at-home parent.
Charlie Gray, 42, who lives in a large house in the West Sussex countryside, regularly posts her tips on homemaking on her @askcharliehow Instagram and YouTube pages and says she is proud to be a traditional housewife.
A growing number of women particularly in the US and increasingly the UK, are calling themselves Trad Wives – rejecting the feminist plight in the hopes of championing traditional feminine roles of looking after the home and keeping out of work.
Speaking to Woman’s Hour presenter Nuala McGovern on Tuesday, Charlie, who runs cookery courses on making dishes such as sourdough and foraged wild nettle pasta, says she hasn’t encountered any negativity about not having a formal job.
When McGovern suggested to the mother of three teenagers that the content she makes might be ‘setting women back’, Gray responded: ‘I’ve just had people saying “thank you for giving me permission to be able to stay at home and not feel the pressure to go back to work”‘.
The influencer, who has more than 34,000 followers on Instagram, is married to husband Simon, 18 years her senior, whom she met while working as a secretary – she described him in an interview with The Telegraph last month as ‘the most wonderful man I’ve ever met’.
His career, running a successful seafood business has meant she is able to stay at home and care for the couple’s children, Archie, Coco and Gus.
Gray told Woman’s Hour that she spotted the need for her housewifery tips after realising that homemaking skills hadn’t been passed down – after she ended up teaching the family au pair basic cooking skills.
Influencer Charlie Gray, aka @askcharliehow on social media, is one of an increasing number of UK Trad Wives, women who champion traditional feminine roles
In an appearance on Woman’s Hour this week, the British Trad Wife, who has three teenage children with her husband Simon, said people had thanked her for making it okay to be a stay-at-home parent
She said: ‘We had au pairs for our children. We had three children under the age of two, and it was crazy so we enlisted an au pair to come and help, and she couldn’t even boil an egg.
‘So then I found myself with an extra child to teach how to do these things.
‘And that’s when I realised that practical skills haven’t been passed down through the generations like they used to be.’
The Trad Wife added: ‘Running a home and being a housewife is a very, very busy important role if a wife or husband chooses to do that, and I’m sharing these tips to make life easier.’
Reactions to the YouTuber’s appearance on the BBC Radio 4 show were mixed, with many suggesting that her social media work is a job, saying: ‘All power to her and she looks really interesting and with a clear style but she isn’t a “trad wife”, she’s a successful businesswomen with an interesting premise.’
Others agreed that vital practical skills have been lost, with one writing: ‘Learning to cook for yourself and run a house is a skill every adult should have housewife or not, I don’t think this is controversial. Why are people upset she’s teaching people how to bake bread?’
Another recounted how she’d cared for her children but faced criticism for the decision, saying: ‘I stayed at home with my three children and honestly loved every minute; the backlash from other parents however was not pleasant, but it mostly stemmed from they thought I was rich enough not to work, which wasn’t true.’
Last week, the most famous Trad Wife of them all, Nara Smith, was criticised by some for glamourising teen pregnancy after posting a controversial TikTok.
She describes husband Simon, who’s 18 years her senior and runs a successful seafood business as ‘the most wonderful man I’ve ever met’
Popular US Trad Wife influencer Nara Smith was criticised last week for appearing to glamorise becoming a young mother as she marked Mother’s Day
Nara has been wed to fellow model Lucky Blue Smith, 26, since February of 2020, and the couple are parents to three children. Pictured in London in 2022
While her social media shows a lavish lifestyle, where she wears designer clothing in a beautiful home, many have pointed out very few teen moms can afford the same lifestyle
The 23-year-old, who shares three children with husband Lucky Blue, posted a video celebrating being a young mother.
The clip, which showed her hugging her young child in a paddock, was captioned: ‘POV: You decided to have kids at 18 and this is your fifth Mother’s Day.’
Nara rose to fame through TikTok, where she flaunts her ‘tradwife’ (traditional housewife) lifestyle, baking extravagant meals for her family while seeming to effortlessly care for her young children.
While her social media shows a lavish lifestyle, where she wears designer clothing in a beautiful home, many have pointed out very few teen moms can afford the same lifestyle.
‘Nara please don’t glamorize this. Happy for you but your life at 18 is not most teens realities…,’ one response read.
‘Reminder to all the 18-year-olds, you do not have Nara Smith money,’ read another.
‘Girlies at 18 you don’t have Nara Smith money so this ain’t your sign,’ someone else shared.
‘No. DO NOT GET INFLUENCED PLEASE. Finish your college. Get a job. Become financially stable,’ agreed another.
