Homemade bread and existential dread: The trad wife phenomenon

Illustration by Kelsey Mason

Baking your own bread, churning your own butter, maintaining a spotless household and effortlessly raising kids — the Nara Smith lifestyle appeals to many modern women, but it’s not as realistic or romantic as they might imagine. 

Women’s participation in the labor force peaked in 1999 at 60.0%, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, and has declined since. The “trad wife” — short for traditional wife — phenomenon has garnered heavy media attention, particularly through social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram. Characterized by women embracing 1950s-style domestic roles — where the husband is the breadwinner and the wife manages the household, cooks, cleans and raises the children — the movement has sparked debate over its implications for gender roles today. 

At its core, the trad wife movement is a reaction to modern feminism and the pressure placed on women to “do it all” — succeed professionally, manage households, maintain social lives and more. For some women, the traditional homemaker role is seen as a way to regain control over their lives, particularly in a world where constant multitasking and the pursuit of career success can feel overwhelming. 

By rejecting societal expectations around career ambitions and instead choosing to focus solely on family and domestic duties, some of these women see themselves as subverting modern feminist ideals in favor of what they view as a simpler, more fulfilling way of life. 

This movement often glorifies mid-20th-century aesthetics, with trad wives embracing retro clothing, cooking traditional meals and documenting their lives through carefully curated photos of pristine homes and happy family scenes. For many, it is as much of a lifestyle choice as it is a visual and cultural revival. 

Despite being framed as a personal choice by many participants, the trad wife phenomenon raised concerns over its deeper implications about gender roles. Critics argue that it idealizes a historical period marked by rigid patriarchy, where women’s identities were often limited to their roles as wives and mothers, with little room for independence and personal development. The trad wife movement has the potential to romanticize an era when women had fewer rights and were legally, socially and economically dependent on men. 

Additionally, there is concern that the phenomenon is reinforcing outdated gender norms that can pressure other women to conform to similar domestic expectations. Even when presented as a choice, the movement can make it seem as though those who don’t embrace traditional homemaking are failing their families or rejecting femininity. 

While many trad wives present their decision as an empowered lifestyle choice, the movement’s message has drawn criticism for its exclusionary nature. Trad wife advocates are often from middle-to-upper-class backgrounds, such as popular trad wife influencers Nara Smith and Ballerina Farm, where a single income is enough to sustain a household and childcare is a financial option. This lifestyle isn’t feasible for many working-class women and lower-income families, who may not have the luxury of choosing between career and home life. 

The trad wife movement also fails to address the racialized and class-based dynamics of domestic labor. Historically, white women in traditional homemaker roles relied on the labor of women of color for housework, child care and other domestic duties. While it claims to celebrate a return to “traditional” family values, the movement seems to overlook how that tradition has been maintained on the backs of marginalized women. 

At the heart of the trad wife debate lies a fundamental question about gender roles in contemporary society: Can women truly make empowered choices if they’re choosing to embrace traditional roles, or are these choices shaped by a culture that still pressures women to find their value in their domestic contributions?

Some proponents of the movement argue that being a trad wife is a form of “new feminism” in which women exercise their autonomy to choose the role that suits them best. They see homemaking as equally valid to other career ambitions and argue that traditional domesticity should not be stigmatized as oppressive. In this framing, trad wives are women who defy societal expectations of professional success and instead derive fulfillment from family life. 

This framing risks undermining the progress that has been made by feminist movements, particularly in terms of workplace equality and women’s independence. While some women may feel empowered by choosing domestic life, the trad wife ideology is based on deeply ingrained gender roles. 

These roles position women primarily as caregivers and men as providers. Such rigid roles reinforce a binary understanding of gender, limiting the possibilities for men and women to equally share both breadwinning and caregiving responsibilities.

The trad wife phenomenon reveals the complexity of gender roles in modern society. While some women feel empowered by embracing traditional domesticity, others feel confined by the movement’s narrow vision of femininity. The conversation surrounding trad wives ultimately reflects a broader debate about what it means to “have it all” and who gets to decide what that looks like for women today. 

As gender roles continue to evolve, the trad wife movement raises questions about the balance between individual choice and societal pressures. It forces us to consider whether these traditional roles reflect a genuine desire to embrace domesticity — or whether they indicate a deeper longing for stability and simplicity in an impossibly chaotic world.

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