Moms who left work force find extra hardships trying to go back

When the time came, Gutowski pounded the pavement for more than a year.

"I started to respond to job postings on the Internet and I would send out a r��sum�� and I would hear absolutely nothing," she said.

Gutowski finally connected with a program at Pace Law School in White Plains, New York, that caters to lawyer moms like her. Pace's New Directions program helps women who have been away from the work force get back into the game while still maintaining a work-life balance.

Gutowski was able to land an "externship" at a law school admissions office. Companies such as Sara Lee and Goldman Sachs have similar programs known as "returnships."

"A lot of people don't realize a woman's brain does not stop functioning because she is raising children," Gutowski said. "The organization skills you acquire caring for four children under 7 years old are transferable to any setting."

Unlike Gutowski, though, many mothers simply cannot take time off work to raise their kids. This year has seen a major decrease in the number of professional women taking large blocks of time off work, because they can't afford to lose their incomes.

Not included in the 14.9 million Americans who are officially unemployed are stay-at-home moms who had intended to go back to work once their kids entered school. They kept their skills up and maintained contacts and are now eager to find jobs, either spurred by the recession or because it was their plan all along.

According to new Pew Research Center statistics, only 21 percent of stay-at-home moms are college graduates, while 34 percent of working moms have degrees.

While a significant number of men (51 percent) and women (34 percent) said inability to find work was a "big reason" they were unemployed, according to the Pew report, far more women cited child care considerations as a major reason (27 percent) than did men (3 percent).

(Edit:Ruby)