as "working or not".
Let's take my grandmother for example. She had 7 children and worked from morning until night.
Wake the children, dress the children, feed the children, send the older ones to school.
Wash the dishes, dry the dishes, clean the house.
Feed the children. Change the babies.
Do laundry in a machine that had an automatic agitator, but required every piece to be run through a ringer to squeeze the extra water out. Hang the laundry. Go back later and take down the laundry and fold the laundry. Every day.
Care for an aging mother-in-law who lived with them.
Sew/mend clothes for 10 people. And take in mending for other people to make a few extra pennies.
Prepare dinner. Wash dishes, dry dishes, put away dishes.
Breathe for an hour.
Get the children off to bed.
She wasn't on anyone's payroll, but she worked her ass off from morning til night nearly every day of her life.
The her husband left her, with 4 kids still at home, and she had to take another job OUTSIDE the house to bring in $$$. (Is that when she "started working"? I think not.)
I'd say her stress level was pretty high, what with the abusive alcoholic philandering husband who spent all his money buying rounds at the local tavern, no money for medical care for the kids, and never knowing how they'd keep the electric on, and never a moment to call her own.
But women have only recently started to "work". 
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