Have you found WOH harder since your children started school?

[bossykate]

i have for a variety of reasons:

• much harder to fit the school day/holidays when both parents work
  
• childcare is hard to find
  
• the needs of the school are at once more urgent and less negotiable
  
• i don't want paid help doing ds's homework with him
  
• appts to see the class teacher are at stupid non-negotiable times
  
• harder to be involved with the life of the school if you work
  
• children's needs become more complex as they get older - starting school is such an important life event for them
  
  oh and probably a few other things i've forgotten to mention.
  
  i'm just wondering
  
  (1) how does everyone else feel?
  (2) why does it appear to be the received wisdom that it is somehow easier to get a job/be employed after the children have gone to school?

[hercules]

I agree. I missed ds's first day at school and all school plays etc.

[Gingerbear]

I am thinking similar things BK. DD is due to start full time school in September and I am in a complete tizz. I work 3 full 9-5 days atm, work want me back 5 x 9-5 in September, but what the hell will I do?

[hercules]

I am a teacher.

[bossykate]

sorry, hercules, i know it is really not funny at all, but i did laugh when i saw your latest post

[hercules]

Most people I know assumed that I was really lucky being a teacher and would therefore need no form of childcare! Yes, it's great having the same holidays but loads of disadvantages too.

[TeddyRobinson]

I agree bk - I don't WOH (I'm a SAHM but I have a freelance career that I do in nap/nursery times, evenings and weekends) but I can't imagine how it's easier to work when they go to school. It's easier to work when they go to day nursery surely?

How on earth do you do drop off and pick up? How do you ever have a chance to get involved (if you want to), what do you do for holidays??? There are 13 weeks holiday - if you both work and get 5 weeks, even if you took separate 5 weeks (which of course you don't want to as you'd never see each other or get a holiday!) you are 3 short. Nightmare.

Although my life is ridiculously stressful right now - working in 'spare' time (like right now, Friday night, bloomin 9pm and still working) it will be entirely worth it when all 3 are at school and I can basically work school hours from home (still got ds3 16 months and ds2 3.2 at home, ds1 is in reception).

[TeddyRobinson]

People always say to me 'oh it will be great when the kids are all in school and you can go out to work' - er, what?! How exactly? (and not to mention, why on earth would I when I can work for myself?!)

[soapbox]

The child care gets more difficult to organise, certainly.

I think most of the rest of it boils down to how flexible work can be and what support networks you have in place.

I always WFH on Fridays and do school drop off and pickups, which means I have managed to make some friends with the other mums who do help me out a lot at times. It's not so much that they do things for me but that they remind me of things and make sure I know about the coffee morning or night out that is happening which helps to keep me in the flow of things.

The children's lives do become more complex, but much of that involves being a taxi driver as a parent and so cna be done by hte nanny

Homework is done by the nanny here, but we always check it and go through it with them when we get home.

I think all of us have different balance points! Mine is to never miss anything that otehr parents will be at. So always at sports days, nativities, concerts, parent assemblies etc etc. That does put an enormous strain on things at work!

I know from your other posts and from our chat on the MN night out that you are not really enjoying work much at the moment, and I think that is the crux of it.

Things that you mind a bit, you can put to the back of your mind if work is enjoyable and absorbing. If work is awful, then those same things seem to have a much greater impact IME!

It is very hard work at times, and I see myself turning into a control freak at work and at home, as I'm terrified that if I let it all go for even a second, I'll never get it back under control again - EVER It means there are times when I don't like myself terribly much, which is a shame, as I used to think I was alright

[Marina]

1. It is harder all right BK and it gets harder every year. We have good after-school care in place and count ourselves lucky but I want to be there at three-thirty for them and I think the older they get, paradoxically, the more they need YOU rather than even the nicest play-leader/most doting granny etc
   I agree with every single one of your list of vexed issues
   
2. HAH! Yeah right, ladies.
   
   I also had a quick chuckle at Hercules - not the predicament but the excellent comic timing of the posts. My view is that teaching is not child-friendly. My colleagues can and do cover for me if I have to race home for a rashy, puking child (and I do the same for their offspring/wonky dog/gushing dishwasher too). You cannot just drop everything in the classroom.

[ladymuck]

Oh BK, how I agree!

Childcare is a nightmare - like you I have one at school and one not. And it is becoming ridiculously expensive (my costs have gone up by 50%!)

I have a conference call booked for 3pm this Monday which is ds's weekly "Open afternoon" at school. Even if I book him into the afterschool club I will feel guilty as I know that he will have watched all the other parents come and view the work of their offspring. And it is the first one this term.

I have seen the difference when I am involved in the daily reading, so of course I want to be.

School holidays are a nightmare! Trying to fit in everything for Christmas (which always seems to come down to the mums!), working to ridiculous year end deadlines, and then suddenly having the end of term does not make for a stress-free run up to Christmas. He has 3 weeks off at Christmas, and ds2 will have started preschool (no idea what his holidays will be yet!)

I suspect it might be easier once your children are in secondary school (and to a certain extent look after themselves), and I suspect that it might be easier once both are in school. But currently I'm viewing that primary school is actually harder - unless you have a job in educations (and there are still compromises there).

[motherinferior]

I think having a nanny does make a huge difference, Soapbox, because at least childcare and homework are covered. I'm not saying 'you have it easy', obviously!

The homework issue bothers me - at the moment DD1 just gets a bit of reading which we do (or don't) in the evening, but later things will change. Although I suppose she'll be up longer.

And of course I do 'have it easy' to some extent. At the moment I plan, when both Inferiorettes are in school in two years' time, to shift to four days' work spread over five, and finish at 3.20. Must remember not to have any more children, of course, in order to make this work.

BK, I'm so sorry work is being so sh*te for you atm.

[soapbox]

Yes you are right MI - it does make a big difference. I thought that BK had a nanny too which was why I mentioned which bits I delegate and which bits I do myself

[motherinferior]

MT, my mum became a teacher on that basis...and hated it.

[motherinferior]

Off-topic but Soapbox, do let's recce at some point when you are in this neck of the woods with your daughter's ballet.

[soapbox]

Yes - we should do

As I must with Marina and BK too!

[Hulababy]

It is for this reason partly why I decided on private school for DD, due to start in September. I work PT and my hours are okay but I couldn't get back to her school for normal finishing time. After school care, till 5pm is included in the price and there is also a breakfast club from 8ish. It also includes extra curricular activities such as sport, music and ballet - so don't have to use up our valuable weekends doing things like that.

I do still have 2 days a week off - so hope to make as many appointments as possible in that time. Dh is lucky enough to work close by and is able to get time away from work when needed.

Only problem will be the holidays. i get 12 weeks holiday, flexible, but DD will have more than that. Will have to make use of MIL and mu mum to cover the extras.


Before making this decision, which I know we are fortunate enouggh to have the choice to do this if we so wished, I was paniking about what we would do. This is part of my solution.

[hercules]

I would never do supply. I am now in a wonderful school which is far less stressful and therefore makes up for the rest.

[Marina]

I am up for that

[hercules]

We also worked out that private school with after school care would be the same as our childminder but ds is in a really good state school.

[Marina]

A coffee with Soapbox and MI and BK that is
Hula, we chose our school partly for similar reasons. Good after-school care = priceless.

[hercules]

I did supply in my own school after maternity leaeve and that was bad enough.

[Hulababy]

hercules - another reason why I am glad I no longer teach. Schools put so much emphasis on parental involvement and don't like it if parent's miss plays, assemblies, first days, etc. Yet will a school give their staff tim off for such event swith their own children? No!