AIBU to give up an £80,000 job to work part time school hours?

I’ve done pretty much every combo of working since becoming a mother - some by choice and some not. Working part time and schoolish hours was good for time with dc, terrible for career progression and my pension. Sahm and doing bits and bobs around dc was terrible for those things and my mental health because I felt like I lost my independence and I hated doing all the sahm bullshit. First things I did when I got a job again was hire a cleaner and get online shopping. Once both dc were at school I found working pt was a waste of my time as a day to yourself but only school hours wasn’t much time at all.

Now I work ft in a similar situation to you op and I pay into a pension and can afford lots of nice things for us all. WFH days and having lots of goodwill built up with my manager over time means I can pop out to watch the dcs in shows, do the odd early pick up, work round holiday clubs etc - this is priceless. I’m also taking unpaid leave to spend more time in the holidays with my DCs.

In the current job market giving up a good job on the assumption you can get a little pt school hours job after a couple of years out is frankly madness.

I think it's really important that you do something because you'll never get another chance at those early years and you and any DC will benefit hugely from your increased time with them. But as with most things, there's a middle ground to be found.
Part time hours seems like the best option right now. If that doesn't work then you can go on to plan B and think about leaving your job.
Put the Bath (or wherever) idea on hold for a while. You can revisit in the future when the child/ren are a bit bigger.

What does your husband actually want to do and when? . Is this a genuine shared plan, or your dream being imposed on him?
Does he want to move to Bath? What about proximity to friends and family? Does he want to stay away from a young family three nights a week or can he find work in his chosen field in Bath/Bristol area to spend more time together? . How much will staying away 3 nights cost each month. Do you really want to be a part time single parent half the week on a lower net income ?

I would ask to change my current job to part time hours after you've had your second child , on returning to your decently paid job after taking maximum maternity leave. And meanwhile spend some time renting some self catering accommodation in and around Bath at different times of the year , looking at local employment opportunities, types of housing, locations, schools etc and getting to know the place as a home city to live in, rather than a lovely place to visit before making this type of massive decision.

Now is not the time to decide......

Living in London and being the higher earner at £80k I would say no - if you have another child and move out of London look at the situation and finances then. I would 100% recommend retaining some financial independence and not burning your bridges. A decent salary, home working and flexibility are not easy to come by.

Do not give up your job to run your household. You are entitled to four weeks unpaid parental leave - use that for more time with the children.
Lots of childminders offer drop offs and pick ups.

If you do move to Bath you might need to reconsider your job but as long as you are in London do not quit that job.

It’s great that your DH does all the pick ups (this is exactly my point). That helps immensely. OP doesn’t have that. Can’t you see that therefore her life is more difficult?

I don’t know why you keep mentioning your DH. It’s completely irrelevant.

OP has said what her DP does and what his plans are

When we are trying to help OP and figure out what would work we are having to take her DP out of the equation. She has clearly said he has a long commute and she does majority of the pick ups. She has clearly said he wants to focus on his career and is planning on working more and staying away 3 nights. That is the information we are working with.

What if OP wants to keep her flexible well paid job? She has to go away to a conference? Who is looking after the kids then if he’s away? The kids are sick. Who is picking that slack up?

Yes but in a supportive equal marriage, both parties are up for compromising and that might look different at different times.

The OP makes it quite clear that her DH isn't interested in compromising at all, the only thing in question is what she does in response for that..

DH has a similar commute. His hours aren't 9-5, he's usually home before 5 and that's why he's usually able to do the pick ups. He does start earlier though so that's where I "pick up the slack". I get it back elsewhere though.

You're looking at it from a standard office hours perspective. Neither of us have worked 9-5 in years, even pre children. Not everyone does these days.

Stop creating villains just because you think he sounds unsupportive from a tiny handful of information have.

To some extent all parents are constrained by the others choices though. Some have more external support than others too. A director at my company works full time, is regularly in a different part of the country for a day or two, and her husband works away. They have a lot of support from parents.

We couldn't do that, because we haven't the parental support she does. But my role being as flexible as it is and DH being able to take some good will for how often he's able to give extra means that when I need him to flex for my role, he can.

If he's able and willing to support in other ways, and OP is able to handle him working away, then she's not as constrained as you're making her out to be.

It might not have worked for you, but plenty of people make this kind of thing work.

Exactly this.

With a 90 minute commute what time do you think he’s home? In time to do the pick up from nursery? In time to cook dinner/ see his child. Then he would be away 3 nights - but apparently that has zero impact.

Best case is he finishes around 5-6 add an hour and a half on to that…

I think you are minimising what the OP is doing and how much slack she is picking up. That’s not helpful.

The point I was making was that her choices are constrained by the decisions he has made. He is magnanimously fine with her not working as much but not on the table is the nature and amount of his work.

She doesn't have the option of sharing pick ups and drop offs. She couldn't be career focussed and take up jobs that involved working away even if she wanted to. Which might be more reasonable if he was the higher earner but she is!

He's still home 4 nights a week in that scenario.

Working away to provide for a family does not immediately mean opting out of parenting.

He currently has a 90 minute commute and is proposing to focus more on his career and stay away 3 nights a week. I’m not sure how much parenting (and the rest of it) he can do if he’s not physically there.

What is this school hours job?
How do you know ylu will get it or like it?
Where does it leave your pension?
Can you get more flexiblity eg 80 % hours in the job you know

I'm not defending men. I'm saying that OP knows the whole story so if she feels like this whole scenario will benefit them as a family, us saying "men are useless" isn't actually helping her figure anything out.

It might be that he is completely useless. But equally he might not be, and for some short term "pain" they might all get the life they want. Together.

I can't stand it when people tell women not to do things they actually want to do, just because "most men are rubbish" and hers must fall into that pool.

I don't understand it either.

I find it so depressing that women come in to defend men like this.

Because "he does one pick up" isn't a whole story. It's only referring to the collection of a child from nursery.

Does home life not count as parenting?

DH does three, and sometimes less. I do all drops offs and pick up when he can't.

He's not opting out of parenting. His work hours and the fact he has to be on site and the nature of his role means that sometimes he can't make it.

By contrast, I'm usually WFH, and have a very flexible role, so I can pick up the "slack" when his job (which we need, unless I'm gonna suddenly earn more than double) calls for it.

He still isn't "opting out". He's doing his share of the providing, which looks different to mine, and he still parents outside of that. Collecting your child isn't the only part of parenting.

I just don’t know why we are defending men doing very little. But here we are I guess.

I give up - it’s apparently fine for OP to work full time and do most of the parenting/pick ups/ cooking etc. He earns much less but that extra commute means he doesn’t need to step up in any way. There we go.

He is doing one pick up a week - that is opting out of parenting, in my book.

Don’t do it. You’re on a good salary, in a good company, working from home 3 days a week. You probably won’t regain this position when your kids are older. It’s hard but you also need to think of the long term financial needs of your family, and what you are role modelling for your kids.

Yes, but again my direct advice to OP was to hold onto her role and try to go part time if she's wanting to reduce stress and they can afford to live on less.

The point of THIS comment was that just because he's wanting to progress his career doesn't mean he's opting out of parenting, and actually could benefit them in the long run by giving everyone what they want. Would you say that OP was opting out of parenting if she'd asked whether she was being unreasonable for wanting to progress her career while DH took on more?

He’s on 50k. More than the uk average but not really enough to comfortably provide for a growing family and moving costs.