Does anyone else love being a working mother and have no guilt?

[AnonymoosePoster]

I have four kids and have worked full time throughout their childhoods. For each I took 6-9 months maternity leave then went back to work. DH works full time too.

People say it’s hard, they don’t know how we do it. The truth is it’s brilliant. I love having kids, they are a total joy. I love my career that interests me and motivates me and pays for a good standard of living. I love the variety in my life.

I actually think I would find it much harder to be home full time or to work and have no kids and potentially no boundaries about ending the day and going home. Having both balances everything out. I cherish my time with the kids but sometimes breathe a sigh of relief when I get to work after a manic family weekend.

Does anyone else really quite like the life of full time working mum and disagree with the stereotype that it’s hard and you cannot “have it all”?

Yes , it keeps me sane , and makes a better mother got my child

Very much. He worked away a lot. We were home alone a lot.

Previous generations have given our generation and our daughters the same education and opportunities as our sons. Health and personal circumstances aside, people have control over starting a family and if one parent chooses not to forge a career - it is exactly that - their choice.

I bloody hope everyone doesn't chose to be a senior career person. I need all those people doing silly things like working in a nursery or being an swimming teacher.

I worked either from home or nights until a eighteen months ago. So I was around.

But I'm now running a pub, the hours are horrific, but we have a home that would cost £3k to rent otherwise, in a town centre, near their college. It's been fine because they're 16 and 17 so pretty self sufficient and actually it's teaching them life skills. They often join me and DH in the bar, DS especially loves running the till and plays pool and darts with some of our regulars, DD is my "behave or I'll send for DD" warning to regulars as they are the best at a look. Obviously in good humour but yeah it works for us.

Totally agree. Never felt any guilt. Totally unnecessary. My DD was always happy as a baby and toddler at nursery and again later in school and after school clubs. Very rarely dwelt on it to be honest. I’ve never had time to navel gaze. I have a mature happy and well adjusted teen who has benefited from my work and my attitude.

I went back to work the week before when my first baby was a year old, 3 days a week. Three years later I had 15 months off (including a big chunk of unpaid leave) when dd was born. I stayed 3 days a week until she started school. The dc are now y8 and y11 and I work 32 hours across 4 days (or standard week is 37 hrs).

I have never felt an ounce of guilt at work. I have felt a lot of frustration at missing something at work when I was at home though! I'm considering moving to a 9 day fortnight when dd goes to high school (we have first/middle/high schools) next year, but my Mondays off are the only slack in our system, and I am needing to spend more and more Monday time with DM (80s).

My working hours suit our needs, and I am lucky to have an employer who has been championing flexible working for 25 years - I moved to them deliberately for this. I've been able to raise a family and progress through a professional career without denying either. We could have got by on just one salary, but neither of us wanted to give up work entirely. I had moments when the dc were preschool age that I thought I'd die of boredom! I'm not naturally inclined to parenting. My natural resting place is not at a dollies' picnic!

I value both sides of my life, am grateful for 2 healthy, happy, grounded teenagers, and also my salary and pension !

@AnonymoosePoster Interesting thread OP.

Can you share HOW do you do it with 4 kids? What's your day like? Do you have live-in/daily help?

I'm fascinated as to when you find time and energy to do all the jobs, all the tidying up, meal planning, cooking, all the life admin stuff for 4 kids. I've got one kid, albeit a toddler, and work FT mostly from home, and even with a weekly cleaner I'm constantly behind on all the "stuff" that needs doing. I'm also constantly exhausted so can't fathom having 4 kids!

I think men guilt is interesting as a concept. Why wouldn't they have guilt?
I suspect it's usually because a baby bonds with mum, as. Food giver ( usually in nature) and having carried that baby etc
So it's usually from mums arms the baby goes to nursery and possibly cries to begin with. So it's mum who sees the child's anguish.
The dad usually would just come in from work and see the child happy at home etc.
So if they don't see the anguish or have that bond why would they consider reeling guilty? I suppose if they did research on early years and bonding and how dc need down time go relax in their own space they may start to feel it?
If its from their arms dc go to nursery having spent maternity leave all day with them?

As a small example one day when dd young I had her in docs she really wasn't well and it was not something I was familiar with.
She was v poorly and the next day instinct told me to take her to hospital.

The nurses and a and e had her straight through but after it was hard to get dh to understand how poorly she had been because when he arrived she was stable sorted and looking like herself on a ward.

DT’s have an equally good bond with DH and I - wouldn’t have it any other way. We probably did an equal number of bottles, nappy changes, bath times and bedtimes. He dropped at nursery/school and I collected. DS broke his leg very badly at school when he was 6. The school contacted DH (he was the first contact number as worked closer to their school). I was working in Singapore at the time so had a long worrying flight home. DH was with DS at the hospital up to the door of theatre and also arranged for someone to look after DD and cover his work (he’s a doctor).

Too many mothers believe (wrongly) that only they can settle their DC’s - numerous threads about it.

@SweetBobby what is the time allowance for loving your children? How many hours a week minimum are we talking to prove your love? Are children that go to school also not loved because they spend the majority of their day away from their parents? Where is the line, exactly?

Our DDs went from dad's arms to nursery. He took a month SPL each time I went back to work and he did the nursery settling. He felt zero guilt, and was praised left right and centre for spending a whole four weeks with his children.

There was zero anguish from either of ours on starting nursery, and he's always done the bulk of nursery drop offs so whenever either of them have had a wobble and had the very occasional tear at drop off, he's borne the brunt. Zero guilt. Just lots of admiring glances for the dad comforting his child.

He's been a fully involved parent from the start, and aside from the breastfeeding days when a boob solved everything, they look to him for comfort just as much as me.

He flexes his hours in the same way I do so we can all have breakfast together and one afternoon each with the kids (not WFH, off, covering hobbies and/or homework). He is father of the year. I get the "why have children if you never see them" comments on here.

Neither of us has ever felt guilt, but it seems it is expected that I feel guilt while he's feted for raising his own children.

I love working too although I wish I could afford more help and a cleaner

Me OP
you’ll be torn to shreds for this but good for you
I too enjoy working and raising my children
it’s called pride
you can do both x

I also work full time and am very happy with this arrangement. I never feel guilty.

Yes me! I worked in a role that occasionally took me away when they were little. I did do some school hours jobs when I got divorced but went back to full time quickly.
They both started nursery at 6 months old and I don't regret anything
They are lovely young hard working women. I thrive off being busy at work and having my career and my girls have benefited from that in many ways

I can confirm that if this is the definition of having it all then I am wrong - I have very little!!

I meant have all you want in terms of things that interest you in life which for me is happy children, a good marriage, an interesting job and a good group of friends.

So my kids are teens and pre teens now and the way things have worked over the years has evolved. For years we had an after school lady who picked them up from school and hung out with them at our house, hosted play dates, took them to activities etc, but no longer.

We have always had a cleaner who also changes all the beds each week and irons for an hour at the end of cleaning. This is a lifesaver as DH and I don’t have to deep clean, change beds or iron. I appreciate we are privileged and I couldn’t work without that. The other lifesaver is batch cooking at weekends. So whatever we cook for each weekend meal we cook an extra family sized portion and freeze so we don’t have to cook in the week, just defrost.

A normal week day now looks something like this:

6am get up, have coffee with DH, shower and get dressed
6.45 wake kids and make them breakfast
7am breakfast and chat then all stack dishwasher
7.30-8.15am total chaos as everyone gets ready
8.15 all leave for school and work

After school - older teens do their own thing, preteens both really into sport so most days have training, one of the trainings is too far for them to walk but another local family drive him there and back with their own son. Kids all home by 18:00/18:30.

18:30 DH and I get home, kids doing homework, we defrost a meal we cooked at the weekend from freezer and make a salad to go with it.

19:15 all eat together

20:00 onwards we help kids with homework, chat, play games etc one of us may go out with friends but the other will stay home.

21:00/21:30 pre teens in bed

23:00 older teens and adults usually in bed having watched some TV together after younger ones in bed.

I should add that DH and I both buy more annual leave than our basic entitlement so we each have 35 days each and try to be around more in school holidays.

Having recently accepted a role working FT after being PT for a number of years I’m really pleased to read this thread as I’d been wondering if I’d been making the right decision from a family perspective (it’s definitely the right decision career wise).

I love this. It's the exact type of mum I hope my kids look back on and see me as.

Me. Ds is now 9 and in Yr 4, I went back to work when he was 6 months old (didn't live in the UK) and then when he was 18 months, I took parental leave for a couple of years, but hated it.

I went back to work FT when he was 4, and have carried on since. DH got made redundant and now has a PT job, so the roles have reversed and he does the majority of the day to day stuff. Due to being mid level; / senior, the flexible nature of my job and being 100% remote (I work for a global company) and being able to make up hours at the start / end of the day, I can still take DS to school 3 x morning a week, and haven't missed an assembly or school play.

I don't regret going FT at all, l have definitely seen the impact tho of having nearly 3 years out of work on my career progression (or lack of) Funnily enough, DH never gets asked the same question!

No guilt for me! Love my family, love my job, and we're happy. What's to feel guilty about. Society/some people on MN are determined that I should feel guilty it seems but I can't when life is so good.

I've loved working, even when I didn't love the company I was at. I felt that financially contributing to the household was important rather than DH carry that load himself. I worked PT when my kids were little but FT now they are older. My role is quite flexible so works with having a family. I did initially have guilt when my kids went to nursery but they progressed educationally and socially which helped them when they started school, so no regrets.

It really depends on the situation, if you love your job, you are supported in your career and have a great support network or can afford to pay for a great support network. Then of course it works brilliantly.

For some people that's not the case, they have jobs where they are treated poorly , paid badly. They have little to no outside help and struggle to afford childcare. So life is a struggle to them. It's also arguably harder if you are a single parent or have a unsupportive partner.

I have two good friends-

Friend 1
Has a career, travels a lot for work. as does her husband. Kids spent a lot of time in childcare/with grandparents. As older teens kids are now very independent. They don't tend to do much together except yearly holidays. Kids are very into friends and spend a lot of time with them

Fried 2

Has a school job so always around evenings , weekends, holidays. Split family so kids were half time at dads . Mum has mh issues. Not close to kids now they are adults, they mostly choose to be at their dads.

Me

Worked part time/sahp/wfh. Always there for evenings, holidays, weekends. Did loads together when kids were little. Extremely close now they are adults, spend lots of time together, have joint hobbies/ holiday together.

There a lot of factors into making a solid family unit and different things work for different people. And sometimes it's tough through no fault of your own.

No I feel run ruggard. Exhausted and stressed. I don't feel guilty because it puts food on the table and they pretty much get what they want for Xmas. I've booked leave for plays, sports days, there at weekends etc...Plus I think its good to show children that mums work too