‘Privileged’ but not entirely by choice

[clearlysunshine]

Posting here because it’s not something I’d really discuss openly with friends, and I’m very aware that I’m in a privileged position in lots of ways.

DH has a big job which involves a lot of travel. When he’s here, he does what he can around work — he’s usually up and out before the kids and I get up and back around bedtime, but he leaves early one day to take DS to a midweek club and picks DD up from hers once a week.
Grandparents are elderly on both sides, so we don’t have family help. The kids are at an independent school and the logistics are pretty full-on — different finishing times, activities, school events, holidays etc. There always seems to be something.
Before having children I also had a “big” job involving a lot of travel, which I gave up when we had them because realistically there was nobody else to look after them. The difficulty is that my industry is notoriously badly paid despite the level of responsibility, so going back to my old career while paying for the amount of childcare we’d need makes very little financial sense. We can live comfortably on DH’s salary, so there isn’t a financial necessity for me to work either.
Most of the families I know where both parents have demanding full-time careers either have a nanny or very involved grandparents, neither of which we have.

I suppose I’m wondering whether anyone else has found themselves in a similar position? I sometimes feel quite conflicted about having given up a career I worked hard for, while at the same time I can’t quite see how two big careers actually work with children unless you have significant help. I’d be interested to hear how others in a similar situation have navigated it.

it is a situation almost every woman in my social group has found themselves in. To be honest, the majority have given into it and spend an awful lot of time playing tennis, going to Christmas wreath making workshops, endlessly renovating their homes (and then their second and third homes) and running about after their children.

It suits some of them, but not all. I have found that so many of them suffer an enormous lack of confidence despite being well educated and capable women. Inevitably, they get bored when their kids are in senior school and end up setting up a hobby business, or if they are lucky finding a low paid but interesting job they enjoy. One friend has retrained as a midwife since her husband retired from the big job at 50. Good for her.

It certainly makes life easier. Whether it makes life more fulfilling a matter of preference.

Don’t you feel like you’re wasting your potential?

You answered your own question - two big careers (pay is irrelevant) is not possible without help.

Where those big careers involve at least one person not being paid very well, and there isn't family help, this can be very challenging because buying in the help can take up a big chunk of that salary.

Longer term however, usually the two big careers continued most likely does lead to more financial success as the cost of childcare help decreases. But of course, that's a decision every family must take for themselves - not buying in childcare might well be a decision that works for your family even if it does impact your career in the long term.

I would absolutely hate to feel I'd had to give up my career because my husband's was more important. Even if it was low paying, it would be important for me in terms of direction and self worth.
I agree that two careers needs childcare help.
I would say though that choices were made that have put you in this position. If your children went to state schools, you might have had enough money to pay in more childcare that would have enabled you to keep your job. Is that an option?

I did, and while I have my moments, I don't regret it.

Here's my advice, for what it's worth. Enjoy your life and the privileges, but don't become a slave to the house. We kept the cleaner and the gardener and, for a time, we had an au pair, mostly just as a second pair of hands (3 kids, different schools for a while). This time won't last forever, so use it to sharpen your skills or add additional ones that will keep you current. Do some serious volunteering/governance type stuff, do an additional degree if something post-grad would be helpful. Have lunch or coffees with colleagues. Is it possible in your career to do some freelance or consulting just to keep a hand in/burnish your cv/keep evolving your skills?

Adding that for us it wan't financial, it was the insanely frenetic pace of life, the feeling of never being able to slow down and just spend time as a family that I eventually started to hate.

Yes massively, without a doubt, and my husband is the first one to say this as well but like the previous poster said, it makes life easier and makes ‘sense’ but maybe not necessarily for me, long term.

i used to work in a creative industry which was hard work and stressful but lots of fun and running a house doesn’t quite hit the same way. I’m definitely not the desperate housewife type. I like having a tidy home etc but I do it mainly for my kids and so I’m there for them

In the couples I know the women take lower demanding p/t jobs. Initially these often don’t pay more than the cost of childcare but invariably the women progress & childcare is not needed so much.

A few have not returned to work.

I know a number of women who have purposefully stepped back, but not completely, for a few years. So they stay in roles, but go part time, accept that slightly sideways move etc, while the DC are small. Then they ramp it up again when their kids get a bit older.

Your midwife friend isn’t Danish is she?

This was me when my DC were younger, I joined the nicest gym/spa I could, made lots of friends and enjoyed weekends of no chores or anything to catch up on and cracked on.

The difficulty nowadays with completely stopping is getting back into something years later.

Only if one thinks a person’s potential can only be realised in the workforce.

employment is only one area of life. Not the only arena in which one can be stretched and demonstrate their potential.

i find it peculiar how much some people derive their sense of self worth from their job rather than from the breadth of contributions and experiences they have made and gone through.

i understand what you are saying and i am sympathetic, i am, it's hard, but how do you think everyone else manages? - even those not in "big careers" like carers, or logistics workers, or truck drivers or admin staff? your troubles with school holidays and clubs and drop offs and needing childcare which sucks up most of what you earn are not unusual to you. you do at least have the choice about how you spend your money to alleviate those. or indeed can choose to give up work while your kids are small so you aren't paying for childcare. or you can make the difficult, tiring, expensive uncomfortable choices people with "small jobs" do to manage the pressures of family life and a job, any job. you can put your kids in childcare and get back to work if you want to, the same as many other people have to whether they want to or not

My DH and I both had big jobs pre kids. I was a SAHM until my youngest started school, then I got a job. It's not as high stress / long hours / highly paid as my previous job, but still an interesting professional career that uses my skills. It's worked well for us.

Just one point: you say you "haven't got a nanny" as if that's something outside your control, but you could have one if you want? It sounds like you'd be able to afford one.

When you have zero help it’s virtually impossible to maintain a good career. Unless you have a nanny it’s constantly stressful coping with unsocial hours, pick-ups and the dreaded illnesses: chicken pox for two weeks and then the other one succumbing followed by a stomach bug not to mention the constant tonsillitis…

A friend of mine who has a stellar career and also had elderly parents says she picked her dh because he had a creative-type work at home job so he could be the on-the-spot parent.

I didn’t. Because I felt I was achieving my potential by making a good job of bringing up my children. It was a new career for me after a long and successful first one.

My DH took a step back from his career when we needed flexible childcare - he had less potential for high earnings, and didn’t really like his job. He went back to it once the kids were both in high school, as we both felt that’s the age they can be expected to get themselves home/keep themselves safe at home.

My (single parent) mum worked full time when we were kids, even before I went to high school we were “latch key kids” - not saying it is ideal but it didn’t do us any harm!

OP is there any way you could do something related to your career in a smaller part-time way while the kids are younger, so you can then pick it up again when they're older?

It’s normal to give up your career when you have children, happens to a lot of us and yes you’re right the people who manage to maintain it are hiding it behind grandparent help or paying extortionate childcare fees.

But what’s this about “privilege” ? Don’t worry about appearing privileged I remember debating someone a few years ago who was adamant the white child of a heroin addict was more “privileged” than Beyoncé’s daughter.
People that throw that word around to guilt trip are genuine idiots best ignored

I came on to say the same thing. I gave up work for seven years, only doing bits of unskilled work locally just to have a bit of cash of my own. But as soon as both DC were in school, I started up on my own, very small at first and taking whatever came my way that was connected to what I had done previously. Now I still work PT but the pay is good and I enjoy the work, which fits entirely around my schedule as I am my own boss.

I find peculiar that you think that people who derive SOME of their sense of worth through their job don't also derive it elsewhere and that you've made "job" and "breadth of contributions and experiences" oppositional in your post.

I’m in a very similar situation. My husband is extremely well paid, and I am high earner too, but we have absolutely no help or family support nearby. We could pay for help if needed but it’s nor something we’d be looking at full time.
We had our baby fairly recently, and I’ve decided to go back to work full-time after maternity leave. Our child will be attending an independent school with a nursery attached, so the plan is for them to be there from around 1 year old right through to the end of primary school.
I know going back to work will be hard at first. I’m sure I’ll struggle with the feeling that my child is growing up in nursery while I’m working, and then there’s the cost… Nursery is SO expensive. No matter how much you earn, paying for full-time childcare every month is a huge amount of money.
But equally, I don’t actually feel bad about going back to work. I think I’d find it VERY hard to give up my career completely. And, as much as I love and trust my husband… who knows what he might come up with in the future 😂 He could cheat on me and leave , or decide to run off and start a new life somewhere 🙈 I’m 99.9% sure he won’t, but I don’t think you can ever have a 100% guarantee that one person in a relationship won’t suddenly go rogue!
More seriously, though, my career is also my independence and my financial security. It’s my pension and my future. Our children will grow up one day. They’ll finish school, become independent and eventually won’t need us to chauffeur them around or organise their entire lives anymore. And then what?
I think it could be incredibly difficult to try to return to a career 10–15 years later at the same level you left it when you decided to stay home and look after the children full-time.
So yeah, for me personally, when I look at the bigger picture and think long-term, I don’t think I’d give up work. It might make these early years harder and more expensive, but I think keeping my career, independence and financial security is worth it for me.

I was similar. Dh had a career with upward potential. My industry was facing job cuts and no chance of movement. I was also being paid significantly less than him. We made the decision to prioritise his career. My shitty salary made is easier because offset against childcare costs there wasn't much difference. It became an easier life, I worked very hard all week as a SAHM and we had 2 days of leisure at the weekends. 1 lie in each, an afternoon or evening off each etc. Dh still pulled his weight. It was a big pay off cos within weeks of DH announcing he no longer needed to do childcare drop offs he got a big promotion, his increase in salary was more than my annual salary, so suddenly we were comfortable financially.

I did this for 9 years and had many times I resented it but i also felt very lucky a lot of the time. I never felt it was the wrong decision for us as a unit but just it affected me as a person. When youngest started primary I retrained to a low paid caring role that I was interested in. I started working 2 short shifts a week to get me out of the house. I developed a real interest and ended up doing a degree. I now work PT but am senior within my role, still low paid and still able to run the house. Kids are older now, teens, so it's very different. There is a massive disparity salary wise and sometimes work is stressful but I feel purposeful. I also have more respect within my role now than I had before, that counts for a lot. I get loads of time off too as I work term time only and kids have the security of a parent at home. I don't want for anything financially and dh and I share all finances. I consider myself very privileged overall. I didn't know this is where life would take me when I took the risk but luckily it all paid off.

I think your kind of old fashioned set up can work well as long as you aren’t too frustrated, share money, and are on the same page.

The danger comes as the children grow older, into older teens and adults. What do you intend to do then. Would you go back to some kind of work and would you enjoy that as it would probably involving working at way below your potential?

And, will you be able to stop managing your children as they grow older and let them take age appropriate responsibility for their own lives?

And then, of course, few can guarantee that a marriage is 100% certain to succeed. So, what would you do in the event of divorce (and it’s not just about the money, although that does matter too).

I think if you can answer those questions to your satisfaction, it is fine.

We dealt with this by me going self employed. I work 3 short days a week.

I run projects with far more flexibility than an employer could ever give me but I still get to maintain and grow my skills.