How to work out money/work/childcare

[Llouisa1980L]

Hi all

Bare with me

We're currently 2 adults 39/40 working full time, just started stage 1 and starting to figure out how you work out the right work/financial and family balance once children arrive and alter your family dimension. Especially as your not moulding your family from having a newborn and you dont know what needs they'll bring.

We're aware this all boils down to what children we end up having and their individual needs as to whether they can attend nursery or school and when they're ready but must wondered how you prepare for it in a hindsight point of few whilst your going through assessments.

I'm aware they will start asking what are plans are on working hours after. I know I could just say I'd go back to full time work mon-fri and have children in nursery (wouldnt be full time as we're fortunate enough to have my mother in law) or school with 1.5hrs after school care but A) dont know how feasible that is likely to be with adoptive children and B) I dont really want to as I'd like to look after my own children as much as possible

We've asked for siblings under 5 so they could either need full or part time care and as I say dependent on their needs could be full time forever more if they have a severe disability which would definitely mean me giving up work anyway.

I guess what I'm trying to ask is did you work out around the finances you would need to bring in, the way you wanted to parent I.e if you chose to be a stay at home parent or something else?

TIA

Hi,

As a single adopter I had to be realistic about finances...My child was just about to start Reception when she came home and I knew that I would still need to work almost full time in the long run.

To meet financial needs I work 97% of full time and made sure I lived in an area with before/after school clubs. It's a struggle financially. Children are more expensive than you think! 😀

To meet my daughter's needs I saved like mad to give myself 9 months leave, and then changed jobs (much lower salary and far fewer responsibilities) so that my headspace is better for parenting...less stress overall. In normal times I get to do the school pick up once a week and that means the world to us both.

I would say I tried to match up hopes for parenting with best realistic options. A few years in, I'm not ready to climb the ladder at work again. Daughter trumps work...I just about manage to pay the bills! What worked for my LO was building up childcare very gradually - maybe this could be part of your plan.

SWs will talk it all through with you I'm sure and when your children arrive their needs will be much clearer.

Best of luck!

Thank you so much for your reply.

It's just so hard when you dont know what their age, routine and requirements will be.

Yes I remember that uncertainty!

I would always be cautious - more time with you rather than less whatever their age. Your own wellbeing matters too though - I have loved returning to work after lockdown for adult conversation!

Absolutely. I use to work as a childminder before I was married and that was tough as a 20-25yr old and not much of a social life. Soon went back to it mind.

My DH and I had a few options ranging from one or both of us being part time to one or other of us stopping work completely. We were also very clear in our matching criteria that we wouldn’t be able to parent children with significant physical disability or learning difficulties. As we were adopting older children 4-7 year olds there’s much less uncertainty about their development and potential disabilities.

I also changed job from one with irregular hours, lots of travel etc to one which was home based and less physically and emotionally demanding. I have really needed the headspace.

Having a variety of options open to you means you’re already prepared to be flexible and you know what’s possible. We started from a place of working out what our current living costs were and how much extra money we had in our budget already, so working out the minimum we needed to live as we are, we worked out where we could economise and added on potential childcare costs, increased bills, changing our car etc.

Another thing to bear in mind is there may be some financial support from the local authority. We got a settling in grant, help with accommodation costs for intros (250 miles away) and help with our legal costs so some of what we budgeted could be put to other things. We also found adoption leave was much less expensive than anticipated because in the early days we weren’t doing lots of activities, we didn’t have commuting costs etc.

It’s all a bit of a guessing game but now is a good time to be thinking about how your job will fit with children and to make changes to your lifestyle if needed to save money.

I’d also assume you’ll be doing as much childcare as possible for quite some time both because children may not cope with childcare and because you’ll be wanting to really develop your relationship with them and give them a planned, predictable schedule as much as possible.

We kept ours at home/school for the first 14 months, then they went to a childminder 3 days a week after school and only now 3 years in are we looking at cheaper after school clubs - my kids wouldn’t have tolerated an after school club in the early days. So your usual choices for childcare may not work out - flexibility is definitely key to allow you to respond to their needs.

Thank all for replying it's been really helpful

When we did our financial planning we anticipated a massive reduction in socialising, which meant it wouldn’t have mattered as much had I not been able to return to work. As it is, we both work full time. In normal times our son goes to Breakfast Club and Afternoon Club and copes well.

We adopted a 2 and 3 year old a couple of years ago. I took adoption leave for 9 months and my partner for 1 month. When I finished my leave my youngest started to attend nursery and my eldest started to attend primary school. Before I returned to work we did the maths in terms of how much childcare would cost us and, surprisingly, we concluded that if I actually reduced my working hours a little bit and earned a little bit less, we would actually save for money at the end of the month. Therefore, I requested my employer to reduce my working hours by 20% (I work Monday to Friday, but 80% of a full-time role). This allows me to take the kids to nursery/school each morning and to pick them up at around 3pm. I might be earning a bit less each month, but I’m also saving on 2-3 hours of nursery each day and a nanny to go and pick up my eldest from primary school, so on balance I save more money at the end of the month and I get to spend more time with my kids. I can’t really imagine what life would be like if both of us had to work full-time with two kids this age. Because I pick them up at 3pm they have a snack at home, I give them a bath, they play a little bit, I cook dinner and take care of essential chores, and when my partner gets home at around 6pm dinner is ready and kids are in bed at around 7-7:30. If I had to work until 5:30pm each day and get home at around 6:30, none of this would be possible.

My DH and I adopted siblings (2&3). We knew from matching that for at least the first few years they would not cope with child care. We considered one of us taking a career break after adoption leave. We were fortunate that we could live on one salary and that both of us earned very similar salaries. We therefore opted that following my adoption leave we would both reduce our hours and work opposite ends of the week from each other. This has worked perfectly for us. We both enjoy our jobs and need to feel like us rather than mummy or daddy all the time. We have the best of both worlds in this arrangement. I love my time at home with the kids but equally love walking out the door half way through the week to be me! Our kids benefit so much from very much equal parenting. Raising our children is all consuming and I would not have it in me to do it full time!

Our plan (which thanks to the pandemic has gone completely tits up) was that my wife would go back to work full time and I'd return to work part time when LO is ready. This was because my wife earns more and is advancing up a career track that she actually cares about, whereas I earn much less and I hate my job!

HOWEVER my wife has now been made redundant so we're a bit stuffed. Luckily our bills are cheap. We're both applying for jobs and may have to move to a cheaper area (not ideal but at least will be nearer family). Whoever gets a job first will go back!

Personally I think plan for the worst case scenario ie one income, no benefits, not able to access childcare. Anything else is a bonus, its a lot easier to revise up than down.

Also think about the lifestyle you want, It doesnt have to the case that one of you gives up work completely, you could both go part time.

As a single adopter I didnt want to running myself ragged during the week, then having the weekend taken up with house stuff and food shopping, and no time just to be a family. I planned on 4 days a week school hours but did get some benefits so was able to drop to three.

A lot depends on how flexible your employer is as well. I tried very hard to keep appointments etc to my non working days and out of school hours but its not always possible. My managers never minded if I had to buzz off to school for a couple of hours or make a call in office hours because they knew I'd make the time up

We've worked out all different scenarios and are going to play it by ear. We figured it's best to be prepared for the worst case just in case.

We're lucky that we can manage on just one income (mine) if we have to so if LO needs a stay at home parent then we'll manage.

If we end up being placed with a child over 4 who can cope with some childcare then our existing full time work schedules mean we'd only need childcare for 1.5 hours after school 10 times a month; so very doable.

In an ideal world I will return to work on reduced hours; around 80% of my current hours and my husband will continue to work his non stressful, full time role. This gives us a good amount of family time as well as a good income.