Are dp and I BU to consider him working in London during the week and just coming home at the weekends?

[MilaMae]

We live in a lovely place miles away from London,good schools,expensive housing,near family ,kids settled etc.

The pay down here is crap though and in dp's line of work he'd get double in London. He's just seen a fantastic job that he's very well suited for and we're considering it.

Would the dc really suffer though,would it be a nightmare for dp?

Do lots of families do this?

If anybody does this advice on accommodation etc would be gratefully received.

TIA

We're doing it at the moment to get us by, pay the bills basically. I'm up north while my OH is in the medical field, working nr London. Jobs in his line of work (locum work, permanent is rubbish money) are non-existent up here since Cameron got in and will probably only get worse.

Its not easy, he pays two rents plus travel each weekend so we're only just scraping by. My daughter, two, misses him and clinged to him during the xmas holidays but we get into a routine so she gets used to it. I found it hard at first and still miss him to bits but sometimes get annoyed at the mess he makes at home at the weekend, as if its like having another child.

I plan to move down there with DD within the next few weeks as I'm pregnant.

Salaries down there are not necessarily more, my OH took a pay cut from what he earned in manchester plus with the extra expenses (hopefully he'll be able to claim alot back through tax). We now realise we were living the high life back then!!

Good luck whatever you decide.

Dh used to work away all week, he's also in IT. It was hellish for all of us. If you can avoid it I would.

Thanks all you've been most helpful.

Dp applying so we can at least find out where in London it is exactly(for room rental/travel cost purposes)and other benefits.

Going to show him this thread tonight,feel a lot of it needs to be his decision.

Thanks again

I'd have thought that the real question is how much the extra money would benefit the family.

If you're struggling financially at the moment and the extra money would make a major difference to your lives, then it might be worth all the downsides explained above.

But if you're already comfortable financially then the extra money is outweighed by being apart.

good luck with your conversation

Slightly different perspective - my DF kind of did this when I was a teenager (as there were no jobs available where we lived) for about three years. He lived in a different city (in a caravan ) and would come back every two weeks (it was a five hour drive) to see us.

It was incredibly hard, and TBH, I don't have the closest relationship with my DF as he was pretty much absent for three highly formative years of my life. But, my parents had little alternative.

It can work, but for a limited period and if you make sure he isn't away for too much time out of the week.

Various friends of ours have done this and from what I can gather from their experiences - dont do it! The weekend is simply not long enough to reconnect with your family and very soon, my girlfriends have found themselves living pretty much separate lives from their husbands with different friends etc. Daddy missing out on the occasional pick up is frankly the least of your troubles. Resentment soon builds up as the girls are weighed down with all the childcare and the boys are off - scot free and (in a couple of cases) on the razzle in town. And then there are the other women..........All I am saying is, think very very carefully.

Would never have done it unless absolutely necessary tbh.

I used to work in the City in IT and many of the people I worked with did the 'weekends at home' thing - especially contractors.

I think it is difficult, and it might help if you have some ground rules about trying it for a period of time and seeing how it goes. But it does work for lots of people.

Definitely think about compressed hours (doing a full working week over 4 days) or working from home 1 or 2 days a week.

My dad for a year or two when I was early secondary school age worked up north in a family business two weekends out of three (I think can't remember exactly).

It definitely affected the family dynamic. Mum and me aren't terribly close but we've always rubbed along together easily. I adored my dad but discovered just how much more demanding he was to live with! I found the weekends he was home stressful, much easier to just get on with life when he wasn't there. And it was strange when he was home, he didn't really appreciate how that was unusual for us, he thought him being home was the normal state of affairs and didn't try to fit in with us at all, we had to fit in with him (but then he is that kind of bloke anyway!).

I don't think it had a long term affect on our relationship but it was only for a couple of years. I have very few memories of the time specifically. I don't know how it impacted on my mum but we did have a straightforward life - lived in town, everything in walking distance etc etc.

I'm trying to think how I would think in your situation now. I think I could cope for a short-term contract, but not for something that could become permanent. I would always be wanting to know when the situation would end, and would struggle with anything that could possibly be interpreted as not total commitment to changing it. But I have no family nearby to give me a break. You seem much more positive at the prospect than I would be so I'm probably not much help. Just thought I'd put in my ha'porth as a child of a similar setup.

I havent done this but worked in a dept where there were many weekly commuters. I had made the move abroad with DH & DCs. Especially early on I did resent these guys (and girls) as they would roll in on a Monday morning, work til stupid o'clock, demand meetings at all hours (I had a home to go to) then spend evenings out on the lash. They would then roll out again on a Thursday evening to fly home.

I do remember that one of my commuting colleagues described it as being like a continuous rugby tour. Many marriages ended or were stretched very tight. Health was also an issue as these people were a long way from their own doctors, dentists etc.

Having seen it & done a lot of business travel of my own I wouldnt do the long distance commute.

Good luck with your discussions and deliberations.

We bought a flat in London, entirely to facilitate this arrangement, as DH's hours are long and the journey time on top seemed silly.

But he hated it.

I haven't read the whole thread yet but thought I'd jump in and say "welcome to the Forces way of life"!

My DH and I have lived like this ever since we first met 9 years ago. He is in the RAF and has to move jobs every 2 years or so, whereas I have a career that means I have to stay put.

We talked things through and agreed that our lives would be easier if I built up my career rather than follow him around the country and have to uproot myself and find a whole new job every 2 years. DH plans to leave the RAF in about 5 years time so we will be together full-time from then on.

We don't have children yet, trying to conceive #1 as we speak (well not literally RIGHT now ) but many, many Forces families live in this way - if anything they find it gives the children more stability rather than uproot them to a new school every 2 years as well.

It is 100% do-able, it just requires a bit of effort is all.

Sorry not read whole thread but wanted to say that my Dad did this for most of my childhood/teenage years and I was really happy. My mum found it hard I think, although their relationship is still really good (married 40 years).

My dad would finish early on Fridays and would always make time to come to school plays/sportsdays etc. He would also pick us up from school any chance there was. We spoke to him on the phone every night too, and when he was more senior in the company he took us to see his office and where he stayed and had dinner etc, so we felt we really knew where he was.

The only thing that was bad about it was when he came back on a Friday night it was 50/50 whether he was going to be in a major grump or not! Stressful job equalled stressed out Dad (not all the time by any means!)

I also think that when I was a teenager it was probably a good job my dad was away so much - we are very similar and argued quite a bit so a lot of that was avoided by him not being there.

Good point about the forces lifestyle MadameDeathStare.

I have some family in the forces and our family accepts the fact that in order to work the dad needs to be away during the week, but we get a lot of from them since DH isn't military. They'd never dream of telling the military people in our family to get a different job or make sure they are home for particular dates, but they do to DH - making it even more stressful for him. I also think military wives get a lot of support from the other wives too. So in some ways it's easier for military wives.

Where I think the situation is very similar though is that I chose to have kids with someone who works long unsociable hours in a stressful job which needs to be based in London because that's where the jobs are. I knew exactly what the situation was and how much work I'd be doing on my own. If it was foisted on me or I was used to lots of help from my DH I'd probably feel differently about it.

Look realistically at what your DH does around the house and with the kids. Will you feel resentful of him "swanning around" as one other poster put it? Or will you accept that being away from the family and committing to all that travel each week are as stressful as being a single parent during the week?

I think HattiFattner up thread summed up excellently the homelife side of what I saw in the office. Many of my colleagues talked about problems occuring at home when they got back after a hard week's working (and eating out & drinking). The commuter wanted a quiet couple of days, the home spouse wanted to enjoy themselves a bit, perhaps have a nice dinner or a glass of wine. The travelling spouse wasnt interested. A recipe for discontent.

The difficulty for many was that the whole of the marriage had to be conducted in the space of two days. Love, arguements, laundry - the lot.