To think I am a bloody doctor, I shouldn't be working for a pittance after childcare?

[knackeredmother]

I am having a pissed off day so am probably BU.
I work 24 hours (plus much more unpaid overtime) a week as a GP registrar, this includes nights, weekends and long days until 10pm.
My take home pay is £1200 (after 5 years qualification).
I have 2 dc under 5 and employ a nanny as my son has lots of hospital admissions with an ongoing chest problem and my shifts mean nursery/childminder would be impossible. I also have no family to help out before I get flamed for having a nanny. There really is no other option for us that I can work out and nursery for 2 would not be much less money.
I pay our nanny about £800 a month gross for 17 hours per week (£10 p.h going rate). That leaves me £400 income to pay all of my outgoings.
My nanny has no childcare to pay for as she uses the 15 hours free government funding and has family help. Its not her fault but she has almost double the disposable income I have for working less and more sociable hours.
I'm using up annual leave today as poor ds is too sick to leave even with our nanny.
It's just made me think what is the point of going to work? I could stay at home, have no sick child stress and although I would be £400 a month down I wouldn't need to run a car, fork out bloody thousands pounds for professional exams and membership fees
I'm being unreasonable aren't I - somebody tell me it will all be worth it in the end!

True, she might not be eligible, but she implied the only reason they weren't claiming is the hassle of it. But if they really need the money, I do think it's worth it.

I do know what you mean Heswall, when I was on ML there were a few benefits I could have claimed that I didn't, because we could get by without them and I felt bad taking money meant for really desperately poor people. But I think tax credits are different.

callmemrs - I think in terms of professional childcare you're probably right. But the difference 20 years ago was that you could use unregulated childcare (i.e. woman from the same town with DC of her own that your friend has used). That's actually illegal now. That sort of arrangement went on quite a lot in my area, where women had jobs rather than careers and so were doing it as cheaply as possibly, and that was definitely a fraction of what I spend even allowing for inflation.

I'm not saying we should return to those days BTW. I think childcare is vastly undervalued, and it's not so much that we should make it cheaper but we should make it more affordable (i.e. more subsidy).

Also, interest rates may have been much higher back then (12% sounds inconceivable at the moment, doesn't it!), but generally people weren't spending such a high proportion of their income on mortgages/rent.

YANBU for now but am I right in thinking that you will only have 12 months of crappy wages? The Registrar year is 12 months on top of the 5 years training isn't it? In that case, I'd keep going with the thought of the salary jump next year .

hardgoing ha ha ha stop reading the daily mail. You have not a clue
knackeredmum am surprised you are doing nights as a reg it is meant to be your final yr so should all be in GP land and no nights. I know you will do some out of ours training and your practice may get you to do extended hrs do not agree with practices that do it. Are you gp1 or gp2 ? Keep at it as in the long term you will still have a career with pretty good hrs and is generally pretty family friendly . Have not read past part of first page. Good luck

knackeredmother - I feel for you, but I cannot help thinking that you were being a little ambitious to start your family before you were fully qualified.

Totally sucks OP especially when people on other threads claim free nursery places whilst not working what's wrong with the world?

"people on other threads claim free nursery places whilst not working?"

What do you mean?

Bugsylugs, I don't need to read the Daily Mail to know that most GPs and consultants once through training make good money, I have numerous close friends who have told me their salaries!

hardgoing they may well do but not all and the level you quote is wrong. You need to look at area whether dispensing , rural type of practice GMS, PMS etc . The average you quote is wrong. Consultants fees are for all to see on line and start lower than you expect. Did not say it was anything but good pay just not the level you are talking. Actually I earnt far more as a reg than as a salaried. Also very few full time jobs on offer or partnerships. I assume those you know are partners do they employ or offer partnerships to any new GP in practice? There is a lot of real poor poor em

OP, I hope you're having a better day. Just to add, as a GP, yes it is worth it in the end .. Despite the negative press and the opinions of some of my colleagues it's a fabulous job which is generally always interesting , challenging and relatively secure.
I remember how hard going Vts training was, especially the hospital jobs - eg I hated A&E and still have bad dreams that I'm sent back to do another placement - and I did it pre children, so I can only imagine what it's like with a young family! It's also especially hard when your own kids are ill in any job , sometimes I think especially medicine as you have to deal with everyone elses poorly kids when you just want to cuddle your own.
Anyway am thinking of you, hope your DS gets better, things will get easier soon!

Phone driving me mad
hardgoing I assume those you know are partners. Income depends on so much where in country you are, type of practice eg PMS GMS etc dispensing no dispensing, rural, extreme poverty etc. not all GPs can have NHS pensions. There are very few full time posts available there are fewer partnership posts. Salaried GPs can be very poorly protected and governed. Ie if you work for nhs you get 1 month full pay and 1 month half pay as sick pay for each yr worked upto six. Very often GP practices do not continue this for salaried GP unless GMS. I earnt far more in my last 2 years of training than as a salaried dr. Anyway off topic
knackeredmum keep going it will be much easier when out of hospital I know it seems a long way off. You will never pick it up as easily if you stop now we had returning mums who had taken 5 yrs off they really struggled. You will find it much easier in the future and will hopefully find it enjoyable. Good luck.
To whoever said wait until training over to have children we should not be encouraging women to delay motherhood until early 30s which is what you are suggesting

Hi knackeredmother. I sympathise with your situation. I can understand why you feel resentment about your situation and compare yourself to your nanny. I think that, in the long term, it will definitely be worth continuing your career (assuming that you enjoy being a GP). Your older child will presumably start school and childcare costs could potentially fall if you change your arrangements.

I am a GP (although only part time and salaried at present- 3 young DC and another on the way). The training is hard work, expensive and anti social in terms of hours. I also find it galling that most of the general public seem to think that all doctors earn huge wages. Somebody ignorant was quoting £200,000 a year for a Consultant up thread, I think. Tis all down to the government and The Daily b**y troublemaking Mail!
coccyx- of course GPs work evenings/ weekends and nights. How else do you think the OOH service is staffed? Nurses certainly do some of the work but they are not qualified to do everything.

I haven't read every post on here so I'm slightly confused about what job you are doing exactly. Are you doing a GP Reg job with a combination of a hospital specialty or are you doing the hospital specialties as part of a VTS scheme? The GP Registrars in my practice don't do unpaid overtime and I don't think the SHOs in hospital do as much as they used to. (My DH does masses of unpaid overtime but he is a Registrar and the responsibility has really risen up the tree since I qualified). Anyway, I'm wondering if you are particularly conscientious and could perhaps be a little more disciplined with your time in view of the fact that you have two small DC.

Financially, would you consider going up to 2/3 time? I did this when I had 1 DC (expecting DC2) and it was fine, even when DH was working in a completely different area and I was by myself (no family help here either).
Do you use childcare vouchers to pay part of the nanny's salary? She needs to be Ofsted registered for this, of course but you could save a bit of money.
Heswell- I can't see any reason with the OP shouldn't claim tax credits if she is entitled to them. She is just as deserving as someone else on the same wage and will presumably be contributing plenty to society and the taxman in the future.
Do you fill in a tax return form and claim back tax on all of the professional expenses that you are entitled to?

Lastly, I do think that bonsoir has a point about postponing ones family if not one that is of any practical use to you now! I am speaking as someone who started their family at a young age for a doctor too (unplanned though). Obviously, if you went into Medicine as a mature student, you wouldn't have had the same flexibility as the rest of us.
I was speaking to a friend of mine recently (a Reg in Oncology at a well known London hospital) and she was saying that, in her opinion, it is better to postpone having children until one is a Consultant unless you want a large family/are older initially obviously. I think it just shows how hard and all consuming hospital training is in particular. Obviously, GP Reg training isn't as taxing and trainers, etc are far more used to female GPs working part time, etc but it is still challenging to raise a family and complete the required log books, exams, etc.
Good luck with everything. I'm sure things will get easier.

Please feel free to PM me if you would like to.

I resented going back to work FT to a good job when DS was 12 months as my DH was self employed and not working. DH has since found work but I still work FT. Glad I am FT now with the economy the way it is. Agree with others that you need to take the long view.

You don't know what the future will hold. So many people have been made redundant over the past few years, and I know some have had to sell their houses, assets, run down their savings etc because there was only only bread winner and often the SAHM cannot find work or return to the same salary level before DCs. A lot of people have to do jobs they hate at minimum wage forever. Some careers are very unforgiving and a break of 5 years is a lifetime. You have trained long and hard for your qualifications, don't give up now.

Salaries for hospital consultants are as follows:

Threshold 1, years completed as a consultant 0, £74,504, period before eligibility for next threshold one year

Threshold 2, years completed as a consultant 1, £76,837, period before eligibility for next threshold one year

Threshold 3, years completed as a consultant 2, £79,170, period before eligibility for next threshold one year

Threshold 4, years completed as a consultant 3, £81,502, period before eligibility for next threshold one year

Threshold 5, years completed as a consultant 4, £83,829, period before eligibility for next threshold five years

Threshold 6, years completed as a consultant 9, £89,370, period before eligibility for next threshold five years

Threshold 7, years completed as a consultant 14, £94,911, period before eligibility for next threshold five years

Threshold 8, years completed as a consultant 19, £100,446

OP

I wondered it too some days and to the first responder who said she was a midwife on more than £1200pm take home on less than 24hrs a week... well I want to work where you work because I have been qualified more than 10 years and my take home (after tax) was just under £1000 (no unsociable) and around £1150 for 22.5 (around 8 hours a month unsociable).
I am thinking you do nights and / or weekends a lot?

When my son was a baby my take home was about £950 - childcare (2 days, one child) £320 and CTC brought me back to around the £950 a month mark... if I did an extra day a week I was £10 a month better off after childcare, an extra 2 days a week and I started to be worse off. I am on my own so got the lone parent enhancement to CTC.

He's now seven... it's worth it. He had lots of illness too and he has an ASD now but I still have my registration and it gives me an option. Keep going... it's absolute hell on earth but juggle and balance as much as you can. It will come... well not good but ok!

Oh and the girl at my son's nursery had more disposable income than me... it was the best contraception she'd had when we figured that out... we are still friends 7 yrs down the line and she still cant get over that!! And she is still childless... has made her other half get a really good job first!!

looby I find it really sad that your friend thinks she shouldn't have a family till she is at consultant level.

Am an academic and in my job the usual wisdom is don't start a family till you've got a permanent job but in my field fewer than 40% of people who complete the training will ever have one and it takes on average 3 years after training finishes to get a job (people string along on temp contracts till landing one).

I know loads of people who started training early to mid 20s and are now in their mid-30s and still not settled.

The competition for serious professional jobs is crazy . I just feel it's an insane situation where someone who has trained for the best part of a decade to do a socially useful job has to question whether she can afford to have children.

peasant- you misunderstand me- she does have children. I think her comment reflects how hard she has found it to combine the work required in training in a competitive hospital specialty with raising a family.
Academia is another career where hard work, intelligence and lots of qualifications don't necessarily reap large financial rewards, far less than Medicine, I believe.

y I was an academic. I was lucky enough to have a permanent job (though it was a 2 hour commute from dh's academic job, but that's par for the course).
With 2 kids I was breaking even. With 3 I would have been making a substantial loss, even though the oldest had started school by that point.

This is why all the doctors I know start their families once they become registrars. I dont know any who have done it before. Just think of how much you will be earning in the near future and, it will be alot.

Dayshiftdoris, surely the answers in your name? Its the unsocial hours that bump up the money. My friends on 90 hours a month come home with approx £1,400

In the absence (quite rightly) of a "Like" button, I'd just like to say that I love loobylu3's post.

I'm also very A doctor and four children? I feel terribly inadequate!

Well I'm a Dr who started her family 'early' at 27...just a few years out of med school..and married to a junior Dr working ridiculous hours too, so in some ways amazing we managed it

I was also taught 'don't have kids til you're at least a Registrar'....and then spent a year working with three lovely newly-appointed female Registrars, each of whom had a heartbreaking time trying to conceive, two of them needing fertility treatmentand rueing the day they followed that advice themselves.

So DH and I got started, and (thank God) went on to have three lovely children..whether it would have been so easy in my mid/late 30's I will never know.

Yes, those first few years were hard with a lot of juggling and not much money to show for it, but I'm glad we did it this way round. Yes, a job/career can be immensley satisfying, and mine is, but creating and enjoying our family beats it hands down.

I would say stick it out - am a lawyer and kept wotking through 2 DSs, went back a t 6 months each time, 4 days per week, and now am still in field, have been able to negoitate flexi etc and am ongood money. Had I stopped I susepct I owuld have lost confidence etc and would not be able ot compete with those still in the game. for a while I was "making" about a tenner a week after nanny fees, but now they are at school, it is so much better

I am enlightened and a bit humbled by how much a GP registrar earns, I earn about the same working three days a week as a primary school teacher. I am at the top of main pay scale but have no management responsibilities.

Anyway, OP - the cost of childcare is appalling. We pay £140 a month for three days breakfast club and after school club. I love how people think starting school means no childcare costs btw! I am expecting DC2 and will then pay roughly £500-£600 in nursery fees for the baby. So then, like you, I will probably be left with £400-£500 a month - most of which will be spent on running the car I will need for getting to work and running the children to childcare.

If it helps, at least you are investing in your career and in the long run it will be worth this shit part now. I don't particularly like my job, have struggled desperately with it since having a family as well, and am not nearly good enough at it. I have no idea what else I can do, and live in fear of new developments to 'get rid' of teachers. I'll probably never earn more money than this either.

jenai- that's v sweet of you!
Honestly, I feel rather inadequate career wise compared to a lot of my friends who delayed having children/ haven't had any yet and have done really well.
I think it is impossible to manage everything to a v high standard. We all have to make choices. Medicine does at least have decent career progression and far more flexibility than a lot of other professions; top legal jobs, for example (although solicitors in top firms get paid much more)!

I am shocked at how little you earn, OP.

I work 15 hours pw as a surveyor and earn more than you.