to think there is a massive disconnect between being a parent and working and this needs to be taught emphatically at school

[theremustbeanotherway]

So that my people like me, as so many of you are, don't spend decades getting those top GCSEs, A-levels, the Oxbridge degree, the high-flying legal career, only to feel like I need to massively downgrade/quit work in order to have anything approaching a balanced life with my growing family? Tis truly miserable. I know part-time is a possibility but certainly not at my firm and they are like gold dust elsewhere. DH very supportive and does more than his fair share but it's not working at present and I can only see it getting worse in future.

Are there parts of the world where society is set-up so as to allow both parents to work without the family suffering? Is it because our society lacks the support of a strong extended family and community network or because our jobs are more demanding and don't acknowledge the competing demands of a young family?

I agree with the OP: we live in a society where we are constantly bombarded with messages to have it all/do more/visibly achieve etc. These messages do nothing to teach children that Real Life is full of trade-offs and compromises because we only have 24 hours per day each. Until more explicit discussion and acknowledgment of human limitations is brought into education we will continue to sleepwalk into default role-modelled unconscious behaviours.

I'm not sure whether it's specifically a school problem (though many have complained about career advice in schools), but a representational problem which the educational systems, along with others, could help correct. I don't think it is a lack of imagination when so many can't see any other way - we can't be what we can't see. If we brought in more adults into schools or kids news TV that discussed having a job and children and life balances in general, it could do a lot of good. If such careers were widely included in TV programmes or movies or books, it could do a lot of good.

Lack of representation I think is the main part of the problem with this. A sub-problem of that is that changing representation can change how a career is looked at - and how well it pays. This topic has brought to my mind some studies from US about teachers and real estate agents and how they were perceived changed as those careers moved towards being seen as 'flexible mother careers' which has resulted in worse reputation and poorer pay (and for teachers, more begrudging the pay they get). Same is happening in STEM professions, there has been a lot of discussion lately about how biology is being pushed away from other sciences due to it being perceived and having a higher rate of women compared to other science fields.

We need to tackle both representation so more people can see these jobs are available and are accessible to them as well as tackle an underlying problem of how flexible work and fields that attract mothers particularly are looked at and paid. Beyond that is the wider pictures of the issues of how society looks at career breaks particularly for parents, carers, and/or those with disabilities and/or major illnesses and this picture so often presented that we should be as 'productive' as possible which is causing a lot of damage both to individuals and in many work place cultures. There are many other issues underlying the issues within careers and life that could be analysed and corrected.

Well, it's that old adage "you can't have everything", isn't it?

For most people it isn't possible to have both a full time, high flying job AND have the time/flexibility to spend significant time with your family during the week. You have to choose what works for you as a family - it might be you working PT or your DH, or you both cutting your hours. But something has to give. And it would be the same in any country in the world...

Just re-reading the thread and am surprised by the number of people who seem to genuinely have thought they could "have it all". It doesn't take more than a cursory glance to work out that you can't.

I work FT in a pressurised job, have two children and am a single parent. On one level I do "have it all" in that I am well paid, have a career and have a lovely family. On another level, I do nothing but work, childcare, sleep. No social life, no relaxation, no hobbies, no aimlessly lying on the sofa. I never watch TV, watch a film, go for a walk...

But this is what I signed up for and I take the view that I will have a chance to reconnect with myself at some point in the future. I agree that men have been able to appear to have it all because they have had a massive support system at home filling in school forms, cleaning, making packed lunches, dealing with nits, doing Xmas. I do all that in my "spare" time.

At my school (superselective girls' grammar) we were most definitely encouraged to think we could have it all, to the extent that the head was reportedly (according to a teacher I knew) annoyed with a Speech Day speaker, a famous scientist, who told us she was only able to do it all because she had been lucky enough to have staff and we should do what we wanted whether it was careers or kids or both.

I also remember being told we wouldn't need to worry about sexism by the time we were in our jobs.

I don't know whether to be annoyed with them or touched by their naivety. I can see that in the 2nd half of the 80s with a woman prime minister and women breaking new ground all over the place, and before the backlash had really got going, such optimism might have been only natural.

Now I look back and think I would like my daughter to have advice about how to deal with the difficulties, rather than be told it was all a bed of roses, but I definitely don't want her to be put off trying.

I don't think I've ever been under the illusion that you could have it all, just that you wouldn't have to necessarily choose between continuing in some form a succesful career and having a family. For example, the ability to take up to 5 years out and then return to the workplace with no more barriers than the next person applying (though obviously there would be a brief initial period of catching up and brushing up in skills) would make a huge difference to working women. Similarly, if it were possible to go part-time for 5 years or so without completely derailing your career, that would also allow parents with young children to keep their hand in. In both cases you would probably have to make a sacrifice in terms of not being at the cutting edge of your profession. However what strikes me now is just how far you have to drop down in many cases in order to keep a career going or the fact that a few years out of work is perceived as degrading one's skills and abilities to such an extent so as to make it difficult to retuen to any job at all in the field, never mind returning to a similar job to the one you left. Of course there are exceptions but my impression is that what I'm describing here is more normal.

I was definitely led to believe I could have it all (late 70s/early 80s). I could have any career I chose -to work hard at school, get the right qualifications and the world was mine for the taking - we were the new women! Equal partnerships etc etc...
Very naive -maybe that's why we are suggesting that the reality of certain things are pointed out at school...

I agree with you theremustbeanotherway (I'm also a City lawyer). I found it manageable with 1 DC and family help, but with 2 DC and no family help I feel as though I need to make a choice between my career and my children to some extent. I just don't feel I'm around as much as they need me to be but, like you, I have no option of cutting my hours without accepting that's it for my career prospects.

I do think whilst not discouraging girls from careers it should be made clearer to both sexes of the reality of the situation

I think it's a tough abstract for a teenager to take on board, but I do think that generation will have witnessed their mother's going slowly insane trying to do it all and want to pursue a more balanced path. Whether they can or not, as long as workplaces continue to be so inflexible, is another matter.

Mothers going insane under the pressure of doing it all is one scenario. Another is divorce. Another is DC succumbing to the pressure of living in a high-stress high-stakes family.

You can't have it all,something is going to suffer.

I had 7 years as a sahp and I'm now working full time with a supportive partner who does his half and a mother doing the childcare.

We are all still stressed and the simple fact is the quality of home life for everybody was far better with a sahp. My dc are definitely missing out at the moment and we are all chasing our tails.

I like my job,we need the money so the sad fact is a stress free life,quality time with the dc and a lot of other things had to go.

Life isn't perfect but we should be honest instead of pretending everything is just perfect and having 2 x wp has no impact on family life and dc.

Lots of references to capitalism and 'the patriarchy' here, yet no acknowledgement that the very same patriarchy is what pushes men into wage-slave misery to a far greater extent than their female partners.

It might be a generational thing, a class thing, or a London thing, but I know plenty of men in my milieu who would absolutely LOVE to either give up work or go part time to become the primary carer of their kids (both extant and planned). Unfortunately for them, their female partners invariably get first-call on this and not one of them is happy with this arrangement. At best, a couple of men I know work compressed, or limited hours in order to spend more time with their children.

The reality is that many women are complicit in this system that prioritises 'conventional' motherhood over a career; and values it over that of fatherhood. This system comes at the expense of both sexes in that it limits our options and forces us into 'traditional' roles.

Now that we are getting closer to parity in the allocation of parental leave; and women are graduating at a higher rate than men (particularly in law and medicine); and women are now out-earning men up to the age of 29 www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-business/11042829/Women-gender-pay-gap-want-to-close-the-pay-gap-Its-time-to-face-an-uncomfortable-truth.html, it is time we accepted that we cannot be the primary carer by default.

If women are generally unwilling to rescind the role of default primary carer, then we will forever be forced into the impossible situation of managing career aspiration and full-time parenthood. We've been sold a lie that we can 'have it all'. Nobody can. Compromises have to be made somewhere.

Unfortunately for them, their female partners invariably get first-call on this and not one of them is happy with this arrangement

You make it sound like they're victims. If they really wanted it, they could make it work. But many men make out they'd love to but when the opportunity presents itself they don't take it.

I'm not sure I agree with the notion that men have it all and women somehow are the ones who lose out. To me having it all means having the career AND being there for your kids AND having time with yourself & your family. But there just aren't enough hours in the week for that...something's got to give.

Men may historically have had the career part but they didn't have the family part. I know quite a few guys now who have reduced their hours or work condensed hours because they're not happy with that scenario - they want to be there to play an integral role in their family. Men are realising they can't have it all either...

Sorry but having gone through 10 years of IVf,carrying 3 children(including twins)inside my body for 9 months,enduring breast feeding and having the hormones one does after giving birth alongside having my body wrecked I kind of think I deserved to have slightly more of a say as regards deciding who was the sahp. Thankfully my dp thought so to and understood why I desperately wanted some time with our dc and why my needs were slightly more of a priority than his.

I went to an academic selective private girls school in the late 80s and we were encouraged to aim high but I really don't accept the idea that this is somehow to blame for women struggling with choices more than 10 years later, especially with careers like law where it's always been known that the top jobs are incredibly competitive and pretty much eat your life.

I would have thought university careers advice would be more relevant, and then once working watching more senior men and women would let you know that there might be an issue coming up.

On the school front yes I agree that primary schools do not seem to recognise that many families do not have a stay at home parent and make life hard for very little reason. Late notice for events, craft support expectations and completely unnecessary homework are all issues. However it is perfectly possible to combine ordinary houred jobs, even with a commute with children who are at school. You just need to use some wrap around childcare or juggle hours with your partner if you can. Most families do have two working parents and do make it work after all.

Bonsoir there is another solution, very little mentioned on this thread: for the woman to be the main breadwinner and have a partner who is a SAHD or works part time/less demanding hours. In other words, the man playing the traditional female role.

I wonder why that isn't offered as a good solution. Is it because there are few men who'd be keen to be the main childcarer/secondary breadwinner? Is it because most women don't want to be the main breadwinner? Is it because women tend to earn less even pre children (and if so why is this) so that it doesn't make financial sense for them to be the main breadwinner post children? Is it because you don't choose your partner according to their career...?

I agree by the way that schools/parents should take care when giving careers advice to talk about the trade offs - money vs hours vs family. However this should be said to BOTH boys and girls.

Ha, cross posted with Babycham and subsequent posts addressing this point.

YANBU but it's nius we need to be educating. It's gone backwards and you don't have to dig far to find out the attitude and expectations of teenage boys to girls and really despair of what kind of partner they will be in a few years.

I have three DSs and I have no idea how I am going to make them Ito caring lovely feminist men one day. It's firefighting mostly round here, and I'm only doing a bit of freelance stuff currently.

Wonder if it's easier if you have a girl too to be sure you're 'balancing' them?

I am the high earner in our family but my DH is not remotely interested in being a sahd. I wouldn't force him into this role anymore than I wouldn't want to be forced to be a sahm. He does otherwise do his fair share of housework and childcare. I suspect, generally speaking and economics aside, there are just far fewer dads who want to swap days at work for days at home managing the kids and household.

minipie - I agree in theory with that solution but IME it doesn't work out in practice. Only yesterday I had lunch with an (intermittent) SAHD friend whose wife has a mega €€€ mega career. Said SAHD gave up his international mega career to support his DC but it hasn't really worked out for the DC (mega wife has benefitted hugely).

To me the best option is to have flexibility between parents as well as in the workplace. My dh has had periods of being a SAHD and being part time. It's not been that damaging to his career, and he generally is quite admired for it (one of those irritating differences). I do think that we need to recognise though that taking five years out is a big deal and no you can't expect to slot back in at the same level you would have been at if you hadn't left, without a structured return to work program (ie not just a couple of months catch up). Unfortunately such programs really only exist in female dominated areas with significant staff shortages. My dh for example has gone back to work at a level below his previous role (he took four years out).

Interesting study reported here showing that one of the issues is that many men are still expecting their partners to pick up the slack at home and that many women get pushed on to 'mummy tracks'.

Oh and my children had a great time with their dad at home, just like most children with a parent at home. Why would it be different having your dad rather than your mum? Assuming that the parent was happy to be there and that there were sufficient family funds.

Samantha Power (US Ambassador to the UN) is one example of a woman who has small children, is very near the top of her game work-wise and has a husband who also works. I don't know how they figure that all out but I imagine it involves live-in staff/extended family.

Madeleine Albright was a SAHM while her husband had a high-flying career. She worked her way back in through academia and got right to the top.

So, it's possible but extremely difficult to make a top-flight career and motherhood work.