To have concerns about going back to work (long post)

[BackToWorkAgain]

Warning extremely long post

I had a couple of career jobs in my 20's. Stayed at home in my 30's raising our family. Now in my 40's it is time to work again.

I have some concerns about returning to work and a couple of questions regarding child care.

Child care questions first.

My DH thinks it would be reasonable to leave a 10yo, 8yo and 6yo to lock up the house and walk 10 minutes to primary school together in the morning and return home together after school to wait home together but without adult supervision until a parent returns. They already do this walk with me daily. 8yo and 10yo sometimes walk back from school on their own.

I think we would have to pay for school wrap around care for all three children. As 6yo and 8yo are too young to be on their own and the 10yo is very anxious child and gets very frightened if they are ever left alone, even to sleep or visit the bathroom.

1. Do we need to pay for wrap around school care for the three younger children ?

My DH thinks it would be reasonable to get the 12yo to watch the 10yo, 8yo and 6yo all day in the school holidays whilst we both work. 12yo would also have to serve a simple cold lunch and get snacks and drinks out.

I think we would have to pay for holiday care for the youngest two at the very minimum. As 10yo would probably be OK with 12yo during the day.

2. Do we need to pay for holiday care for the youngest two/three ?

Now the work concerns

I have not formally worked for a decade, but have volunteered for a few things during this time. However I still have a working brain and I am more than capable of finding work and actually doing a job day to day.

In fact the thought of working with adults is appealing to me, to do work that matters rather than the endless grind of housework. All things being equal, I look forward to returning to work. However I was planning to wait until the youngest was in high school and my DH wants me to go back now...hence looking into practicalities now.

My main concern is that I won't be able to turn a profit. My last job was well paid, however as I need a local job and a short commute (because of health issues) there isn't much choice locally. I will likely end up in a minimum wage no promotion type job.

I need to balance this new income against one off costs (work clothes and a pair of shoes), work related costs (petrol/parking), child care costs AND taking into account the loss of child tax credits (removed at a sliding scale depending on my new income) and loss of PIP (which I suspect will be removed the moment I return to work, even though in theory PIP is not related to work, in reality it usually is)

I need this combination to come out with a positive number. Of course if I found a term time or school hours job that would be a lot easier to do, but nothing around here at the minute. So looking at full time hours jobs.

I know there will be comments about how childcare costs need to be taken out of DH's wage too. But in reality his wage already covers all monthly expenses with a tiny amount left over. Simply speaking, if my wage can't cover all my new costs plus turn a profit, it is not feasible.

My DH has ruled out evening or weekend work, as he doesn't want to be stuck in with the children whilst I work. Which is a shame, as this would be the easiest way to turn a profit. I will talk to him again, as I think this is the best solution.

Night work would be very hard for me, as I need to use my cpap machine a minimum of six hours a night in order to be compliant and keep my driving license.

So I am looking at week day work.

I am worried that my ill health will make holding a job down difficult.

My bowel disease means that I need access to a toilet at all times and that access has to be spontaneous, as I might only have a minute to get there. I can not finish a phone call or finish serving a customer, I need a job that I can excuse myself and visit the ladies as and when I need to.

It also means I have periods of a few days a month when I can't leave the bathroom in the morning and would near the flexibility to start work late on these days.

I also have a yearly review and every three years I have a colonoscopy. So would need time off for that stuff too.

I am on a medical diet to reduce IBS symptoms (in addition to my other bowel issue), which means I always have to eat my own food and need somewhere to store, reheat, eat food. This should be an easy one to sort out, as I carry my own food with me as standard.

My Under Active Thyroid requires regular blood tests and medicine updates to get my levels right. This is partially why I am so exhausted all the time. Probably only need two gp appointments every three months. One for bloods, one for results.

My hearing issues are mild, I wear aid in my hearing impaired ear but not in my deaf one, I can lipread. I find noisy environments very difficult to deal with and clearly struggle to hear at some times. But honestly this has never affected my work much.

Beyond people failing to get my attention sometimes and I prefer to confirm everything in a email to check I haven't misheard anything (which is sensible for everyone to do).

Sleep Apnoea adds to my tiredness and I use a cpap machine overnight in order to keep my driving license.

I am temporarily having balance issues, I am falling over more and dropping things a fair bit. But I am confident this will go away, maybe I need some exercises to do. I have a Neurology Appointment next month, hopefully it will rule out the nasties and I will get a sheet of exercises to strengthen my legs and grip.

My bowel disease and my hearing impairment are classed as disabilities but I don't consider myself to be disabled.

My DH thinks I am disabled and I should tell potential employers upfront and I am more likely to get a guarantee interview this way too. But I am concerned my issues would put them off employing me. However it would give me a chance to explain in person, how I am a good worker, despite a few health issues. So I am very undecided on this point.

I am unsure when/if I would tell an employee about my health issues. Before interview, after I start work, if it starts affecting my job ?

3. Do work need to know about my health issues ? If so when do you mention it ?

4. Will work allow me time off for regular medical appointments?

I am concerned that DH has made it clear that he can not help with the children's clubs, illness, homework. As he works long hours a good distance away.

In particularly I need to cover 12yo brace appointments every three months and 6yo speech therapy appointments one hour weekly.

5. Will work allow me time off for regular children medical appointments? Or how else do I get children to these appointments?

Currently there are also a beavers, cubs, dance, scouts and gymnastic evening clubs outside school. Plus a couple of after school clubs too.
I usually parent and ferry children around between 3.30pm and 8pm (latest one 9.30pm) every evening.

6. But if I work full time and need to fit homework, tea, bath in for the kids, I assume they will have to quit all these clubs. Or do I get a taxi to run them there, whilst I parent the other children ? How do other people do this ?

My DH has already said that he can not take time off to cover children illness, it is up to me to cover it all. Luckily only the 6yo is ill often and I am confident that this will improve in time. I am guessing I will need maximum 6 days a year to cover D&V bugs, hopefully a lot less.

7. Will work allow me time off when kids are ill ? What are the alternatives ?

I am concerned that I simply will not be able to cope doing everything that I do now and work 40 hours on top of it
However I know plenty of women do it and therefore there is no reason I shouldn't try.

But I am so exhausted already and I don't know how I am going find the extra energy I need. Already at home, I can not sit down from 3pm onwards as I will fall asleep, even if talking to someone or doing paperwork. The doctor said that is normal for parents, so I just have to KOKO.

Despite all these worries, if I can address all the above concerns and bring in some much needed money into the house, I would be delighted.

On the plus note, I want to earn my own money, help support our family, maybe save up for a family holiday. I want to stop living on such a tight budget, where so many things are simply beyond our means. It would be great to know that when something breaks we would have the money there to to fix it.

But what if I make everything so much worse for me and the kids. What if I work full time and bring in a small amount of money or nothing. I am worried that the kids will spend all their time alone or at school, have to cancel their clubs and not see their friends, so I can work for no profit.

I am definitely going back to work but I planned to get all the kids into high school first, to reduce child care costs. I just think with three in primary school this is going to be hard.

Any positive advice welcome.

I am feeling better now my concerns are written down. Hopefully I will get some good pointers from here and I can work down my list, eliminating my concerns.

Ps. Congratulations for reading this far !

Does your DH really have to go into work every day? If they didn’t want to lose him last time, can he ask to work from home 2 days per week. If nothing else it will save you the petrol money.

The kindest assumption for this situation for your DH is that he - like you - does not accept the reality of your medical situation.

Even if you were in perfect health, working f/t with sole responsibility for 4 DCs is a big ask. But for you with your condition, it sounds barking mad that your DH would expect you to do that, and expect his DCs to bring themselves up because no one else has the time to.

Honestly, the more you type about your DH the worse he sounds. If he'd said something like - look I know it's hard with the DCs and your health, but is there any way you can think of to bring some money in as I'm finding the commute and always being broke really hard - then yes absolutely fine to ask - but to tell you to go out and get a ft job , oh and btw he's not going to help you with DCs being sick or school drop offs or anything - with the situation the way it is, nah he's not being a wonderful soulmate in my book.

I'd be very careful about jeopardising your PIP. I understand that its very hard to qualify for it, therefore you're clearly getting it for a reason. I would hate you to try to go back to work to appease your DH, for it not to work and then for the family to be worse off by losing the PIP money.

IMO you need wraparound care and holiday childcare for all three DC. Evening or weekend work for you is the most sensible option.
Your DH was happy to leave you "stuck with the children" thus far whilst he worked, now it's your turn. If he isn't happy paying for childcare needed for the three children he chose to have, maybe he could omit the need for it altogether and stay home whilst you have a turn at building up your career and pension.

Yeah, your husband is foul.

It doesn’t sound like this is a good time to be going back to work - I think in another couple of years it would be much easier re childcare?

When did you promise it though, Back ?

Before you were disabled?

Before you had your first DC?

Whilst persuading him to have one more DC than he wanted because he was worried about money? (not saying you did, but that would be just about the only circumstance where I think he would be justified in holding you to your"promise."

I am taking the positive posts away from my thread.

But I really don't understand why people are being so negative about DH. Who is cooking me a meal from scratch as I type, so it meets my medical diet needs. He is a good man and he loves his kids too.

We might not have a meeting of the minds about me working atm but we will get there.

All four kids were wanted and planned by both of us and I gladly agreed to stay home with them whilst they were little and I agreed (whilst only having hearing impairement) to go back full time when the youngest settle at school.

He has been very patient. It is not his fault, that I am worried and scared that I am not up for it, at the moment.

But short of a lottery win, I need to bring money in somehow.

People are being negative about him because he thinks it's acceptable for a 12 year old to do more childcare than him. That's actually fairly awful. I'm not saying he isn't also a good cook or that you don't adore him, but his attitude to this whole subject stinks like a shovel of shite.

cheminotte DH works from home when he can and when he works from home, he picks up the kids from school, if I am not feeling up to it.

But his boss wants him in the office 95% of the time. I love it when he is home. Just being able to leave little ones with him, whilst I take the older ones to clubs really helps. Everything is easier when a second adult is in the home.

But backtoworkagain - the reason you are having doubts about the plan to go out and work f/t, is because based on the facts you have provided, it's simply not feasible and would be highly likely to exacerbate your symptoms and mean you lose your PIP money.

In fact based on what you've written I find it hard to believe that any reasonable person would propose it as a viable option and that's why I - and others - are struggling to see your DH as this adorable man that you have painted.

So you made the promise to go back to work when relatively well. Since then you have had health issues develop that are so severe you are considered disabled and receive PIP. Your husband now thinks you should keep the promise you made before you were disabled, when everything was completely different. Is that more or less how it is?

I know that you agreed to this, but surely dh must understand that circumstances have changed. He can’t expect to hold you to this with your health issues as they are. He can’t expect a 12 year old child to practically take on a parental role to save money in childcare. And he certainly can not expect you to take on a full time job while his life doesn’t change at all.

You may not want to hear this but he is being ridiculous, unreasonable and cruel. You are saying that he is wonderful and supportive but everything you have written about him tells a completely different story. More money may be helpful for you as a family but if he wants this, he’ll have to pull his weight more. He could start by parenting his children so you could work when he is home as this is the only solution as I see it.

Agree with PPs, your H is the problem here.

You will need childcare. V unfair on your DC, especially the eldest, otherwise. It will be costly and a hassle, but nothing unusual for families where both parents work.

Your agreement to return to work after DC4 was of school age should have included your H making changes in his working life when you returned. The set up worked and enabled him to have 4DC and continue to work as he had before DC: you have taken a huge personal financial and career risk.

Don’t straitjacket yourself now to further facilitate DH.

If you have good experience as a statistician, you should definitely be able to find contract / flexible work WFH as an analyst or data scientist.

Find some recruitment agencies (linkedin is good for this), and have a chat with them about how much someone might earn for the type of work you'd be qualified for. It might be initially challenging because of your 10 years deskilling, but once you've got some more recent experience on your CV you should have a really good earning potential. (I'm in an allied profession, and there's loads of demand.)

However, I'm with the rest of the posters in saying that your DH is being unreasonable. He can't say you have to go back to work, but only under certain conditions that make it impossible to find work! How many employers does he think would be ok with you doing all the school runs, all the illness, all the Drs appts and lots of holiday care? While WFH? And still pay enough to make it worth your while?

Perhaps he'd like to find some example jobs that you could apply to... and when he can't, he needs to revisit his aversion to you working weekends.

Well if DH cares for you as much as he says he does he’d go and talk to his boss and explain that he’s finding the commute really hard and will need to look for a job closer to home unless he can work from home more. He can put in an official flexible working request but a subtle threat is probably better.

Bloody hell, you sound far too ill to work IMO!

Your DH needs to explain why he doesn't want to move closer to work, (and clearly its not just about equity, you can move nearer than 200 miles away!!)

And i think that you can give your DH the responsibility of finding this amazing job!

He knows I struggle but feels if I work full time, all our current money worries will be over

Well the money worries would also be over if he magically got a £100k a year job. But that isn’t possible and nor, I suspect, is you going back to FT work at a profit.

Just because you promised you’d go back FT at this stage doesn’t mean you can make it happen. Perhaps you didn’t realise the realities of school age childcare, perhaps your health issues are worse now, perhaps he’s less able to help than you thought, perhaps a bit of all of those. Either way the fact that you promised it long ago doesn’t mean you can do the impossible.

Any chance he could move to a job closer to home?

Asking him to help find a job is a good idea. As well as getting a breakdown orlf losses and costs associated with full time work and we can figure out how much real profit will be made.

I still think weekend work would work best for me atm.

Maybe babysitting or cleaning houses would bring enough in.

I will also keep looking at free lance work too...any recommendations for best employment websites ?

People are being down on your DH because he has set parameythat mean he expects your 12 year old to do approx 50 days of childcare a year while declining to do any himself

Home based work
www.indeed.co.uk/m/jobs?q=Home+Based+Senior+Statistician

Just present a couple of options.

Dh, these are the options; either I pick up weekend work while you are here with dc or you look for a much closer job, which you initially said you would, so that I can work weekdays and have some support midweek. Once you have decided which of these you would prefer, let me know. In the meantime I will look for bits and bobs I can do from home.

Who looks after the budget at home OP?

I found a bank job not too far away £16k a year. Customer service and IT skills needed, I can easily do that.

Job pays £1100 monthly after tax. Basic wrap around child care for a month is £600 for youngest three children (reduced rate for having fulltime care places)

Parking would be £8 per day city centre car park charge, so £160 a month

Leaving £320 to cover petrol, any reduction in child tax credit or loss of pip.

I need to find out about tax credit rates slide.

However on school holidays child care is £375 per week for three kids in holiday care or £1500 per month !