Raising kids, successful careers and pursuing hobbies, how?

[ponder1ng]

I have a 6 month old. With a commute I work 8-6. Husband works longer hours and earns more. Ideally I don't want my child to be in nursery/school breakfast and after school clubs. I want to be there to drop and collect them and take them to the park etc. If they stay after school, by the time I've collected them it will be time for dinner and bed. Is this the norm? And then when do you fit in time to pursue your hobbies and everything else that life demands? We can survive on just husbands salary but I don't want to give up my job if I don't have to. I don't have a thriving career but was planning to work my way up, although I imagine this is probably the worst timing having just had a child

You can't have everything at the same time. Unless you've got to a point where you're senior enough to pick and choose your hours, having some semblance of a career is going to require some childcare.

I finish early 2 days for the school run, DH is full time but one day he starts early and finishes early. There are days where they come home, have tea and go straight to bed but not every day.

We share the morning drop off. If you are determined to do everything yourself or your DH cannot/will not make any compromise to their hours then it will be difficult to also work your way up career wise.

In reality a lot of women move to part-time working in order to make this work, or both partners work part-time.

I only work part-time and both my children are at primary school, but many evenings and weekends tend are taken up with ferrying them to activities, sports fixtures and parties. It's quite difficult to fit in time for my hobbies as well.

I worked part time to keep my career and have some time to do the things with my kids. I have done varieties of 3 longer days, 3.5 days spread over 4 and 4 days. It’s been hard to juggle things and make compromises and sometimes feel like you’d allocated your time in a way which impacted your children. They’re now 11 and 7 and I’m pleased I did this as getting back into having a job at this stage having had so long out would have been difficult and stressful. I’ve actually planned it so I can work fewer hours for the teen years and be around a bit more. Whatever choice you make you will probably always wonder what if, so my advice would be weigh up with your OH what you want, and then stick to it.

If you're both tied up with work from 7:30/8 until 6 or later then you will need to use breakfast/ after school clubs or whatever wraparound care is available. Yes this is the norm. It's what we did and all my friends/ colleagues who carried on with 2 full time working parents.

Realistically the adults' hobbies take a back seat for a few years, unless you have the kind of hobbies where you can involve/integrate your kids. But even then it will change how you engage with those hobbies. Best to adjust your expectations on that front so you don't feel to frustrated as time goes on

The other thing I was told which I benefited from was that where there are nurseries available - juggling the two is relatively easy. Moving from this to 8:50-3:10 school days and 14 weeks of school holidays to manage becomes much trickier. I know people who had to have a career break to navigate this part to get the right support in place. If you have a child with additional needs which require extra support this is ever more difficult. So factor getting wrap around care/ childminder into the mix early, and make sure your choice of school enables all of this to work seamlessly. It’s doable but a lot of work behind the scenes.

It is a massive adjustment. No one finds it easy. Build support networks IRL so you can get things in perspective. It's definitely not just you

I have (largely) sacrificed hobbies in order to prioritise the other two .

I do a decent chunk of my work in the evenings so that I can be around for the kids before and after school. This is at the expense of having really any time to myself but feels worth it as my career has gone from strength to strength since I had my first child.

Any flexibility to work from home for you / DH / both?

I went back full time with DC1 but one day wfh. Then had dc2 2 years later and went back 22 hours over 4 days. DP did school / nursery drop and pick up 1 x week and later 2 x week as was able to wfh.

Don't give up your career but it may take longer to advance.

Hobbies - I run, cycle and do yoga . Going to a class once a week was non negotiable and so was a weekend morning run. I also tried to build exercise into daily life as much as possible. If your hobby is amdram 3 x week that would be harder, but you shouldn't be putting your career on hold AND not having any free time to pursue hobbies.

Depending how fast you want to progress in your career you and your dh could drop some hours, put in a flexible working request for fewer hours or some home working, compress hours so whatever you need to do to make it work.

Unfortunately reducing hours will likely have a negative impact on your short-medium term options, it absolutely shouldn't but a lot of employers see it as a negative (which is a huge conversation I won't get into detail about here).

Hobby/social life, this is where your dh comes i again, if one of you wants to go out and do something alone the other has the baby (in the absence of a baby sitter/grandparent). It's a balance you have to find of how to split your time and it can take a while to get right but you'll find what works for you.

Personally, both me and dh have very flexible employees. I have flexitime and can work whatever and whenever I need/want to and DHs employer don't have a flexitime policy but really don't mind what he does while his output is where it needs to be. We do things for ourselves whenever we can, around dcs dancing/swimming/rainbows/play dates/sports. Regular hobbies are on the back burner for now but we both manage to do something every week or two.

It’s tough and is getting easier as my dc get older. I work 0.9 and pick up two nights a week from school, husband does similar, breakfast club every day which they love. I run x2 a week which as a poster said above is non negotiable to me but most other things I’ve adjusted my expectations on. I’m def less career focussed than I was and I am the higher earner (but not by much) so it’s a pretty even split. It does get easier

I work part time and it's the best of both worlds for me. My DC are at secondary now, but when they were at primary I could pick them up two days a week. I have had to accept less career progression though.

You accept that they are perfectly happy in wrap around childcare, you pay a cleaner and someone to do the ironing and you don’t ever sit down until 10oclock at night.
Happiest time of my life, but its hard work and you have to be organised.

DH does his bit. Makes breakfast. Packed lunch. Does the laundry. Batch cooks.
He works from home one day a week and used to pick up early from daycare and then work at night. He earns three times what I do but sees his career as being entirely as valuable as mine. For a brief period he even worked four days a week so I could focus on my career. We took a small financial hit but he rightly pointed out that it would be worth it in the long run. (It was). Having a supportive partner who doesn’t think their life/career/hobbies is more important is critical.

I did the same.
Sacrificed most hobbies. We don’t have a lot of couple time. We are ok with that when the kids are young- this is something we have talked about. Again we have known each other since we were out of our teens so there is a long history of friendship/partnership before our marriage.
Being ridiculously organised especially on weekends and doing all the family/life admin promptly. Having DH taken on some of the school/daycare related admin like who is wearing what for Halloween (we are in the US).
Keeping the weekends as free of extra curricular activities as possible.
Housework- little and often. The kids tidy up their rooms before bedtime and help to tidy up downstairs with us. We run a small load of laundry daily. We also have a cleaner who comes once a week. To be fair if you and the kids are out of the house then the house isn’t getting too dirty.

You both need to actively engage if you want a balanced life.

DS does before and after school twice a week. That allows me to work 7.30am to 5.30pm on those days, getting in a good chunk of hours. DH does the early pick up once and I do it twice (because not much is happening in my role at 3pm on a Friday afternoon)

This means we both do our 37.5 hours a week, are visible in the company, but get evenings to do hobbies/gym/see friends/work extra where needed.

But this is only possible because we don't see eithers job as more important (even though I earn more...)

I did the same as in picked up early from daycare one day a week. So only three long days- Monday/Wednesday/Thursday. This felt more doable.

Also accepting you will be a bit tired and frazzled and your standards will drop a bit. That’s key.

Unless you get in help, like cleaners, chefs, nanny's etc or invent a time machine, yep, you can't have everything. Babies take up a ton of time and you miss out on things you used to do, you'll get to do stuff, but not as frequently. Gets better when they get older and start becoming a bit more independent though, but you've got like another 8-9 years before that happens, and still then you'll probably be taking them to their hobbies more than you go to yours. Maybe more like when they are teenagers really, when they don't need looked after as much.

People are going to come on and say you can have it all and you just need to work harder etc but the reality is no you can't have it all, only a minority can. The majority either work part time, not at all or use childcare. They also give up their hobbies for the most part, like I say they get to do them, just not as frequently. People lie to women too much about having kids. The above is most likely going to be the reality.

Can you work less days?

I’m going back 3 days but working long days - 10 hours -8-6!

Those days my husband drops off at nursery at 8 - then will finish work at 5 to collect her! He will do dinner, bath, bed!

Then the other 2 days I’ve got her.

Time for ourselves in the evening after she’s in bed / weekends we can tag team it and take turns with hobbies etc !!

I think you just accept that we have to miss out on certain things and being permanently exhausted.

I work a 9 day fortnight so I can pick up from school 1 day in 10.
I do quite a few drop offs because the school is close to the office and I launch my child through the door!

After school clubs are dealt with by grandparents… I sign her up and they take her.

I love my job and earn a good salary which means when I do have time off we can do things (although she prefers pj day).
It also means I can pay someone to cut the grass and do the ironing. If I could justify a cleaner every week I would.

It’s hard and I often wonder if I’ve missed out on things but at the same time my kids are growing up thinking that work is the only option in life.

My observation is that men can do all of the above if they have a wife. Or even an ex-wife.

Are you back at work yet @ponder1ng or are you thinking about how to manage it?

My kids are nearly 7 and 3.5
I work F/T. It’s v senior which means responsibility and sometimes stress but also flexibility as I manage my own time to a large extent.

Since I had my first child I’ve done all sorts of combos - 3x short days, 4 short days, 3 full days, 4 full days. F/T with fixed WFH days. I’m now F/T but WFH whenever I like this makes life easier.

Home, school, crèche and work are within a 15 min drive of each other which helps. We have a part time nanny and a cleaner. DH has a similar level job and does 1 school pick up and I do 1.

I have no hobbies - I started running as it was the easiest to get some time to myself - and I hardly ever see my friends!

I worked p/t and hobbies waited til kids were older.

There are 24 hours in the day. You can fill them with work, sleep, kids and hobbies. So clearly if you want to see your kids more, then work and/or hobby time goes down. No-one works full time, doesn't use childcare and spends time on hobbies.

Why doesn't your husband want to be there to drop and collect them or take them to the park?

It's too hard to juggle everything & I don't work f/t & DH can wfh.
We prioritise kids, each other, work, extended family, friends & unfortunately hobbies/exercise is at the bottom of the pile but it's not forever.

You can't have it all right now.

I've flexed my working hours so I do 4 days a week but in a way that means I wfh 2 days, and have 1 day off, so I do 3 school pick ups. This enables me to keep my career going, once my children are a bit older, I can step up the pace again. We have 45 years to work, I will still have 25 of them left when the kids are in junior school.

We fit in swimming lessons after school one day and will add piano lessons.

My own hobbies I have less time for but I do fit things in in the evenings.