Working mothers can't have it all?

[Unicornhat]

I've never been ruthlessly ambitious but have always worked hard and been in pretty senior roles since my mid 20s. I'm currently in a snr manager role in a large company and earn a really good salary with perks etc. I feel like I kind of fell into this role - I've never consciously decided this is where I've wanted my career to be, I was approached about the job and here we are.
I now have an almost 2 year old and I hope to have another.
I'm finding the balance really difficult. I have so much less interest in my job and I'm fed up of it taking up so much headspace outside of the office, and I'm fed up of being the manager. It's a role where you're creative and always coming up with more and more new ideas. The workload is intense I always feel I'm letting someone down.
Realistically, for me to get a part time job, or even one that gives you an opportunity for a proper lunch break and to leave on time, would mean a massive pay cut. Also, if I step back for a while I'm concerned I wouldn't get back into a senior role and salary for a v long time.
Am I just crap at managing things, or is it possible to hold down a good career and have young children? Has anyone given up a job like this and then regretted it? Have you struggled financially?
My sister and in laws keep telling me to get an easier job but it's not that simple!

@124scones

You're welcome

If only I could charge a fee

I also wrote about wishing I could have the big career and make more money!

I also don't regret anytime away from them. I just dont want to spend more time away than I currently do. As I said previously, I also prioritise time with just my husband and friends away from my children for me this is a really important part of my life. I prioritise this time and these relationships over working more too.

I think priorities and focus changes after you have kids. I never used to mind my job but now I hate it with a passion, I hate thinking about it and the fact it takes me away from the children. I think once you become a mother, your headspace is filled with your children so it's difficult to juggle all things. That's just my perspective

@Unicornhat God, I don't envy you.

When my first child was born, I was already wondering how the fuck I could possibly do a proper job at work and a proper job at home. DC2 was the nail in the coffin. I used to think I'd have to clone myself to do both things properly. So I resigned from the job.

I loved every single minute of being a SAHM and didn't regret ditching the career (clue is in the username) for a second.

However, when I got divorced 20 years later and was completely unemployable, I sort of wished I'd found a way to keep my hand in with work. Though at the same time, I'd have hated every single second I didn't spend with the DC when they were little.

The short version is that there's no entirely satisfactory answer for women.

On balance, I'd still spend every waking minute with my children when they were small, even though I'm slightly fucked now that they are adults. It's a shame that we have to make that calculation, but there's no way round it unless men start giving birth (which I wouldn't want them to do, as it's a woman's job and about the only thing that men can't encroach on).

@3WildOnes

Not as much.

Anyway we clearly don't agree on the definition of having it all.

Yours is having the impossible

Mine isn't

I work in clinical practice for the NHS covering 12 shifts, including weekends and bank holidays. And the only way I could do it was to hire a nanny but she only worked until 6.30, mon-Friday. My husband did all the rest.

The only problem with that is the cost. We live in SW London and although we didn't have a mortgage it was still very expensive. But after 4 "A" levels, University and hard years of training, placements, exams, and being shouted at, just looking after a small infant wasn't for me.

The other issues were guilt, having to leave them in their PJ's waving to me at the window as I started my third nightshift in a Major Trauma Unit. Missing out on quite a lot of their childhood - lots of photos with either my husband, nanny, or MIL, very few with me and the kids. Kids being just as close to my nanny, closer in some respect. Finding cover when the nanny is off altho you try and coordinate holidays.

Finally, I couldn't have done it without my husband and MIL's unfailing support and enthusiasm. There are Nichola Horlick's out there, but how they do it is a mystery. I know I couldn't with my job, not and three kids.

Possible yes, tricky yes, would definitely need lots of help.
I’m not a high earner but work in a high stress intense sector, two kids one 2 one 7. Husband works part time so that I can work full time- that’s how we make it work. Oh and the house is a permanent shit tip.

I think until the kids are 5 it’s survival

I don’t think men or women unless they are incredibly lucky can ‘have it all’. There will always be compromises and often demanding jobs will compromise how present you can be with children. I find it hard to get everything in during the evening. I pick up at 6 and will rarely have finished bedtime
before 8.30. Those 21/2 hours are very child focused and I am quite jealous of people who finish at 3 and have a bit more time to chill out, sort out clubs etc. the thing I feel I’m missing is time for me.

My husband works very long hours and is excelling career-wise but is in a high stress role and I think his relationship with me and the children has suffered as a result. In the short term our lives would be easier if I became a sahm but we’ve only got one year before my youngest goes to school and it feels like we’ve battled through the hardest years and I don’t want to give up all I’ve worked for career wise.

In no senior role do you get in at 5.30.... more likely 6.30 or 7pm.
So even with teens, that means you don't see them much, and for younger children you are not there to supervise the homework, help them with reading or things they don't understand, watch the swimming lessons (let alone take them there), etc etc.

@CocoC

In my senior role (if I was doing my normal hours which I'm not at the moment ) 2 days I finish at 6 and 2 days at 4.

Plenty time for homework and clubs

Yeah I don’t think there’s many in senior roles that are clocking off at 4pm
every day to spend 4.5 hours with their children. Those 4-8pm hours can be the busiest; homework, dinner, ferrying around to various clubs.

The question is how many hours is enough - if you get home at 6/6.30 earliest. And the kids go to bed at 7.30/8 How do you fit everything in? And then get some downtime for you? Or exercising or socialising. I never thought it stacked up.. Hence I don’t want to do a full time role and all the compromise and juggling and pressure on my time that that would involve.

@CocoC
One of my roles was a global region/multinational role where I had my time zone to +4. So I worked in the office from 6am to 4pm. But I agree in principle that you either see the DC in the morning or the afternoon, but not both. Exercise was at lunch, and then you eat on the go.

This.

Depends massively on the age of the kids. DS goes to Beavers, which I help out at. He goes to Gymnastics which we travel to and from together so it's literally just an hour he's away from me and he does one late day at school but it's 45 minutes. He doesn't play out in the Street with his mates because he's 7 and there's only one of his mates on our estate. So yes, I see him from 7-8.45 then 3. 15-8 every night bar 1 hour 45 minutes. I'd say that's pretty typical at that age. Obv changes once they have more independence.
But that's our compromise which was a necessity not a choice that I no longer have a career and we have less money.

Everyone has different ideas to what “having it all” means.

To career driven parents I imagine a high flying job with many house, lots of stress but a big pay packet is part of “having it all” whereas for other parents that world be a nightmare scenario.

I’ve taken a step back from my career over the last 8 years since having my first child and have no regrets.

I have an amazing husband and that’s part of my “having it all”.

I would love a tidier and cleaner house, which I could have if I had the motivation to do it, but I don’t. When I worked full time we had a cleaner but I’m not sure I could justify that now I only work part time 😂

Ive been offered more hours at work which I’m considering taking on (as my youngest has just started school) but it would mean another evening away from the children and I’m not sure if I want to do that’s.

My perfect “having it all” scenario would also involve me not having any health problems and include me having lots of cats. None of those things are going to happen though.

Nobody can have their perfect ideal scenario…..as many posters have said before, something always has to give.

It's nice to hear you are owning it and admitting you have lost out Many people on here are in denial and also trying to convince others they can work full time and not miss a thing. Sorry but that's impossible

Get a job share partner.

@SleepingStandingUp

Thats not an ideal most people are striving for. To almost never be apart from their children.

Most people I know kids spend time with friends, other family.

Does their dad ever get a look in? Or is it ok for him to 'barely' see them as long as they're bringing in the money?

@DreamToNightmare

I have my perfect ideal.

🤷‍♀️

@outtheshowernow

I'm not in denial. I dont feel I've missed out on anything.

Even if I was id be ok with that because having a career is important and in no way equates to neglect or harm for children.

Then you are in a position that is far, far more fortunate than a lot of other people out there.

Perhaps, rather than enjoying gloating about it throughout the thread, you should show some humility and be thankful you have your ideal life when so many of us don’t and may never do.

@EmptyHouse0822

I'm not gloating.

But im also not going to deny my existence or quietly accept the sexist notion that women can't have it all because they shouldn't want to be apart from their children and if they are it means they are 'sacrificing' having it all.

That really they should just be happy at home. That's the all they should want.

Fuck that

And I'm really not the fortunate. The vast majority men manage it just fine. No one thinks they are extremely fortunate.

It's possible to have a senior role and do a 35-40 hour week. I also WFH quite a lot, which means I turn computer off at about 5.15 and am, within seconds, in the midst of family life. Yes, sometimes I have a late finish to meet a deadline or travel for work, and occasionally do overnights for work - TBH it's blissful having the opportunity to have a hotel room on my own.

I don't feel like I'm missing out on things. I've previously worked part-time and picked up directly from school at 3pm two days a week. It just seemed to involve standing in a cold muddy park with a whingy child, then coming home, finding snacks and putting the TV on. DD's school doesn't set homework so only reading books to do, which is easy enough everyday. I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything by rarely doing the school pickup.

I was miserable on maternity leave for a year - severe PND and bored out of my mind. I came off antidepressants when I went back to work and, with hindsight, regret not going back to work earlier but there is so much pressure to take the full year because you're missing out on so much when they're tiny . I so wanted to punch people who said that to me that year!

We also found that, as we don't have any family support, paid childcare staff became the 'village' we needed to have other trusted adults in DD's life, provide support for us etc.

We’ll have to agree to disagree about the gloating.

Amonsgt all your messages I haven’t seen how old your children are so I don’t know whether they are in a nursery or in schools and how you manage drop-offs, pick-ups and evening times etc alongside your work, but you must be able to see that not every family can work the same way yours does?

I mentioned at the start of the thread that I could increase my hours and how the extra money would be lovely would but that I won’t do it beciase I don’t want to be away from my children anymore than I am.

If I could work full time and still take my children to school and pick them up and spend many hours in the evening with them before bed then it would be perfect, but that situation will never exist. I can’t have it all so I just choose what matters the most to me at this point at time.

How about thinking about something other than what YOU want. Given a choice would an under five pick to be at home with a parent or stuck in a nursery For the first five years the needs of the child should come first mum or dad it doesn't matter but one of them should make a sacrifice