Am I the female equivalent of a cocklodger?

[Allwelcone]

I have 3 kids, 12, 14 and 15, with DH, and 1 from b4 who has left home. My "career" is crap due to time out for childcare, mutually agreed with dh.

I used to have a proper ft job before kids but since then and leaving London ive never worked ft and my salary has been dire, but I do only want to work for "jobs-with-meaning" so salary suffers. I went back to work as soon as youngest was in reception. I usually have worked 2.5-4 days a week.

I have a job interview tomorrow but the hours are miniscule (half time) and it's worrying DH as we are so overdrawn.

Now i have a 4-day pw charity job i do not enjoy at all, wrong skillset, chaotic managent, boss giving off signals that doesn't want me around (neg comments and I still havnt got passed probation for 9 months) so I do need to change.
But am I being lazy for not going ft? Am I being really inconsiderate? Dh hasn't said anything. I'm worried I'm being selfish. Our home could do with someone there, the kids need input and ferrying.

Whats my standing in the mumsnet arena?

You are being a princess. If your family is overdrawn, you need to suck it up and work full time in something that pays better. Even 20 years part time working for a non profit should have left you with some skills at 51… I can’t imagine being married to my spouse if that was his attitude. Of course we all want fulfilling jobs that pay well, but you have to pay the bills, which you are not.

Have you tried Civil service? or local Council?

Crikey, OP. I'm the same age as you, and no way would I have the mental or emotional capacity to look after three children still at school, never mind have any kind of job as well. Children between 11 and 16 are far harder work than toddlers. I am in awe.

If you're overdrawn, you dont have that luxury. Someone will fill the noble post but I think you k ow you need corporate now. You can bring corporate experience back to third sector and go for promotion.

Typically you have to compromise somewhere, whether that's hours, job or pay.

Meaningful jobs that are not well paid are a luxury your family cannot afford. You aren't a CL, but you have to face the realities.

Crikey, OP. I'm the same age as you, and no way would I have the mental or emotional capacity to look after three children still at school, never mind have any kind of job as well. Children between 11 and 16 are far harder work than toddlers. I am in awe.

Oh crumbs the 1950's have just phoned in.

Hate to break it to you, but here in 2023 quite a lot of us have taken off our pinnys and cracked on.

I don't think you have a choice OP. He's entitled to ask you to share the burden.
I completely get your desire to do meaningful work. I'm the same and there's a labour shortage in our sector so you should be able to find something that's a better fit without too much trouble. It'll be poorly paid though, so maybe its a choice between meaningful and FT or well paid and PT? Have you calculated how much you need to earn?
The other thing to have in place is an equal split of domestics. You're going to have to change the habits of a life time for him to stop leaving the lions share to you. So get that agreed in advance.
Oh, and a CL is usually only in the relationship for the material benefit and exploiting their partner. So, no.

I think that if the family is in financial difficulty then you can't afford the luxury of part time or vocation driven work, and you need to do what you can to increase your income.

So a full time/nearly Ft job in something like HR?

I’m same
as you.
while I love
working helping others, my skill set is now so limited to that I couldn’t get a higher paid job in corporate world though I’d like to as my finances
are
dire.

I don't have a 16yo yet, but an 11yo is clearly no where near as tricky to care for as a toddler - how could they possibly be?

It's perfectly possible to work full time with dc of any age - millions of families do it! Nice if you have the option not to, but if you have to work, you have to work.

I agree with this. Providing for your family's basic needs has to be a priority. You can't afford your principles.

Plenty of women work full time with children. Of course it is hard but it is better than debt.

There's lots of crossover between non-profits and corporates. I've done both and so have most of my colleagues. Needs must. When DCs were little, I moved into corporate consulting because I could earn more for less hours. I picked up work 'with meaning' when I had time and when the DCs were older.

I sympathise with the need to have someone available to ferry the DCs about, etc. But it would make more sense for you to get a part-time corporate job than two not-for-profit ones.

You are overdrawn. You can’t afford to work part time and cherry pick what jobs you want.

I think it's really hard to move into the professional world in middle age after decades spent child-wrangling, shouldering the mental load for the family and doing less demanding work that fits around it all. As a sector it's changed out of all recognition in the last 25-30 years and even job searches and applications can be totally incomprehensible if you haven't been learning the corpo-speak, before you even get anywhere near the jobs themselves. I think it's fantastically daunting and also might be a long old slog to convince anyone to employ you, even if you're smart and actually have lots of skills.

I also take the view that in doing part-time, non-corporate work but additionally picking up the overhead on teen-support, housework and all that, you're putting your husband in a position to be able to focus on his higher-earning work - in other words, every pound that he earns is partly earned by you too.

I think you're being really hard on yourself and although it's obvious that something needs to change if you're living off an overdraft, I think if you're suggesting things like not having a holiday and he's horrified, then he's as much a part of the problem as you. You're not suggesting he can't take any annual leave fgs, just not spend it on an expensive vacation.

So I think you probably both need to sit down and look at economies as well as realistic ways you could earn more. In your shoes, I would look less at the corporate sector and more at self-employed or entrepreneurial possibilities. I bet you have a shed load of transferable skills.

You need a reasonable balance. You are working and contributing financially so not a scrounger.

Honestly? If you need the money to keep the family afloat I think with dc of that age, you should be sharing the financial responsibility and looking for more hours or more pay.

I went full time when my youngest was 12. It’s not easy because teenagers are surprisingly needy but we managed.

I think you're assuming that you couldn't go corporate, but the corporate world is a massive one with lots of different companies.

I've worked for co-ops, building societies, and a weird trust thing. All of which paid better than the non profit I worked for.

But actually all had better cultures and made more of a difference, because their management and direction was better. So I've found it better paid and more fulfilling - I know not all charities are like that, but if you don't love where you are, a move to be more corporate might work. ESG is a huge buzzword right now, and lots of companies have charitable partners and community programs.

Another this

I’m 3 weeks into a new full time job after working part time for years (which I loved). I had a HUGE wobble about how I was going to manage (I also have 3 DC same sort of ages as OP). But DH assured me he’d pick up the slack and we’d split housework etc…so far so good!

It has been a big adjustment (I miss my days off) but the job is going well and I’m earning decent money (at least twice as much as before plus increased pension contributions) which feels amazing. It will really make the difference to our lives and for me that was the deciding factor in taking the job. The DC haven’t really missed me being about as much!

I’m a similar age to you OP as well so know how scary it feels to change jobs, but if you’re miserable at work it’s no fun. You could always approach agencies and see what they have on offer?

Oh fgs, go away with your silly 1950s cliche. Are you going to ask me if I'm on glue next?

I found that once I got to peri-menopause and beyond that my 'nurturing' hormones went away. I am now entirely selfish, but have that luxury as my DC are adults and are utterly delightful but I am no longer in the trenches of teenage dramas.

But if you want to talk about the 1950s, then while they were generally pretty shit, at least women weren't expected to do all the child-stuff as well as having a f/t job in their sodding 50s. When do women ever actually get a break?

Sorry but I do think you are being a bit. By the sounds of things your marriage cannot afford you just limiting yourself with jobs with meaning and limited hours. Sorry but you need to grow up and start living in the real world

You have older kids, yes it would be ideal to have someone at home but clearly not viable in your family situation and maybe your kids may have to start walking to activities/public transport or drop activities. You nèed to step up to the plate a bit.

Agree with "if you have to work, you have to work". But if it's not absolutely clear-cut, then don't work.

Actually 11 yr olds are mostly fine. But I found the teenage years really hard. One of my DC was a horrendous toddler and was a dream teenager. My others were horrendous teenagers. They are just like toddlers and need you just as much, but they are less portable and they don't go to bed at 6.30 (or they do, but it's 6.30AM and they've woken you up by trying to set the house on fire by "cooking" while drunk).

I can’t afford to go back to work until DS finishes school because of the ridiculous long holidays and lack of holiday clubs around here in rural Ireland and we have 11 weeks summer holidays just for starters.

We live rurally and lots of friends are farmers so there’s usually someone at home with older kids working on the farm once they’re at secondary school.

DS has a mild disability that means leaving him at home alone for 6+ hrs a day isn’t feasible.

Agree! How would you feel @Allwelcone if your dh wanted to give up his job and do one with much less pay but he enjoyed better?