That two parents working doesn’t work

[Itsmyshadow]

We have 3 DCs aged 8, 4 and 1. DH works full time. I have recently returned from mat leave doing 4 days per week. On my day off I have DC4 and DC1 at home and a large part of that is taken up with swimming lessons.

I feel like I’m failing at everything to be honest. House is a state, am not on top of my work, kids in nursery and after school club for long hours, and don’t even get me started on the amount of after school sporting activities DC1 does which don’t really fit with going to work.

DH is a great dad, does his fair share with the kids, does 50% of the school / nursery runs, and most of DC1’s after school sporting stuff (whilst I have the younger two). He could pull his weight a bit more with the housework but gets off his bottom when I huff and puff / nag, and does all of the DIY and garden. Like most women I carry the mental load, doing all the school, nursery, medical admin etc.

I feel like I need to do a real half arsed job of my work on my wfh days to keep on top of the washing / house / kid admin / kid homework (saw a thread on here the other day about that), but workload / conscience won’t let me do that, and that doesn’t solve for the fact that DC1 has football at 5:30 on a Tuesday or hockey at 6pm on a Wednesday and if I finish at 5pm and I’m in the office, those timings don’t work.

We have a cleaner and a robot vacuum, but I still can’t keep on top of all the crap all around the house (paintings from nursery, party bag loot, paper admin that needs addressing, magazines etc), and feel like the kids get given toys / grow out of clothes much faster than I can get sort through the old ones. Result is a massive mess of a playroom that I keep getting half through sorting before the kids mess it up again and there’s nowhere for everything to go.

Don’t talk to me about TOMM or similar. I’m not lacking motivation or direction. I spend hours per week washing and putting away clothes, batch cooking, sorting through piles of stuff, firefighting cleaning tasks (usually when something mouldy is discovered or someone has spilt something somewhere), but no sooner is something done it’s a complete mess again.

So those of you who work a lot of hours and have young kids. How are you managing? Do you spend hours every evening cooking and cleaning (how do you find the energy if so?), and how to you manage the demands of kids after school activities / social lives?

How should lone parents manage then? How would they provide for their children if kids should have one parent not working? It's tiring of course, but you have two people to split earning and caring between, so 48 hours per day to do what a lone parent needs to do in 24.

Parenting is exhausting, expensive and a lot of juggling and means little time to yourself though, I agree.

I have a 2 year old and a 6 month old and none of our naps are scheduled. We just go with the flow of when they're tired.
I know lots of people prefer structure but it just doesn't work for us.
Would be difficult they were in nursery though and I can imagine they would become more structured as they would have more precise wake ups and bedtimes

Scheduled naps? Bizarre. Never did that with DS, I just let him nap when he wanted to as long as it wasn't too close to bedtime.

Lone parents are meant to do everything and not complain or else they're LAZY. Work full time, do all the housework, 100% of the childcare, nobody to help out at all. SAHMs with husbands are hard workers and get sympathy, a SAHM who is a lone parent is a LAZY BENEFIT SCROUNGER.

Mine needs the structure. Without it, he'd get over tired and grumpy and his sleep would actually get worse.

A schedule works really well with him.

What's the issue with scheduled naps?

My kids napped nicely at nursery.

At home they monkeyed about, wouldn't sleep or wanted me to lie down with them for ages and ages, or just kept going , refusing to sleep and running round like the Energizer Bunny until they were really really overtired and screeching and hysterical. Then they'd fall asleep at literally the worst and most inconvenient time.

They seemed happier and calmer at nursery.

Kids like routine, they like to know what’s coming next, and that a natural series of events will take place. I’m not opposed to some freelance parenting not when it came to sleeping and eating. Nursery definitely got that right.

Lone parents are meant to do everything and not complain or else they're LAZY. Work full time, do all the housework, 100% of the childcare, nobody to help out at all. SAHMs with husbands are hard workers and get sympathy, a SAHM who is a lone parent is a LAZY BENEFIT SCROUNGER.

Yes @Beezknees , my apologies, I forgot my place. And if you DO work and support your own children with no state support as a lone parent then you are milked like a dairy cow and taxed MORE than a household with two parents and the same household income. But we should shut up and suck it up, feckless mothers doing everything who should have just used their crystal balls to choose a better husband. 🤦🏻‍♀️🙄

I would say as well all the families I know in my friendship group, both parents work and the men are just as likely to be part time or compressed as the women which I think is great. A few have shared their parental leave as well.

I really do think there are lots of benefits to 2 part time parents compared to 1 full time and one SAHP if it’s an option, both parents have financial security, both are in jobs with option to ask to go back up to full time when kids are older, skills and CPD are kept up, pensions, paid annual leave, sick leave and special leave for both as well as the right to unpaid parental leave, assuming a heterosexual couple kids see both men and women in working and caring and housekeeping roles, workplaces see both men and women as likely to need flexibility for their families, dads get to spend more valuable time with their kids and see them grow up and their milestones, men will value childcare and housekeeping more when they are having to do it, plus a lot of benefits like child benefit and tax free childcare are set up that you won’t get them if there’s one very high earner so it’s better to have two lower earners.

Of course I do recognise that unfortunately lone parents don’t have that option.

@PurpleButterflyWings what is your opinion on single mums claiming benefits to enable part time working? So many people say mums should be at home, but only if they're nice middle class and married.

I was on a thread here years ago that a single mum started, she agonising over whether to work or not with a toddler. A married SAHM had the cheek to come onto to the thread to tell her that she should work for her own self respect. I, a full time working single mum, told the married SAHM that she should also go to work for her own self respect. It didn't go down well?

Just saying if I saw a lone parent who wasn’t working I wouldn’t give a shit, and I think most people I know as the same. I was a sahm for nine years and when I went back to work I got congratulated like it was the best thing I could have done but in the same breath told it would be tough on the kids but good for them. When, a few years later I considered leaving (my mum was having trouble, my db wasn’t in a great place (he has as) and two of my sons had constant ear infections and what with doctor and hospital appointments and me trying to get to my mum when I had a chance both myself and dh were constantly in trouble with work, both fighting, both wrecked, also house was falling apart) I got horrible horrible comments- basically your poor dh, had a bit of help with the bills now you’re going back to being a lady of leisure etc etc. I stayed on in work but honestly it taught me a lot. People who make comments are not in your situation, will never ever know your struggles and will moan and bitch about something else if you give in to their opinions!!

To be fair this was where sure Staf was absolutely brilliant because so many of the not middle class married Mums that we stay at home mum’s on benefit were neither use nor ornament to the children. And many of them were actually a hindrance to the kids development. Being such a pushchair and given a Greggs sausage roll, whilst being wheeled around all day vs in a stimulating nursery environment is a complete no brainer. Not all stay at home Mum’s are created equally.

What a gross stereotype.

An accurate one though

You are right. Some SAHM's aren't great at it.

Including some middle class ones. Society just makes it easier for those with money to hide it.

100%

None of the people who bang on about the evils of “farming out” your kids appear to have given this a minute’s thought.

Dont you understand there’s always a man breadwinning and the mum is play acting at having a job because she wants to wear a suit with big shoulderpads or buy expensive shoes?

It’s apparently beyond these people’s comprehension that some of us actually need to work.

@3BSHKATS I'm talking about working single mums though, who may still need benefits due to not earning enough if they don't work full time (or even if they do). So many people say mums should work part time or not at all but then berate them for not being financially independent.

It’s hard! I would suggest cutting out some of the clubs, they don’t need them. Swimming is important but the others can go! . Can they not swim another time so you at least get one day at home to do the chores? It’s a mums job to feel guilty, you are not alone - the kids still grow up fine 😊

As a single mother who has 3 children I find it laughable that this is the debate around benefits.

I used my education and worked my ass off to get myself in a position where I can earn enough. I’m earning a lot more than £300k a year and with the ridiculous taxation and overly generous benefits system I’m paying way more than my fair share if I live in the UK. I’ve been offered senior leadership roles but declined.

In the real world there are many many families working 50 hours a week each and they have childcare and help running their home as a standard basic function of living. It gives a job to someone who can’t work long hours or doesn’t have the education.

The UK economy is absolutely stuffed if people are not willing to work 40-45 hours a week. The main reason why people aren’t willing or able to work more hours is because the benefits system penalizes those who do. It’s a very silly system. There needs to be a whole recalibration of benefits and income taxes on lower wage earners.

And won’t need benefits as pensioners either.

@Aintnosupermum you are a super mum earning ‘a lot more’ more than 300k without even being in a senior leadership role. Wow.

Wage top ups are entirely different from benefits imo. Thats what they should be called, businesses subsidise not universal credits to the employees. Business should be made to claim and implement them and all the paperwork and over payment processing falls to the business, its not the employees problem but its made their problem by the stupid ass government.