Working peeves … Can women have it all?

[Roxyoc]

I have two young children aged 1 and 3 . I got made redundant from a client facing job I loved and found an internal support role with the same company . The team are very nice people, it’s quite flexible in terms of number of days in the office which is 1-2 days and my boss is great.

I miss the technical client work so have been looking externally and got called for a final round interview with a rival company for a client facing role. The catch is I would need to be in the office 3 to 4 days per week compared to the 2 days now. It would be a more interesting role with better pay and career prospects but I would not be home as much in the morning /evening as the hours would be longer. I feel really torn as spent years at university and doing professional exams to get to where I am now. . Can we have it all?

I don’t feel like we can .and I am considering withdrawing from the final interview. My friends think it’s right role wrong time and that my children are too young so I should stick with the support role that gives me much more flexibility to work from home , put my kids to bed and log in when needed in the evening . Interested to hear people’s experience?

And it depends on your career but it's not easy to say "let your husband pick up 50%" when he also works flexibly, already does pick up and drop off etc. Fact is, some careers are more than 7am-7pm, and even with a husband doing 50% of the load, it's still not possible.

You can do this. Take the better job/pay. Things will settle over time and you will find a balance. Make a rota between you and your DH for pickup and drop off. Time is both quality and quantity - you can do lesser but better quality with the kids. And if it turns out to be impossible you can always move to a more comfortable option 8-12 months down the line - but it would be with a better pay/role so this would've been a stepping stone.

Ofcourse your DH wants you to stay flexible - that serves him well. It's time to split your home chores and childcare 50-50 and in the short term throw money at problems - nanny/babbysitter - whatever it takes to get things going until you find your balance.

Life is about compromises.

If you make a choice to have children, then they need parenting, which means one or both of you need to take on this role and one or both careers being compromised for a decade or so.

You need to have the discussion with your DH about advancing your career and whether it is then feasible for him to step up more with the parenting role.

My DH works full time so I found teaching full time with kids almost impossible - I kept feeling like I was failing at both parenting and teaching. I now teach 3 days a week so have a really good work/life/parenting balance. My DH can finish early on a Friday so takes over the childcare so I can stay late and get some work done.

I personally stayed in more flexible, less stressful job at this stage. Once both kids started school, I started leaning in more and going for higher positions. It’s only a few years in a long career after all.

While I don't disagree with the need for compromise, did it have to be you? Why isn't your DH saying, "As Ratatouille's job is so full-on, I dropped down to PT" ?

That's the issue here - it's almost always women compromising around men, and rarely the other way round.

(I'm sure you'll say "Because earning capacity is greater" which of course begs the question of why that is.)

Completely agree with this.

My DH and I worked together to support each other in our careers and parenting.

You can do both. If you work together and share the load.

And ignore or ditch the unsupportive friends.

Go for the role and see what you can negotiate. Would 3 long days in the office be possible? What would the commute look like? Will dh pick up the slack on your office days? Would you be ok with not seeing the kids for 3 days your in the office if long days with a commute?

Having it all is a dated phrase from the 90s. See the x/twitter "man who has it all". You will realise that when you apply to a man instead of woman it stops making sense. See also "career woman" and any traditionally male career with female qualifier "lady doctor/fireman/builder etc"

So if you are asking if you can have a good job and a family the answer is yes and you absolutely should.

Of course women can have careers and children. I agree with pp about thinking about the long term because they won't be 3 and 1 forever.

Maybe also see if your husband can flex some hours too. Why should it only be you who makes some sacrifices?

I have a career I also have children as a single parent. You can have it all to a point but I don't think it's sustainable. Some days I feel i have my shit together as a mum and an employee and other days I definitely don't. There is a constant nagging guilt at the back of my mind that I'm letting someone down - my boss or my kids sometimes both at the same time. It's the consistency - I don't think you can consistently have it all.

I agree with your friends. Now is not the right time to give up the flexibility of working from home if you need to.

I agree. I could get paid much more if I was prepared to work from the office but for me working from home is priceless.

You can only ‘have it all’ with a supportive partner who totally pulls their weight.

Hmm, why does he think that? Genuine question

I think it would be much more of a dilemma if you currently worked every day from home and then had to go into the office full time for the new job. If it's an increase from 2 office days to 3 (negotiate for this since you said 3-4 days, if they want you, this is the time to set your deal-breakers/terms) then you'd still have 4 days a week with your children. No one would ever think that too little for a man so why does a woman have to feel guilt?

Of course only you know what matters most to you, but reading between the lines, it really sounds like you'd like to take the new job if offered it and why not? It's ok to have ambition, it's ok to want/seek more job satisfaction and it's ok to put yourself first occasionally.

Because his job is not able to be part time. Any request would be refused.

I used to do the same job and decided to change career.

If it was my DH who had switched to teaching and me that stayed in engineering then it would be him going part time.

Im in a very similar position. Currently internal non client facing which is paid pretty well, low stress but I find very dull! I was recently offered a more interesting / more money and probably better prospects in long run. However they wanted me in 3 -4 days a week at a minimum whereas I currently have complete flexibility over where I work. This would have meant much longer days when factoring in commute. I decided logistically it was going to be too much of a pain and I’d rather have the lower stress, flexible job whilst they are young. I hope if I want to I would be able to make the move back to client facing in the future as like you, I miss the techical work but just don’t feel it’s the right time for my family at mo. There’s no right or wrong answer and I think perhaps I had better support and a husband in a more flexible role my decision may have been different but for now I’m focusing on being grateful for the benefits of my current role and more time with kids.

I've thought more since my first post and thinks it comes down to this. My husband is the only dad on the schools WhatsApp group with reminders about what's going on when. Plenty of dads do pick up but he's the only one I'm aware of who books extra-curricular clubs, fills in the school trip forms and has his name and contact number on the party invitations. It's astounding in 2024 that this is the case. We've been to soooo many children's parties and on not one single invitation has there been the dad's phone number for RSVPs. This is in an area where many women work in professional jobs. So much of it comes down to the roles you are each willing to play as parents.

If you wanted to take the new role, how would your husband support you. In our case, it was definitely my choice go work part time but also my husband's earning potential was multiples of mine and he needed to put the hours in to realise that potential. When you are a family, I don't think it is possible that both parents work long hours because inevitably the kids will end up being brought up by someone else