To want to work as little as possible?

[Mumofboys37]

Hi all,

Ive got 3 young DC (7, 5 and 4) and have always been the breadwinner by a long way. Because of a recent payrise my husband and I now earn similar amounts - in the region of £50k each.

I reduced my hours recently to a 4 day week and it’s changed my life but now I’m craving even more time off!! We could definitely affford for me to reduce to 3 days whilst still being comfortable but we have some debts that would then take longer to clear. Also my youngest starts school in September and I feel like I’ll be judged for having 2 days “off” every week whilst they’re there.

I use my day off now to sort the house out, walk our dog and have some down time - AIBU to want to give myself this time? Has anybody been in a similar situation? I feel like now the holidays are here I’m appreciating the child free time I’ve been getting whilst all the kids are at school/preschool!

Also - if you’ve ever worked 3 days what’s your preference - to take mon/Friday off and get the work days over with? Or break up the week?

thanks all!

im a stay at home wife. I dont miss it all . Have a small holding so im always busy .it suits us so we ignore the other comments .Do whats best for you as a family

What sort of debts?

Of course time to yourself is lovely but if you have large amounts of credit card debt, I would want to pay it off ASAP, it would feel a bit selfish to be working part time just for fun time.

Just be wary, on 3 days a week I ended up struggling to do all the work in the time. When the kids were not in school I managed but it was stressful. Then when they were in school, I did extra on my ‘days off’ and resented it. It does depend on your job and having strict boundaries. I think it’s harder if you don’t have set working days and work from home.

Both cars on finance which I don’t mind so much but then we have about 6k in credit cards we really should sort first x

I do mon Tues weds

Sort yours debts first OP….don’t want them hanging over your head

It’s boring but if you reduce your hours, then your/your employers pension contributions will go down by the same percentage, unless you make the difference back from your remaining salary. If you are early career, this can make a massive difference in the long term to how much is in your pension fund.

Can you do compressed hours instead? It givs you the best of both worlds - same money, more free time. When I did that, I took Mondays and Wednesdays off. It was quite nice to not ever be more than 2 days away from a day off.

I detest the rush to PU and DO. I just HATE being constantly rushed and always feel like I’m flipping between places. I have one in nursery and one in school atm so the two separate drops don’t help.

Yeah I’m hoping it’s easier when I’m dropping off just straight at school instead of both in September xx

I have a professional career that is very stressful. After years of working full time, I decided to reduce to part time, 8 hour days
, Mon_Wed. Much prefer this option as now have a good work/home life balance and I’m a better mum and wife. My son is aged 25 but working fewer days means I’m available to support my disabled husband. Do it if you can as family and your health is the most important thing. My career hasn’t suffered so no regrets from me.

How did you manage t have 3 children so close together while working full time?

DH and I also work full time, I however earn a lot more than he does and sometimes worry it will be chaos if I had a third child. Would love to hear how you did it :)

With the first 2 I only took 9 months maternity leave as we knew we wanted another baby and would need to save for that! I had 6 months full pay each time so financially we were lucky! I was then pregnant during Covid and that meant I was furloughed on full pay and luckily this saved us the nursery fees for a whole summer before mat leave and we cut down just to funded hours!

when I look back it was absolute chaos and I have honestly no idea how we survived financially but we managed - although that is the cause of some of our outstanding credit card debt!!

despite all that I couldn’t imagine not having my 3 boys now and providing it wouldn’t be impossible financially I would totally recommend - I found the switch from 1-2 babies much more difficult than adding a third to the chaos 🙂

Definitely have the reduced hours now when DCs are young.

For many years I did 4 days a week with Mondays off. Now I do 3.5 days a week.
Gives me time to look after elderly parents. Bank holidays are usually pro-rated so there is no advantage when choosing the days you work.

The thing I find hard about part-time working is effectively squeezing a full-time job into part-time hours, but its worth it!

If you can cut a day and you want to, do. Let them judge you!

Who the fuck will judge you?! Only some jealous fools.
3 days is the best and I've done them all (1 to 6!)
I preferred working Tuesday to Thursday lovely long weekend. Got all the boring shit sorted in the week and weekends were for fun.

I do 20 hours a week and have done for 5 years. I do more on the ad hoc if needed. I’m careful with money. I’ll increase them as the children don’t want me around as much. For now, time is more precious to me.

Same! My youngest is going to the school preschool. Will now have school hols to contend with but not the bloody two drops!!!

In your shoes, I'd see about your DH reducing to 4 days. Why should women automatically make the sacrifices career, earnings and pension wise.

If you've 3 kids you are undoubtedly very busy and it gets to the stage where family life/commitments need to be balanced vs career and stress levels! If you can afford it then don't worry about other people, they don't live your life.

i'm also currently in this quandary of whether to reduce days .... just working out the maths of how much /whether we can afford it.

Yes, do it!

I work 3 days a week, and plan to stay part time even when my youngest starts school. I plan to make up the pay by doing external work (paid for one off assesments). I like to think I never return full time, at least in my demanding role.

It's clearly up to you but personally I would want to clear the credit card debt first. I wouldn't describe it as comfortable to cut hours if I had substantial credit card debt

Cars on finance are a slightly different type of debt.

I currently work 3 days a week and love it! I don't ever want to go back to 5 days if I can help it.

I do job share, so thankfully someone else picks up the workload on the days I'm not there, so I waltz out of there on a Wednesday evening and don't have to think about work again until Monday morning - I wouldn't enjoy it so much if I knew I had to somehow squeeze 5 days work into three, or that there was a pile of overdue stuff waiting for me on my return. So I guess it depends on the job.

It's nice if you work a Monday because you still get your bank holidays, and it's also great if you want any last minute deals for long weekends away.

I personally couldn’t do it if I had debt handing over me. I’d also worry about implications for future career progression and for size of pension.

I agree with this. If you can manage on reducing your days, go 4 it!
Looking after a home and 3 young children is a monumental task