To sacrifice my career for my family

[Flumpi]

Long story short, I am training to be a Nurse and DH works for a small private company which my family run. They are going to merge with another company and DH has been asked to be a company director.

he does school runs when I am on early shifts and pick ups when I’m on lates. He takes the kids to sports clubs so I can study.

If he becomes a director he won’t have this sort of flexibility any more and would have to spend a lot more time working. I really doubt I will be able to continue with my training.

it would mean a huge step up in finances for us and we would be able to send our children to private school and move within the area we want to be.

But really love my job and don’t know how I would feel about throwing all that work away. However it would be so wonderful to spend more time with my children while they are small.

AIBU to even consider it

Just reread your first paragraph about

Long story short, I am training to be a Nurse and DH works for a small private company which my family run. They are going to merge with another company and DH has been asked to be a company director.

Does your family have no influence on his working pattern. They will be co-owners?

I would not give up my training under any circumstances, although I'd certainly look at working part time once I'd qualified (as I do now.)

My DDs are now 7 and 5 so both in school. I am SO glad I didn't give up work completely and kept my hand in working part time. I love my work and DDs loved their nursery. They were well set up to start school as they had lots of time around other children, and started school with some of their nursery friends.

The nursery and pre school years really fly by and I'm grateful now I don't have to start building a career from scratch. DDs are wonderful, happy children that thrived in nursery so I have zero regrets.

If some of your children are in school already then there is nothing wrong with after school club. Mine love it, it's just getting to play with their friends after school and being fed a snack before I pick them up!

I gave up my career in speech and language therapy to be at home with my kids. Never regretted it. But i am very maternal and loved being able to spend the time. I did retrain as a childminder so made a career out of what i was best suited to anyway.

But it's not for everyone. And it doesn't seem to be for you.

To my mind just some of the advantages of retaining a career, particularly if it’s one you really enjoy, include:

• remaining stimulated, building new skills and keeping your brain primed to learn
• broadening your experiences
• having things to talk about other than children
• wider social circle and meeting different kinds of people
• kind of in line with the above, day to day variety (think the importance of this can’t be underestimated and some SAHPs do really miss it)
• modelling to your children that your career is just as important as their dads
• similar to the above, in your specific case, modelling that getting the big bucks isn’t everything and you can have a rewarding career even if you’re earning less
• avoiding resentment growing towards the SAHP or from the SAHP towards the earner - happens a lot I think
• never feeling like you need to be grateful to your husband for keeping you
• as above, maintaining a healthy dynamic of equals rather than you being his dependent
• present financial security
• future financial security - should he become ill, pass away, divorce, lose his job etc. plus your own pension - which will be pretty good in the NHS
• also in your specific case your career is something really skilled and socially useful. If you enjoy it that is a real gift. Spending time with your children is certainly fulfilling but a job that feels worthwhile and fulfilling that you’re using your specific skills and training for is a totally different kind of fulfilment. I believe most people would be happier with a bit of both kinds of fulfilment in their lives.

I could go on! None of this is to say he shouldn’t become a director. But IMO you definitely both need to think carefully about balancing his career with yours, which after all is - I repeat - just as important as his.

The kids are 5 and 2 - in year 1 and just started nursery part time. On earlies I have to leave the house at 5 am (but see them in the afternoon) and on late days I am not home until nearly midnight but get to do mornings with them. I’m really lucky that my employer has already let me work set days rather than a changing shift pattern but I’m the only trainee they have (for now) so I get a bit of privilege there. But this is the NHS and they can’t be endlessly accommodating. Plus to qualify I will eventually have to go to different departments, I have about a year until that happens. They can put me on nights/shifts/whatever they like if they want to be like that.

because of the location change DH would have a lot more of a commute so it’s the late/early hours that seem… sticky. We have talked it over and over this evening and as much as school breakfast club is great they still only open at certain times.

DH would be taking over from my Dad who is planning on retiring and returning to his home country during the winter months. He would still have a financial stake in the business though. As a child we hardly ever saw him, mostly due to the nature of the work they do needing him on site but also because he was just knackered. Maybe merging means DH will have a lot more time than my DF did, we certainly hope so, but what if it’s still a lot of time away?

I guess my biggest frustration is not doing it sooner because if I was already qualified I could either be working part time or take a break and still have a career to continue later on. I just wish I hadn’t put it off for such a long time

I love this - gives me lots of hope that it will work out when the time is right!

and yes Brutal is the word 😂 I guess I just feel like it’s hard enough with things ticking along as they should without us adding more to the plate right now.

Please don't. I gave my my career for my DH's fancy all important work (and he never gave an inch to help me with mine). Meanwhile his fancy career advances, his earning capacity advances, his ego advances - and I stay where I am. Can you tell I resent it a bit? I am very glad I got to stay home when my children were young but like your DH might, they get comfortable that someone else is picking up the family load and lose any flexibility that might enable your career.

I did push back a bit but it didn't help. One day he told me to 'take charge of my own life' (easy for him to say when he didn't have the children to work that around). I regret not saying 'ok' and walking out the door for a few hours leaving him to see how being in charge of your own life wasn't so easy when you couldn't just leave children. I didn't have support for childcare from anywhere else and it was expensive to pay for.

Obviously your life isn't my life but maybe this is a glimpse of where you might end up if you don't take care of your own career and insist he support you in it too. You are just as important.

So I originally trained as a classical musician. For a long time I had been doing music projects for people with Dementia/Parkinsons etc and loved it so much but always said one day I’ll do nursing. After I had my second DC my contracts were getting thinner with lots of places having to make cuts etc and I decided the time was right and went for it. I worked in the hospital as an HCA to see if I liked it and applied from there. I would say that there are a lot more mature students than I was expecting and it doesn’t seem to be uncommon in nursing.

The answer is childcare, not sacrificing your career.

Don't put all your eggs in one basket financially.

Don't consign yourself to a life that isn't what you want.

Find a good childminder or a nursery, it will be fine, and worth the investment for the many years of work you have ahead of you.

it would mean a huge step up in finances for us and we would be able to send our children to private school

I would spend those finances on childcare instead and finish my training if I were you.

Finish your course it's one of the most difficult courses to do but once finished the (nursing) world is your oyster. You will be able to pick and choose your hours then

@Flumpi my niece has become a nurse through being an HCA and then doing her nurse training her children are 15 and 11 and she loves. It. Just pay for childcare and then you can work PT once qualified. Hate to put a downer on it but partners sometimes leave or die.

Never give up your earning potential in order for a man to reach his, that's the best advice my mum ever gave me 💐

What about you becoming director?

This should be pinned to the top of every post where someone asks if they should become a SAHM!

'Never, never give up your job' said my mother
Best advice I could give you too. . Children benefit from having more socialization ie different people in their lives.

Your husband could fall ill, hate his job, leave you etc. You are a grown up and need to take responsibility for your own life. I know too many sah mums who are now in their 50s, in poverty, with little prospect of ever getting out of it.

Always plan for the worst and you'll be doing the best for you, for your husband and for your children.

No I absolutely would not. I'd keep training. Why are women so willing to martyr themselves on the altar of family. Use the money for childcare and have your own life.

Just to add our experience of a nanny - just because someone is paid to do a job doesn’t mean they’re not passionate about it (as
you are yourself!)

Our nanny is great and our DC has the best time with her.

I'm a single parent and midwife, I did my training when they were small and don't regret it a bit. You're in a very fortunate position financially, meaning you can find childcare that suits you more easily. I would say carry on. Or even defer for 1 year and then go back once your children are both in school as this will make childcare easier. There's loads of flexibility within nursing and you will be able to find something which suits better once you qualify.
Please don't give up this big part of yourself unless you really want to.

I would get childcare.
My DH has a big job and I didn't need to work but I enjoyed what I did.
Initially we used nursery, then we got a part time nanny for drop offs and pick ups. We employed her for 4 years.
It kept my hand in, my pension and NI contributions in kept building up.
Basically 10 years on, financially, we are a lot more secure plus my DH has been made redundant for a few months during this period and we were lucky enough that he could look for the right job, not just any job.
Your DC will be fine in childcare

Nursing feels much nicer as a student - stay at home and go back later! I have friend who qualified in their 50s

Could also look at music therapy/occupational therapy as alternatives that tend to pay better and have better life balance than nursing

Agree.
I gave up my career that I worked so hard for to enable my husband’s billy big b*locks career and regret it every day.
We are now on the brink of divorce and I am deeply unhappy. I’m 5 years out from my career and no idea how to get back into it.
keep going if you can. We need nurses :)

Now your worried your husband won't be around enough at all if he takes the promotion. I think you need to agree as a family what it is you want out of life because it feels like you are making changes and then complaining and feeling like it's happened to you and want something different. I'm finding this a frustrating thread now. You know the options.