To wish I hadn’t married a man with a well paid job

[butteronthebread]

DH earns well, not loads but realistically is always going to be more than me.

So as a result it’s naturally meant my career has had to take a back seat. I know some manage without any compromises but we’ve no additional support and someone does need to do the child related things so this lands on me.

its very much diamond shoes are too tight. And I know this. But sometimes I wish I had the luxury of working more.

You probably know a lot of families like that because you are a family like that. Do you seriously think it is common? It really, really isn't.

@catcafeatno10 while there may be some cases where the family are genuinely better off in the long term by sacrificing one partner's career, this must be very much the exception. What's far more likely (you see this frequently on MN) is that women believe that their husband can only manage his career if she sacrifices hers to facilitate it. I suspect some men are quite comfortable to perpetuate this belief.

Anyway, as you say, it may be a scenario which some families choose but it certainly doesn't seem the norm in the 21st century, and for that, I'm very glad. If one parent can only manage their career by the other parent having to sacrifice theirs, it must be extremely demanding, probably takes them away from the home a lot and means they can't be nearly as hands on with the children.

I'm not saying it's common. I'm explaining how and why families might structure themselves like this. Where I live, it's not that unusual.

You're explaining how a small minority may do that. The vast majority who give up their careers are leaving themselves financially vulnerable.

I wish I saw working as a luxury!

For me the main point would be maintaining my financial freedom and not becoming vulnerable, but I'm pretty doubtful most women would be pushing their career if they won the euromillions.

But I may of course be wrong. I certainly feel like many women place more self validation in their jobs whilst men just want the money.

And I also feel like part of the issue is that people will often (understandably) prioritise their own family rather than doing what's best for women as a whole.

For example, we frequently see posters stating that they went part time as it made financial sense due to their partner earning much more. However, in many cases this is a choice and they could still perhaps have got by sending their kids to a state school, living in a smaller house/less desirable area, and driving older cheaper cars, holidaying in the UK, etc.

Of course many prefer a higher quality of life in material terms and that's fine but it arguably perpetuates the dynamic/expectation of the man being the main provider and the woman being the default carer. But any individual knows that their personal contribution is likely to be pissing in the wind so it's a big ask to suggest that people should make big sacrifices to uphold a principle when their doing so probs won't really make a tangible difference.

Therein lies part of the issue IMO. It's like how a lot of people want others to pay more tax but don't want to stump up themselves.

We also see posters acting like paying for childcare is only their responsibility because they are women. If their DH's are such high earners that they can afford private school on one salary, they can afford to pay nursery fees too.

Who has even mentioned private school? I don't even know anyone who have two children in private school. I know two families with single children in private school, one being funded by grandparents!

Lots of couples have their mortgage based on two incomes and no childcare.

Along come children, maternity leave, then nursery fees, lack of wrap around school care. If a couple are looking at the best way for them to manage finances and it works out better for one to reduce hours that's most likely what they will do.

Because remember the mortgage still needs paid. The other long term benefits of both trying to work full-time like pensions become secondary to the mortgage at that point in time.

Nannies, au-pairs, private school are a complete pipe dream for so many people who still need to juggle children jobs commuting and pay the mortgage.

Funnily enough, the pp I was responding to.

For example, we frequently see posters stating that they went part time as it made financial sense due to their partner earning much more. However, in many cases this is a choice and they could still perhaps have got by sending their kids to a state school, living in a smaller house/less desirable area, and driving older cheaper cars, holidaying in the UK, etc.

I know a lot of families like this. It's not far-fetched at all.

Sure you do.

This actually happened to me. Not in a wild way but 2024 standards to just do housing and school is like woah lottery win. I cried and cried because I gave up a lot for about 5 years, but I didn’t slam my husband’s career too hard (his job is more 9-6 mine is more 7-7 PM or on unfortunate days even 7-10 PM). However the only good part is that he then transitioned us out of comparative financial instability when a startup did well (again this is still our lives are basic 2024 standards but stability is a luxury these days).

It seems to me one setup that works best for equality is when two people are both in the same profession eg two lawyers two doctors two engineers because then each understands the rigours of what is required in each profession. I see a lot of successful and equal couples in this scenario.

If two people are in different careers then you have differing expectations and to like share power and trade because different people have different opportunities and demands at different times.

My husband loved my career when we were dating and there were zero problems he was a super supportive boyfriend and I loved coming home after a big week for him. It was when our two needs started clashing post baby and mat leave that it became really hard and I- by the exact unconscious or semi conscious default we are taking about- sleepwalked into being the one who absorbed the change.

My friend who is in an ideal position I would want to be in professionally paradoxically has financial challenges because although her and her husband have stayed equal, it’s really really expensive where we live. So this goes back to the conundrum of OP: if you let husband take the front role, you’re somtimes (not always!) financially better off for it. If my friend would have allowed her husband to take an opportunity abroad he’d be on 500k albeit working 80-100hr weeks but she didn’t want that, she wanted to keep her own career and stay near family.

I think the thing that’s helpful in talking about all of this is there’s not ever really very often realistic information out there about how women actually do it all. Women face harsh judgement from other women if they admit to a short mat leave; Wheras the reality is your husband will accelerate beyond you and you’ll become defacto parent on a long mat leave. If you go back to work hardcore hours, you need someone who is willing to show up at your house at 7 and also who maybe lives there. One faces judgements if you say you need live in, the reality is if you’re getting home at 10 PM, someone else has to cook dinner for your kids who are asleep when you get home. So there’s sort of a secret world of skills on how to run a household if you’re not there that needs to be deployed effectively if you’re actually going to have the big career and the kids.

This is why I’m always asking for tips!

Cue women saying if you want a big career don’t have kids 🙈

Whether any individual knows families where dad receives life changing mega bucks and is such a jet setter that he needs a woman at home to facilitate it is pretty irrelevant.

The facts and statistics speak for themselves. Women as a group are far more financially vulnerable than men. Mothers are more likely to have less well paid lower status jobs than fathers (despite equal level of ability and qualification.) And when they get to their 50s/60s way more women than men realise they have massively underfunded their older age, with hugely inadequate pension provision.

These things are a massive societal concern. The fact that a few people have trust funds or a premier league footballer hubby to support them are exceptions to the rule. It's not most people's lived experience.

Women valuing their work life as much as they value their husband's (and of course husband's valuing their role as a parent and taking on domestic responsibilities) is what we should aim for at a societal level. It's certainly what I aspired to for my sons and daughter. And if on a personal level I hadn't - if for example I didn't value my own job equally, and if I raised my sons to believe they should be primary or sole earners as adults, and I raised my daughter to believe her work life was of lesser importance - well, even if I had done those things, I would hope I'd have the self awareness to know that might have suited me, but is not best for society as a whole.

Why would you say this?

I have no need to make anything up. There are families in all kinds of circumstances with all kinds of set-ups. This is hardly news to anyone.

In London, some parts particularly, there are a lot of ex pat families or international families who have settled here. Millions of people. The schools my kids go to are full of them. Parts of London are also full of finance types, ex finance types or self-made business people because this is the only way you could buy the housing in many parts of Central London (unless you inherited and there are lots of that type of family too, though we know less of them). Any comparable city is the same. If your husband (or you) had a certain type of career or business interests, you will know other families that are similar. A lot of them have a spouse who doesn't work. Where two parents work, they generally have a nanny. Many people have nannies anyway, even with a non-working parent.

"It seems to me one setup that works best for equality is when two people are both in the same profession eg two lawyers two doctors two engineers because then each understands the rigours of what is required in each profession. I see a lot of successful and equal couples in this scenario."

Good point @ThreeLuckyStars and I also know lots of couples like this. DH and I both met studying law at university, so it wasn't a big surprise we ended up in the same line of work. A lot of the women barristers I know are married to / with another barrister, and doctors similarly.

Yes, I agree with this. My son is in Year 3. He’s in an independent school so it’s a fair assumption that most of the parents are successful professionals. I would say that since my husband and I started doing school runs in 2021 there have always been minimum 40% men doing pick up and drop off on any given day, with most couples dividing it equally throughout the week, as we do. The more successful people are the more flexibility they tend to have. My male colleagues (law) also freely talk about arranging meetings around school runs and other childcare commitments. It really is becoming a social norm.

Depends on the type of law? If they are in court, there's not likely to be any flexibility at all. You can't pop in at 10.35am after dropping infants at school with a cheery wave to a jury.

I hope you’re not trying to start some sort of “my type of law is more worthy than yours” collateral argument that has nothing to do with the thread?

Surely it’s self-evident that all jobs have variants which are more and less suited to flexibility? The point of my specifying my industry was, however, to show that I have first-hand evidence that even in law, a profession that is often perceived to be very high pressure and time-consuming, flexibility for men is becoming acceptable to employers.

But for what it’s worth, a couple of factual points:

1. My son’s school is open from 8am so there’s plenty of time to drop and be at work well in time for the start of the business day, certainly well before “10:35am”. Surely it’s attitudes like yours, suggesting that accommodating school runs means starting at 10:35am, which create stigmas and prevent employers from being willing to consider flexibility?
2. My colleagues and I are civil litigation and regulatory solicitors. We are obviously not in trial with the same frequency as barristers because, as I am sure you are well aware, good dispute resolution skills tend to result in settlements before proceedings are issued. If we are in trial then obviously we make alternative arrangements for our children.

Neither of those points was implied, nor can I see that they can reasonably be inferred. I was just pointing out that "arranging meetings" isn't a universal experience across different areas of law; in some areas there aren't really meetings, except for conferences with clients. Barristers I know also tend to have to travel a lot to court, so dropping a child at 8.30am (or 8am) and then being at a distant court might not help.

I don’t think that a detailed discussion about the specifics of individual legal jobs is necessary or helpful on this thread. Regardless of what you intended to imply, I am afraid I did infer a somewhat defensive tone to what you said, tinged with a warning that I should not make sweeping statements about flexible working and law(something I never intended to do). If that makes me unreasonable, so be it.

@HotCrossBunplease can you actually understand that for many private school is just never going to happen, esp with VAT and multiple kids??

Most state schools do not have pre-school care starting at 8.00. Your very lucky if they have a breakfast club doing "toast to go" at 8.40 - yes give them toast then expect them to stand around in the playground and eat it!!!
In other words it's not really about providing pre-school care it's the school trying to manage the effects of poverty on kids.

Of course. I’m not sure what you thought I was trying to say.

I posted initially simply to share my observation that I have seen a lot of fathers doing school drop offs and pick ups, agreeing with a poster who said it was becoming more socially acceptable for men to step up.

I mentioned in that post that it was an independent school, because that was relevant to the point that these men are likely to be high earners with”big jobs” and this whole thread is about men with “big jobs” not having an automatic excuse to step out of childcare.

I then mentioned in response to a poster who seemed to think that doing school drop offs meant having to start work at 10:30, that in fact our specific school allowed drop offs from 8, so it’s not a given that having a big job means you can’t do a school run.

(As it happens, I am rarely there at 8am myself and the parents of both sexes that I am seeing there are more likely to be around between 8:30 and 8:45.)

Nowhere did I suggest that I think anyone and everyone has access to private education or before-school care from 8 am.

The early years are tough. Very tough. They are sick a lot. Childcare is extremely expensive and even when in primary there are multiple days off or training days etc, where schools are closed. It's exactly this period when women have to put their foot down and refuse to give up their career no matter how junior they feel they are.

To see the women's salary vs childcare costs is very short sighted and also misogynistic. Why the men's salary is not taken into account?

That period in your life passes quite quickly and that's when you cannot come back to the same point. It's when it paid off all the juggling, all the multiple conversations with your DH/ partner that you want and need your career as much as he does. That you don't want him to go for the Big Job of 80 hour plus and travelling away because that fucks up your career big time. My own DH was perplexed when he heard that for the first time and knew I did prefer to do my awful night shifts for a while (requiring for him to stay put). If i didn't do that for those key years I wouldn't have progressed to where I am now.

As pp said before, it's all those decisions you make. We didnt have any "family help" or inheritance. Its important to see where you want to live, transport links, access to transport/ schools/ roads/ cities etc. its not about having the big house in the middle of nowhere. Also your DH travelling commitment, his flexibility etc.
The set up of two people with flexibility, and well paid jobs doesn't happen overnight. It requires a lot of commitment for years.

The point I'm getting at is if you don't have childcare until 9.00 standard school start time by the time people drop off and get to work it's 9.30.
Not every job has that amount of flexibility 2 or 3 days a week.
Lots of people are expected to be at work for 8.00-8.30

So ultimately something has to give. One other or both of you have to ask for flexible working - but employers don't need to give it.

Flexible working / reduced hours also means people are likely to be overlooked for promotion. Little point in both parties stalling their career.