To ask how many kids you have, their age, and how many hours you work a week?

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I'm curious how normal it is to work full time, 40+ hours a week with kids. I feel like everyone's life would be so much better if I did even just one day less. What do you do for an evening meal? I find this hardest and spend a fortune on convenience food (not take aways, but super easy comfort food) for the family. Does it matter if its a career? As in its worth it because it will pay off long term or if its just a job and you simply need to.

Aibu unreasonable to try and work out what is normal?

I'm only 24hrs but shift work (I'm a nurse) so quite often not in for dinner, husband is he works full time. I feel like it can be that way with us too so your not alone in thinking that way.

Should add two kids age 5&7

Two children aged 19 (he is at uni) and 10. I work anywhere between 30 and 80 hours a week, depending on emergencies / schedules / cases going wrong.
DH is the same. We do dinner depending on who is home first. We have quite a few things in the freezer for late-home-cook-quick emergencies, such as soup, lentil dal, casseroles, etc. Also do wholemeal fresh pasta and veggies, that's quick.

2 DC aged 4 and 7. I work full time 37.5 hrs per week. Short commute, some wfh and no overtime. DH does the same

At work most women with young DC seem to go down to 4 days and make one of those days a wfh day.

Amongst the school mums it's a real mixed bag from not working all, up to full time working. I would say those of us who do full time tend to be public sector so full time is 37 ish hours a week. We are out of sensible commuting range for any of the big cities so no one really has big corporate type jobs.

2 kids. 10 and 8. 2 days a week from home.

1. 6. 27.5

Single mum, one child age 5, work full time in a senior role. Caveats are it's mostly WFH and I've chosen an industry/company who are extremely flexible.

I think life would be easier if I dropped a day, but it's not on the cards for me. It is exhausting. In terms of dinners, we're normally freezer bits, pasta, snacky plates (cheese/veggie sticks/pittas etc) or will eat out between activities.

FT since they were babies - they're 10 & 13 now and I average 50+ hours a week.

Easy for me because home, work and school are in 4 mile radius so no commute to tackle.

Personally I find I need to be far more emotionally available now my kids are heading into teen years, than I was when they were younger so I can finish at a reasonable hour, spend time with them and then carry on working in evenings if necessary.

I do 27 hours over 3 days, children aged 5 and 3. On the days I work, the children attend breakfast / after school club and nursery all day. We have little family support day to day so have to use clubs.

When the youngest is school age I may increase to 4 days but I’d still like a day to do housework, admin etc.

I will go back to full time when older.

There is a phrase I like that a friend of mine uses; 'In this phase of my life'.

This. And yy to how the other parent works too.

I have a primary age child and two preschoolers. DH works 9-6, I work around 20 hours a week. I'm hoping to work more come September.

There is a phrase I like that a friend of mine uses; 'In this phase of my life'.

This. And yy to how the other parent works too.

I have a primary age child and two preschoolers. DH works 9-6, I work around 20 hours a week. I'm hoping to work more come September.

There is a phrase I like that a friend of mine uses; 'In this phase of my life'.

This. And yy to how the other parent works too.

I have a primary age child and a preschooler. DH works 9-6, I work around 20 hours a week. I'm hoping to work more come September.

Two kids, aged 12 (yr 7) and 4 (foundation). Both schools 5 minutes walk from home

I’ve got one salaried role which works out at about 12 hours a week and then I do freelance work for about 20 hours a week but that’s fully flexible and term time only. I work from home, although I do have use of an office for two mornings a week, so I’m generally home to sort the evening meal.

DH has a professional career - works from home 4 days a week, and is fully flexible as he manages his own workload. As long as he meets the minimum financial targets he can do what he likes in terms of hours. This means we get to eat together every day at 5.30. He takes over the kids after dinner if I need to catch up on work or housework, and if he needs to he catches up on work whilst our eldest is at one of his activities in the week (he’s out for 3.5 hours on a Tuesday evening).

It works really well for us. I used to teach (stopped when a single parent) and couldn’t do that now as easily. I feel lucky, and now there’s no childcare costs I’m adding more to my private pension (which was a worry before).

2 DC, 13 and 15. DH and I both work FT, both 3 days in the office and 2 at home. We try and make sure we work opposite WFH days so someone is about for DC 4 days out of 5. We live in London and DC have a 10 min walk to school so now they are older, are perfectly fine to walk home, get themselves in and be by themselves for an hour or two. Being in London means they can also get themselves to any after school activities on the bus if necessary.

DH deals with the cooking and meal plans at the weekend. He's usually home by 6pm and DC are at sports clubs most evenings, so we don't usually eat until 7.30pm/8pm once they are back. We can stick a wash on/empty the dishwasher when WFH so we don't find evenings too rushed these days.

When DC were smaller, I worked PT either 3 or 4 days a week, I went back to FT out of necessity when DH was made redundant, but obviously he was at home then so wasn't an issue. Think DC were about 8 & 10 when we were both back working FT. It's all so much easier now they are fairly independent.

Three teenagers, two days WFH two days on the office.

I have three teens, two at secondary school and one away at uni. I work 30 hours a week.

2 kids age 6 and 15.

i work full time, 90% wfh. I work about 50 hours a week, often more.

Food can be cooked from scratch even if you work. Batch cook soups, spaghetti sauces, curries and chillis. You could also batch cook cheesy or white sauces for a quick macaroni cheese or fish supper.

We eat lots of pasta or stir fries and marinated chicken or occasionally salmon with veg and noodles or rice. If you have all the components chopped in the morning, and pans out with kettle full and rice/pasta weighed into a saucepan, you can throw a meal together inside 20mins. Get the kids to lay the table!

I also use the airfryer a lot, and sometimes the slow cooker

Im not a saint - we have convenience food once a week or so (eg potato waffles, frozen peas and ready made breadcrumb chicken tenders) But you can get rid of most of the crap with some planning! I’m not convinced I save a lot, but I feel better than feeding everyone ready meals

This isn't true of my experience. It varies but I know a solicitor who is a SAHM and two others who are PT. If those women are with similarly qualified partners they have good incomes and can save a bit and then manage on 1 salary, still keeping options open to return to their career, albeit at a lower level. The people I know with 3 or more children all have part time or SAHM except 1, who had lots of family support. The couples both working FT have 2, the general consensus is that 3 is the cut off point without family life becoming chaotic.

I have 1 DD aged 6. I work full-time - 37.5 hours. I predominantly work from home, which helps enormously as I can flex my hours around school. I use breakfast club and afterschool club for part of the week. In terms of a career, I still argue that in the 21st Century women can't have it all especially when you become the default for anything school related. Food wise DD is in Y2 so she has a school dinner. She will then have a light tea when she's home and I do Gousto Monday to Friday so she usually has some of that when we eat.

I have 2 children aged 8 (in school) and 4 (in nursery). I work approx 30 hours over 3 jobs/4 days. I used to work full time compressed over 4 days when my oldest child was a baby and it was very hardgoing. I also couldn't wfh back then like I can now (I wfh approx 2/4 days per week now which makes a huge difference).

It really all depends on so many factors how doable it all is. When I worked full time (37.5 hours) over 4 days we also lived further away from our jobs and couldn't wfh but now both me and the OH can wfh about 50% of the week and we live a lot closer to work. I really love my job and would probably work all the damn time if I didn't have kids (like extra training, conferences etc), 😅

2 DC, 8 and 5. Basically work 5 days a week 9-3 with the odd evening

DH and I both work 40hrs a week, we have 6yr old twins. We both WFH on Mon/Fri, so we do dinner for them those days. Tues/Weds/Thurs we work in the office and have an after school nanny til 6:30. We'd be fucked without the nanny though, so I get it.

2 children, 6 and 4. I'm a solo parent and work 40 hours over 5 days. I am able to WFH and to some extent can set my schedule, subject to mandatory attendance at various meetings etc. I am usually in for 3 days, WFH for 2.
In terms of dinners, I use the slow cooker a lot, and pasta, batch cook and freeze various curries etc. The kids have school dinners so I don't beat myself up if tea is something on toast to allow me to get home from work, collect from childminder and get them winding down for the day.

I have sons aged 17 and 14. I work three days a week. Any more than that and I can't manage to get them to the places they need to be (17 yr old has just started learning to drive).

We live in a very rural area with no public transport.

I don't know any mums that are working full time to be honest but it might be because of where we live.

My husband works away too so take some annual leave then!

3 kids age 14 to 8.

I work full time, 50+ hrs a week at the moment. I’m leaning into a new role so don’t mind.

We have a nanny and a housekeeper. It wouldn’t work without them