To be confused by the two working parent set up

[Angels1111]

As I return to work from my Christmas break I return to the same conundrum I've been having since kids were born...
...that is confusion at how to handle my multiple roles in life.

I can't help but think that in my mother's generation they had to do the same stuff as us, but with no work. And, there was more of a community to fall back on too - she could get the neighbours to watch us if needed, relatives had more time to visit and play with us, etc. But she had time, to keep herself healthy and to keep us healthy.

Now it feels like a lot of us work in careers which are not conducive to taking long career breaks or going part time. Or, we can't afford to. So we end up juggling everything that comes with having a family with work. My partner does lots but it feels like two people splitting three jobs between them (work, children, house) is more of a stretch and a juggle and I wish every day that I could just focus on the house and kids.

I feel resentful that if I hire a nanny or a baby sitter or get family to help, they'd just play with the kids, feed them lunch, and maybe wash up after lunch wheeras I'd be doing all of that plus the food shop, house cleaning, admin, cooking dinner, washing, homework etc etc simultaneously, and if I wanted to hire someone to truly replace my roles it would take 2-3 people just to do the home stuff let alone work.

But this could just be how I'm handling life! I have a chronic condition so potentially have less energy than the general population, I do handle it a lot better when I'm not flaring.

There's a theory that feminism shot us in the foot. We wanted it all, women wanted careers and independence and boy we got it. Problem is, we didn't lose the domestic roles, we just got a lot added to that so the burden doubled.
There seems to be a narrative that women work because they have to financially, and we'd all be SAHMs if we could afford to. I worked because I wanted to. I wouldn't like to be a SAHM, it would have driven me crazy and hats off to the women who can do it. I worked hard for my career and have given both my teens a great work ethic. No regrets but it hasn't been anywhere near easy

i’m a teacher and I have recently realised that after 15 years of teacher culture I am struggling as a parent because of how my job makes me think. I take personal responsibility for everything, every meltdown, every snappy word said, plus every organisational thing in the house, because that’s what I do as a teacher. The constant message from education systems to teachers is ‘what could you do better?’, ‘reflect on how you could have handled that situation differently’ and ‘evaluate your performance’, if you have drunk in this message for years it’s really hard not to apply it to your home life too. It might help to reframe it to look at what your kids have that is good and praise yourself for what you do rather than constantly looking to improve.

A family used to be able to live on one wage, and now they can't. That's the big problem. Maes it hard for families, and single people can't afford to live properly. The money mostly gets swallowed up by the ridiculous housing market and private landlords. Something has gone terribly wrong.

I am 53. When I was growing up, my mum, my aunties and my friends parents all worked with the exception of one or two who had a lot of kids. Most worked part time.

My mum went back to work part time when I was 3 because we were skint. They had over stretched with the mortgage thinking they weren't having any kids and then I came along when my mum was 39!

I went part time when I had my son (now 19). I went full time when he was 9 and split up with his Dad soon after. All my sons friend's parents worked to varying degrees but most worked part time. My family and friends also all worked after having kids. A few full time, most part time.

I know of very few stay at home mums either of my mums generation (she was born in 1933) or mine.

I did similar to you for the first few years my son was at school. I worked half time hours over 4 days so I could take him to school and pick him up.

I hated working full time while DS was in school as there never seemed enough time to get everything done. In my case it is usually the cleaning that suffered although I like to cook and the house was generally tidy. My ideal now would be to work 4 days but at present I can't afford it. I am thinking of downsizing.

At the end of the day, we just do what we have to. I think much of your difficulties are due to your illness. I don't have any answers but maybe (as you have mentioned up thread) see if there is anything you can do to manage that better. You may be doing all you can but it can't hurt to look.

25% of mothers don’t work at all.

depending on where you are in the country, there are still reasonably priced houses. Ok, not so much London but London has always been expensive relative to the rest of the country.

parts of Lancashire, parts of Manchester and large swathes of the north east have houses that are extremely affordable.

ok, there’s a jobs issue - London jobs have always paid more. But everywhere has hospitals, GPs, healthcare, schools, accountants.

It’s not feminism that shot us in the foot. It’s capitalism that caused this issue. Housing now being seen as an investment. Women encouraged to work to contribute to the economy etc. Our energy and railways, and council houses sold off/privatised was not a good move but driven by capitalism. Thank you Tories!

Please don’t glorify the ‘olden times’. Just because you didn’t see single parents coping doesn’t mean they weren’t there, just that you haven’t seen them.

My mum, born pre-WWII, brought us all up as a single mum. However in the 70s and 80s it wasn’t acceptable for a woman to leave her marriage for whatever reason. So there was no village or family support as she was shunned. There weren’t after school clubs or wrap around care either.

My mum was AMAZING. But yes Mum’s stellar career suffered due to society’s misogyny, the abuse in her marriage and having to be there to be a brilliant Mum for us.

That's still 50% that didn't work outside the home in the mid 1970s, and the ones that did, some of those were only part time. So the people saying that not many women worked full time when they were young are not wrong.

It’s an unpopular view but women entering the workforce has driven up house prices and now few can afford a family home on a single income so we’re trapped whether we like it or not.

Same here. My ‘children’ are now late 30’s and I worked FT. Me and DH had very demanding jobs plus looking after our kids, paying massive nursery and childminders fees (no free hours then!) and just juggling life as best we can. No work-life balance or flexible working then. No help from grandparents to speak of.

The upside of this is that we still remember how difficult life was for us at that time and now we’re retired we make a conscious effort to help out with our grandchildren now to ensure their parents (all working full time in demanding, busy jobs) get the balance and time out and time together they deserve. it’s very rewarding and we have such special relationships with our grandkids.

No help to you right now but hopefully you’ll feel the same as we did and ensure that your kids get a better deal in the future.

and how many who didn't "work" were financially abused? financially trapped? physically abused? mentally abused? couldn't leave because financially trapped?

forced out of the workplace due to marriage or having children? unfulfilled and depressed? alcoholic? taking drugs? and then, in their old age, they are faced with ungrateful adult children expecting them to provide free childcare, while they have a tiny pension because they didn't "work"?

As pp said, there has never been a golden age for women and it is unlikely to arrive.

In the meantime we need to make sure men step up. That provision for women is improved. But mostly to make men step up.

I'm in my 60s and worked outside the home all the time my children were growing up (I was an SP from when the youngest was 2 onwards). It was brutal sometimes.

Neither of my now-adult daughters are showing any signs of children on the way, and I've reached the age when I'd love to have children in my life again - loads of my friends and colleagues have grandchildren and spend lots of time helping out with childcare. I'm reducing my hours at work next year in the wind-down to retirement. I wish there was an adopt-a-granny scheme for those of us fit and healthy enough to be useful kinds of grannies - my local area does have a scheme, but it's for older people who aren't in the best of health, and it's more about families opening their doors to give an older person a meal. I'd love to be the kind of adoptive granny who might be some help to the OP and so many like her. I've got time and energy for childcare, housework and so on a couple of times a week, or at weekends. This thread makes me seriously think I should set up such a scheme once I have more time. There must be loads of people at both end of the age spectrum who'd value it, now that we mostly don't live in idyllic villages collectively shouldering the domestic burden.

How old is your mother? My children were born in the 1980s and it was common for both parents to work. I worked part time, then full time as a single parent. Most of my colleagues at work were married women with children. Many of us ended up looking after our elderly parents too. I never had a cleaner or any home help, but the kids were good about doing chores as they got older.

Ah, I see you’ve answered about your mother’s age already - she’s younger than me. Basically, you just have to get on and do it to the best of your ability.

How old are you OP? I am retired and this sounds the same as I experienced as a single parent. I did it all, worked, paid all the bills, cooked, shopped, cleaned, decorated, did all the life admin. My mum (who lived 60 miles away) helped by having my child to stay at half term but this was only for a few of years as she became terninally ill by the time they were about 6/7 . My mum also worked once my sister started infant school . All my friends' mums worked too.

Excellent points 👍

I don’t think it’s an unpopular view so much as fact? And you’re right, we can never go back. People will always strive for a better quality of life, so you can’t stop people working more to bring more money in for their family.

@Octavia64 ok, there’s a jobs issue - London jobs have always paid more.

Well yes, that's the issue. Houses in other places are more affordable, but you are also likely to be earning a lot less too, so it's not really solving the problem.

Houses are not supposed to be nearly as expensive as what they are.

Delusional home owners will rub their hands with delight when they see property prices going up, but they will not profit from this because if you sell your home, then you either need to buy a different home, or rent somewhere. Everyone needs to live somewhere.

I think the increased retirement age is also fueling reduced family choices. If you have working GP then that option isnt there and people still have mortgages ( i do and it will remain crippling until we downsize). My mum retired at 58, my dad 63. I can't afford to.
My husband has had a physical job for forty years. He's got five years to go to state retirement. He's tired and fed up. Companies use to pay off all the over 60s but they're too tight to do that now. They just hound you out!
We'll be too old to privide any childcare.

In my social circle (millennial professionals), no woman would ever make herself financially dependent - on a partner, family or the State. It would be unthinkable. Those with kids continue working full-time without exception. They seem to just… get on with it? No signs of mental health problems or nervous breakdowns. Agree with PP that MN seems to skew towards low-energy catastrophisers who complain about the trauma of the ‘mental load’ when they have to book a dentist appointment or renew the car insurance. They bear no resemblance whatsoever to the parents I know IRL.

I agree with this, I grew up in the 80/90s era of 'females can have it all' & 'girl power' etc & it took me until my late 30's to realise it's a fucking trick! What had happened is we do more than ever. That said I have kept my career, pension contributions & protected my assets so I certainly have never relied on a man for income & could afford to live without one so I guess that's a positive.

I think your post nails the difference between now and SAHMs of the past (where they existed).
My mum was very much a housewife who looked after myself and my sister as well. Activities, days out and the general expectations of today's parents and their children were just not a thing then. I think my mum took us swimming twice - literally - in our entire childhood, whereas now it's pretty much a weekly activity for a lot of families. Soft play and role play cafes did not exist back then because there would have been no demand. In other words, we were not as child-centric as we are now.
I do think that when threads such as these crop up, harking back to a golden age of SAHMs and bemoaning that today's mums can not afford to stay at home, it's like comparing apples with pears.
My mum could afford to give up work because expectations were pretty low, so a lot less money was needed to fund her lifestyle than the constant expectations of lunches out, soft play, activities, visits and holidays that seem to be considered a fairly basic requirement now.

I can't help but think that in my mother's generation they had to do the same stuff as us, but with no work.

This only applied to a small % of mothers in every generation.

Dad's an accountant but we have in our family bus drivers, shop keepers, shelf stackers...but it does sound like this is v unusual!

My DM is 75, she worked full time from
the age of 15 for over 45 years apart from 6 years where she worked 4 hours per weekday evening in a factory.

Maybe it's the people who need extra rest? I for one reach to MN for company when I'm in chronic pain /bedridden so perhaps MN is skewed in that regard