Disillusioned when earning 150k

[Littlezonedout]

I know these threads cause trouble, but this is how I feel. I can’t help but wonder when does the merry go round stop. It is worth it waking up crack of dawn, kids to breakfast club, nursery, after school club, run home, make dinner, bed, bath. Glass of wine because I’m exhausted.
if I stayed at home I’d save 20k on commuting, wraparound childcare, cleaner, gardener, etc.
fine, I can afford a house, but the maintenance, the upkeep, the bills.
not sure why I’m ranting. Know I’ll get pulled to
pieces. Just exhausted

Not RTFT, but I hear you, OP. I do all that on £37k. 50+ hour weeks. I don't think the logistics of life change much, some of us just do the same, living in crappier houses in less salubrious neighborhoods, without a gardener or cleaner.
If there really are no perks (such as capacity to save, invest, status, fee-paying schools, nice gym, holidays etc -there must be something that your extra £113k gives you access to?!) then just pack it in.

Is a sideways move into another data field not possible? I work in data too, been fully remote for 5 years, work part time, 6 figures and fully flexible.

Analytics engineering has loads of roles available and offers a really good work-life balance plus has both technical and managerial progression tracks all the way to director level

15years ago I gave up a job in the city to be a gardener. I never regretted the decision and the chance to see my kids grow up. We had less but it was enough. OP if you are serious you can do sth similar. Switch your mortgage to interest only while you have nursery fees then switch back after. Skip some holidays and get a cheaper car.

The problem is you are trying to have it all, and I don't mean that unkindly.

Just that when you have small children, you have to pick which sacrifice you want to make.

You have the niche role with the pay packet but no flexibility. But are your skills really not transferable to say an 80k role which allows some home working or a nine day fortnight?

Where would that leave you in terms of tax and childcare in terms of your lifestyle?

You are a bit stuck but through your own choices. You wanted the big house in the country and I'm sure it's lovely. But it further reduces your options.

You also have to consider that once the main childcare stage ends, things change so this isn't an entirely static situation even if you do nothing.

In some ways this is easier (reduced costs) but in others it's harder as there are school concerts, events, things to be around for.

Personally I think in the primary years flexible working is worth a pay cut.

I'd be looking seriously at other options. Not 30k a year jobs but something in a related field where your experience would surely count even if not at your current level.

And if the job really can't change, what else can?

Don't be sucked into the 'it was much easier for previous generations'. It may have been in terms of work life balance but they were also stuck with a lack of choice - just in very different ways.

I feel for you, there are no easy answers to trying to balance career and a family. But one thing that might help smooth life at home is to pay for a nanny rather than bitty childcare (breakfast club, after school etc). We did this, had a few different lovely people look after our children, ranging from young women to older retired ones. It meant the children could spend a lot more time at home, which was more relaxed for them and us, and they absolutely loved all the people who looked after them over the years. And the cost was no different to two lots of fees at all the different settings.

Is long days in childcare a perfect life?

Kids just want their parents time. The juggle is hard but as they get older the childcare costs will reduce significantly (unless you go for private schooling which again ties you financially for a long time).

Where do you see yourself in 10 years?

We swapped the rat race for country living and haven't regretted it for a second. The financial sacrifices for a simpler life have had endless benefits for our DC.

Surely just the life of a full time working parent rather than specifically one earning 150k… I think we can all relate to this. On teaching days I’m out of the house by 7 to commute for over an hour and get into the room for a 9am lecture. Then I spend the day rushed off my feet and barely able to eat or piss, usually eat on the way to another meeting or lecture. Then I commute home for an hour again, get home for around 7 pm if I’m lucky to have final lecture / meeting end at 5 that is. Get home and have to help DH put DC to bed, haven’t seen them all day. Shower, eat tea and go to bed. Rinse and repeat.

I like research days when teaching has ended because I can WFH and see my DC but WFH doesn’t mean sitting on my arse not working. I often have online meetings back to back and over summer I invariably will have conferences to attend.

It’s just life. I don’t know what to say. You can quit the role and get an ‘easier’ one for less pay but will you feel less knackered and more fulfilled? I doubt it and you’ll be more broke.

Good for you. Some of us like working.

Most people get exhausted working to live

cut the wine might make you less tired ( do as a day …)

cut the cleaner and gardener and all the other trappings of a wealthy life , save the cash and work out your retirement / step back plan

I am on a similar income OP, only got 1 child around £1000 a month a nursery for 3 days and I do feel resentful of the cliff edge too sometimes but it’s hard to complain. A bit diamond shoes are too tight. But I think what people forget is if you’re on a salary like that the job is normally so unforgiving and demanding, with crazy hours and responsibilities, you have my sympathy 🫂 no real advice but I hear you and we’re in the same boat xxx

You are right in the centre of storm in terms of child care logistics and expenses. You do have to ride it out, to some extent. Eventually you will get to a point where you drop the kids off at (hopefully free or subsidised) school breakfast club and pick them up from after school club. Then they’ll start getting themselves to school and home. Then they get a key and can hang out watching tv and eating snacks until you or partner get home.

I’m just pointing out the dynamic nature of things, you feel stuck but things are actually changing all the time, by degrees.

i would like to know what part your DP plays in all this, and what they contribute in terms of mental load and finances. They seem conspicuously absent from your posts. Not sure if that was deliberate or your subconscious trying to tell you something.

P.S. I grew up on a council estate wearing hand me downs and I am REALLY trying to be nice about the fact that you are in the top 5% of UK taxpayers.

I think there is also a factor in this that if earning £150k people think they have ‘made it’ and their life will look a certain way…

… but actually most of the time their life just looks quite ordinary, due to the high cost of living (particularly if living in the south east).

So the reward doesn’t feel like it reflects the effort.

I work 3 nights a week in care, my husband is a teacher 3 days each week. We have a wonderful work/life balance covering all essential childcare between us. However we live in a smallish 3 bed semi and have little spare cash - e.g. I'd like to get the ancient stair carpet cleaned professionally but am putting it off due to cost. We prioritise the kids activities with our money so have very little else to spend.

What no one can tell you is how to manage on 30k while living in a house in the country that you mortgaged on 150k.

You can have more money or more time - that is true for the vast majority of people.

In all likelihood you won't be able to work 3 days each week in a local low stress role and keep your lovely house. So do you prioritise time with your kids and quality of life for you - or a bigger house in a more expensive area and using lots of childcare?

As is true for most people you can't have it all.

Oh we work (very hard), just a different lifestyle!

What I was trying to say - what does the OP want long term. If it's sucking up the negatives of her current situation to bring long term benefits of the family then fine. But if this thread is the seed of really wanting something different out of life, thats okay to explore too.

But yes, the years of young DC and career progression are very, very tough.

If you've only recently moved I'd give it more time?

Outsource cleaning etc and anything else you can.

Can your partner drop their hours to accommodate more family stuff?

I think this is what working full time in any role is like when you're juggling small kids?

If another job wouldn't come up for ten years, i wouldn't quit.

Sounds like you are just back from maternity leave op? If so, give it 12 months before you make a decision. It’s a tough transition, particularly with a second - it’s statistically the time most women drop out of the workforce.
For what it’s worth, my personal experience was similar. I stuck with the job (kids are older now) and I have the foundations to get the mortgage paid, secure our retirement and give the kids a decent start to adulthood. Hard to be sure if it’s the right choice long term but, on balance, I wouldn’t make a different one. In the end, I couldn’t risk the financial security for the kids - probably because I grew up in a financially insecure household and I felt, however hard the stressors were on me, that was harder. What helped was reframing my expectations of that time, believing that providing for my children could give a sense of purpose, carving out non negotiables - a number of bedtimes, assembly, school trips, weekends kept as family time, finding small moments to be grateful for (a commute listening to a good podcast etc) ….

I think you do have e a choice. You could change house, you could radically change things so you’re not on a treadmill. But that comes with risk and cost.

If actually what you really want is the house you currently have and love, and to have good pensions - then own that - I’m working hard in order to have this thing that’s really important.

it’s not possible for you to both stay in your current house which you love, have good pensions AND earn a lot less. Would that it were! But sadly it isn’t.

So you have to make an active choice and own it wholeheartedly. You aren’t trapped at all. You can change things if you really want. It’s just that the “cost” of doing that is not one you want to bear. And fair enough.

feeling trapped when you in fact aren’t is not good for you. Better to say this is the choice I’ve made and for these reasons- not an easy choice, granted, but nonetheless one that I have made.

I have a friend on a similar salary to you (more, actually) and honestly I think she should quit it and do something else. She's got completely caught up in a trap whereby she feels she needs to spend all that money otherwise what's the point of working herself to exhaustion and never seeing her kids to earn it, but now she has to keep earning to keep spending it to make it worth earning to make it worth spending. She's stressed, exhausted and miserable and she could halve her income and still live in the top few percent with a lovely house, great holidays, private education for her kids etc. In my opinion she could also chuck the absolutely useless husband and save a fortune that way too.

I am absolutely not romantic at all about poverty or low income (been there, it's just shit) but in my view her lifestyle simply isn't worth what she has to sacrifice for it, and she's miserable.

I think more money brings more happiness to a certain point and after that point you get a plateau and more money doesn't bring more happiness.

I get it. I really do. If it helps, £150,000 today would have been c. £73k in 1996 and only £50k in 1986, so the reason is, £150,000 doesn't make you rich, and it feels like it should do. I earn quite a bit more than you and we are not rich. I have a nanny, a gardener, commuting costs and endless bills for school and music lessons, while I seem to do lots of the teaching/learning/consolidating at home.

I can't put my fees up, but someone at my stage and my level of success in my career in 1996 would have had a house (a proper house) in zone 1 or 2, private school and an actual life.

It sucks. I know there are very many, many who are worse off, but that doesn't mean you can't be unhappy about things that feel out of kilter in your life. Sadly I'm not sure there is a solution.

I wish this “in the trenches” nonsense would stop, four of my great uncles were killed in the trenches of Ypres and the Somme and my grandad’s leg was ripped off by shrapnel.
It is a pathetic and disrespectful saying.

Depends on what is important to you , but I wouldn’t be doing that . But ppl will prop not like to live my live and I love my life . No amount of money can buy or replace time.

Youre not being unreasonable, personally id rather be skint and feel less stressed and exhausted. It’s the rat race unfortunately the more you earn the more is spent.

This

Exactly. I've done both and have to say I'm much happier in a tiny house earning just above minimum wage but doing a job I actually enjoy and don't dread everyday.
I can't afford holidays and my child's never been abroad at 14 but spends a lot of time at a club he's very passionate about and that's where the 'spare' money gets spent.
I decided a while ago after burnout and a big relationship breakdown (now solo parent) that I'd rather every day of my life be quite nice and chilled with no holidays, rather than every day stressful just for 14 ish days a year of happiness.
It's a very hard choice to make, but it is a choice!

if it’s a niche job, would that also mean that it’s hard for your employers to find someone like you?

if so, could you use it as leverage to work from home two days a week? (if you think that would make you a little happier)