to apply for jobs and not want to go to interview....

[debs40]

this is a self-indulgent whinge ....

I've got two boys (3 and 6) and I've worked freelance since they were born on top of doing a PhD.

My husband is in IT but is contracting and on short term contracts miles (an hour and a half drive) from home.

I've started to apply for jobs again now boys are used to school and nursery but all the work I can do is in London (an hour and a half train trip away).

I now have two interviews in London next week. Good jobs. One is well paid - the other not so well paid.

My problem is:

-it costs £50 a day and three hours a day to commute

• we have no family locally so I don't know what I'd do about school collection

• My husband can't work flexitime or part-time so he can drop off or pick up but not both

-he earns better money so he couldn't give up work and we live on my salary (particularly after deducting the costs of commuting)

• dh's contract finishes in April and who knows what the future holds after that

-ds1 is waiting to see a community paediatrician as he may have dyspraxia and he handles change really badly

• there are no jobs in the place we live in my field but I could do my freelance work but it is very irregular

• we can't move at present as brother with cerebral palsy has just moved in to supported accomodation nearby and has no one else to help him

Sorry, I just don't know what to do for the best. Go to these interviews and try and get a job (I would like to do either of them if it weren't for the commute) and see what we coiuld muster with childcare but we'd be replacing one absent parent (dh is out 7 to 7 at least 5 days a week) or leave it and see how things go and then find out dh can't get work....

Any ideas?

why are you applying when you can't do the actual jobs? It's too far for you.

give yourself a break and wait til you find one in your area or do freelance til you do

I'm risk averse so I would try to get one of the London jobs

I do a similar commute (1.5 hours each way), and have 2 school aged children. We have an au pair to provide the before/after school cover..and flexibility for the inevitable broken down train. Have you space for an AP? It also means that the children stay in their own home and chill out after school which suits ds best (he is not good with change - had SN when younger).

Go to the interviews. They may offer flexi time and homeworking that would help. Also a good CM would do school runs and Holiday cover.

Personally I think you sound like you don't want to go back just yet. Are you financially secure enough if DH does not find a new contract to wait and see?

Thanks for your posts. I think this is the problem.

I like the idea of both of those jobs but I hate the thought of not being around.

Dh has been increasingly less hands on (through force of circumstances really) over the last year and I feel like things would crazy a bit at home if I wasn't here as he hasn't a clue. I have to give painfully slow, step by step instructions for everything - I know I'm a control freak!

Anyway, I also know that he hates his commute and he has already suggested he could try and do freelance from home if I returned full time. This may enable us to live off the salary I'd make (at least with the better paid job).

Trouble is he is not self-motivated at all and I can see weeks ticking by with him at home, the house a mess, the kids in dirty clothes and me turning into a nag - why haven't you done x, y or z.

When he started his own IT business, I ended up having to do everything to do with the accounts. I'd show him what to do and he'd forget time after time. It would cause big rows so I just took it over even though with the kids, my work and PhD, it's not like I have a lot of time.

So, there's the crux of it I suppose. If I felt it would all be organised domestically and dh would get some work in to help with money, then I wouldn't mind going to London every day. Truth is, I know it won't be and that makes it a big risk whichever way I choose to go.

Not sure about an au pair - I think I might find it too intrusive

See I am definitely a control freak!!

I just want it all - a job on my doorstep, a husband working nearby, and happy kids!