Can anyone suggest a way in which I might improve my work/life balance or come up with more than 24 hours in a day?

[MrsSchadenfreude]

I commute 1 1/2 hours each way and am essentially out of the house for 12 hours. I don't have a lunch hour so that I can leave "earlier." I need to do some exercise as I am looking like Mr Blobby's older and less attractive sister, but I just don't seem to have any time. I come home from work, cook, put children to bed, flop on sofa for an hour or on here for a bit, or write a bit, and then it's 11 o'clock and I need to go to bed for 0600 getting up and have achieved nothing and am knackered.

I cannot work from home one day a week as I don't have the IT necessary (I work on v sensitive stuff and most of it's not even on the computer). I am also not very disciplined and if I did somehow manage to work one day from home I suspect I'd spend the day asleep or pottering.

The alternative is to go to bed when the children do - at about 9 ish, but then I've had no evening and feel like I'm on a treadmill.

I spend the weekend sleeping, cooking, tidying and doing minimal cleaning (DH does more as he is less of a slut than me). I have an existence, not a life, and this needs to change. But how?

3 hours a day commuting sounds absolutely rubbish, no wonder there is not enough time.
Can you change your job or move closer?

also, arrange to see working friends straight after work every now and then...it means you don't have to rush back to put the kids to bed and you can have a laugh/gossip and it does make you feel more human.

The exercise has made the biggest difference to me though....and I do think FT working IS a treadmill in many ways, isn't it.

You could be me. I work (very) full time too and have 2 children and one long commute. Have my strategies - some of them work, some don't.

1. Get a pedometer and walk 10,000 steps a day. This gets you up from your desk and talking to people rather than emailing, walk part of your commute etc.

1. Very good IT. Blackberry/good phone/laptop with GPRS etc and use it on one way of the commute for work/to plan the day. On the way back you can do shopping mumsnetting online.

1. Organise the shopping so that a big online monthly shop takes care of the non-perishables, then you can just do a 30 minute food shop a week.

1. Get all the help you can find or afford. We've got a fab cleaner who does lots of stuff. Also an aupair and a gardener. Spare time spent doing chores means zero you-time.

1. Make a rule that you are entitled to 10 hours of you-time a week. That might be flopping on the sofa watching TV but it might be a long luxurious bath, a walk, a trip to the cinema, reading books, mumsnetting, whatever. I get an hour a day in the week and three hours a day at weekends.

1. Get into the habit of delegating and don't accept responsibility willingly. So if your DCs need some nametags sewing into their clothes, have half an hour showing them how to do it, then they get to do it for themselves going forward ... Make sure they set and clear the table after every meal and wash up too.

I refused a blackberry on the basis that as I'm full time and also have a 90 minute commute each way, I have more than enough time out of the house without feeling like i need to have an umbilical cord between me and my email . If they need me out of hours, they call on my mobile and get me that way. I think I would go insane if I could check my emails all the time.

That way, the commute is my time...albeit not very pleasant or satisfying, but it means on the way in, I can read the paper and on the way back, can read a bit of my book and do feel, when I haven't been called up, that I've had a bit of a break from everyone.

Quattrocento, I'm interested in this rule of yours:

1. Make a rule that you are entitled to 10 hours of you-time a week. That might be flopping on the sofa watching TV but it might be a long luxurious bath, a walk, a trip to the cinema, reading books, mumsnetting, whatever. I get an hour a day in the week and three hours a day at weekends.

Do lie-ins come out of your 10 hours? Also time with your DH?

Well this rule of mine is really aimed at me rather than DH/DC time. It includes time in bed reading for instance. Sofatime too - I don't get any of that in the week so I try to make sure I get to watch a tv programme at the weekend. It's a bit odd but it seems to work

And the lie-ins? If your DH gets up with the DC do you have to deduct say two hours from your total?

What are lie-ins?

Some good suggestions here - thank you very much. I will have a look and a think and report back. I think the lunchtime is a must.

Quattrocentro for some reason I'm very interested in your 10-hrs a week rule.

Does time with your friends count as "you time" (out of your 10 hrs) or as "other people time"?

I was even telling my DH about it, and we were having reveries over the thought of carving out 10 hours dedicated me time each every week.

You know what lie-ins are, is when you lie in bed for longer on a weekend, innit?

Yes,eliminating tv from life helps enormously (as long as MN doesn't fill hole)

Althoguh at least MNing is sociable and useful unlike tv.

Definitely agree with the lunch hour MrsS - it's so easy to get out of the habit of it. Apart from anything, being hunched over a desk all day does nothing for your physical well being.

Even if it's only half an hour, make a definite break and go outside for a quick walk/breath of fresh air.

What's your time management/delegation like once you're at work? Are you someone who always says 'yes' rather than 'no'?

IME and IMO this is often an area where we end up being bogged down with stuff that then starts to take over.

Definitely agree that your DH does more - you haven't said much (other than he is less of a slut than you!) but if you're the bread winner, then why are you also (as it sounds) taking responsibility for all of the household stuff?

A cleaner would be non-negotiable I'm afraid. Even when we've had dire financial times, this has been the one thing that I have insisted we keep. At £8 per hour for someone else to do the ironing and keep the house clean this is well worth it and saves my sanity.

Are you eating properly? May sound daft, but if you're not eating well it lead to less energy which then makes it seem as if everything is getting on top of you. Are you living on too much coffee, for example?

I would also try and find a yoga or pilates class near you - good exercise but also fantastic for dealing with stress. The first time I did pilates I was so dismissive about it - how could this be exercise? But when I could barely get out of bed the next morning I realised just how much it was exercising my too sedentary/corporate body.

Sorry, lots of questions, but hope that you can steal some of your life back for yourself!

Hello MrsS! (I met MrsS for a drink last night at Euston, twas very nice!)

Well, I was doing the same hours as you and it was killing, frankly. Really, really hard. I currently commute for 4 hours a day as I have a slightly longer journey from Euston.

But last week I did the first week of my new negotiated hours and it's made SUCH a difference. So now I do 9.30 -4.30 x 4 days and 1 day at home. The day at home makes a huge difference as does the later start/earlier finish. The deal is that I use an hour and a quarter of my commute to work and do a longer day from hmoe as there's no commuting time. And now I get up at 6.30am rather than 5.45am and I get home for 6.30 si I see the children.

Can you propose something similar to your employer? Are there policies and guidelines somewhere you can refer to and quote when making your case for it? And SURELY you could do what you do frmo home given certain IT and stuff?

Also, we have a cleaner twice a week who also collects ds and gives him supper, I pay £10 an hour as it's a cleaning/childcare combo and it's well worth it.

I shop online, did it during my work frmo home day, it took half an hour and then dh put it away last night while I was out drinking Pinot Grigio with you.

I do sympathise, I was on a hair trigger until I changed my hours.

Re cooking, can you go out sometimes at weekends or get takeaways, just to take the pressure off? Or get a new repetoire of easy, quick and healthy meals?

If you came up with a decent proposal surely your boss would consider it?

Hello WWW! Great to meet you! I have just had a Lovely Nap as Dear Friend has relieved me of the children. We are getting new IT at work soon, so it should be possible for me to work one day a week at home. In the meantime, I am doing:

a) no cleaning. If DH wants clean house, he knows where all the stuff is (and does most of it anyway).

b) cooking food in bulk and freezing it (was doing this for children anyway, but will do it for us too)

c) getting bus to Aldwych and walking from there in the morning (about 15-20 mins) ifit's not raining, which is nice walk and bus goes through Holborn, which has lovely childhood memories for me as it's where my Great Gran lived.

d) Walking round park with MI once a week at lunchtime

e) making sure I have a break every day and go outside, even if it's just half an hour.

f) doing online shop from Chavsda for basics with top up from Johnny Lou Lou's food hall.

Occasional takeaways good idea, but we live in the middle of nowhere, so it will have to be on one of the days the chip van's in teh village

Am also thinking of buying trampoline "for the children" and going riding again.

Sounds good - has it made you feel better?!

you dont need us, you've thought of all the answers already...all i'd add is the quickest and easiest exercise to fit in anywhere is running, cos you burn max calories in min time. you could do 20 mins at lunchtime three days a week and be disgustingly fit. (I hate running but have just made this calculation for myself). trampoline of course even more fun.
dont know what you do for a living but i found when i went back to work in lunatic long hours job that i could reduce hours by a good 10-15 pc and sky DID NOT FALL IN: my output didnt actually decrease by nearly that much, mostly because i now waste absolutely no time in the office. you may be able to carve out time where you didnt think you could.
its awful middle class cliche but if you want sthing to yourself (love the idea of quattocento's ten hours metime - god i wish) you could join book group (find a slacker one where all you do is drink wine and gossip and nobody's ever read the book). you could use your commute/tv time to read and feel like you've got some escapism