How do you hold work and family life together?

[Udford]

I’m recently back at work following MAT leave. I’m working 34 hours over 4 days. I’m finding it so hard this time around - functioning on barely any sleep because our kids don’t sleep or sleep in small sections throughout the night. Either that, or they’re poorly and I’m having to work with them at home or take time off.

House is a tip, washing is overflowing. There never seems to be enough time for ‘fun’ or for me and my husband to actually spend time together.

How is everyone else managing this? Feel like I’m either being a rubbish mum or a rubbish employee and I’m about ready to self implode.

Is their dad doing half the overnight wakes and half the sick days?

Have you got a tumble dryer. Especially in winter. Game changer!

Hi Op, I don't have any answers but wanted to offer some solidarity because it is HARD!
I find that it's hard at the best of times but when you add in illness it just tips me over the edge.
I also work 4 days. And only 1 from home. When the kids are ill I either have to try and work from home whilst entertaining them or dealing with them all day on top of trying to deal with a large workload and quite a lot of stress.
I find though that when the illness is over and things are easier again it can feel quite good that you managed to get through it type thing.
My DH is hands on but I do find this time of life very stressful and I don't like wishing their younger years away but I do dream of DC2 starting school so they're both in the same place and my life getting a bit easier, and less expensive.

Sorry for the textbook mumsnet ajswer but have you thought about getting a cleaner for when you work from home?

Working 4 days (2 long office days where I'm out minimum 12 hours and 2 from home).

Split nursery drop offs, pick ups and sick days with DH. He WFH a lot and does washing throughout the week. Tumble dryer. One tackles our dinner while the other puts DC to bed. Less sleep than I would like. A flexible employer who doesn't care how I do my job (within reason) as long as it gets done.

My non-working day is my get shit done day. Fun is for the weekends or annual leave.

Less sleep than I would like. But mostly, a DH that pulls his weight.

I'm still on MAT leave and can't keep up with everything, every-time I turn around the house becomes a mess. I don't know how people work and deal with this as well, I guess I'll find out when I return to work in a few months

For my first year back at work it was tough. My LO only started sleeping through at 2 years, 2 months and I’ve 2 older kids with evening activities!

A few things that helped me.
-eating the same meals every Tues / weds. Boring but cud batch cook so made life easier.
-doing a wash from start to finish everyday
-having set jobs with DP. And set drop off / collection days for both of us. It’s really nice having at least one day a week where don’t have to sort baby for nursery etc.

Short answer: badly!

Long answer: do different bits badly at a time. So, when ours aren’t sleeping, the priority is sleep and survival and doing the bare minimum to keep afloat (school uniform, personal hygiene, stuff like that), and accepting that this too shall pass and even though I haaaaaaate having piles of clean washing in our bedroom that we have no time to put away and we’re all tootling through the bags to find clothes, at least my hair is clean and I had a lie-in at DP’s expense after I did a night with the toddler.

We alternate nights on the monitor with the toddler. Other grownup takes the primary-aged one who sometimes has nightmares or wets the bed, but generally sleeps through.

Not everything gets done! When we prioritise X, Y drops off the radar. We had a cleaner for a while but can no longer afford it and tbh, though the house is now filthy at least I’m not stressed running around tidying it while getting two kids ready to get out the door (DP commutes so mornings are on me).

Meal plans, batch cook, divide chores so one person does all of one task so you’re not constantly doing “handovers” or thinking the other person should do it. DP does laundry, organises the food shop, bins, a load of other things. I do meal plans and bulk of cooking (WFH), calendars and school admin, a load of other things.

The best things that help are a shared Google calendar, a meal plan on the fridge, Muji 5-column calendar so everyone’s things are on view (and a column for bin day and random things!), splitting pickups drop offs, mutual understanding that it’s a struggle for us both, regular nights out with my friends who are all in the same boat, and a thoroughly decluttered house (I’m still working on convincing DP to streamline his fucking wardrobe so there’s less STUFF. No one needs 71 T-shirts and 60 pairs of socks! Less stuff, less washing, less putting away).

The washing machine has a delayed setting. So you can programme to finish at any time (for example 6am or 5pm).

Hard period is now until all children including youngest consistently tidy up after themselves....

I think organisation and routine are key.

Online shopping set up with favourites so you click a couple of buttons and all of the staples are delivered. At the same time each week.

Midweek meals are basic and samey. Nobody has to think what's for tea because it's Wednesday so it's jacket potatoes.

Before bed every night make sure shoes coats bags etc are all packed and ready to go. Leave the kitchen respectable.

As soon as you get in from work get the packed lunches done and a load of washing on. In the morning air it. Etc etc.

Adjusted to whatever suits your routine.

At the weekends prioritise rest.

Yes same! My only hope is that once I'm back at work and DD is at nursery then no one will be in the house to mess it up! At the moment we mostly have 3 meals a day in the house so that creates a lot of cleaning up, plus putting away toys etc, which should lessen once we're all out of the house more 🙏🏽

@JimHalpertsWife He does but probably no where near as much as he should.

We’ve had lots of arguments about sharing the load in the past and to be honest, nothing ever changes.

@Ukholidaysaregreat We have a washer/drier. It does dry clothes but it takes a while and they never really come out feeling cupboard dry so I always have to let them sit in the open afterwards. Adds to the mess 🙈 I also use an airer - thinking about upgrading to a heated one!

A dehumidifier on laundry setting has helped loads for us so worth considering. We use gousto/hello fresh for meals in the week this suits us but appreciate it won't be for everyone. I also bought lots of underwear, school uniform so I always have enough if laundry doesn't get done! My DH does night wakes as I am on meds that knock me out. But I get up early so he gets an extra lie in. It's not ideal but works for now. The DC won't be little forever.

I would try a book called Fair Play, which has a system for assigning all the household tasks equally (no one can bagsy all the once-a-year, direct debit stuff and claim to be doing their share but not do daily grind stuff like cooking and laundry). It really helps show that one person can’t do everything, even two people can’t do everything so it has a way to whittle down priorities, to show that even stuff like the tooth fairy is more work, however minor, so do you as a family want to buy in to it.

And it recommends a weekly check-in so you can both talk about what’s working and what isn’t, if there are any “grind” chores that you need to swap. It really helped us see each other’s invisible loads, and it cut out some work because we weren’t both trying to do it, or having to talk about it – I know what DP does and I don’t get involved, he knows what I do and doesn’t get involved. Eg if someone’s job is bins, they’re responsible for all the bins in the house, putting the bin out on bin day, buying new bin bags, cleaning the kitchen bin when it gets manky, going to the tip. There is no part of bin I’m involved in except putting my rubbish in them; it’s like having a magic bin fairy! Same as DP has a magic tidying up fairy because that’s my role.

Fair Play uses playing cards (we made our own) with the chores on and physically seeing the size of my pile vs his really helped him, even though he already did a lot, see how much more I was doing and how much we were both sharing when it would be easier to wholly own a task.

Online food shop, i am religious about this, same day and time every week so dh also knows and has to be there. Simply meal planning. Pasta, noodles, fishfingers or something in the slow cooker. Washing done as regularly as possible. Sharing the load as much as possible. When dc were little Sunday evening dh and I to try and coordinate the week so we knew who was doing what. Do not over plan stuff for the weekends, allow time for nothing.

Accept it is hard at this stage.

If you are both working (albeit yours is not a full week) and you have 2 (or more?) small dc who are obviously completely dependent on you, and also going through a phase of not sleeping, then it is a phase to be 'got through'.

Of course, having two parents who pull their weight makes life much more manageable. I don't know how people cope when they don't have that, and it hasn't changed when confronted