Poor performance professionally since becoming a parent

[Threesmycrowd]

Just wondering if anyone else has experienced this... i work in a professional role and was performing well before children. I now have a 2 and 4 year old and work part-time. I make mistakes every day at work. Typos, miss emails, no attention to detail. I can't understand it i was never like this before. Has anyone else experienced this? Did anything help?

I tell myself every working day that i'll be better and then i send another email getting something basic wrong. It's always low-level, but i cannot get through a working day without a mistake.

I don't know if it's related to not working full-time (so my head isn't properly 'in the game') or if it's because i'm now juggling so much more 'life admin' that i don't have proper headspace for work, or if hormone changes or something mean that my brain doesn't work like it did. Or if i'm actually just a bit shit! It's really, really frustrating and really upsetting. I don't want to be someone who makes mistakes - and i didn't used to be.

You’re probably sleep deprived. It’s a downward spiral - need to get work done / stretched thin at home and work / work more / home stuff / sleep late

Has anyone at work spotted or is it more that you feel less efficient / lower quality on the first round?

I feel for you, OP. With young children your working memory is so full of things involving them. You aren’t the same as your pre-baby self when you could give 100 per cent of your attention to work without distractions.

However, you CAN overcome this. It’s good that you have identified the issue, ie low level mistakes in emails. Now you need to plan for how to overcome those mistakes. Some things that may help are- copy and paste your email into word and re-read it in a bigger or different font, before sending it. I do this sometimes and it helps me to spot errors. Try sending important emails to yourself as a draft before you send it externally. This also helps me to see mistakes. Always triple check attachments and email recipients to limit the risk of errors. You could also use the ‘read to me’ function in Outlook where it reads your email to yourself (if you have a private space or headphones).

There may be other and better techniques you could use. The trick is work with your current self- you may not go back to your child free professional self, but you can use new skills which will make you an ever better worker in the long term.

How is your health generally? I get like this when I'm anaemic. Or it could be tiredness, or hormones, or thyroid, or a number of other things. Maybe a blood test would be a good place to start, then look at diet, sleep, lifestyle?

Yes I found this - I don't think it has improved as the kids have got older either as then heading for peri menopause- I work full time and my head is constantly like a computer with a thousand browser windows open and naturally that leads to missing things

Thanks so much for your replies/support. Some practical suggestions too, I'll do my best. No one at work has commented but I have a new boss and I'm fairly certain she thinks I'm an idiot. I will try to take more time over things and more care, I guess I have to adjust to not expecting myself to work as efficiently as before. And maybe get a blood test!