'High fliers' and nannies

[Takver]

I've seen in several places recently (including in threads on here, and for example in this article in last Saturday's Guardian) an assumption that if you are a wealthy and successful family where a nanny provides most of your childcare this is likely to result in your children being less 'stimulated' / likely to become highfliers themselves / otherwise missing out.

Typical quote from the piece linked to: "You assume they'll be intelligent, but you've never wondered how this will come about: when they try to interact with you, you're too busy."

Now maybe I'm overthinking this, but it seems to me that if we go back 40 or 50 years, it would have been the absolute accepted norm in a wealthy family for nannies / other staff to do the vast majority of childcare, and indeed for boys at least to then be sent off to boarding school from age 7 onwards. I can't imagine that anyone would have dreamed that this would in someway disadvantage their children or result in them being less successful themselves when they grew up. Of course back then the women of the family wouldn't have had the option to have top jobs themselves, they would have been occupied with their social functions.

Yet now - when women are able to access high flying jobs - we are told that this pattern of purchased childcare is going to disadvantage the children. And of course the corollary of this assumption is almost invariably that it is the mother - never the father - who is in some way being selfish by devoting their time to work and not childrearing.

I should say that I don't have any direct interest here myself - I am absolutely Ms-hippy-nature-walks-and-crafty-shit-mother but it just seems to me like another cunning way to stick women right back where they belong . . .

You are going to have a working life of over 40 years, a few years off with small DCs is a very small part of it for either you or your DH/DP.

but do you think many women take 5 years off then, when they go back to work, their DH takes on 50% of the childcare/housework?

i am sure some women do achieve this but not the majority.

It is really up to the individual - no one has to be married and if they are they need to make it clear from day 1 that they are equal. From reading MN it is clear that many women appear to have, and put up with, an extra DC. Many women appear to become 'senior parent' - they both start from no experience, but she becomes the expert who has to show him how to do things and she won't walk out of the door for a few hours and just leave him to it!
I think that many women like it that way! I could just go out and leave my DH with them- he knew how the house worked and he knew them.
A lot of women are their own worst enemies- the man doesn't do things her way and they take over!
The majority could achieve it if they started on their first meeting- 5 years down the line with a DC is too late to start.

But sometimes it is not that simple. My dh does his fair share around the house. We have a cleaner then both have particular jobs that we do. But he travels a LOT for work. We discussed this when he took the job, but it does have a huge impact on me. I am lucky enough to have a decent job with a high degree of flexibility BUT with limited chances of advancement. The jobs out there involving promotion also tend to involve long hours and more travel. I am just not able to do that without him cutting back/buying help.

Now that would be fair enough, but he is 54, and has 10 years to work. He has a final salary pension!!!! It makes more sense for him to go for it now - and lets face it, he would find it hard to find a similar position elsewhere.... I continue to gain experience and can probably go down the consultancy route later on....

But in our case, it COULD have happened the other way round.....I am not sure if I would have preferred that though - and I do ask myself why that is.....

I wouldn't expect my DP to take on 50% of what I currently do if I returned to a FT job! Why should I? He works really hard and hasn't any additional capacity. We would hire other help.

Do you plan to do this in the future, Bonsoir? I have a dream of leaviing the rat race and setting up some kind of business when dh retires. Working from home.....Dd will go to Uni (if she wants to) around the same time.....

You can have all the legislation you like- the bottom line is that someone has to look after the children, either family or paid help. They have to know what will happen if the nanny is sick, the DC gets chicken pox etc.

No not 50% of what a SAHP does but 50% of whatever needs doing that isn't outsourced to someone else.

You might even expect more - like the parent who's career hasn't suffered for 5 years and who has benefited from the role the SAHP has played might do whatever was necessary in terms of flexible working to create the mental space and time needed to help the other partner get back to work.

... Not saying happens a lot, just that it should.

But it has to be up to the couple, Himalaya- you can't legislate for how a couple help each other. People have lots of different scenarios e.g. I know a couple with a toddler and he is in the RAF stationed in Cyprus- hardly good for her career- and even if she found something they will be off in another couple of years and they don't know where they are off to. Is she supposed to wave him off for 3 years and let her poor DC have him as an occasional visitor?
It is very common for someone to relocate with their job in order to get on.
Once you are a couple you are a team and not an individual in competition, you have to work out priorities and solutions for yourselves. One couple will not do it the same as another.
There is only one thing for sure and that is that having a DC will make a huge difference to your life, you are kidding yourself if you think it won't. It is up to the parents themselves to sort it out the way they want and it isn't helpful thinking everyone is the same and that they want the same solutions.

Exotic - no you can't legislate, but you can notice that something is wrong. You can establish the principle that both parents lives can be expected to change and both can be expected to be able to continue their career.

If your friends in Cyprus were a different couple - a female soldier and a male civilian. Would it be immediately obvious that the DH should give up his career to allow her to take up the posting. I think the more likely conclusion would be that her job is in incompatible with motherhood, and she would have to give up/retrain.

Similarly after his tour in Cyprus would he say 'ok you've put your professional life on hold for 3 years, now I will return the favour and move to where you need to be'. Would the army say -that's fine, come back in 3 years time with all the great management skills you've got from being a FT dad' ?

That is entirely up to the couple. As it is the woman loves being a mother and is having a wonderful time inCyprus, an experience that I would love. Another couple are in Las Vegas for 3years with the RAF- I think that they see it as a wonderful opportunity rather than a drawback.

however with high divorce rates, the chances are, one of the two couples you mention marriage will end.

then i doubt the wife will be looking at the years she spent keeping the home for XH as favourably as you are.

I think that they are more likely to get divorced if the women refused to go with the posting. They both knew the score before they married and if they didn't like it that was the time to end the relationship. Personally I would much prefer a once in a lifetime chance of being paid to live in USA or Cyprus for a few years. You only get one life- if you just play safe you miss a lot.

DH nearly got a job in Switzerland once, looking back I regret that we didn't get such a wonderful opportunity. Even if things went wrong I can never regret having those years with my DCs- priceless to me.

Exotic - so would you say the same thing to a male accountant (....say) married to a female soldier? "You knew she was a soldier when you got married etc...of course you should jump at the chance to go keep house in a foreign country, it's a chance of a lifetime, man?"

If he wanted too, Himalaya. You do seem very inflexible. You have one life, seize the opportunities! It seems that you have to miss them all because you are so fearful of what will happen if you step off the treadmill! Life has changed, people are no longer starting work-keeping to the same line and getting the pension and the clock at the end! They are having changes of career, some from choice and some forced upon them. Men are being the stay at home dad, people are having years off to travel, one partner is often supporting another while they retrain, study, write a book etc. I know couples where they have all moved because the Mother's job was the one that gave new opportunities.My DH has been made redundant three times, he has worked abroad for a number of years when young, I have recently had a change of direction. My DS is young, he has already had 2 changes of direction.
The best thing about being married is that you are a partnership, in it together and not this terrible competition where you keep saying ' but exotic would you say the same thing to a man?' Yes I would- why not?
It is up to the couple and for the umpteenth time you don't have to get married! Women in 21st century don't need a meal ticket.
One thing that I do admire Xenia for is that she is doing it alone and even managing to buy an island! You can be sure that if she did meet someone else it would be on her terms.

Exotic - I am all for flexibility and all the things you describe - it's just that all around me I see it working out not so flexibly - it is 90% women in the playground at pickup time, while when I go to meetings for work at senior level it is not unusual for it to be 90% men.

I don't think these women are seizing the opportunities to be honest. They are doing up their houses, ferrying their children around, marking time in pin money jobs, watching their weight, planning their family holidays. I don't think it's what they had in mind when they thought about their dreams in their teens and twenties (unless they had very dull domestic aspirations).

If it was all wondrously flexible this would just be a random year - maybe next year all these men would switch with their wives and the playground and the boardroom will look different.

Exotic, I think you have misunderstood couples where both work. We aren't competing with each other. Its a different way of supporting each other.

some couples work in the same areas so can v obviously assist each other. Others different but if you both have similar level jobs, the will be a lot of common experiences you can both draw on.

It would be v dysfunctional to complete with ones partner. What has made you think this way?

however with high divorce rates, the chances are, one of the two couples you mention marriage will end

Why have we got such high divorce rates. Is it because we go into marriage as individuals and once there we continue to act as individuals? (general question not personal)

(unless they had very dull domestic aspirations)

I think you would have to ask that person if the domestic was dull. I remember at school several of the girls aspired to just that, big weddings, white dresses, children and a semi-detatched with a garage.

mini - because of the descreased stigma in divorce meaning fewer people live in unhappy relationships? what do you think?

My dh wants me to go to work. Thankfully, we are in agreement about this. Perhaps he thinks I will have time to get into too much trouble at home.

We are both lawyers but in vastly different fields. That means we can understand each other's career concerns on quite an intimate level but not talk shop all the time. I prefer it when I have that added dimension when interacting with my dh, and I presume he likes it too, hence him preferring me to keep my spurs on and fingers in.

I personally think fewer people getting married would mean fewer people wasting time and money getting divorced. (personal opinion)

Yes there is less stigma, that is a good thing if it means more women can escape violent and emotionally/financially abusive marriages. However if you really look into abusive/violent/unhappy relationships you find women still struggle to break free even when they are not married.

I think relationships are too complex simply just to say divorce is easier or financial independence is a primary factor in divorce rates etc...

What I do think is the major factor, is how we define and view ourselves, we no longer define ourselves by our relationships to others but as individuals. Are we more selfish? Have men always defined themselves as individuals first and foremost? Are women becoming more/less flexible and cooperative?
Are women now putting themselves first where as men have always done so? Have all men always put themselves first? Did women gloss over this in order to create and maintain relationships?

In a healthy relationship we would of course see the significant other and their needs as equal to our, I think the prevailing culture of individualism/ neo-liberalism and economic forces have shaped our concept of what it is to be both an individual but also part of other relationships.

I think the fact that there are many more jobs , particularly in the western world, that do not need so much blood, sweat and tears,has majorly played a part.That there are so many more men, in comparison to say even the sixities and seventies,who now work at desks instead of in fields, factories and manufacturing.

I don't think that you are getting my point- and that is that it is up to the individual couple. There is no point in looking at others and thinking they should be doing something else. Maybe they are quite happy, if you saw me at the school gate I would be there because I wanted to and if I had a high flying job I certainly don't want to be in senior management meetings- I hate meetings.
I haven't managed my dream as a teenager, but my role model was not my mother but my aunt. She ran a farm with her DH. She was around most of the time, she ran her own parts of it. She had a wonderful garden and made all her own chutneys etc and if you wanted chicken for dinner she went and killed one. She had a rambling old house, land with a stream, an orchard etc. She was very artistic and had plenty of time for projects. She did a lot in the community. When they sold it they had ample to retire on. To my mind that beats the stress of commuting and offices, she didn't have to even dress up and wear make up.
There are many different ways of doing it. Sort out yourself and you need not worry about the rest of us.
A few years out do not harm prospects if you are really keen. My father didn't even qualify until he was mid 30s with 2 children and a third on the way- he made it up the ladder, had he not died young I expect he would have got to the top, he was the rung beneath.
My DH1 died incredibly young. I now live life differently.I live for today and seize the opportunity, and as long as we are alive and healthy all other problems are small- happy is a bonus. I certainly wouldn't pass up the chance of living abroad for a few years because it was with DH's job and not mine. Even if it all goes pear shaped I had those years with my DCs and it beat any career IMO. I wouldn't expect others to feel the same, but is up to them to arrange it with their DP.