Getting to 50/50 - anyone managed to really share career and child care with their dh?

[3inABIRDsnest]

I saw this book recommended somewhere www.gettingto5050.com/ and I 've ordered a copy on eBay. Just wondered if anyone has read it? Or if anyone has managed to really share the childcare and having a career?

In a perfect world, I think dh and I would both work 3 days a week and use a nanny 1 day.

When the kids are older, We're interested in homeschooling but there's no way I could do it full time. If we had this work pattern, we could each school the kids 1 day per week and buy in a tutor 1 day.

Am I in cloud cuckoo land, or do you think it's doable?

At the moment I have Fridays off and my husband arranges his work so he can work from home on a Thurs. DS is in nursery Mon-Wed. It works fine. Can't see why it wouldn't really!

Illness is the only thing that throws a spanner in the works sometimes. DH has a more senior role than me, so I usually take more of the days off when DS is sick.

3 days is still quite a bit of childcare to pay for though mh! (not judging, great it works for you). I guess I was asking if it's possible to both do 50% work, 50% childcare, and have no / minimal childcare...

I don't think you're in cloud cuckoo land!

DH and I used to do 50:50, sadly it wasn't working for him and he decided to go back full time (but will now do the weekends when I work). I know plenty of families round here who have similar arrangements.

Similarly I'd love to do HE when the DCs are old enough but again it would be shared with DH. We are both fighting to stay at home full time, so it only seems fair we split the childcare

Not read the book though

Ah I see what you mean.

Yes it is still expensive. We don't have jobs that would easily lend themselves to a three-day week unfortunately or I'd definitely consider it. HE wouldn't be for me though (don't think I'm patient enough).

Ps bird are you me?! I feel like we want to live parallel lives

Ha, mrsdob, it's because we obviously have the answers
Shame part time didn't work for your dh. Mine would love to go pt (he used to have 1 avo off and loved it). But we're always a bit stuck because I've had 4 years out and he's 3 years older than me anyway, so he's way ahead of me career wise and earns more. But if I could do 3 days and he just dropped 2 days of work, that would probably be ok, And just 1 day of childcare we could probably cope with. And with 3 Dcs a nanny would probably work out as cheap as childminder doing various pickups etc.

It's something to aim for, anyhow. I reckon homeschooling 2 days per week each would be really fun!

My friend does - i will email her and see if she has time to reply

Cool thanks!

I totally agree re HE. You prolly wouldn't even need a tutor just childcare as you could do homeschooling on the days you are there as its so flexible. It would be awesome. DH is really up for it too, but I guess we'll just have to see what the kids want when they're a bit older. They might really really want to start mainstream school!

My friend's DH is looking to go down to 1 day/week while she does 4 days. Wish I had his job! They've kept their LO out of childcare for 2 years by doing 50:50 but she's just taken a promotion and has upped her hours.

I guess it will be easier for you if you are studying? I think it's much much harder for the DPs to organise part time work. DH was faced with incredulous comments like 'why on earth would you want to look after your children' and 'that's career suicide' from his colleagues, particularly the senior ones. Although we seem to know a lot of DPs that do some or most of the childcare, none of their work colleagues think its normal

Hello, I'm Lcy's friend. DH and I have done this, and variations of it for 4 years. Currently we both work 3 days, but one of his is a Saturday.

We have been lucky in that we both have pretty flexible public sector jobs. We both work fairly long days to fit as many hours in a possible at work. We only have one day off a week together which is hard.

Financially there is obviously a hit. When Dd1 was around 2 we put her in a nursery one day a week and I went to 30 hours over 4 days.

The hardest thing has been relinquishing control. I spent 2 x 10 month periods where I was on mat leave therefore in control at home. While I didn't want to stay at home FT it was hard to accept dh had his own way of parenting and managing the house. He found it v hard at first especially with 2 after having been back at work FT, but he has gotten used to it and the benefit to our kids is enormous. It also means that we rarely have to worry about kids being off school/sick etc.

Working pt is difficult and a whole other thread in itself but on the whole we are really pleased with our decision. There have been financial sacrifices, but the biggest factor in making it work has been luck in our job situation.

DH & I have been doing this for the past 18 months & it's been great. He quit his salaried employment to set up his own business working around my job & the children with a view to increasing the hours as our youngest started school. I work 3 long days away form home so leave before anyone gets up & home just about by bedtime so having DH around was really the only option and he's in sole charge those 3 days - it took quite a while before we settled into a decent routine where DH proactively undertook household chores (as opposed to doing things I asked or nagged about!) but I'd say we're pretty much 50:50 now if anything he does more. It's been absolutely fantastic for our children and neither of us have to worry about time off for sickness which has been lovely. I'll be gutted when I leave my job (redundancy likely) as it will most likely mean going FT and stopping our really lovely family/work balance. .

I'm still on ml at present, but DP and I've arranged what shold be a 50:50 split for when I go back. I'm lucky that I'm a nurse and had a flexible working request agreed to let me work full time hours over 4 days on a Mon, Wed, Thurs and Sat. DP runs a company and will also work full time hours over 4 days on a Mon, Tues, Thurs and Fri. Very kindly Mil has agreed to have DD on a Mon and Thurs when we're both working. So we do 2 days care each plus 1 day together (with Mil having 2 days too).

The downside to this plan is we'll only be together as a family one day a week, on a Sunday, also both DP and I will work one really long day a week on which we won't see DD at all. But it's still the best solution for us.

My DH and I almost do this. He works 3 days a week and I work from home 1 day a week. My parents have the DC the other 2 days (when we're both in the office) but they spend 4 hours in preschool (free for my eldest who is almost 4).

DH does spend a lot of time working in the evenings but we always make sure we have the whole weekend off. It works well for us as we are both in employment and both know what it's like to look after the DC and run the house. DH has also now started to do chores proactively, which is fantastic (it took almost a year though).

I was a SAHM for almost 3 years so we tried it the other way but this is much better for both our sanity and for the relationship with our DC.

Thanks for all your stories - gives me hope it can be done! I will ake some serius juggling though, and one problem is because I'm younger than dh (4 yrs) and have had 4rs out to have kids, I'm way behind in my earning capacity. But I am determined to sort this out as soon as i can...

YES YES! We do it!!

I have a very high pressured, professional city job (think lawyer/banker type). DH is a consultant. We split our week. We dont use any childcare.

It's hard but works for us.