Please tell me it'll be ok

[confusedandemployed]

I am just about to give up my FT, quite well-paid job to take on a half-time job which will bring in about half what I am currently on (so still quite well-paid, just fewer hours).

Until July DP was a SAHD and we survived on what I brought in alone. Now, with his wage and my reduced one, our household income is unlikely to dip much below what we lived on for over a year while he was at home, and yet I am very nervous about money when I will be PT.

On the flip side my job is making me miserable, and during the scant time I have with my 18mo DD, I am stressed, short tempered and I don't feel like she and I have any sort of quality or fun time together.

I also have an opportunity to take on a bit of freelance work, so there may be a few more sheckels to go round.

I suppose I'm just after a bit of reassurance. Has anyone taken a big financial hit in order to spend more time at home?

Lots of people do, but I'd be concerned not about the financial side, but more about your job making you miserable, and I'd also be concerned that you're not feeling as though you have any fun time with your DD even though you're only working half a week.

Why is that do you think? Because if you're feeling like that it's not going to seem worth it.

I'm currently working more-or-less full time. By far the biggest reason for giving up current FT job and dropping to the proposed 17.5 hours is so that I'm less of a cow around her. She's a feisty young thing but that is no reason for me to get angry with her all the time - especially when the real reason I'm angry is because I'm anxious about work.

When I have a decent break away from the place (rarely, because I feel unable to take much leave) we have great fun, and I think that's because I am more relaxed.

The new job, whilst being pretty well-paid, is far narrower in its scope and much less susceptible to crises. In my current role I feel like I'm just lurching from one problem to another.

Reading that back, it sounds like a no-brainer.

Oh sorry I read that completely wrong! Well in that case yes it sounds like a no brainer!

Last year I went from 55 hpw to 17.5 hpw.

The wage is considerably less (obvs) but still well paid.
I am a much happier person since going part time. I have a better work-home life balance , I am less stressed, I have more fee time and I am relaxed.

It was the best decision I have made in a long time and although we have taken a drop in income we can manage fine.

I left a well paid but very stressful job working far too many hours for a lower and less stressful role with less, but still good, money last year. I was really miserable in my old job and just as you describe I felt I was not always mentally there when I spent time with my ds as my mind was always on work or stressing about work.

I had a good few sleepless nights about money and worried endlessly about how I had thrown away a good salary and what if this and that happened. The reality is that we still have a lot more than most and of course you adjust to things although from what you say you are not that much worse off.

I have never looked back as at the end if the day i am much happier now and have s much better relationship with my kids and that is far more rewarding. You will always worry with such a big life change but you obviously did not make the decision overnight and I suspect it was a long time spent miserable before coming to the decision to move jobs. Making changes to make you and your family happier is always the right move. As long as you can still pay the bills, happier is better.

Thanks for sharing your experiences.

I am pretty much set on downscaling and it's reassuring to hear how others have done it. I just need to pluck up the courage to resign now! I have to do it today.

I have done it. Gulp. Frugality here I come...

Good luck OP