City lawyer with toddlers can't cope

[RosieIrene]

I work FT at a city firm and have two dd 1 and 3. Have a full time daily nanny but still can't cope. Work all day, come home and put kids to bed and work all evening to make billable target or have to go to client functions. So stressed out that on weekend just want to sit in garden with kids and do nothing. Can't sleep, can't talk to anyone. How do people manage?

Don't think it is a troll. Not posted much but seems consistent, and nothing unusual.

oh for gods sake, an exhausted woman comes on here to ask for help, some posters use thread for a private squabble that hides much of the good advice given, and now she's the troll?

She's not a troll. She's fed up with us adding to her burden by creating a thread that's 3000 posts long.

Really silly question but whats a troll?

ooh good luck with the job pph. What would you recommend to the OP?

It is tricky.
First thing I'd say is that when you are IN the city working in that sort of high pressure high prestige job you imagine that actually (a) this is normal, this is what people do, other people cope, you should too; and (b) this is incredibly important and exciting work, anything else would be extraordinarily pedestrian/crappy/dull/boring.
Actually when you are out of it, you realise that life in the City couldn't be further from normal - in the real world hardly anyone professional even picks up the phone after 7pm and thinks you are a nutter for trying - and there are a lot of interesting, intellectually stimulating and prestigious jobs outside the square mile, just with more realistic job expectations (ie you work really really hard for 8 - 10 hours a day, 3- 5 days a week, not the sort of 24/7 indentured slave existence that you get in the City).

It sounds to me that she is so overworked and stressed and panicked by it all that she can't see past the reality of her life to what might be possible beyond it. I can't stop working - I've spent so long training - I'm so good at what I do - I enjoy being good at what I do - I need to prove to myself that I can make partner - I couldn't do boring shit work - so I can't leave. That sort of thing.

But actually, there is a whole slew of things that you could do. You could do what you do now, but 3 days a week, say. You may not be able to do it in the firm you are in, you may not be on the same career trajectory (partnership will take longer, but you could do it. Or you could change areas of law to something that is less stressful. That is the PSL route, for example (which I could never have done - I'm a seat of the pants, instinctive, deal lawyer, NOT an academic in any way shape or form!) but it works for lots of people. Or you can do what a friend of mine did - she was asset finance or something and one day thought "fuck it". Chucked in her job, bought about 5 books and took a couple of courses in family law, and set up her own practice as a divorce lawyer. NOT brain surgery, requires a certain bedside manner, but it is a very self contained manageable area of law. She only deals with high net worth women (she gets referrals from her ex firm that doesn't do divorce), works 3 days a week, employs other women lawyers as consultants to share the caseload, pays them all about £200k and takes home £500k herself. You need to think laterally.
Or you can go into industry - lots of interesting jobs there, almost ALL with much better working hours etc. It is much better to be a client than a private practice lawyer from that point of view.
Or you can (if you have at least 7 yrs PQE) look at the judiciary. Don't laugh. Very keen on women, very keen on solicitors, very keen on intelligent under 40s with city experience. If you go the civil courts route they work in terms, so you get summers off, pay is OK, hours are 9-4.30, there is a career progression, and it is intellectually stimulating work which can be local to home (not necess london). Look at www.judicialappointments.gov.uk

I'm just saying it is a big world out there - this isn't working for you, so try and think of something that does.
Best of luck x

dh picks upt he oheon after 7pm

farking yanks

thank you cod.

And don't work for an american firm/company, they like talking in the middle of the night

But - and I do wish the op would come back and comment - if her children aren't sleeping through the night, then everything will look impossible. If that was sorted, things would be very different.

I think that is WONDERFUL advice PPH. I hope she will come back and listen to it. I totally agree you can be so stuck in your groove that you can't even imagine life outside it.

PPH the american thing is our family downfall

yes its shitty isn't it comeoveneer
dh was offered millions (literally!) to work for a yank bank and he refused point blank.

Dh does work for an american firm, there is a chance he is about to be sent over ther (without us for the rest of the year)

Poor you.
RoiseI, being at home with under 5s would be much harder for you and much worse. They will soon be bigger, they will sleep and all will be well. You and the children's father, if he's around, will soon find things are easier. Just stick it out. I remember when I had three under 4 and it was hard but it would have been much much worse and much harder at home which is boring unpaid and pointless. So don't even think to go there. We had a full time daily nanny too.

I was once interviewed by a journalist about combining work and children (I have 5 and have always worked full time) and she said every one she'd spoken to including me seemed to be happy to compromise - that was the defining characteristic - that we did what was good enough. I was lucky enough never to work at a firm with targets for some reason but that doesn't really affect the work or hours. What makes it work for most of us is having another half who is as responsible for being home to put the children to bed as you are so you're not having to be 100% responsible at home as well as at work. Most men with wives like you share the burdens.

What's wrong with sitting in the garden at the weekend with the children? It sounds great.

The thing is no one ever said life was some kind of delightful picnic. Many women spend their lives eking out an existence with children on benefits, walking because they can't afford the bus and a lot of us are just so hugely lucky but we don't always realise it. A lot of professional women can't have children. They left it too late. They cry at night and are jealous of you.

The difficult period passes and at 5 children get so much easier. YOu don't really have long to go and then you've 20+ years probably of really interesting work. If you asked my 3 now at university if they were glad I worked they would be very pleased indeed. It hugely enhances our relationship.

You are coping. You're not sitting in the bedroom refusing to go to work. You're doing what's required and it's very very hard for all men and women with small children at home. Obviously you need to check if you have depression but that's a separate issue and more likely to be present if you're a housewife.

Does your firm have someone you can talk to anonymously? Or if you can't talk to anyone is there not someone you can go to to chat to about htings?

I think getting away from the perfectionism helps. You are being a very good mother and worker and that's enough.

P, don't agree. Why can't her children's father stay home as a househusband in that case if that would make things easier or reduce his hours? Why should women always make the sacrifices? May be she needs two nights mid week in a hotel on her own without the children say for a bit of peace. That's another solution.

a nic epost from X

What a great post Xenia, I agree with every word.

I think two nights in a hotel could be nice (I'd actually hate it, would miss my family) but it's not really a solution to an intolerable workload, is it?

ds is reading over my shoulder and suggested I do this after 'miss my family' -

aah!

Has anyone mentioned academia as a route? When I was at law school several of the teachers were female city lawyers taking a few years out of the city while their children were young and teaching company, contract, commercial property etc etc subjects. Yes the pay would be a dramatic drop but the hours more or less to suit -sometimes evening classes - and wonderful summer holidays to spend with your children. It would keep your law brain sharp whilst not damaging your cv?
I didn't go into law as a career btw but am self employed in another field and work very hard 3 days a week and a couple of evenings on paperwork at home and it suits us well.

RosieIrene, I haven't read the whole thread, so apologies.

Although I have read what Xenia and PPN said, and think it was all really sensible advice.

Can you take a week off to think all this through?

Would you consider PSL work? I used to work FT before children in the City in Corporate Recovery, and now do 2 days from home in Bristol for the same City firm as a PSL. It is great - I work predictable hours, no random clients ringing at the weekend, I am up to date because I have to be, and do lots of work on templates, advice letter precedents etc. It is really fantastic, and I think if I ever wanted to go back to fee earning, I could because I'm not totally out of the loop. Although I must add I was always good at and interested in the research side of things...

Good luck.

Plenty of people buy a place in town and do work there 3 nights a week and don't worry about children or putting to bed and can client entertain and work as late as it takes although it depends on your career stage and income as to whether it's possible. I think under 5ds are just hard. My brother's are about that age and he hasn't had a through night's sleep in over 3 yearsl not one, one not one single one. He'll be up from 4am with one to 6am sometimes when it won't sleep, and then go to work. This is life. But then it passes and today the twins are 8 and they'll just at time hardly be here, engrossed in their games. Yhe under 5 stage is a blink of an eye but the giving up or compromising career thing affects your children badly for decades and you for life.

You can have a fabulous life and earn plenty of money without working stupid hours or living apart from your family. My god, I'd hate that. How grim would it be? With the Op's husband a partner I hardly think this family is on the breadline with littl starveling children crying with hunger.

Aloha, you're making a judgmnet there about what kinds of lives people want. For me it would be hell on earth to be with under 5s 24/7 with a husband working all hours. People have different views and of course if one of them were going to give up work or reduce hours it really ought in 2007 to be the man because it is so important that it's men becoming househusbands not women staying home in some kind of pastiche Martha Stewart Stepford Wives alleged nirvana.