How many of you returned to work after your 1st child thinking you could have it all, then realised the truth and...

[artichokes]

...expedited getting pregnant again just so you could stop working?

I ask on 9.30pm on a Friday night as I finish catching-up on the work I could not finish this week because I had to pick DD up on time. Once I have finished with this thread I will go and pack my bag for my Sunday morning business flight that will take me away from my daughter for a week.

I never realised how hard juggeling work and family would be. DH and I have been discussing it all week and instead of leaving a three year gap we are going to try for a baby ASAP so that I can be at home again. If we are lucky enough to conceive I will take a career break after my maternity leave.

I know three others who are rushing their next pregnancies because working is too hard. Are there more out there?

mattersnot sorry if I offended you. I don't care if mothers work. Their choice (I accept sometimes it isn't). I also know it would be hard working all day and then coming home to look after dc and do all of the cooking , housework etc.

It makes me angry when women like Xenia, who work fulltime, imply that it is easier to stay home. It is a sore point for me as my sister constantly rings me up from work asking what am I doing at home all day and how her life is harder because she works fulltime. Funny how she can't cope with her kids on the weekend though and "needs" to go back to work on Mondays.

mymama, I don't think I've ever said it's easier at home. Being at home is the hardest least respected job on the planet and God knows why anyone ever chooses it. It's domestic service without the pay, it's the jobs we pay the least for on the planet, cleaning the toilets clearly up after children and looking after them. It's hard and dire and unrewarding except occasionally when you have time to enjoy the small children or you have a fetish for housework I suppose and very very hard indeed. I'm always telling people to get back to work for the rest.

Someone said I had live in help. I've never had live in help. By the time I was 26 we had 3 children under 4, both worked full time and we were paying half the daily nanny's salary each out of our wages. It was very hard but nearly 20 years later it was so so worth it.

I have three children at university now as well as 2 at school and sadly I'm now divorced. You never know what the future will bring but what is clear these children psychologically and financially would be hugely worse off had their mother decided to stop work all those years ago, without a doubt.

Seriously though, Xenia, are you not sad, that you had these glorious children with your husband, so you must have loved each other at some point, that you can't sit back and recall memories with each other. I know that's a bit sentimental but now you have taught your children to be so independent, what do you have in the way of family life if you know what I mean.

Yes, all of yours are doing fantasticly well but where does it really leave you. They don't need you, you taught them that. Your Ex is off doing whatever. What about you? Serious question by the way.

I have not read the whole thread but within the OP (and in fact in many wohm/sahm debates) there is a supposition that working is a matter of choice. For many women, working is not a choice. It is a matter of necessity.

The fact that I happen to enjoy it, and nine years after DD1 was born I still enjoy it, happens to be a bonus.

You can have it all. It is harder than I ever imagined it would be. But you can have it all.

i agree with xenia's first post actually - in the context of the op. as someone who doesn't have a choice about working (and yes obviously the juggling is pretty hard) - i think asking if people are "rushing their next pregnancies because working is too hard" is rather wimpy actually. you have the luxury of choice presumably because your dh is in reasonably well paid job?

mumsnetting with a glass of chardonnay

I have one dd and we're not able to have any more. She is 26 mo and going up from 2 days/week to 3 for the next year while I finish my PhD. I am extrememly anxious about what will happen when I try to get a job (ie postdoc) after that. There will be no room to negotiate PT hours - I'll be lucky to get anything at all considering I can't move as most people would at this point. I hate the idea of going FT or even worse, commuting long hours as well. If I could keep it to 3 days/week that would be OK - but not FT. I wish more professions were more flexible about going PT. I'm just hoping I can have some flexibility with the hours so that I can pick dd up from school at least 2 days/week - that's my goal.

As for just stopping for a few years, well, I may as well just quit now and flush grad school down the toilet. I would never get back in. I need to do this and I've worked hard for it. I feel very guilty that I actually want to work some of the time and don't actually want to SAHM and I'm very relieved that dd enjoys nursery now (it was more up and down last year). I just don't want to work FT and I really, really want to get dd from school some of the time. That, to me, would be having it all. If that isn't possible, I really don't know what I'll do - it upsets me to think about it.

Dh has a good job with some flexitime but he also travels a lot so childcare could get complicated. Overall agree with www - every mother has to work out this balance for herself, her circumstances and her nature. Jill

cat64, I guess by outsource, I meant get someone to do it that isn't you, so nanny, au pair, another parent (for returned favours), anything but not being at work purely to be a driver!

Acinonyx, but why do you feel guilty? Men don't on the whole. You shouldn't imo. Could your dh go part time/sacrifice something in order for you to do what you want? Have you tried negotiating hours? Is there anyone in your professioh that has doneso? I just wonder whethr you might find there's more flexibility than you think once you start investigting

I can see us having some problems prioritising jobs in the future. I can't say I'd really like him to change his job as we rely on his salary, and as professional jobs go, it is pretty reasonablee wrt working hours (a lot more than mine will be). Also, he doesn't feel the same wrt daycare - he doesn't see why we can't both just work FT and is actually quite eager for me to become a FT wage earner again. I just don't feel comfortable with it myself. But no - dh doesn't feel it at all.

I don't know anyone in my dept who has had a PT post - I am hoping that there may be some flexibility when it comes to it. Research funding is so competetive though, other women further ahead than me have advised me to get the job/funding first and then talk about flexible working hours or PT - but not at all before.

I was just at a conference last week. None of the other women I met had kids. I asked them about their hours - and one tenured lady told me that she cheerfully worked 60+ hours a week. It's hard to compete with that and pick up your dc at 3 pm. jill (something of a worrier by nature...)

Artichokes - interesting how your own experience affects the way you feel about staying at home. Xenia was the opposite to you, grew up with a SAHM who was bored and unsatisfied.

But the solution is in your hands. Try to think of what you would have to sacrifice in order to be with your child for however many years it is you want to be at home. If you want it bad enough, you'll be able to do it somehow.

Artichokes - yes, full-time work with small children is very, very hard and even if you can afford lots of help (or family is there to provide it for free), you will still see less of your children and your family life will be a less important part of your existence than if you stay at home.

As another poster wrote, there are only two good reasons for working:

• you really enjoy your job, and/or
• you need the money

If neither are true, why work? I always think that people who say that life at home is dull must have exceedingly limited imaginations... . Personally, I love my life as a SAHM and, although I am going to start working just a little bit quite soon, I fully intend for it not to infringe upon my enjoyment of life

I agree with your Anna - I'm in the same position myself.

I don't think that any woman can 'have it all'. Men don't and never had so it isn't a question of equality. It will always be an enormous balancing act and the right balance for one person may not be the right balance for somebody else. You have to weight up your enjoyment of work and your need for money with your desire to be with your children and their need to be with your and then do the best that you can.

It rarely happens as I find her arguements very one-dimensional most of the time, but I actually agree with Xenia it isn't about achieving perfection. The pursuit of contentment or happiness is far more important and as nobody is perfect you won't be happy if you are forever feeling a failure whatever balance you end up with.

I only agree up to a point with the "not striving for perfection" argument. I think all human beings have competitions they wish to engage in and that matter to them, and others they don't care about. You actually have to be pretty perfectionist to get anywhere in any competition.

Xenia has said many times that she loves her work and, crucially, "wants to be the best in her field in the UK". So that's the competition she engages in, towards which she puts her energies. And she cares less about other competitions, which other women might care more about. Most people are trying to do well at something - when they aren't, or when they are failing, they are usually depressed .

Of course, what no-one can achieve is perfection across the board in everything. You have to work out which competitions matter to you most and prioritise - and be content to leave the other prizes to other people.

I prefer competing for that than whether I've chosen to wear the best dress or have the cleanest house on the road or the most successful children but I also think being a good parent to them is very important too so just like anyone else whether male or female working in out of in the house we all balance things and try to go a good enough job without being neurotic for some kind of perfection that doesn't exist. There isn't enough acceptance that life is hard and full of failure and illness for most people, life as a veil of tears, via dolorosa or whatever, just inflated expectations that there is a perfection that we all must meet and if we don't have it we've failed. More people should go to church, may be.

taxis.. at one point we seemed to be ferrying three chidlren around all over to parties when they were 5 - 8. We got an Australian part time nanny who didn't live in and part of her job was if there was a party at the weekend she would drive that child to and from so we could be home playing with the others rather than the others being carted from pillar to post on another child's outings. Money and women having good careers enable you to achieve those things.

UCM, yes, I'm divorced. I never married intending to divorce. People have ups and downs in their lives. It's just part of the human condition and a lot of people married aren't very happy married either. As for the children they are very independent and I see that as a gift from me to them, not a problem but they certainly don't hate it here and are never around even the 3 at university. All 5 are here at the moment. Two are living here all year of the older ones and the third hasn't gone back yet. So it's very much still a family unit even if there isn't a man here and I'm working on the man bit.

"your family life will be a less important part of your existence than if you stay at home"

That needs further clarification, anna. As it stands, I disagree strongly.

Sorry. Not read the thread. But I did manage to have it all whilst I only had the one. Still working full-time, still loving mt job, managing to be a happy, good mother to my boy, had enough money to still had a good standard of living. It was only when DD came along that it all fell apart - when I realised how much I had resented having to work throughout DS's babyhood and how much I'd missed out on. I have never felt as downright desolate and miserable as I was when I had to leave her with the CM and go to work. Ended up with bad PND.

As has been said, there is no 'one size fits all' answer. I found that my job pre-dd just wasn't feasible. I was a management consultant and earned good money, but was away from home 3/4 nights some weeks. My dh is in the military and consepuently is away from home sometimes...who looks after dd when I am in London/Cape Towm/New York?? It wasn't going to happen, and asking dh to leave the military when he is 4 years away from a £16k per annum pension (at 38) was sheer financial stupidity. I did go back to work, but changed. I don't earn as much, and its not as challenging, but its still £30k for 4 days a week with local gov, who are very family friendly and have flexible working policies. I am happy; I get the stimulation from work, a slary, and to see my dd. Perhaps in a few years I may go back into consultancy again, we'll see.

I think you can have 'it', but 'it' may be a bit different to what it was before...IYSWIM

However....what I don't have is the good sense to reread posts.... for spelling errors

I don't agree with Anna either. Family life is very important to working parents whether male or female even if they work full time. In fact your family life can be better if you work but that's a separate topic but whether we work out side the home or spend the day dusting behind the cupboards or whatever 2007 housewives do we still love our children and partner (if we have one). I don't see why domestic service and housework/cooking and cleaning etc means you value your family life more. You certainly become more dependent on a man for money so in that respect being a good little hausfrau might be important as it's your meal tickets but I don't think it means the importance in your life of your family is more or less. In fact people who live and work together often don't get on as well and those times apart from loved ones whether at work home or in the gym or having your nails done can make family life better.

Every day I see around me working parents forced to choose between their family and their work, and work taking priority. That is the sense in which family life becomes less important for many working mothers. They aren't there for their families at times they would have liked to have been.

That's not a criticism, just a fact. And the main reason many mothers choose not to work when they have the luxury to afford not to.

Xenia - out of interest - what do you do with your family? Because you always talk about domestic chores as if that was what family life was all about... but I don't think domestic chores loom very large in the family scenario at all.

Family life isn't less important. It's just arranged differently. And even if I and others have to miss certain family member events, doesn't make family life less important.