What do I do?

[BeanEm]

Hi, sorry for the long rambling post, but I am in a bit of a rubbish situation and could really do with some advice.

I had my baby a couple of years ago and like many, I was thrown into a whole new world when lockdown hit. My partner and I both work in an industry that requires long hours and shifts at any time of the day or night. Obviously we got used to being around each other a lot more during lockdown and also having valuable time to spend with our child.

Now that restrictions have lifted and we are, mostly, back working, I am finding that I absolutely hate my job, I dread each shift and feel miserable when I'm there and thinking about the other people that are essentially raising my child. I can even go a day or 2 without seeing him sometimes just because of work hours.

During lockdown I started working towards a Lvl 6 qualification in Property Management and I am halfway through it. However, the second issue is that I am absolutely terrified to put myself out there and apply for jobs. I have next to no experience and can get quite bad anxiety about new situations, new people and generally taking a risk as big as this.

I worry about the financial impact, my options are, a traineeship but that would involve taking a huge pay cut. But I don't have the experience to take on a role where they ask for experience.
I'm not sure what i'm looking for exactly, I guess, I just want advice from people who don't know me.

Thanks for reading through this!

Tricky one, you don't get that time when they are little back again so I totally understand your desire to have more family time, but then again the childcare heavy baby days are also over quite quickly so I'd be hesitant making really long term decisions e.g. giving up work entirely based purely on the desire to spend all day with your kids, soon enough they're at school etc and you might regret having given up your job if otherwise it's something you enjoy and find fulfilling (although it doesn't necessarily sound like that's the case)?

How are your partner's earnings, what would taking the traineeship mean for you as a family, would it simply be tightening the belt for a year or 2 and going without a few luxuries, or would it mean you can't pay the bills/mortgage easily or end up in more debt as that's a big difference to me. How does your partner feel about being the 'breadwinner', is s/he happy in their job? For me so long as we could still pay the bills I would be perfectly OK to support my partner in taking a big paycut so long as they were sure it was what they wanted to do in the long term and I know he would do the same for me. But then again if s/he also hates and is stressed out by their job you might need to make sure they aren't going to resent you for effectively 'trapping' them in it so you can have more time with your son. How would your long-term earnings be in the property management role, how quickly could you get back up to your current salary after the traineeship?

Finally and very practically, are you thinking of having another baby and on what sort of timescale (I know these things aren't totally predicable obviously). If you want another in pretty short succession it might be worth thinking about sticking it out in current role until after 2nd maternity leave and thinking about a move then esp if your maternity pay is good in current job. Whereas if you were thinking it might be years until you have another or not at all then make the move asap, what you don't want is to give up a good maternity pay and package at current role to take up traineeship, then get pregnant before completing training, that will only delay/complicate things and probably you wouldn't get much by way of pay if it's a low paid role either...

@maxelly

Tricky one, you don't get that time when they are little back again so I totally understand your desire to have more family time, but then again the childcare heavy baby days are also over quite quickly so I'd be hesitant making really long term decisions e.g. giving up work entirely based purely on the desire to spend all day with your kids, soon enough they're at school etc and you might regret having given up your job if otherwise it's something you enjoy and find fulfilling (although it doesn't necessarily sound like that's the case)?

How are your partner's earnings, what would taking the traineeship mean for you as a family, would it simply be tightening the belt for a year or 2 and going without a few luxuries, or would it mean you can't pay the bills/mortgage easily or end up in more debt as that's a big difference to me. How does your partner feel about being the 'breadwinner', is s/he happy in their job? For me so long as we could still pay the bills I would be perfectly OK to support my partner in taking a big paycut so long as they were sure it was what they wanted to do in the long term and I know he would do the same for me. But then again if s/he also hates and is stressed out by their job you might need to make sure they aren't going to resent you for effectively 'trapping' them in it so you can have more time with your son. How would your long-term earnings be in the property management role, how quickly could you get back up to your current salary after the traineeship?

Finally and very practically, are you thinking of having another baby and on what sort of timescale (I know these things aren't totally predicable obviously). If you want another in pretty short succession it might be worth thinking about sticking it out in current role until after 2nd maternity leave and thinking about a move then esp if your maternity pay is good in current job. Whereas if you were thinking it might be years until you have another or not at all then make the move asap, what you don't want is to give up a good maternity pay and package at current role to take up traineeship, then get pregnant before completing training, that will only delay/complicate things and probably you wouldn't get much by way of pay if it's a low paid role either...

It's having to have him stay away overnight so frequently and having babysitters (grandparents mostly) be in so late regularly. I don't want to give up working entirely but just a more fixed working schedule with evenings and weekends which I don't have currently. I used to love my job, my industry, everything, but it just isn't conducive to having a family. Unfortunately my partner isn't working a great deal right now, not for lack of trying, just the nature of the job. I am contracted, he isn't.

Yes, that is a very real fear. We want to have another soonish but I don't know I can put up with another x many months in this job. Not that the maternity pay was great but I do fear for what would happen if I changed jobs.