work / life balance

[beepbeep]

I'm returning to work in July after 8 months maternity leave, I will have a 7 month old, a 2 year old and a 3.5 year old. My old hours were 8.30 - 5.30 tues, wed & thurs.

I have now been told that my hours need to be reviewed and I need to contribute more to the night & weekend hours (night is anything after 7, weekend is thurs-mon). So have now negotiated to do 7-5 tues-thurs (full shifts raher than flexi) with one thus in 5 till midnight and one fri in 5 7pm til 3am. My husband woks for the same organisation and already works 2 full weekends in 5 and 2 weeks of evenings in 5.

Now i'm being told that they would like me to include a weekend (sat/sun) in my shift pattern - am I being unreasonable to think that this is a bit much, as they talk about getting a good work life balance? DD is at preschool and it would mean that in every 5 weeks we would get 4 days as a family together, one day of which I will have only got in at 3 in the morning!

I cut my work dramatically after 3 children.Your timetable sounds very tough.

I guess it depends on what all the other employees are doing. You say your dh works evenings and weekends.....

He does but he works full-time, they take his hours into account when we are looking at my shift pattern. I just think that 3.5 days in every 5 weeks as a family is not a good work life balance - which the organisation goes on about being so important.