How do you do it all?!
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Anonymous
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This is an honest question-
I am a Foreign Service Officer’s wife and for various reasons we are done with living overseas. I am facing a life back in DC which I am fine with but also starting to look for full time employment (which will be its own huge lift after many years overseas and no semblance of a career but that’s a different thread). I have two children and no family help. For those who have full time jobs, how on earth do you do it? If you work till 6 or whatever, who is making dinner? Who is helping the kids with their homework? Who is shuttling them from activity to activity that I keep reading is so vital for their personal growth and college prep. Do they stay in aftercare, making their days 11 hour days? I am not judging anyone for their choices and I acknowledge I am so fortunate to not have to worry about this till now but I honestly don’t see how it is done. But I know millions of you do it, so please tell me. Husband is helpful but has a demanding job that is not flexible. So sick days and doctor visits and figuring out extracurriculars will be on me, realistically speaking. I’m starting to panic a bit about how much our life is going to change and how I am going to pull it off with only so many hours in the day. |
Anonymous
| We have a nanny, and a twice-a-week cleaning person. |
Anonymous
| But it is incredibly expensive to have full time help in DC. Doesn’t that eat up a huge part of your salary? |
Anonymous
| you either find something that’s full time but also flexible/remote AND your DH uses some seniority to get some flexibility, WFH days, etc. or you stagger schedules so someone is 8-4 and home for the activity runs/dinner and the other one gets kids off in the morning. Or you get a lot of help, which likely means full time nanny given how many random no school days there are. Without Nannies, many folks leave at 4/early and catch up after kids go to bed. |
Anonymous
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Two working parents here and we are not stressed a bit. Nanny helps tremendously. Of course it eats (quite substantially) into salary. The other option is not having a salary?
Also both my husband and I have flexible though demanding jobs (wfh) and a big one is that we downsized our life. There’s no way I could handle taking care of our family around two working schedules AND being stressed about the potential of one of us losing our job. Would much rather give up vacations and house projects to have a lot of $$ cushion. |
Anonymous
Some people's salaries are higher than other people's salaries. |
Anonymous
| I don’t. |
Anonymous
We both work, 3 kids age 2-10. My husband has an inflexible schedule, out of the house. But he's in general very helpful. And both of our parents are local - two grandmother's and a grandfather. Without them, we would be in a much harder situation. My job is flexible, which .... I just clocked out at midnight but was able to step away during the day. For those who have full time jobs, how on earth do you do it? Much is always left undone. But so not to drown in daily spinning wheels and keep sane, I think very important to carve out time for your personal hobby or passion project. Mine is plant propagation. I'm far behind goals but still so important to have that bit of personal life. If you work till 6 or whatever, who is making dinner? - instead of cooking from scratch daily. I pre-make "ingredients" that are quick and easy to turn up into meals. For example, slow cook a few pounds of meat in water/spices. Now there's a large pot of broth with countless uses, and fresh cooked meat to quickly build a meal around. Other times I have pre-cooked rice as well. So at dinner time, I only need 15-20 minutes to put together above cooked rice, meat into a stir fry. Or to add ingredients to the basic broth and have fresh soup ready in 30. I rarely bake or anything, for desert is either fruit or ice cream. Who is helping the kids with their homework? Often times, grandma does because they can study together much more often than with me. My daughter had a tutor for about a year. But meeting once a week was too little and largely a waste of money. Who is shuttling them from activity to activity that I keep reading is so vital for their personal growth and college prep. For activities, again shared with grandma or with husband. For example, older girl takes archery, the crowded gym is no place for her 2 year old sister. So always goes with grandma. Or again ask grandma for favors to take son to activity on Saturday morning while I'm home with the other 2. Husband takes kids to another activity that's on his day off/Friday while I work. Do they stay in aftercare, making their days 11 hour days? No aftercare. Come home right after school, play with siblings, invite friend over ans go to the park. I work from home. |
Anonymous
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50% of my income goes towards nanny salary/cleaning help, makes sense for me so I don’t lose out on earnings potential if I stopped working or moved into a less intense job/field.
Daughter goes to DCPS (free), nanny drives to activities, does dinner when I get home late (sometimes 7-8). I do have some flexibility — wfh Mondays and Fridays — but generally have about 3 intense days a week. For sick days, holidays we have nanny help. I am able to plan other annual checkups/dentists etc when I am Wfh |
Anonymous
| Just adding that in addition to my salary I get healthcare for our family/retirement benefits through my job, so maybe the split is slightly less than 50% going to nanny if you consider those expenses too |
Anonymous
| Sorry one more thing — depending on where you want to be in the DMV, you can also scale up/down the costs. For ex - we have a nanny but we live in an apartment and don’t have a car. Our housing costs are higher because we are in the city but we are metro accesible so don’t have to worry about car, parking, gas. So depending on your lifestyle/where you want to be you can make some choices like that to reduce expenses |
Anonymous
First of all, you become realistic. You make dinners that don’t take much time to put on the table. If you google something like “10 min dinner ideas” you’ll find a million ideas. Second, were you in a million extracurriculars growing up? Did you turn out fine if you weren’t? If you did, then your kids will too. The most important part of growing up is learning how to be a quality human, and shuttling your kids to a million activities doesn’t necessarily lead to that. Figure out what you want your kids to learn/be exposed to, and work from there. Third, get off DCUM. This place is nuts and doesn’t reflect normal human behavior. When you come here, you will meet people in real life who make it work without million dollar salaries and an army of nannies. Learn from them. You’ll be fine. |
Anonymous
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This is how we do it with 3 kids:
- live in a lower cola (doesn’t apply to dmv but there are pockets that are less crazy) - kids go to public school, so they take the school bus - quick and easy meals, housekeeper weekly - my oldest two are 10 and 12 and they can do things at their ages like their laundry and pack lunches - staggered schedules. We have worked various combos of jobs but we have never both done a “9-5” thing. Right now he works from about 6-2:30, with a few extra hours here and there, and I work 8-4:30. He is remote, I am in an 100% on site. But we eat early (around 5:15) and have family dinner every night. The kids all do about one activity per semester and maybe one after school club that we don’t have to drive them to - re homework- a lot of American schools have gotten rid of homework in early grades. In middle school they can do it themselves. - focus on jobs with good leave policies vs a more interesting or higher paying job |
Anonymous
| ^ I will add that my dh also had a demanding job and I was a sahm then part time mom for a few years, and did all the heavy lifting on the parenting / mental load front. But when i went back to work full time, and we had our 3rd (special needs), something had to give. So dh took on some specific things (like dentist visits) and just made it work. You know that you as a mom would make it work in your husbands’ shoes, too. |
Anonymous
| ^ one more thing - they do some additional extracurriculars at home, too - piano lessons, swim lessons, a neighbor comes and teaches my 10 yo sewing and crocheting. The schlepping is the biggest hassle but if you can find people who come to you, or get in with a carpool, it can be manageable |