Two working mid-level professional working parents
![[Post New]](/jforum/templates/default/images/icon_minipost_new.gif){kind=icon}
Anonymous
|
[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous].
To try to clarify my question: How common are two full time, WAHM, working professional parents without family nearby and both commute 30+ min to work? And where are such households? My theory is one parent will downshift or work close to home. Or I guess they hire a nanny/driver?[/quote] Most people I know with kids are in families where both parents work outside of the home and don't have family help. Commutes are typically 30+ minutes though the ICC has helped cut off some time for some families, but not for me. We all use daycare and we all pick a few days a year where we show up for school stuff. No one I know has a nanny but some of us do hire people to drive our kids to sports if practice is after school. [/quote] OP here. Looks like I lose this debate. So in McLean and up MoCo this arrangement is the norm? How do folks manage, do you only see the kids from 6-bedtime? We live close in just b/c of short commutes and good schools, but culturally we at not representative b/c we don't have much money and no one stays home. We don't care and have loved all the families we've met, but do see DC wondering why we can't come to school more and I wonder if we will have later divides such as summer camp or activities that start right after school. Already we see the play dates after school with all the SAHM and we would love to participate but logistics prevents us. |
Anonymous
| We live in Bethesda and our son goes to public and I would say his class is 1/2 working parents and half not. Both my husband and i work full time and we have a morning and afternoon sitter to make it work. i have only spent two days volunteering at his school this year-yes i feel guilty and my husband doesn't....-but I hope to do a better job next semester. The Feds I know usually have a compressed week so they can spend one day every other week at the school or doing around the home stuff. The bottom line is that we all do the best we can. |
Anonymous
|
DH and I have 4 kids (18 months to 10 years). We both work FT and have to commute (my commute is 60 minutes-ish, and his is closer to 40). We tag team it: I head to DC super early (6:30) while he gets them off to school and daycare around 9ish. I work through lunch and get home early, while he often works later. We have a sitter in the afternoons at our house until I get home. She gives the school-aged kids a snack, plays with them outside, and gets them started on their homework. I'm usually home by 5...sometimes earlier. The older two have CCD and sports a few times a week, so one of us has to be home to drive them. No nanny. No housekeeper. No lawn service. Is it busy? Yes, super busy. But it's manageable. It sounds like you and your spouse should consider staggering schedules like we do. It helps a lot.
Fwiw, we live in Olney....where there are tons of working parents as well as SAHMs. |
Anonymous
| I am a single mom, making 56K a year and make it to all of DC's school events, I don't understand what your problem is. |
Anonymous
| We are dual income and combined work over 120 hours a week on average. No household help, no family nearby. We live close to work and simply leave work for kids events. (Make up hours, what's that? We already work enough that no one cares.) |
Anonymous
|
DH and I are both full-time Feds who live in West Springfield. We have a 3 year old and a 5 year old, who is in kindergarten. Before she started school, I worked the 9 hour days and then had every other Friday off, while my husband just works a regular 8 hr, 5 day schedule. Once she went to school, I gave up the AWS deal, but my agency started allowing 50% teleworking. I start work daily at 6:45 so regardless of whether I'm teleworking or in the office, DH takes them to daycare and school, which doesn't start until 9 so she goes to SACC. I always do pick up- her school gets out at 3:40. We switched our son to a school that's 1000ft down from the elementary school, otherwise we would've been driving into burke for his old place and that would add 1 extra hour each day. Also, we are lucky the elementary school is very close to our house. We do have to use aftercare for both kids, but they're not in it for too long most days.
No housekeeper, no lawn service, etc. I would totally pay someone to plan, shop for, and cook meals though! |
Anonymous
|
OP, I think 21:23 explained in great detail how other families with two WOH parents do it. You are Feds. Ask to telework. Use your annual leave to attend your kids' activities.
My DH and I are both Feds. We live in Silver Spring. One does the early shift, the other the later shift as 21:23 described. We usually only see our kids between 6 and bedtime, but we do take annual leave to attend school parties or go on field trips with the kids. Maybe you need to find a more family friendly fed office, but no one blinks in our offices when we say we have to miss work for a Valentines Day party. |
Anonymous
OP here, we have misfortune to both work Fed offices which do not allow telework. Period. We shift our schedules some and AWS is available (but AWS is a rigid schedule -- can't shift to accommodate school events that pop up at various days of week so not really helpful). What our DC is lamenting how many parents are in school 4 days a week for reading or visiting during lunch; I am just trying to arrange dropping off a form for school hours to the office, and that requires taking 2 hours of leave b/c it doesn't open until I am supposed to be at work (again, fixed schedules are required) and then I have to commute to work. Just drop off form (this is special case,most things with student,but this one can't). And coming in for a lunch would be 30 min commute - 45 min lunch & logistics - 30 min commute. We will try tips, and maybe things will improve as we earn more leave. Right now most of our annual leave is consumed visiting family and covering days the school is close and we have no available camps. My colleagues seem to make it work with parents, or relying on neighbors who are SAHM, or one spouse working very close to home & school. I guess our long term plan is to find more flexible, closer jobs -- though that has been pursued in the past and this is the best we have managed -- and when we started in Fed service,we thought telework would be available after all the promotion of it by Obama administration,but clearly its all about the management perspective. |
Anonymous
This is astounding on many levels. Kudos. Teacher or work at non-profit? We have friend who says being a single parent is someways easier, b/c no negotiation and just have a "Just Do It" attitude -- but I expect two parents are always easier... |
Anonymous
How do you even manage getting dinner on the table? Most aftercare/daycares are 11 hours long, but you are working 12 hour days (5x12 = 60). Do you work after kids asleep? Weekends? |
Anonymous
|
Honestly, I feel guilty about some things, but being a dual working couple with kids isn't one of them. Maybe that's because my own mom WOH, so it feels normal to me. That's not to say it's not hard, sometimes it really, really is. But I don't feel guilty about not being at school for things. I just...don't. Mostly what I feel is annoyed that there is any expectation for this. The irony is that when I was a kid (I was born in 1966) and so many more moms were at home, there was no expectation at all that moms would be doing things at school. You took the bus there and the bus home and your mom rarely came to the school at all. Certainly dads never did.
When my kids have complained about this, I have made a point to try to come in for something, but basically I do so 1-2 times per year and my DH does it maybe 1x per year. There are fewer expectations of parents volunteering in classrooms as kids get older, so it won't be like this forever. As for things being easier if one parent is a teacher, I can tell you from personal experience that this is not the case. Teachers rarely slip out of the "office" to run anywhere during the school day. |
Anonymous
| do you both work at the same agency? Do you agree that your jobs are not teleworkable or did you both just happen to draw excessively bad managers? Telework is the wave of the future (current?). The administration is hugely supportive. Does the whole agency not telework or just your division? I would complain. |
Anonymous
| I'm a PP who is a two parent work out of the home family. I can't believe there are really that many parents who come to your child's school four days a week for reading and/or lunch. Even the most involved stay at home parents I know don't even show up once a week for this stuff. Regardless, by the time you figure out things with a new job or lifestyle that allows you to show up four times a week, your child won't want it and/or it won't be an option. There is no perfect life and things will be a lot easier for you if you just accept your situation and let your kids know the limits. I always tell mine that if something is really important, they have to let me know and then I'll do everything I can to make it work. We look at the school calendar way in advance and make our list so that I can build my schedule around what matters. Typically, I do one field trip for each kid, all school conferences, Halloween party, and all IEP meetings. |
Anonymous
I would develop a telework plan and take it to management. 
|
Anonymous
I think your DC is not seeing things as they are. No one and I mean NO ONE I know is in a classroom four days a week AND for lunch. Teachers may have different parents come in every day (but they are not the same ones). Except for parties, only one parent and rarely two came for an hour once a day - and we took turns. Perhaps twice month per parent. Few parents come for lunch. Maybe for birthdays. There are one or two over the top volunteers but they are not in the classroom daily- they are copying or cutting or laminating or helping out in the office......... |