now that you've been wfh

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had a baby during the pandemic and have been wfh for months. I can’t imagine being away from my baby 9 consecutive hours for 5 days now. If I am forced to go back 5 days, I will likely quit, but may reconsider if there’s wfh at least a couple of days a week.

Yeah I don’t know how we are going to put this genie back in the bottle for a micro-generation of moms who didn’t have to send their 12 week olds to daycare or pay for a nanny. It’s clear to me that as a practical matter this can’t become the status quo (“work from home” with no infant care) but I have to assume a lot of these moms will drop out of the workforce.

+1

I mean surely this subset of pandemic moms either a. Didn't have a very demanding job to begin with or b. Were not performing at 100%/for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. We all KNOW one cannot work with an infant, 1 year old or 2 year old at home en toe.

Some of them did fine, because they worked when the child was asleep, eating or occupied. It's pretty easy to have a baby nap or breastfeed while working on a presentation. And kids that have a solid 11-12 hours overnight plus 1-2 naps during the day? It just takes flexing when you do your work (if work allows that).

[Anonymous]

I appreciate some of the things about working from home, but overall I absolutely loathe it. I hate the lack of boundaries. I hate the assumption of 24/7 availability. I hate the absence of meaningful networking opportunities. I miss nice clothes, makeup and heels. I want nice lunches and coffee breaks. I hate the lack of natural opportunity for making connections. I can see working from home a couple of days a week but I want to be at the office for most of the week.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had a baby during the pandemic and have been wfh for months. I can’t imagine being away from my baby 9 consecutive hours for 5 days now. If I am forced to go back 5 days, I will likely quit, but may reconsider if there’s wfh at least a couple of days a week.

Yeah I don’t know how we are going to put this genie back in the bottle for a micro-generation of moms who didn’t have to send their 12 week olds to daycare or pay for a nanny. It’s clear to me that as a practical matter this can’t become the status quo (“work from home” with no infant care) but I have to assume a lot of these moms will drop out of the workforce.

+1

I mean surely this subset of pandemic moms either a. Didn't have a very demanding job to begin with or b. Were not performing at 100%/for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. We all KNOW one cannot work with an infant, 1 year old or 2 year old at home en toe.

Agreed. I had my baby last November. His daycare spot was ready for him in February, but they were nice enough to hold it for him until May. My husband (also WFH 100%) and I decided to send him to daycare in April because it just wasn’t tenable anymore between the baby’s needs and our work responsibilities. It’s one thing when the baby is younger and still has relatively short periods of being awake. Once they’re awake for longer periods of time, it’s just not fair - to the baby or your employer.

Oh, I read the first post in this mini-chain a bit differently (possibly just projecting) - that the poster has childcare in the home (either a nanny or a stay at home spouse or something) but now having to be away-away will really stink. That's where I am - we host a nanny share, so while I'm working from 9-5 and don't have to do childcare, I can go and hug my baby on breaks and talk to him when I'm making my lunch, etc. He's older now, and weaned, but if he were younger I could be nursing instead of taking pumping breaks. Transitioning from that to being straight up gone for 9 hours will be tough, and would be tougher if he was younger.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had a baby during the pandemic and have been wfh for months. I can’t imagine being away from my baby 9 consecutive hours for 5 days now. If I am forced to go back 5 days, I will likely quit, but may reconsider if there’s wfh at least a couple of days a week.

Yeah I don’t know how we are going to put this genie back in the bottle for a micro-generation of moms who didn’t have to send their 12 week olds to daycare or pay for a nanny. It’s clear to me that as a practical matter this can’t become the status quo (“work from home” with no infant care) but I have to assume a lot of these moms will drop out of the workforce.

+1

I mean surely this subset of pandemic moms either a. Didn't have a very demanding job to begin with or b. Were not performing at 100%/for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. We all KNOW one cannot work with an infant, 1 year old or 2 year old at home en toe.

Some of them did fine, because they worked when the child was asleep, eating or occupied. It's pretty easy to have a baby nap or breastfeed while working on a presentation. And kids that have a solid 11-12 hours overnight plus 1-2 naps during the day? It just takes flexing when you do your work (if work allows that).

Man I cannot relate at all. I can't work on a presentation while breastfeeding, or really deeply focus on work while my kids are eating or playing. If I'm "on duty" with my kids while trying to work any given task takes 5x as long.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had a baby during the pandemic and have been wfh for months. I can’t imagine being away from my baby 9 consecutive hours for 5 days now. If I am forced to go back 5 days, I will likely quit, but may reconsider if there’s wfh at least a couple of days a week.

Yeah I don’t know how we are going to put this genie back in the bottle for a micro-generation of moms who didn’t have to send their 12 week olds to daycare or pay for a nanny. It’s clear to me that as a practical matter this can’t become the status quo (“work from home” with no infant care) but I have to assume a lot of these moms will drop out of the workforce.

+1

I mean surely this subset of pandemic moms either a. Didn't have a very demanding job to begin with or b. Were not performing at 100%/for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. We all KNOW one cannot work with an infant, 1 year old or 2 year old at home en toe.

Agreed. I had my baby last November. His daycare spot was ready for him in February, but they were nice enough to hold it for him until May. My husband (also WFH 100%) and I decided to send him to daycare in April because it just wasn’t tenable anymore between the baby’s needs and our work responsibilities. It’s one thing when the baby is younger and still has relatively short periods of being awake. Once they’re awake for longer periods of time, it’s just not fair - to the baby or your employer.

Oh, I read the first post in this mini-chain a bit differently (possibly just projecting) - that the poster has childcare in the home (either a nanny or a stay at home spouse or something) but now having to be away-away will really stink. That's where I am - we host a nanny share, so while I'm working from 9-5 and don't have to do childcare, I can go and hug my baby on breaks and talk to him when I'm making my lunch, etc. He's older now, and weaned, but if he were younger I could be nursing instead of taking pumping breaks. Transitioning from that to being straight up gone for 9 hours will be tough, and would be tougher if he was younger.

Maybe some moms, but I know of a LOT of employers who are dealing with trying to bring back workers who haven't had any childcare at all. It's a big ol' mess.

[Anonymous]

I used to work from home once every 2 weeks. Now my office is talking about allowing 2-3 days a week telework. I'm a bit conflicted. I actually like being home all the time and the increased flexibility but I do miss going to the office. I'm not really sure what going to the office will be like is a lot of my coworkers are teleworking. If 2/3 of the office are teleworking on any given day it seems almost silly to have 1/3 in the office. What's the point of going in if every meeting is still going to be on Teams and I'll just be signing on from the desk.

[Anonymous]

I loved it so much that I left my boring, low paying gov't job and found a FT WFH job that has been going great so far. I plan on going in occasionally, but we have multiple WFH employees, so it's an established part of the culture. I don't think I can ever go back to five-day-a-week office job, tbh. I'd be open to 1-2 days a week, maybe. This is just not the phase of my life where I need or want to be in the office all the time.