Working parents: how do you have the energy to do it all?

[Anonymous]

NP. We do the best we can. We realize we are not perfect. We prioritize safety and well being and education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I do not come home from work on Wednesday. I run all my errands and go to the gym or meet friends out.

I go to lunch with friends 2x a week, I pack lunch and eat at my desk 3 days and pay bills/meal plan.

I work out Saturday mornings and one morning before work. I walk during my kids practice.

My H does morning routine, I get to work early. I do pickup except Wednesdays.

I only cook M/T/W, left overs on Th, order in on F. H cooks Sunday.

I nap in the afternoon when the kids nap or have “quiet time” and read.

I have a cleaning person 2x a month.

Is the lunch with friends work friends or personal friends? I wish my personal friends worked close enough to me to meet up for lunch.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was just like you. It’s okay. You’re in an exhausting stage of life and most parents are in the same boat with very young children. It was just kids, work, kids, household tasks and then pass out from exhaustion.

Fast forward to all my kids being school age…6, 9 & 12. I up at 5 am to swim laps 2-3 x a week, yoga also a few times a week, decided to learn a new instrument.

You will eventually hit your stride with parenting, have older and more independent children, and sleep better without night time wake ups, and night time potty training. It will eventually happen for you.

It really does not get better. I think ages 0-5 are the easiest years. My kids are 11 and 14–almost 12 and 15. It is harder than the years before school started. School stuff, activities, social plans with their friends—it never ends. Exhausted is an understatement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was just like you. It’s okay. You’re in an exhausting stage of life and most parents are in the same boat with very young children. It was just kids, work, kids, household tasks and then pass out from exhaustion.

Fast forward to all my kids being school age…6, 9 & 12. I up at 5 am to swim laps 2-3 x a week, yoga also a few times a week, decided to learn a new instrument.

You will eventually hit your stride with parenting, have older and more independent children, and sleep better without night time wake ups, and night time potty training. It will eventually happen for you.

It really does not get better. I think ages 0-5 are the easiest years. My kids are 11 and 14–almost 12 and 15. It is harder than the years before school started. School stuff, activities, social plans with their friends—it never ends. Exhausted is an understatement.

+1. My kids are 10 and 12 and I’m so exhausted I’m going to get bloodwork because I think something is wrong with me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Okay - working mom of 3 (6, 4, 1) here.

1) Almost all of us are exhausted most of the time. You’re not weird, and I doubt anything is wrong with you.

2) 18 months is hard. It’ll get easier every year.

3) No one is doing “it all.” Make sure you’re cutting corners, it’s the only way to stay sane. I have given up on the following things: Christmas cards, thank you cards (I text), washing sheets more than every three or four weeks, wearing cute outfits, doing my hair in any way that takes more than 3 mins, showering daily (it’s every other day now unless I’m sweaty), shaving my legs in winter, anything in the category of “redecorating” and probably about 294729 other things that are just objectively less important than staying sane, doing a decent job at work, and raising my kids well. And these things don’t even bother me. It’s honestly freeing.

4) You need breaks from the grind. My husband and I aim to each take a chunk of time completely off from childcare responsibilities most weekends. The other parent is 100% in charge during that time. Today, I slept until 10am and then laid in bed and watched bed TV and played on my phone until noon while he was in charge of the kids. This evening, I took care of the kids, did bath time, dinner time and bedtime solo, and my husband went to a movie with friends. To repeat: this is not a once in a while thing. It’s nearly every weekend, and it’s CRITICAL for staying sane. We also try to each take one or two weekday evenings off per month to have dinner with friends or go to a happy hour or show or something. Additional advantage: while taking care of all the kids solo for long stretches can be challenging, it also makes all the other times, when your spouse is there, seem easier.

5) Can we dig in more on your evening routine? Kids in bed by 8, great. Cleaning, etc, sure. But then 20 mins later you’re asleep? Something here isn’t adding up. Are your cleaning/evening chores taking more than 45 mins or an hour? Each? Every night? Then see #3. You’re doing too much and need to cut way back or simplify or something. We might be able to give you tips if you can tell us some of the time sucks there. Otherwise - does that mean you’re falling asleep at 9pm? What time are you getting up??

Assuming you’re up around 7, you should be able to be asleep around 11, getting ready for bed around 10:30, which should mean you have from 8:30-10:30 to yourself just about every night. Provide more detail as to what’s going on here. My suspicion is you are spending a lot of time in the evenings on screens, which isn’t awful sometimes, but if it’s robbing you of all your evening free time, you’ve gotta restructure your habits/routines.

Can you please just stop with the “working mom” / problematic terminology?

It’s “working parent,” or, if you need to be specific, then “birth-parent,” ok?

I think the correct term is now “gestating parent”

[Anonymous]

It could be any number of things. Some thoughts:

- get a physical and full bloodwork panel done to make sure there isn't something affecting your quality of sleep

- hire cleaners if you can so that you are only keeping the house picked up

- see what else you can outsource (gardening, food prep, etc.)

- be very purposeful with your time because some people waste cumulative hours scrolling their phones during the day and then can't figure out why they don't have time for things, or people don't make sure to have time for relaxing activities like taking a walk, reading a book, watching a TV show and then they feel like they're never "off"

- schedule some of the things you want to do like dinners with friends and then make them happen even if you are feeling tired at the time, you'll usually be glad you made the effort and went out

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Gets better when the little one is 4/5. It becomes less physical. Then we started more activities. DH sleeps 6 hrs a night and is fine so he works out in the am at 5. I need way more sleep so I get up at 7 with the kids. We also stopped dividing the kids. So one parent does both kid bedtimes/activities and the other gets a full evening to do something etc.

This! We've done this since our twins were born and it makes a huge difference when you know that every other night you will have some down time and every other morning you can sleep in or get that workout in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wait what time are you actually going to sleep? 9pm? that’s too early for an adult! We sleep 11-7. Sometimes 10:30. (I wake at 7:30)

We definitely clean and work for 2 hours after kids go to sleep. But yeah, life is hard and not easy. I’m dying to come home to a cooked meal. Neither of us telework.

I don't know any adult with children who sleeps in until 7:30 unless it's summer, they don't work, and their kids are in high school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A lot of people think that their energy is a finite resource that needs to be carefully guarded and conserved, but my experience is the opposite. The more you do, especially exercise, the more energy you have.

Sometimes yes. But sometimes I have to accept that it’s not happening today. It will happen at some point but not at this moment.

[Anonymous]

I don’t know anyone with more than one little kid that works full time that isn’t always two steps away from a nervous breakdown. Just survive and lower your standards for what you can, like meals and having a clean house. I had a very flexible job during those years and still felt like I was always drowning.

[Anonymous]

I have 3 kids from toddler to high school and the older one is completely exhausting emotionally while the youngest keeps us up at night. I'm not alone in that feeling.

I drink lots of coffee.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wait what time are you actually going to sleep? 9pm? that’s too early for an adult! We sleep 11-7. Sometimes 10:30. (I wake at 7:30)

We definitely clean and work for 2 hours after kids go to sleep. But yeah, life is hard and not easy. I’m dying to come home to a cooked meal. Neither of us telework.

I don't know any adult with children who sleeps in until 7:30 unless it's summer, they don't work, and their kids are in high school.

Me! I'm the working mom of three from up-thread (kids are 6, 4, and 1).

I wake up at 7:30am every day year round, and so does my husband (unless one of us is sleeping in on a weekend). All three kids get up at that time, too (we do not mess around about sleep training, and the oldest two have okay-to-wake clocks that turn green at 7:30). Both my husband and I can get ready in 10-15 mins in the morning. He takes a quick shower (like 2 mins), and we throw clothes on, brush teeth and hair, and that's about it.

We have super-simplified our morning routines (see - "things I don't do" from my initial post). One of us handles the big kids first thing, the other the baby, and we alternate. Baby person gets baby up and dressed, and then makes a simple breakfast for the kids. Big kid person makes sure the big kids are up, tells them the weather and any special clothing requirements, assists if they need help (they generally don't) and simultaneously gets themselves ready. We all converge in the kitchen by 8am. Three kids eat, big kid person assists/monitors as needed and also does our daughter's hair. Baby person goes to get ready. By 8:15, breakfast is done, everyone's ready, and we've got about 5 minutes for final stuff (pack backpacks and work bags, get shoes/coats on) and we're all out the door at 8:20.

We both work hybrid with an alternating schedule - one person is always WFH and one is always at the office each day. The office person heads to the office, the home person does drop off. Both our work days start at 9am.

I think this is a good demonstration of my larger point - prioritize (sleep is basically our #1 priority, for everyone) and streamline (it is possible to get a family of five out the door in 50 mins if you keep it to the basics). Yea, my hair hasn't been styled in a way that takes more than 60 seconds in the past 6 years. But I'm well rested!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was just like you. It’s okay. You’re in an exhausting stage of life and most parents are in the same boat with very young children. It was just kids, work, kids, household tasks and then pass out from exhaustion.

Fast forward to all my kids being school age…6, 9 & 12. I up at 5 am to swim laps 2-3 x a week, yoga also a few times a week, decided to learn a new instrument.

You will eventually hit your stride with parenting, have older and more independent children, and sleep better without night time wake ups, and night time potty training. It will eventually happen for you.

It really does not get better. I think ages 0-5 are the easiest years. My kids are 11 and 14–almost 12 and 15. It is harder than the years before school started. School stuff, activities, social plans with their friends—it never ends. Exhausted is an understatement.

Yes! I could have written this. Today I drove one kid to camp, one to an orthodontist appointment and dropped off the third to the mall because they wanted to go see a movie with their friends. All while trying to manage a full time WFH job. Needless to say I gave my husband a hard time when he came home from work because I am exhausted!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was just like you. It’s okay. You’re in an exhausting stage of life and most parents are in the same boat with very young children. It was just kids, work, kids, household tasks and then pass out from exhaustion.

Fast forward to all my kids being school age…6, 9 & 12. I up at 5 am to swim laps 2-3 x a week, yoga also a few times a week, decided to learn a new instrument.

You will eventually hit your stride with parenting, have older and more independent children, and sleep better without night time wake ups, and night time potty training. It will eventually happen for you.

It really does not get better. I think ages 0-5 are the easiest years. My kids are 11 and 14–almost 12 and 15. It is harder than the years before school started. School stuff, activities, social plans with their friends—it never ends. Exhausted is an understatement.

Yes! I could have written this. Today I drove one kid to camp, one to an orthodontist appointment and dropped off the third to the mall because they wanted to go see a movie with their friends. All while trying to manage a full time WFH job. Needless to say I gave my husband a hard time when he came home from work because I am exhausted!

Look, I know that different things are hard for different people, and I can understand that some people may find the emotional and logistical labor of teens stressful. Plus, you're obviously older when you have teens than you were when you had babies and toddlers. But you took a max of three car trips and did work at a computer, all of which are... just sitting there. To compare that to chasing a 2 and 3 year old around or getting up four times a night with an infant and say that this is more exhausting is absurd.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wait what time are you actually going to sleep? 9pm? that’s too early for an adult! We sleep 11-7. Sometimes 10:30. (I wake at 7:30)

We definitely clean and work for 2 hours after kids go to sleep. But yeah, life is hard and not easy. I’m dying to come home to a cooked meal. Neither of us telework.

I don't know any adult with children who sleeps in until 7:30 unless it's summer, they don't work, and their kids are in high school.

Me! I'm the working mom of three from up-thread (kids are 6, 4, and 1).

I wake up at 7:30am every day year round, and so does my husband (unless one of us is sleeping in on a weekend). All three kids get up at that time, too (we do not mess around about sleep training, and the oldest two have okay-to-wake clocks that turn green at 7:30). Both my husband and I can get ready in 10-15 mins in the morning. He takes a quick shower (like 2 mins), and we throw clothes on, brush teeth and hair, and that's about it.

We have super-simplified our morning routines (see - "things I don't do" from my initial post). One of us handles the big kids first thing, the other the baby, and we alternate. Baby person gets baby up and dressed, and then makes a simple breakfast for the kids. Big kid person makes sure the big kids are up, tells them the weather and any special clothing requirements, assists if they need help (they generally don't) and simultaneously gets themselves ready. We all converge in the kitchen by 8am. Three kids eat, big kid person assists/monitors as needed and also does our daughter's hair. Baby person goes to get ready. By 8:15, breakfast is done, everyone's ready, and we've got about 5 minutes for final stuff (pack backpacks and work bags, get shoes/coats on) and we're all out the door at 8:20.

We both work hybrid with an alternating schedule - one person is always WFH and one is always at the office each day. The office person heads to the office, the home person does drop off. Both our work days start at 9am.

I think this is a good demonstration of my larger point - prioritize (sleep is basically our #1 priority, for everyone) and streamline (it is possible to get a family of five out the door in 50 mins if you keep it to the basics). Yea, my hair hasn't been styled in a way that takes more than 60 seconds in the past 6 years. But I'm well rested!

Ok... Our bus comes at 7:20 during the school year so we can't all wake up at 7:30 and neither can the parents of all the kids at our private school (some buses come earlier, we are one of the last stops on our route).