Is it worth it for me to work?

[Anonymous]

I know several moms like you and they work at the elementary school as support staff. Great hours and benefits.

[Anonymous]

OP, my husband travels a ton for work and I'm the main backup parent for sick and snow days. I'm a fed and work FT from home, so for me it's absolutely worth it. Your kids are old enough to be in school full time, so you don't need after care for at least one.

[Anonymous]

Its really not that hard. I've been doing it for years as a single Mom and now as a military wife. I'm the breadwinner and the only person with flexibility in my schedule. It's not as hard as you make it seem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Not Op. I’m a SAHM who also works 5 hours per week, room parents for my kids, active in PTA, work out, etc.

OP, you don’t mention a housekeeper. We have a large house and I have a housekeeper and do very few chores around the house. My youngest only goes to preschool 2x per week though so I still keep occupied with the little one.

I will be you in 2 years when my youngest starts kindergarten. I struggle with going back to work. Just the past 2 months, we went on 2 vacations, all the kids and I took turns being sick, I planned holiday parties for kids classes, hosted friends and family. I could not have done all that if I was working.

I couldn’t host play dates on snow days and teacher work days.

I would consider the $15 job though if I thought it was interesting work. We pay our nanny $25 per hour so it seems silly but I would consider it in the future. I’m Ivy League educated and have multiple degrees. I know I can offer a lot. I just don’t want to work full time and we don’t need my income.

I work FT, and the only thing on that list I haven't done in the past two months is plan a class party. But I have planned and run a couple of events related to a volunteer activity. My point isn't to say that there is anything wrong with the choice you've made, but if you do want to go back to work you can make it work.

I also work full time and have done all the things on that list except I have 3 kids that were all sick (only class parent for two of them but have helped plan class parties, helped with teacher gifts, etc). One of our vacations was to visit my sister and her husband, who both work full-time demanding jobs and somehow managed to host us (is that really a jewel that "busybusybusy" people put in their martyr crowns now- hosting guests?). None of that stuff really takes up all that much time. It is fine if you don't want to work OP but none of these are excuses for not working- working parents do them all the time.

You took 20 PTO days within 2 months?

Pp here. I used to work and got 20 days per year. I took one week off for xmas break, had my parents visit and watch kids other week of winter break. I did take quite a hit for sick days.

I am the PP and no, I did not take 20 PTO days in order to take two vacations and cover sick days. For sick days I used a combo of working from home and back-up care. For the vacations one was over Christmas so I only used 2 PTO days that week and worked remotely one. The other was in early November and I used 5 PTO days for that one.

Pp here. We went away 4 times but two of them were weeklong vacations. Others were long weekend to Mexico and NYC. We hosted out of town friends during working days when kids were off from school. I am not trying to compete with someone who works. I’m just saying that we could not do what we do if I worked.

DH probably took 10 PTO plus the holidays he got off. He joined our friends for dinner while I hosted family during the day. We met up with a friend who was visiting family in Maryland. I couldn’t just get up and take a day off to see a family friend we haven’t seen in forever.

When I worked, we would have done one trip and I probably would have put my kids in camp during the teacher work days and breaks. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this. I remember putting my kids in spring break tennis camp and some LEGO engineering camp during winter break and they enjoyed it.

[Anonymous]

Hey OP, say "I deserve more" 10 times while looking in the mirror.

Signed,
The rest of the world

[Anonymous]

You could work part time as a sub at your kid’s school. This would keep you on their schedule and keep your schedule flexible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Its really not that hard. I've been doing it for years as a single Mom and now as a military wife. I'm the breadwinner and the only person with flexibility in my schedule. It's not as hard as you make it seem.

Oh come on. Can you stop feeing sorry for yourself for a minute and try to put yourself in someone else’s shoes? The OP is in a very different situation.

I’m the primary breadwinner too. And let’s face it. Sometimes I have to work when it’s inconvenient. Sometimes I don’t particularly love my work or find it rewarding. But as long as I am being paid, it is what it is, and we deal with whatever comes up. But the OP’s family doesn’t need the money. So every time it’s inconvenient for her family, she is going to wonder if it’s worth it. Her spouse is going to wonder if it’s worth it, and her kids will wonder what she’s doing. No one outside of her spouse or hired help is ever going to help her.

You are working as part of a team with your spouse to provide for your family. OP is not contributing to the team or her family when she is working. She is taking some time away from the team in order to persue a personal interest and feeling of fulfillment.

[Anonymous]

No, you won’t find a new job that will give you five weeks vacation (unless you work at a school) snow days, sick days for kids unless you want to work for a low wage

I hope you are set financially. Only way I’d stay at home was if I had a full 50% of that income into my solo investments and accounts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No, you won’t find a new job that will give you five weeks vacation (unless you work at a school) snow days, sick days for kids unless you want to work for a low wage

I hope you are set financially. Only way I’d stay at home was if I had a full 50% of that income into my solo investments and accounts.

Are you saying that if you decided to SAH you would want to have half of the savings in accounts under your name only? This doesn’t seem like a huge ask to me. It might be weird if you suddenly moved a ton of money into an account under your name, but if you had been doing it from the beginning, I don’t see why it would be a big deal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No, you won’t find a new job that will give you five weeks vacation (unless you work at a school) snow days, sick days for kids unless you want to work for a low wage

I hope you are set financially. Only way I’d stay at home was if I had a full 50% of that income into my solo investments and accounts.

Our savings are joint, all his pay goes into a joint checking and I manage the finances. I spend about 5x more than DH does.

DH is obsessed with security. We have fully funded college, retirement and he pays a ton for disability insurance. If we ever got divorced, I would get half marital assets.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Its really not that hard. I've been doing it for years as a single Mom and now as a military wife. I'm the breadwinner and the only person with flexibility in my schedule. It's not as hard as you make it seem.

Oh come on. Can you stop feeing sorry for yourself for a minute and try to put yourself in someone else’s shoes? The OP is in a very different situation.

I’m the primary breadwinner too. And let’s face it. Sometimes I have to work when it’s inconvenient. Sometimes I don’t particularly love my work or find it rewarding. But as long as I am being paid, it is what it is, and we deal with whatever comes up. But the OP’s family doesn’t need the money. So every time it’s inconvenient for her family, she is going to wonder if it’s worth it. Her spouse is going to wonder if it’s worth it, and her kids will wonder what she’s doing. No one outside of her spouse or hired help is ever going to help her.

You are working as part of a team with your spouse to provide for your family. OP is not contributing to the team or her family when she is working. She is taking some time away from the team in order to persue a personal interest and feeling of fulfillment.


As someone in the same situation as OP, I would argue that her personal fulfillment is also important. My husband is a physician and the breadwinner. But it’s his second job, one he chose for his own personal fulfillment. His first career was well paying and much more flexible with regular hours but he was bored out of his mind sitting at a desk, just as I was bored out of my mind at home doing chores and volunteer jobs with zero intellectual stimulation. So yeah, you could say I’m not doing this for my family, but then neither is my spouse. I’ve also given him the option of quitting and we downsize, but he won’t take me up on it.