Being a working parent (during non-pandemic times) - is it as bad as it seems?

[Anonymous]

DH and I are in our late 20s, both want to have a child, and are thinking about TTC sometime soon. The catch, if you will, is that we both work full time, our income is divided fairly evenly, and we are not high earners (about $200k HHI in close in suburbs). Technically I could stay home but it would be extremely difficult financially. With that said, I can’t wrap my head around the logistics of two full time careers (in normal times - pandemic would hopefully be in rear view mirror by time we have a baby) and a baby. Adults need sleep to drive to work safely and then actually do their job, and it seems like a full nights sleep is not a thing for many people until a long time in. There’s also the disruption - we recently had a home repair emergency that required me to suddenly take time off at work, which caused me to fall way behind and have to work crazy hours to make up for what I missed.

I’m kind of rambling, but I’m just scared and confused because I don’t feel like two working parents and a baby are compatible unless you just accept that things are going to be really miserable for a while. Am I being dramatic or does this make sense?

[Anonymous]

$200 HJI is in 1%.

[Anonymous]

Sometimes people get more flexible jobs. And catch up on sleep by going to bed early or napping on the weekends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DH and I are in our late 20s, both want to have a child, and are thinking about TTC sometime soon. The catch, if you will, is that we both work full time, our income is divided fairly evenly, and we are not high earners (about $200k HHI in close in suburbs). Technically I could stay home but it would be extremely difficult financially. With that said, I can’t wrap my head around the logistics of two full time careers (in normal times - pandemic would hopefully be in rear view mirror by time we have a baby) and a baby. Adults need sleep to drive to work safely and then actually do their job, and it seems like a full nights sleep is not a thing for many people until a long time in. There’s also the disruption - we recently had a home repair emergency that required me to suddenly take time off at work, which caused me to fall way behind and have to work crazy hours to make up for what I missed.

I’m kind of rambling, but I’m just scared and confused because I don’t feel like two working parents and a baby are compatible unless you just accept that things are going to be really miserable for a while. Am I being dramatic or does this make sense?

Hire a nanny

[Anonymous]

There are thousands of dual-income households in this region. They are not all miserable. Yes, it's hard, especially at the beginning when you're totally sleep deprived. Decent parental leave matters. But people find solutions. Including people who make FAR less money than you and your husband.

[Anonymous]

It is a lot of work and if you aren't sure, then don't do it. It's totally okay to make the decision not to have children. Many people make it work, but it is stressful. And often, parents (women primarily) trade off success at work for parenthood. If you love your job and want to be able to rise and succeed, think long and hard before you have kids. You can outsource much of the work, but at the end of the day, your kids are your responsibility and it is time consuming.

[Anonymous]

You’ll figure it out. Luckily you make plenty of money for good childcare.

[Anonymous]

Depends on a lot of things.

How much help you can hire.
How much family help you can enlist.
Flexibility at work.
Your own capacity to be organized.
Your capacity to not be perfectionist about things.

For our family, two ambitious careers have worked due to being willing to hire a lot of help, fly family in, and utilize all available job flexibility. I worked from home with nannies the first year of both of my kids’ lives. I personally am not comfortable leaving a non-verbal child with someone who I haven’t observed for several months, but your comfort level may vary. I will say that this has helped me become more strategic in terms of understanding where to target my energy. Yes, time and energy are finite and there will be times when you feel you are juggling a lot. But it is doable with proper planning and identifying your own priorities.

[Anonymous]

I would start sniffing around the parental leave policies at your respective companies. My company had a 4 month fully paid leave, and you could take up to a year (after 4 months it would be unpaid) and return to your position if you got it cleared with your department head. I knew a bunch of women who took 6 months, for instance, since swinging 2 months unpaid is usually doable even for a dual income couple, and the difference between returning to work at 4 months versus 6 months is actually pretty big.

If you can take a decent maternity leave (or split between maternity and paternity leave, though for infants it is my personal opinion that it makes the most sense for mom to take most of the leave because she is still recovering from pregnancy/childbirth and is often breastfeeding and will therefore get the most benefit from the time off work), find a daycare or other childcare that is within budget, and don't have super demanding jobs, it's more than doable. It's a lot of ducks to line up, but in this area, a lot of people do it.

Talk to parents at your work, talk to parents in your neighborhood, talk to you friends. Don't take everything they say as gospel (newish parents love to tell soon-to-be parents what to do, because they've been getting unsolicited advice for a while and want to turn the tables), but collect info. Where do their kids go to daycare. Go ahead and ask questions like how much their nanny share actually costs (we did, which is how we learned that a full-time nanny runs 40k or more a year in this area!) and how they found it. Ask people how long they took off and if they wished they'd had more or less. Again, none of this is prescriptive. Everyone is different and everyone makes their own choices and there is truly no right or wrong way.

And then stay flexible. We planned on staying dual-income, and then for a variety of reasons I decided to leave my job after returning and was a SAHM for another year before returning to work. Like you, we never really anticipated doing that and didn't originally think we could make it work financially. But then it became the thing we needed to do, and we made it work. That's what people do -- they figure it out. It sucks, and there should be way more societal support for new families, but most people do figure it out. And at 200k HHI and relatively stable jobs, and being as young as you are, I don't have any concerns about you. You can put that puzzle together.

[Anonymous]

You are right to at least be thinking about it. If you only have 1 kid, it's doable. Things get harder with 2. That's when you see 1 parent (often the mom) cutting back on work or SAH. If 1 of you may make more money eventually then it will be easier. And yes, the early years are super difficult, if kids don't sleep, or they get sick and you have to take an emergency day off of work to take them to the doctor. A nanny makes it easier but you'll be paying $40-50K a year for that.

[Anonymous]

You suffer for a little while. Humans have endured much worse than a few night feedings.

[Anonymous]

Not miserable at all. Key factors:
- WFH 2x a week, fairly flexible hours the rest of the week to avoid traffic
- A great nanny, and a Mom nearby who could be around and help

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not miserable at all. Key factors:
- WFH 2x a week, fairly flexible hours the rest of the week to avoid traffic
- A great nanny, and a Mom nearby who could be around and help

Oh, AND
- An equal partner with respect to childcare and housework

[Anonymous]

You don't get a lot of sleep as a parent, even when hey are older. In fact the toddler years are in many ways far easier than elementary years.

So how exactly do you plan the day to work? Here's how we did it in the before times

2 kids , one in elementary one, one in daycare.

DW gets up at 5am and goes to work early, getting to work by 6am. Works till about 3pm, solid day of work, then is at school soon after release (but kids are still in extended day) and picks up from daycare. Takes kids to after school activity such as soccer practice or scouts, then gets home and cooks a very simple dinner like mac and cheese and steamed brocolli.

DH gets up at 6am, makes lunches, probably cleans up from the night before, and then kids get up at 7am. Head out at 8 to do 2 drop offs, elem is kiss and ride but preschooler is a much more involved walking in, reading a book, hugs process. Drives to work and arrives around 9am, works until 6pm.

Most everyone aims to be home by 6:30 - 7:00 PM, but one parent has to be home much earlier if you want to spend any time with your kids.

Dinner as a family is ideal, but DH sometimes misses it and eats after we are already finished.

Then we spend time in the evenings together, talking about the day, probably helping with homework, doing chores like cleaning up dishes, laundry, washing lunch boxes, picking up toys.

Then 8:00PM is the bedtime routine (some kids are earlier) and kids are asleep by 8:30 - 9:00 PM.

DW essentially goes to bed then, because a 5am wakeup means a 10pm bedtime is still only 7 hours of sleep.

DH often stays up to do a few more chores or putter around as men are wont to do, and is in bed by 11pm-12pm.

Rinse and repeat this over the week, some days DH leaves work early b/c two activities for two kids at same time, and either makes up time in evening or takes annual leave.

Weekends are largely consumed with some big activity (soccer game, day trip to apple picking, etc), grocery shopping, household cleaning, yardwork and home reparis, church, and family board game or movies, and some trips or walks as family.

Date nights happen saturday night when we hire a sitter to watch the kids at 7pm and we head out for dinner and entertainment.

No nearby family. No money for a nanny/au pair.

Its definitely a slog; summers are actually worse because of the patchwork of camps you have to build your schedule against.

So does this sound "bad"? If so, plan accordingly. I've been trying to talk my spouse into one of us SAH and moving to some far excurb. Remaining working spouse would have super commute, but I honestly that would be less exhausting for everyone. But our aggregate wealth would be much much lower, which can affect retirement, support for our kids in the future, etc.

[Anonymous]

Hi OP, I was you awhile ago. I’ve got two kids now. We are a dual income family. It sucks.

But! No one would ever have kids if the choice was sleep vs. no sleep, or having disposable income vs. spending all our money on your kids.

You need to be thinking long-term... over my expected lifespan of 60-80 more years, will the joy of having children outweigh the fact that no one gets sleep with a newborn?

That’s a “heart” decision, not a dollars and sense decision.