Reply to dads/moms with "professional careers": do you eat dinner with family on weekdays?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]dad here, lawyer at midsize firm.  zero chance I am home in Vienna before 7:30pm.  and a few times a month, or more, I have board meetings, business development, etc.  When I was in biglaw it would have been impossible to get home before 9pm.

So let me know, and if the answer is what I expect, how do you explain to your family?[/quote]

DH and I are both practicing lawyers, both working full time. We make it a family priority to eat dinner together as a family every night. We eat at 6:30.  Coincidentally, we also live in Vienna, and my DH commutes to DC.

We do this by declining evening obligations as much as possible, going to work super early, working at home after dinner and being happy with secure but low to medium powered careers. Our HHI is over $300,000 though so not any financial sacrifice to do it this way.[/quote]

this is the OP.   getting to work early would not make a difference, unless I could change all of my co-workers and clients. I need to be there when they need me. and yes, if your combined HHI is $300K you are making a sacrifice.  That is fine for you and I'm happy it works out, but my target in a few years is approx $350-400K or so myself.  besides, it cuts my commute in half if I can get on 66.  [/quote]

Hey OP, I'm sorry to be judgmental since you are obviously trying to make more family time but $300K HHI is not a "sacrifice."  If you want to pursue your career goals of making $350k-400k, then unless you are in charge of your own schedule, in most jobs, clearly you are not making it home for family dinner at 6pm.    I am the PP who is a 2 lawyer family who has dinner at 6pm nearly every night.  Our HHI is probably $250k.  We own a house in DC, have 30 minute commutes via metro and have zero financial stress.  I would not trade in our comfortable life (including family dinners) to make an extra $150k.  But you do.  You can't have it all.[/quote]

OP here, and I will catch up on the rest of this thread - but wanted to respond to this one.  for my career, there is not much middle ground possible. [b] I would KILL for an in-house $200K type job. [/b] I've tried and tried, but I cannot get one.  The market is impossible for people with my skillset and credentials (transactional, finance, corporate, real estate type stuff).  I will continue to try. So for now, I can either advance (small firm) or get canned, not much in between.  Not too many non-equity types at my firm.  Besides, its not that hard to make equity where I am, and they don't work hard at all, and do make $400Kish.  That would be the ideal life for my family.  Comfortable good place to work and very family friendly.  I can get there.  But I've been laid off before and would rather not take that risk again.  It is a real risk.[/quote]

Then why were you so mean to the PP who said her HHI was 300k?  Something doesn't add up here.[/quote]

that came out wrong.  I apologize.  Its not that I am driven to make more money, it is that there is honestly no other career path for me right now.  Either I work hard, develop clients and bill hours and make equity partner at boutique type firms (or try to land another biglaw job and work even longer hours as a non-equity or senior counsel type), or I go to plan B.  And there really is no plan B.  So I cannot be satisfied with that because it is not an option. I need to keep a roof for my kids, that is #1.  [/quote]

OP, I wonder if there is some other way to slice this.  Can you leave your office with enough time to have dinner with your kids, and then log back on later to do an hour or two of work, after they are settled in bed?

Or, if you are an early-to-rise family, can you start having breakfast together in a (relatively) leisurely way?

I just wonder if you can flex your hours a bit to get at least a couple of weekday dinnertimes with your family.[/quote]

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