Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The people described in the responses are incredibly fortunate.

Or just make different choices than you do

it's pretty fortunate to be able to afford part-time day care AND a nanny in such a HCOL area. Or have the luck to live close to and/or have competent grandparents who want to be involved. There's not much choosing when it comes to how far you can stretch your childcare budget, for people who have budgets, or how things shake out with the grandparents.

I'm with you PP. I had to put my DC in full-time daycare around 2 in order to work and I didn't love it. Part-time would have been a better fit for her but we could not afford the nanny or for me to stay at home.

Or to just make sacrifices to be a SAHP? "You're just so FORTUNATE to live in a 2 bedroom house. It would just be impossible for me to cram my family of 3 in anything less than 5,000 sqf." "You're just so FORTUNATE to go camping for vacation each year, every year. We just wouldn't be able to survive without spending $50,000/year on luxury trips."
"You're so FORTUNATE to drive a 10 year old economy car. We'd never survive without buying a brand new XL luxury SUV every other year."

DP, but I can’t afford to stay home (or have a nanny) and we live in an 800sqft condo, mostly “vacation” by visiting my parents, and don’t own a car. I also don’t have a career that would allow re-entery after a five year gap. Yes, I regret choosing this career. No, I don’t have a time machine to fix it with. You are in fact fortunate to be able to stay home if you want to.

So again, it’s about the choices you made. Not “fortune.”

I guess that’s a fair point. It is about the choices we made at 20 and 25 and 30. Unfortunately, when you’re wanting to stay home at 35, you can’t go back and change any of the earlier choices to make that easier. Your examples of sacrifices are things I have already sacrificed to afford kids at all so I can’t sacrifice more to stay home and pay for part time preschool. I maintain that people who are in the position to do so are fortunate, either financially or logistically if they have family willing to help out. Why are you so offended by being called fortunate?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The people described in the responses are incredibly fortunate.

Or just make different choices than you do

it's pretty fortunate to be able to afford part-time day care AND a nanny in such a HCOL area. Or have the luck to live close to and/or have competent grandparents who want to be involved. There's not much choosing when it comes to how far you can stretch your childcare budget, for people who have budgets, or how things shake out with the grandparents.

I'm with you PP. I had to put my DC in full-time daycare around 2 in order to work and I didn't love it. Part-time would have been a better fit for her but we could not afford the nanny or for me to stay at home.

Or to just make sacrifices to be a SAHP? "You're just so FORTUNATE to live in a 2 bedroom house. It would just be impossible for me to cram my family of 3 in anything less than 5,000 sqf." "You're just so FORTUNATE to go camping for vacation each year, every year. We just wouldn't be able to survive without spending $50,000/year on luxury trips."
"You're so FORTUNATE to drive a 10 year old economy car. We'd never survive without buying a brand new XL luxury SUV every other year."

Please! No one in upper middle class circles is staying in a small condo and going car-less so that they can stay home and send their kids to preschool.

I work part-time during the hours our child is in preschool. I got a job that allows me to set my schedule and the preschool is only 3 hours per day, so that’s what I do. I was a SAHM before this.

Anonymous wrote:I like PT preschools for that exact reason. A FT caregiver at home (SAHM, grandparent, nanny, or au pair) to step in if the kid is under the weather. Fewer illnesses bc people don’t send their kids to school sick

That’s a good point. We had a FT nanny while our kids did PT preschool as I worked close to FT and DH did FT

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The people described in the responses are incredibly fortunate.

Or just make different choices than you do

it's pretty fortunate to be able to afford part-time day care AND a nanny in such a HCOL area. Or have the luck to live close to and/or have competent grandparents who want to be involved. There's not much choosing when it comes to how far you can stretch your childcare budget, for people who have budgets, or how things shake out with the grandparents.

I'm with you PP. I had to put my DC in full-time daycare around 2 in order to work and I didn't love it. Part-time would have been a better fit for her but we could not afford the nanny or for me to stay at home.

Or to just make sacrifices to be a SAHP? "You're just so FORTUNATE to live in a 2 bedroom house. It would just be impossible for me to cram my family of 3 in anything less than 5,000 sqf." "You're just so FORTUNATE to go camping for vacation each year, every year. We just wouldn't be able to survive without spending $50,000/year on luxury trips."
"You're so FORTUNATE to drive a 10 year old economy car. We'd never survive without buying a brand new XL luxury SUV every other year."

DP, but I can’t afford to stay home (or have a nanny) and we live in an 800sqft condo, mostly “vacation” by visiting my parents, and don’t own a car. I also don’t have a career that would allow re-entery after a five year gap. Yes, I regret choosing this career. No, I don’t have a time machine to fix it with. You are in fact fortunate to be able to stay home if you want to.

So again, it’s about the choices you made. Not “fortune.”

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The people described in the responses are incredibly fortunate.

Or just make different choices than you do

it's pretty fortunate to be able to afford part-time day care AND a nanny in such a HCOL area. Or have the luck to live close to and/or have competent grandparents who want to be involved. There's not much choosing when it comes to how far you can stretch your childcare budget, for people who have budgets, or how things shake out with the grandparents.

I'm with you PP. I had to put my DC in full-time daycare around 2 in order to work and I didn't love it. Part-time would have been a better fit for her but we could not afford the nanny or for me to stay at home.

Or to just make sacrifices to be a SAHP? "You're just so FORTUNATE to live in a 2 bedroom house. It would just be impossible for me to cram my family of 3 in anything less than 5,000 sqf." "You're just so FORTUNATE to go camping for vacation each year, every year. We just wouldn't be able to survive without spending $50,000/year on luxury trips."
"You're so FORTUNATE to drive a 10 year old economy car. We'd never survive without buying a brand new XL luxury SUV every other year."

you know not everyone can afford to not work for a couple of years right? Even your sarcastic examples show what a bubble you live in.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The people described in the responses are incredibly fortunate.

Or just make different choices than you do

it's pretty fortunate to be able to afford part-time day care AND a nanny in such a HCOL area. Or have the luck to live close to and/or have competent grandparents who want to be involved. There's not much choosing when it comes to how far you can stretch your childcare budget, for people who have budgets, or how things shake out with the grandparents.

I'm with you PP. I had to put my DC in full-time daycare around 2 in order to work and I didn't love it. Part-time would have been a better fit for her but we could not afford the nanny or for me to stay at home.

Or to just make sacrifices to be a SAHP? "You're just so FORTUNATE to live in a 2 bedroom house. It would just be impossible for me to cram my family of 3 in anything less than 5,000 sqf." "You're just so FORTUNATE to go camping for vacation each year, every year. We just wouldn't be able to survive without spending $50,000/year on luxury trips."
"You're so FORTUNATE to drive a 10 year old economy car. We'd never survive without buying a brand new XL luxury SUV every other year."

DP, but I can’t afford to stay home (or have a nanny) and we live in an 800sqft condo, mostly “vacation” by visiting my parents, and don’t own a car. I also don’t have a career that would allow re-entery after a five year gap. Yes, I regret choosing this career. No, I don’t have a time machine to fix it with. You are in fact fortunate to be able to stay home if you want to.

One parent worked part time and the other had a flexible schedule. Child took a nice long nap after preschool until other parent came home from work. We did have a good part-time nanny/ baby sitter at one point.

I’m a SAHM. Every single other family in our part time preschool class has a nanny, au pair or parent at home.

OMG how is this a question.

if you are lucky enough to afford that you cherish every minute with your kids.

I was and it was fantastic.

Why in the world would you farm that out?

Most people do not have this luxury.

Friends who switched from full day childcare to preschool- even preschool with aftercare were scrambling over all the breaks, teacher institute days, etc. I think it’s better for two parents who work full time to choose the best child care center rather than try to find a unicorn part time nanny who can also go full time in the summer.

Our preschool had a two hour lunch bunch, so the working parents usually used that plus grandparent care and/or flex schedules. The rest of us were SAHMs. I think there was maybe one family that had a nanny, but there was also a baby sibling that nanny was with.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The people described in the responses are incredibly fortunate.

Or just make different choices than you do

it's pretty fortunate to be able to afford part-time day care AND a nanny in such a HCOL area. Or have the luck to live close to and/or have competent grandparents who want to be involved. There's not much choosing when it comes to how far you can stretch your childcare budget, for people who have budgets, or how things shake out with the grandparents.

I'm with you PP. I had to put my DC in full-time daycare around 2 in order to work and I didn't love it. Part-time would have been a better fit for her but we could not afford the nanny or for me to stay at home.

Or to just make sacrifices to be a SAHP? "You're just so FORTUNATE to live in a 2 bedroom house. It would just be impossible for me to cram my family of 3 in anything less than 5,000 sqf." "You're just so FORTUNATE to go camping for vacation each year, every year. We just wouldn't be able to survive without spending $50,000/year on luxury trips."
"You're so FORTUNATE to drive a 10 year old economy car. We'd never survive without buying a brand new XL luxury SUV every other year."

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The people described in the responses are incredibly fortunate.

Or just make different choices than you do

it's pretty fortunate to be able to afford part-time day care AND a nanny in such a HCOL area. Or have the luck to live close to and/or have competent grandparents who want to be involved. There's not much choosing when it comes to how far you can stretch your childcare budget, for people who have budgets, or how things shake out with the grandparents.

I'm with you PP. I had to put my DC in full-time daycare around 2 in order to work and I didn't love it. Part-time would have been a better fit for her but we could not afford the nanny or for me to stay at home.

Anonymous wrote:The people described in the responses are incredibly fortunate.

Or just make different choices than you do