Why You Should Consider Day Care When Working With a Home Parent
I have three children and I work from home. Even when I had one or two children, I asked: “What are you doing?” Your conversation with strangers always grew into their admiration for the fact that I manage to combine children and work. Sometimes they ask how I do it; sometimes they say, “I tried it, but it was too difficult.” People. Stop. I have a secret and this is kindergarten .
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I couldn’t concentrate when three small children wandered under my feet. Every snowy day or sick leave reminds me of this: taking care of children is a job. I am happy for everyone whose work and child are compatible, but please know that it is impossible to be one hundred percent for your children and 100 percent involved in your work.
If your family has two parents, day care is for both of you.
Day care is expensive, so we need to talk about money for a second. If your partner is working full time and you are not, day care is not just your personal expense. I have worked as a freelancer for many years, so at first I always calculated how many dollars I make today versus how many hours I used in day care. This is a treadmill of agony. If I didn’t have a lot of work to do in one week, it would be difficult to justify the high cost of daycare. I would have worked fewer hours to take care of myself less, but then I had no time to look for more work.
But wait a second. The children are in kindergarten, so we can both work. The correct way to make this calculation is to look at the costs and benefits for the entire family. If you and your family choose to invest in day care training, it is because it allows you, as a freelance or part-time worker, to pursue your career. If it makes sense for your family, then you are investing it in your family budget.
If that doesn’t make sense – and after all, kindergarten is a hell of a lot – call the phone that works for you. But don’t forget the factor in the cost of not used day care, too. A childcare gap can lead to a resume gap and a wage gap that can be difficult for you to cope with.
Family budget
I knew all of this intuitively, but what helped me to take a healthy attitude towards it was simply to shuffle a few accounts. I used to pay for my day care from the same bank account that I received all my freelance checks. We changed it so that daycare is done from a shared account, and my freelance job pays for other, less emotionally complex bills.
At the same time, I adhered to a work schedule that made sense for my career and our family’s budget, not related to the day-to-day calculations of what assignments I received. These changes made a big difference, guys. Especially for creative pursuits like writing, where you already measure your self-esteem against the quality of your work, hell add a new hoop where you judge whether you deserve to work or not based on the amount you can put out under pressure.
Realizing this shit allowed me to turn my part-time freelance career into a full-time job while continuing to pursue raising young children. I’m on the staff now, so the calculation is much easier, but I might not have gone that far in my career if I had continued to pretend I could do everything while I was sleeping.