- My husband and I decided to work part time after the birth of our first child.
- Strangers have asked my husband why he's taking care of our kids.
- We've both taken pay cuts — but we've also saved money on childcare.
When we had our first child, my husband and I needed to figure out how to balance childcare and work. We both wanted to spend time with our son but didn't want to stop working or pay for expensive childcare. The UK has some of the highest childcare costs in the world, and the lack of government support for working parents leaves many facing difficult decisions.
After many hours of researching and looking at finances, we both decided to work part time. I returned to work two days a week, and my husband started working a four-day week. This left us with four days of childcare, and we found a babysitter for the remaining day. We both had understanding employers who were open to flexibility, but I know from friends that this isn't always the case.
We've since had another child, and we took shared parental leave after she was born, something very few men in both of our organizations had done before. After that maternity leave, I decided to quit my job and freelance, giving me more flexibility with a workaround for both children.
Our son has now started school, and my husband and I both work four-day weeks, meaning we each have a day with our daughter while we continue our careers. Over the last five years we've saved around $40,000 on childcare, and despite both taking pay cuts we aren't that much worse off.
Our working schedule is unusual
Our setup doesn't feel weird to us, but it is unusual. In the UK in 2019, only 2% of families with children the same age as ours had two parents working part time. The norm is dads working full time, which was the case for 96% of families.
We've faced some resistance to our setup — my husband has been asked by strangers what he is doing with our children when he's out with them, illustrating how uncommon it still is to see a father doing childcare during the workweek.
We don't have a perfect childcare split or balance — ours often feels precariously arranged and requires a lot of admin. I sometimes feel like I'm failing at parenting and work, and in trying to do it all I'm succeeding at neither.
But I hope that by finding our own answers to the impossible dilemma of childcare we're normalizing men looking after their kids and women continuing to enjoy work after starting a family. Work can be just as fulfilling and purposeful after kids, and part time doesn't mean part qualified or part committed.
I hope that fathers doing childcare becomes more common — not just for women, but so men can enjoy some of the joys (and sometimes struggles) of being a stay-at-home parent. It can be a whole lot of fun going out for ice cream or to the park on a weekday afternoon.
Women are so often told they need to do it all in work and family life — but for that to be realistic, it's important for men to be able to do both too. Progress for women in work is amazing, but it's only really possible if there is progress for men at home too.