Lifestyle Choices

`I was the first of my friends to work full time with small children, and most of them seemed to think I was mad. However, now, one by one, all but a few seem to have returned to some form of work.’

Wendy, 36, beauty therapist

`No, they don’t, and I don’t think that they have any idea how hard it can be. They talk about a busy week when they have to fit in a haircut and a visit from the gas man!’

Sue, 36, deputy head teacher

`I think the ones who don’t work pity my situation and wouldn’t dare not be supportive, even if it’s not how they would raise their own kids.’

Jane, 35, public relations/marketing manager

`I sometimes feel guilty when I see their tidy homes, their home baking and the pictures etc. that have resulted from playing with their children and so on’

Joanna, 37, local government officer

`They do not make me feel guilty. They accept me as I am, and I accept them as they are. The world is made interesting by differences. And we all have our children’s welfare at heart.’

Margaret, 47, senior medical laboratory scientific officer

`No, they don’t work and they often make me feel guilty. They say that I’m not with my children enough, and that I’m tired and they ask me why I had children at all.’

Nicola, 34, air-traffic controller

`Some of my friends think that it’s odd that I chose to because we don’t actually “need” me to.’ work,

Valerie, 33, part-time special needs assistant

`No, most of my friends don’t work and those that do, work parttime. They tend to admire me and say things like “God, I don’t know how you do it, you must have so much energy” etc..’

Allyson, 33, teacher/head of department

`It’s more or less half and half. People try desperately to be forward-thinking and modern, but most have an inbuilt basic disapproval of working mums. I get funny looks and feel that I have to apologize for working.’

Donna, 3o, registered nurse (for the mentally handicapped)

`Some work and some don’t. It is not difficult to make me feel guilty about the time I don’t spend with my children, though. I have a predisposition to guilt: I am a woman.’

Claire, 36, social worker

Won-working friends have made comments about feeling that it’s not fair to leave their children when they’re still so young, that it’s such a short time etc. I point out how being exposed to other adults results in confident and adaptable children; how well they relate to people; how much attention they their minder, who concentrates on them, rather th get from an doing the housework.’

Elspeth, 38, teacher

`Yes, most work, but many are part time or job share. Most are very supportive; we cover for one another on the odd occasion when the children are ill.’

Stephanie, 31, midwife

`Half of them work and half don’t. The ones who don’t are mostly supportive. They don’t make me feel guilty, but often they can’t understand that its not the money that motivates me.’

Janey, 35, chartered quantity surveyor

`I have found myself making friends and keeping in touch with people who do work and have kids, as we share similar ideas; they keep me sane. I don’t quite fit in with the friends I have locally any more because they’re all full-time mothers.’

Nikki, 34, TV producer/journalist

`Most who don’t work at all make me feel guilty; not through their attitudes, but because they are always so organized. I feel like my children and I are barely holding it together sometimes.’
Sarah, 37, college lecturer (fashion design)

`I had children earlier than any of my friends. Many of them regard me as a role model now that I have three. I am no expert but can advise people going through it all for the first time — although most of the time you don’t feel you are doing well enough. What keeps you sane is having one or two female friends who are close enough for you to be able to offload all the bad bits onto.’

Charlotte, 33, doctor/senior registrar

`They never make me feel guilty. They respect my decision. Sometimes they do forget that I work full time when making social arrangements.’

Gillian, 35, systems training designer

`My 20-year-old daughter is the only one who really makes me bristle; she doesn’t work and spends a lot of time with her daughter. I have had a lot of flack because my two-year-old still has her dummy. Frankly, my 20-year-old daughter sucked her thumb and, in fact, still does when she watches television. I can throw away the dummy in time.’

Lindsey, 38, school secretary

`Interestingly, the wife of one of my cousins said she didn’t approve of my working, but now she has had two children of her own in quick succession and says she wishes that she could get a job!’

Diane, 29, insurance underwriter

`Half my friends with children work. They are all supportive. We have each other’s children to stay from time to time so that everyone gets a night without them - excellent!’

Jane, 33, local government manager

`My neighbour has a child the same age as Molly. She tries to agree that nursery is a good idea, but she manages to make me feel guilty too, somehow.’

Sarah, 28, regional administrative officer

`My friends who don’t work do not understand how hectic life becomes with a job as well. They cannot see why you haven’t time for coffee on a non-work day.’

Helen, 27, agricultural consultant

`I think the ones who don’t work envy me — but I envy them!’
Jayne, 38, estate agent

It’s fine to sit down to watch Casualty, ER and Medics, because no matter how real the situations appear, we know that it is only television. We can, however, do without that kind of excitement in real life.

It is only when an emergency strikes that we find out whether we are generally managing to hold all the various sections of our life together, or whether we are daily teetering on the brink of disaster. If our support mechanisms are strong, then with any luck, like the foundations of our homes, we should still be standing when the storm has subsided.

Most of the women to whom I spoke said that when they were ill, they tended to struggle on regardless, but when their child or career was bedridden, the alarm bells started to ring and partners/family/friends were drafted in to help. If the illness was serious, then employers had to be told. But would they always get the whole truth? For 6o per cent of the women honesty was the only way. They said they always told their employer they had to take time off to look after a sick child; only six per cent admitted to lying and saying that they were ill themselves instead.

So how do employers normally react? Just under and just over a quarter said their bosses were very understanding and ‘okay’ about it respectively. Just three per cent hated the inconvenience.

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