Part Time Hours, Full Time Guilt
I recently collaborated with the Career Mum Collective (an amazing subscription box service for mums juggling work and home) to chat all things part time work (and full time guilt) and wanted to share the post with you guys too:
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I was surprised to find that 84% of mums go back to work part time after their first baby - this was even higher than I thought…
However every Mum that comes to me feels some form of guilt around their part time working hours, as well as:
guilt about how often they’re putting their kids in childcare… and also
guilt for not loving every second of work OR motherhood.
They feel torn between wanting to be working when they’re with their kids, or wanting to be with their kids when working.
And they have a very tough time at work communicating their part time hours at work too.
Here’s a few actionable strategies to help you manage your guilt about working part time, and I’ll be back soon to share an exercise on how to change your mindset around it.
1 Set your out of office
In your online calendar, you should be able to set your working hours and apply a setting that automatically declines meeting invitations outside of your working hours.
Say you don’t work Fridays and you get a 2pm invite for next Friday… you might think… “I guess I could join while the toddler is napping… but it’s my day off… what should I do?”
Setting out of office automatically makes the decision for you.
2. Stop referring to it as your “day/s off”
How often do you say or hear others say “Enjoy your day off!”
We all know work is often way easier than parenting, haha!
So come up with how you want to refer to it or respond to that. “I’m with my 2 kids tomorrow” or “Tomorrow is swimming and soccer day with my toddler”.
3. Choose your own boundaries
I never actively encourage working out of hours but it’s up to you how you set your boundaries.
When I went back to work 3 days per week after having my daughter, I would make a cup of tea and spend 30 minutes checking email and messages the night before I went back to work.
It helped me be more productive on my work days and didn’t bother me, but you’ll know what works best for you.
4. Identify whose opinion is bothering you the most
Really at the root of all this is caring what others are thinking of us.
Do they think we’re doing a good enough job? Do they think I’m slacking off? Do they think I’m not serious about my career?
Identify WHOSE opinion bothers you the most and make a list of what they might be thinking.
Is any of it true? Usually you’ll find it’s not, but sometimes there are tweaks you might want to make at work.
By identifying what is bothering you, you bring it to the surface and will stop trying to please others if their opinions aren’t true.
I’ll be back soon to share a mindset hack to help you at work and home too!
If you’d like more help with time management as a toddler mum, grab my free guide to Get Everything Done here or follow me on Instagram for daily stories and posts with ideas for you.
