Hello Ladies.. I hope after reading this post of mine..U would agree that most of us are going thru the same phase.. I took a break of 1 yr for maternity and later from July 2010 I joined a new S/w organisation. My baby was 8 months that time. As my parents/ in-laws cannot come here to take care of the baby, I and hubby decided to put him in a creche. Creche is maintained by hubby's office. My office timings are strict from 9am to 6pm. Hubby's office is flexible which is why I am able to continue my job here. My routine starts at 6:30 am. Get up, cook breakfast. pack lunch. Pack lunch juice breakfast etc for baby.In between the maid comes to sweep n mop and takes the clothes for washing.Then I clean the kitchen. Meantime, hubby gets milk and wakes up Aayush (My Son). I bathe aayush and hand him over to hubby and go for bath. By the time I am out, aayush is half ready. den I get ready and feed aayush something. By this time my hubby rushes for bath. HE comes out and I leave for office. Time is 8:35 am. then hubby gets ready n has breakfast n leaves aayush in the creche n goes to office. Evening I start from office at 6 pm. go to the creche, pick aayush, come home. Wait for hubby to come since aayush is now 1.2yrs n he does allow me to do anything once we reach home.I need to sit with him n play (Which is obvious since m away from him for the whole day!!). Meanwhile Maid comes and washes vessles. So play around with Aayush in the duration Hubby comes, freshens up, I handover Aayush to him, and get into the kitchen. Make Dinner and Have it . Time is 9:15 pm. Now it Aayush's dinner time, HUbby feeds him the dinner while I need to dance sing and do all sorts of things to make him eat ONce thats done, Make Aayush ready for sleeping and finish off the cleaning wrk in the kitchen. By this time hubby makes Aayush sleep. Time is 10:30 pm. Incase Aayush is in no mood to sleep, we need to play with him. By the time he is put to sleep it will be 11:30pm. This is how my day starts and ends.. The real commotion starts when Aayush gets up rather early some day or when I get up late. Ofcourse I skip making the lunch when m late.. HUbby really supports me a lot.Takes care of Aayush..plays with him when m in the kitchen.. Never demands anything.. But he really gets bugged with my office timings..which even I cant help.. At the end of the day I feel, I am having no time for myself or my hubby..same feeling my hubby has.. we both are dead tired by the end of the day.I feel I am only in the kitchen all the time when I am @home.. I feel I and hubby are getting very less time with each other, and hubby prefers to stay @home on weekends. NOt that he doesnt like going out, but he gets back pain after carrying aayush all the time when we are out :biglaugh:biglaugh I dont prefer a cook and neither we have the habit of cooking a preserving it in the fridge..so these 2 options are ruled out!! Is this happening to all the working ladies with kid?? or am I not doing time management properly..?? PLease post your commments and suggestions ladies for me to get some time out ot this busy schedule.. Cheers Sona
I think you are doing too much. See, there are only 24 hours in a day and there is only so much you can accomplish in this alloted time period. To free up some time, you need to make changes to your current routine ... you can't have your cake and eat it too! Seems like you cook everyday. That probably is your # 1 time consumer for the day. See where you can take shortcuts here. Outsourcing your chores will also help you free up some of your time. 1. you can chop veggies and store in fridge and cook fresh as needed. For example, 2-3 times a week, I get enough onions peeled, tomatoes chopped, garlic, green chillies and ginger minced for 2-3 days. I do veggie shopping once a week and decide the menu based on my purchases and get the veggies washed and prepped accordingly. This way, I don't spend more than 1/2 hour a day cooking. I get my maid to do the veggie chopping for me. Since she is not chopping veggies every day, the kitchen also gets messed up less and that means less time spent on cleaning it up, which frees up her time to do other chores. 2. Daal can be boiled every 2-3 days and you can put a fresh tadka every day. 3. Alternate between rice and chappatis - don't make both every day. 4. Keep breakfast simple. Cereals, oats, sandwiches etc. This will save you a lot of time in the long run. If you have to make traditional items eg poha, idlis, dosas etc, then do prepwork in the night itself so that you don't have to rush in the morning eg keep the veggies chopped, boil the potatoes etc.
Hi, If you have reliable help, your life will be less hectic and you will be able to give more to you baby and job. 1. Since you have your baby in creche, you can think think about getting help in the evenings for 2 -3 hrs, who can cook or all other adhoc work in the evening. this gives you enough time and energy to focus on your child. 2.In my home the only things which get made in the morning are breakfast and lunch pack for my son. Both me and husband eat our breakfast ( idli,dosa,poha etc) in office and we both are used to eating lunch at office from the time we started working. The only exception is that i make breakfast for my inlwas when they are there. 3. I have Nanny who comes in to look after my son after school and she does our dinner. I only have to make chapathis as we prefer chapatis in night. SO there is no tensionas we already have majority work one for dinner, and maner times i have so much time that I cook something special in the evening because I am relaxed. Cheers
Wow, all I can say is that being a working Mom in India appears to be so easy compared to being a working Mom in the USA. I am up at 5am -- leave for work at 7am -- and don't get home from work until 7pm. Which is a normal day here....that is not even considered a "hard worker". And having a maid is only for extremely wealthy people.....no one in this country has maid service unless they are very, very rich ....and only that is some light cleaning which they will do about 1 time a week for about $100 US Dollars. They would never watch your kid or chop up veggies or do any hard cleaning. In the USA, all cooking, cleaning, working is on the parents.....and paying someone to watch your child costs an extraordinary amount of money - about $12,000 to $15,000 USDollars a year. The one thing that is evident though is that men and women in this country have equal roles. Mom and Dad cook, clean, take care of the kids, take care of the house, and work. There is no such thing as a Dad doing nothing or getting annoyed because of his wife's hours because they are equal beings and probably make the same amount of money. Having a Dad say he gets tired or can't carry their kid around......means he should try harder -- that would never go over well here. Also, little kids need about 10 to 12hrs of sleep a night.....so I'd try to put the little one to bed earlier and get some rest for yourself.....along with follow the advice of preparing meals ahead of time or getting some extra help. You are so lucky you live in a country where you can hire help. In a place like here, you would work to death and never have any help. P.s. Not to mention, maternity leave here is 12 weeks maximum. Any time taken over that amount, then we lose our jobs.
You probably havent read the 1000 threads in the Relationship forums on this site that say otherwise (talking abt Indian families in US). But one thing you are right about is the domestic help situation. In US, it is upto the parents, with none or minimal maid help.
Hi Laxmi, Hiring help is US nowadays is catching up with indian working couples. I see so many mails in our office common mailer enquiring about help to do cooking/cleaning etc. It is catching up. It is relatvely easier in India since we have affordable help.
I think you will have to work around with cooking; thats the only thing I can see which is consuming too much time for you. I understand that you don't like storing food in freezers etc, but its only for a short while, until Aayush is a little big and doesn't need 24 hr attention. Then you can resume cooking every day. Perhaps getting a cook is another option, if you can afford it.
