Grad School

[ReadingMama1214]

I am currently starting my second (out of 3) years of graduate school. I am working towards my masters in counseling and had planned to take the state exam to become a licensed practicing counselor. My goal was to do my masters while the kids are little (currently 2 &4) and start working once they were both in school full-time. My son won't start K until 2019 and could be full day then. But, I am drowning in housework and school work and I am not sure I can juggle it all much longer. DH works full-time and the only time that I can fully dedicate to school is some of DSs nap and after the kids are in bed. But, after the kids go to bed is also when I do some of the days chores that need to get done. I am awful about sticking to cleaning schedules, but think that I could benefit tremendously from finding one that is easy to implement. Between housework, planning meals, doing the errands, caring for the kids, doing some preschool with my daughter, babysitting during the day (I do this for work out of my own home, and school, I feel like I am ready to burst. DH is helpful with tidying up and such, but not with the big cleaning (bathrooms, laundry, etc). In my perfect world I would have a sitter one day a week or a day to do work, but that's not realistic. Getting DH to commit to taking over so that I could have a few uninterrupted hours of work is also not realistic and hasn't worked well in the past. I want to earn my masters so that I can move into a career that helps support our family. 

Anyone else juggle parenting, housework, and a masters degree program? Tips? Cleaning schedules? We do already meal plan. 

[ReadingMama1214]

I don't do much cleaning during semester. I let the housework go.  I also have older children who can pick up the slack.

 

I prioritize study, nutritious food and homeschooling. I can't do anything more than that, and I only attend part time.

 

Sometimes it's not about being more efficient. It's about having less on your plate. Being able to do it all at the same time is a myth. 

 

Good luck!

 

Oh I forgot to say that I am going online. So each semester is split into 2, 8 weeks sessions and each session I take 1 class. So right now I am on week 4 of one class. I haven't really had a break since starting. I have a few weeks over Christmas and a week between classes, and take a class over the summer (certain classes are only available during the summer and are required). 

I wish I could let cleaning go, but it's not the deep cleaning, it's the laundry, dishes, daily tidying that is drowning me. And I find that I can't focus if the house is crazy and our family can't function. We also live in an apartment, so the mess seems more overwhelming than if it were spread over a house. 

 

I agree that it is about having less on your plate. I think that is my issue is that I have too much on it. Trying to figure out what can come off...

[ReadingMama1214]

 I'm assuming that you need to do the babysitting for financial reasons ? Because that's something it would be handy to drop.

 

Yes, the babysitting is for financial reasons. Even though it isn't a lot, it helps and does contribute to our families needs. We're working towards paying off debt and buying a house, so any little bit extra helps.

 

What about hiring a local teen to be a mother's help ? You don't have to pay much, and they can play with the kids and give you a couple of hours off to get on top of study or housework.

 

I've thought about this, but we don't know any teens and the ones that I have used charge about $10 an hour. Our church doesn't have a lot of female teens, it is mostly teenage boys. But it's worth looking into. I also have had a hard time figuring out a time to have a helper. I babysit Tuesday-Friday from 8a-5p and on Monday evenings we have our church community group at 6p. I'll have to ask around to see if there is a teen who would be willing to do it for fairly cheap since that would help a lot.

 

Do you have any friends who can trade childcare ? You look after all the kids for a couple of hours, she looks after them a couple of hours ?

 

We do, but not that can trade on a regular basis. A lot of friends trade for full-days so that they can work. And I only have Mondays that I could trade. It's also tricky because my preschooler goes to a program 3 hours a day and not many can go out to pick her up. I've tried trading and unfortunately it hasn't been consistent enough. We do trade for evening baby siting though. Days a are a little harder with work schedules to synchronize. 

 

Can you pre-prepare meals on the weekends ? Even if you don't want to do full on freezer meals, could you do the prep ? 

 

I could. I'd have to figure out how to do this. I'm assuming you mean things such as cutting up veggies or precooking any meat? We do the crockpot a lot which helps. Unfortunately we only have our refrigerator and I wish we had room for a deep freezer. I do double batches of things such as chili or shredded chicken breast. 

 

 

 

Dad takes kids for one day on the weekend ?

 

I wish this one would work out and even just for a few hours. Unfortunately it is hard to get hubby to commit to this. I take our daughter to dance on Sat morning and he keeps our son at home. But it's been hard to get him to commit to having the kids for several hours on a Saturday. Sundays we do church.

 

One pot meals are excellent. Make double quantities so you cook once but have meals for two nights ?

 

We do this a lot with crockpot shredded chicken or chili and other soups. It does help a lot. Or we do simple meals. I don't usually go all out unless it is a weekend evening. I will have to add more meals to our rotation that are easy to double. 

 

I feel for you...I remember studying for a counselling certificate when my children were small, and boy, was it hard to find the time! Parenting small children is time consuming. 

 

If I think of anything else, I'll come back and post.

 

Thanks! It is nice to have someone who can commiserate. My friends often tell me "I don't know how you hand it, I couldn't imagine doing that with little ones". So it's almost as if they view me as some kind of superwoman (Which I am not!). I am trying to decide if the counseling degree is actually worth it. In my perfect world, I'd stay home and homeschool. But, unfortunately that isn't realistic and if we desire to pay off debt and buy a home, we need me to work. School also gives me something to do that is completely mine. As a stay at home mom, I find that school stimulates me intellectually and I get the social connection (Even though it's only online). 

[Guest]

Seriously, drop the babysitting and the saving for a house. Just get your school done so you can start earning real money.

 

You would not believe how close to the bone we lived and what we put on our credit cards while we were both getting MBAs. But that debt completely disappeared within 2 years once we were earning real money...and we never lived high AFTER that. We put more than 50% of our salaries into 501k and any other savings plan we could. And retired at 50, me earlier.

 

Get into your peak earning as quickly as you can. Even without a house.

[ReadingMama1214]

Seriously, drop the babysitting and the saving for a house. Just get your school done so you can start earning real money.

 

You would not believe how close to the bone we lived and what we put on our credit cards while we were both getting MBAs. But that debt completely disappeared within 2 years once we were earning real money...and we never lived high AFTER that. We put more than 50% of our salaries into 501k and any other savings plan we could. And retired at 50, me earlier.

 

Get into your peak earning as quickly as you can. Even without a house.

 

We honestly couldn't meet our budget without my babysitting. Even bare bones. And we would rather not add any more credit card debt since we have decent student loan debt.

 

The house isn't something that would happen anytime soon. But we can only be in our current rent-controlled apartment for another 3 years and after that we'd have to find something else to rent in our high-cost area. Our rent currently is about 60% of what others in the area pay. I think my husband would rather buy a house than pay an exorbitant amount in rent. In 3 years I would be done with school and working towards my license. 

[Spryte]

Sadie's got this. Great plan.

 

You could do a variation of what DH and I did when I was very ill (mine was a long term illness, not talking about the flu here). We cut out all extra work, even getting rid of house plants. Anything in your home that requires extra maintenance could be rethought. Toys were culled or rotated so pick up was easy. A cleaner was hired - ask at your church. A teen helper was hired (ask/email your local homeschool groups). Meals were precooked on weekends and reheated. I can give you a list of what we made. Paper plates were used as needed to cut down on dishes. Hated to put them in the landfill but something had to give.

 

I understand about needing your space to be clean to focus. It's tough!

[LibraryLover]

Whatever you do, do not quit school!   You will have so many more opportunities with that MA than without!   A 'perfect' home now is not worth neglecting your future prospects.  It is too bad your dh won't help, but don't let that keep you from working towards better options down the road.  Try to simplify meals, tread water with laundry etc. It would be great if your husband would do a load of laundry here and there, or make sandwiches for the kids on days you're trying to write etc. Has he said why he can't help? 

Edited February 3, 2016 by LibraryLover

[Melissa in Australia]

I haven't done masters but I did study and get a bachelors while homeschooling . I only had the evenings to study. I found that I Had to start studying the second the evening meal was finished. I had older kids so they could do the meal clean up etc. I would study 4 hours every evening. the house wasn't as tidy as it could have been but we got through it.  just over one year since I graduated

[ReadingMama1214]

Maybe you need a good chat with your dh ? It's just not possible to do all the things. If you both agree that the babysitting is necessary, and that your school is also necessary ( I think you are doing a good thing by studying, btw ), you are going to have to work together to come up with the time for you to actually study!

 

I wish I could send one my big kids over to give you a hand, but we're a bit far away :)

 

~

 

Maybe break up the housework into three sessions per day. Morning, after lunch and before dad comes home. Morning - laundry/dishes 

 

After lunch - mop kitchen/dishes/choose one area eg vacuum common areas per day.

 

Before dad comes home - general tidy

 

That should leave you with only dishes to do in the evening ?

 

Leave bathrooms for Saturday before or after dance. Or can dad do it while he has ds on Sat mornings ?

 

If you had 4 evenings a week, and Saturday afternoon to study, you could totally rock this thing!

 

I think I used to cook the main meal at lunchtime as well. Dh could warm it up for dinner. It meant I wasn't doing lots of prep or dishes in the evening. 

 

Thanks! Those are really helpful suggestions. I have a cleaning schedule but it's pretty vague "Monday:kitchen, Tuesday: bedrooms, etc" and I haven't followed through on it as much. I like the idea of breaking tasks down into times of day. That way I won't be doing much after the kids are in bed.

 

My evening study time is after the kids are in bed around 8:30/9 and I am usually up past 1am. It's exhausting, but hopefully it will pay off. I also have to do school during the day in order to interact on the class forum. This doesn't take much time at all. My biggest struggle has been finding time to read (it's a lot of reading!) and study or write papers. 

 

I think I could do dinner prep at lunch. Some days I could do the main dish entirely. The tricky thing is that the girl I babysit is 1 and needs a lot of help with meals still (give 4 pieces of food and wait and give more haha). But that's where the crockpot has saved my life since I start it in the morning and it's done by dinner. I do think doing more prep ahead would help a lot. Even just cutting the veggies and cooking the meat would help. Or if it's a casserole I could make it at lunch and then just toss it in the oven for dinner. I am going to try this today! We are having stir fry and I could cook the chicken at lunch time and just toss it all in the wok this evening for dinner.

 

[ReadingMama1214]

Sadie's got this. Great plan.

 

You could do a variation of what DH and I did when I was very ill (mine was a long term illness, not talking about the flu here). We cut out all extra work, even getting rid of house plants. Anything in your home that requires extra maintenance could be rethought. Toys were culled or rotated so pick up was easy. A cleaner was hired - ask at your church. A teen helper was hired (ask/email your local homeschool groups). Meals were precooked on weekends and reheated. I can give you a list of what we made. Paper plates were used as needed to cut down on dishes. Hated to put them in the landfill but something had to give.

 

I understand about needing your space to be clean to focus. It's tough!

 

It is my goal to get a cleaner one day! It's not in our budget right now, but I am hoping we could fit it in later this year. A few people in our church use them, but they're still paid a decent amount. I'd honestly feel bad paying only a little since many of the women I know that do cleaning for ladies in our church are doing it to support their families.

I will have to talk to our local homeschool group about a teenager. We are actually going to be talking with one of our areas Classical Conversations directors this week. It would be nice to have someone come for a few hours in the afternoon on Monday. A homeschool teen would work best for that!

 

We have a dishwasher, so the dishes aren't too bad with the exception of hand wash ones.

[ReadingMama1214]

Whatever you do, do not quit school!   You will have so many more opportunities with that MA than without!   A 'perfect' home now is not worth neglecting your future prospects.  It is too bad your dh won't help right now, but don't let that keep you from working towards better options down the road.  Try to simplify meals, tread water with laundry etc. It would be great if your husband to do a load of laundry here and there, or make sandwiches for the kids on days you're trying to write etc. Has he said why he can't help? 

 

He hasn't said why directly. He expresses a desire to help when I get overwhelmed and voice my concerns to him. I think his biggest struggle is that he is exhausted after work and usually needs some time to unwind after work. I also think that the fact that our kids prefer me if I am around. So if I am still home,  they will usually try to find me if something is going on or they're upset. He hasn't really said why he doesn't help more. Honestly, I don't ask enough and he's not one to initiate helping. I think I hesitate to ask because of how much more stressed he seems afterwards and I feel like he does a lot for us by working all day.

[Lawyer&Mom]

Maybe you can pitch school as an investment in his future relaxation? It must be stressful working all day and facing the pressure of being the sole breadwinner. I want to help! But first I need your help!

 

Don't forget you also work all day too.

[NorthwestMom]

He hasn't said why directly. He expresses a desire to help when I get overwhelmed and voice my concerns to him. I think his biggest struggle is that he is exhausted after work and usually needs some time to unwind after work. I also think that the fact that our kids prefer me if I am around. So if I am still home,  they will usually try to find me if something is going on or they're upset. He hasn't really said why he doesn't help more. Honestly, I don't ask enough and he's not one to initiate helping. I think I hesitate to ask because of how much more stressed he seems afterwards and I feel like he does a lot for us by working all day.

 

Gently -  he is underfunctioning as a spouse and a parent, and you are overfunctioning. You are carrying his weight. Why is that ok with a grown man?

 

I think you are going to have to drop things off of your task list if you want to prioritize your grad school classes the way you need to.

 

:grouphug: :grouphug:

[LarlaB]

I have an MA in counseling (earned prior to kids) so I understand The workload… Although it sounds like it is more spread out with less rigorous studies over a longer period of time. That's challenging in a different way… Been in school for 3 to 4 years is a different kind of challenge.

 

I went back to school two years ago to become licensed as a massage therapist… It was about 40-45 hours out of the house per week including clinical hours…And that was before a single hour of studying.

 

I nearly drowned in the responsibilities-just as you're saying. Staying up late to study, watching the housework pile up around me etc. and I'm much like you, I found it almost impossible to focus and study when the home around me was a wreck and I was exhausted. When I was so tired the "mess" compounded my lack of concentration.

 

Gently said, I agree with previous poster and that this is a group effort and your DH needs to try to help give you some slack and help more.

 

Why? Because you simply can not do it all. You have more on your plate than a single human can perform, particularly over a long period of time. If you can proactively realize that you cannot do it all, this will save you from having a breakdown, burning out or reaching a crisis point. Please trust me on that… where he can help, is something that you will have to figure out together. However, it needs to be a nonnegotiable and some regards… Of course it's going to make it unpleasant for him, but if you keep continue at this pace you are quite possibly facing longer-term issues.

 

Absolutely, a more organized approach to household responsibilities will help it feel more manageable… as well adjusting your expectations and standards. I gave up on being the housekeeper, cook and home manager that I used to be when I went back to school. And now I'm working and running my own business, and have adjusted again to realize that I will never be a stay-at-home mom who manages the house like I used too...and that's ok!

 

Hugs and high-fives to you! It's a hard thing to be in school as a mom, but I believe that it's worth it!

[Bluegoat]

I think you do need to somehow get your husband in on domestic work.  If he finds that hard, I might think about giving him a very particular job.  If it were me I'd think about laundry - if he needs to unwind he can have a beer and watch tv while he folds. Or - maybe he could be the supper dishes guy.

 

I think it often works best to have a very specific duties for someone who isn't the main "at home" person - something they can plan and know what will be expected.

Edited February 3, 2016 by Bluegoat

[Crimson Wife]

For your sanity, switch to disposable dishware, utensils, those plastic crockpot liners, etc. Use Swiffer pads to go longer between real moppings. Anything that reduces the amount of cleaning you need to do, use it. That's what I did when my DH was in grad school and I was employed FT with a toddler and a baby on the way. No, it's not environmentally-friendly but you can go back to reusable when you're at less time-starved stage of your life.

[flyingiguana]

Here's what I learned while working part time and going to school part time while hsing the kids --

 

A) first and foremost DO NOT CLEAN.  Yes, the laundry needs to occasionally get done and there do need to be clean plates to eat off of, but you can let most of the rest of it go.  At the end of every semester you can clean.  If you're busy, you won't notice the dirt anyway

 

B) absolutely essential housework can be shared by spouse and kids.  A husband CAN integrate cleaning/cooking with childcare.  Even when he's working 60 hours a week otherwise.  Even a four year old can do housework. 

 

C) you find a space where you can shut the door (for real or metaphorically) and tell everyone you're doing your homework.  No, they can't interrupt unless it's to evacuate from a burning building

 

 

If your family can't do these things, then you're either asking too much or they're falling down on the job.  If it's the former, you need to talk about priorities.  If it's the latter, they need to step up to the plate.  Most importantly, IT IS NOT YOUR JOB TO TELL YOUR HUSBAND WHAT HE NEEDS TO DO AROUND THE HOUSE.  He needs to see the problem and do it.  If he can't see it, well, it is possibly not a problem (you really can leave the floors unmopped for a long period of time).  But if the problem he sees is, "kids are hungry and wife isn't feeding them" then he doesn't understand what it means to have you in school and how he needs to support that.

 

I discovered that my husband could figure out the essentials -- having food in the house, basic cooking, and something to eat from are the essentials he settled on.  Sometimes people wore dirty clothes, but after a couple times, they figured out how to do the laundry.

[magnificent_baby]

I would keep on plugging away. Mine are 8, 10 and 12 and I really wished I had finished mine when they were younger and wouldn't remember all the times I had to tell them I'm too busy to do whatever. Mine have only become busier with activities now that they are older. I have let the house go and just keep reminding myself I'll be done in 3 months and I can clean it then. DH has taken over the meals for the most part. If he had not have been agreeable to me going back to school, it wouldn't have worked. He has taken over many of my normal tasks. It will go by way faster than you think, just keep swimming!

[zoobie]

He hasn't said why directly. He expresses a desire to help when I get overwhelmed and voice my concerns to him. I think his biggest struggle is that he is exhausted after work and usually needs some time to unwind after work. I also think that the fact that our kids prefer me if I am around. So if I am still home, they will usually try to find me if something is going on or they're upset. He hasn't really said why he doesn't help more. Honestly, I don't ask enough and he's not one to initiate helping. I think I hesitate to ask because of how much more stressed he seems afterwards and I feel like he does a lot for us by working all day.

You are working all day too.

[ktgrok]

Every saturday afternoon  you go to panera or starbucks or anywhere like that and study, and leave him with the kids. Make it a routine. He'll manage. 

[Melissa in Australia]

Can your DH pick up the get kids off to bed routine - sometimes males who are very reluctant to do housework don't have a problem with the get kids of to bed thing- and it might mean you could start studying 30 minutes earlier- thus get to bed 30 minutes earlier.