Of course it all depends on lots of things. The people I know have been at various stages on the career ladder - from about £20k-£50k. I was thinking through them earlier too, and pretty much all have moved up the career ladder since too. And indeed there aren't lots of people doing it in every area, yet. The legislation hasn't been there long. We're still waiting for equal pay regardless of gender and that has been around for many many more years. But if no-one ever asks because they think the answer will be no, then of course things will never change.

I think in my section at uni, prob about 50% work part time. It's not for childcare reasons in the main, more because they do other work, because we are related to a specific profession so people also work in practice.

For me it's not just about fitting having a baby around career, i've also gotta convinve boyfriend it's a good idea! at the moment her's quite anti having kids possibly ever :-(
He's going into teaching (is this more child friendly? I have a feeling it is) and would poss consider a baby in a few years if he got to be a stay at home dad while I work my way up the career ladder. Has anyone considered that option? I'm not sure how much I'd want to when/if the time came, plus I guess there's the whole breast feeding issue......

Yes we decided that being a lecturer would mean plenty of school hols holiday time, and the my husband who is self-employed could look after kids more in term time. And if I am in a more stable, better paid job then it would make sense for him to do more kid looking after than me, if that's what we feel at the time. Of course it depends on what we are both doing when the time happens. Assuming you breast feed, after however long you do that for (in my experience 6 months) then whoever wants and whoever it suits best can stay at home when the other builds their career unless you both do.

Dear Arg! You know, it's funny but i've also been thinking about this issue lately. I suppose for me it's the reality of what I want to do, when I want to do it and whether any of it can be done at all! I have a long term partner - who lives in another city, we both have our own flats, he works, I'm in 2nd year of PhD, which if I'm honest, I perpetually wonder if 'I did the right thing' by taking it. Perhaps it is the realisation that its a long slog until this PhD is done and where do I fit in more travel, living together, getting a job (under no illusions it'll be an academic one - so is there any point in doing PhD?), planning to have a baby, let alone actually doing so! I really don't know the answer, but i just wanted to say that I hear you and can relate to your frustrations.

A good friend of mine did his PhD part-time while they had two kids. His wife was quite a high flyer and definitely the major bread winner. It was very tough though. She only took 3 months maternity leave and did find it very distressing - sometimes she resented not being the one to stay home. He also found it very er, challenging being at home with the children (it can send you a bit batty). They've come through it now and he has a lectureship which he has negotiated down to 4 days/week to help with childcare.

The breast-feeding issue is something a lot of people don't think about until it's too late. You can express, but there's more too it that just the milk (sorry for those who are squeamish - stop here). I nursed my daughter for a year which meant I couldn't be away from her for very long. A senior academic here told me she nursed her 9 day-old at a dept-meeting so I guess it can be done (and my dept coffee room was OK for me) - but it's something to consider if you think this is going to be important to you.

My husband used to say he would like to stay home with the baby. He is a doting father but there is no way that now, experiencing the reality of it, he would ever volunteer to do that. Even I, quite frankly, would not want to do that 7 days/week - I'd go out of my mind. Part-time work is perfect for me personally - I went back 2 days/week when she was 1. My husband looks after her on Saturdays while I work. They have a good time but that is the limit that he could handle cheerfully and willingly. It's hard to know how you will really feel about splitting childcare until you get to it - so it's worth considering different options.

Pamplemousse - yes, that is AHRC. It's really good to hear these concerns raised actually. I'm young so under no pressure really about having children but my partner is 7 years older so I guess we think about it more. I'd always thought I'd be so career minded but I've become broody and think much more about having a family. I really would like to consider an academic career but of course the job market is terrible. However, teaching would be another realistic option, and from friends' experience I think either career is quite a good one to balance with family life. At the end of the day though, however much my partner would love to be a stay-at-home-dad the fact is he is always likely to earn more than me, even though he's only 18 months into a new career path. On the other hand his keenness to be hands-on would probably mean that I know we'll be able to split things as far as possible. I also know that my parents would be great grandparents which would doubtless help, especially as they're quite local, although my father still works full time (and probably will forever - I don't think he'd know what to do if he retired). It's been said to me that you'll never find the perfect time to have a child - some will be better than others but there will always be some sort negatives to it.

I'm in a very similar position, my husband is six years older.
I may well end up taking the AHRC up on their maternity leave, which I think rates very well in comparison with that available for 'proper' jobs. I am, however, seriously concerned about my supervisor/departments reaction to me having a baby mid-way through my PhD (and I don't think I'd make out it was so planned!) as well as feeling guilty about using money that could be used for studentships for others -- however I expect they must allocate a separate pot of money for this....
I think the hardest thing if you're planning on a first child at this stage is not knowing how you'll react/ how easy it will be to leave it in child care etc... Actually the PhD life of an arts and humanities student probably fits in quite well with babies...

I heard some advice that the best times to have a child are either while you are still a student or when you've got tenure. In between is the trickiest, career-wise.

Organising childcare can be pretty stressful and some kids take to it much more easily than others. I would probably have used more chidlcare if my daughter was more amenable but she is not. Nursery was up and down but she is much happier now with a childminder (which is cheaper too). I've probably agonised over all this more than is entirely helpful as I have a lot of personal baggage around these issues (insert long tragic story with violins).

All depts must regularly have students who have babies - it's not so uncommon. My (male) supervisor actually encorouged me to have my daughter.

Smilodon - good to hear you've experiences that sort of support, and Pamplemousse - I totally share your view. But if I manage to convince my partner that having a baby say next year - which is what I really want - would be a good plan (and perhaps he'd like to marry me first!!) then I think I'd go with it regardless of how the department might feel. Admittedly I don't know how I would tell my supervisor mind you... Maybe wait until she noticed! I think the PhD lifestyle - in spite of the intense element of the work to some extent - is actually one of the most compatible lifestyles to having a baby as at least you could be around more for the first couple of years whilst still managing to do research, even if it would be moved to evenings and weekends some of the time.

We always said that if we had another (which we won't lol) we'd have it during the phd - I started my UG degree when my youngest was 11 months old and it was HARD, but good :-) Much better than trying to hold down a ft job and have a baby - they throw multiple spanners in the works at every stage lol - but if you can get a form of mat pay through funding bodies and then carry on while caring for baby then it'd be great.

Hi all,
I've been away from postgradforum for a long while now, just dropped in 'cause it's such a rainy gray Sunday afternoon.

I'm half way through my third year and my revised timetable shows me going for at least another 18 months. I just turned 33 and my fieldwork, which has to be nearly finished before I get pregnant, as it involves seeing women who can't get pregnant, is slowly drawing to a close. So now is the time. We are actually starting to try for a baby before the end of the month.

Unfortunatly I'm funded from abroad (Switzerland) and the funding runs out in May. I might be able to get an extra year or so, on application. If I do, I might get a little something in terms of maternity leave. But not much - Switzerland only just introduced general maternity leave, in 2005, so in this respect they are quite backward. If I can't extend the funding, I'll be unfunded and thus no mat payments (unless non-earning women in the UK get anything at all... I do have British citizenship and have paid NI contributions in the past).
But still, it is now or probably never for me. If we don't have a baby now/soon, the next chance (career-wise) would be when I'm well into my first post-PhD job, and it's gotta be a job that is not temporary... so in four years the earliest, probably later - and I'll be approaching 40 - and after 35, fertility halves for every year of age...

So we're going for it now. Wish me luck :-)

Fortunately, my partner has a steady job as lecturer. If things go badly, we'll just have to rely on his income alone. But that should be doable. And if things go well, he'll try to reduce to 0.8 FTE or such, and I'll try to get something similar post-PhD, and 2-3 days/week we'd use external childcare. Unfortunately, no grandparents to help, they are in Switzerland, all four of them!

I totally know that now is not a perfect time for having a baby. But, I am quite certain that there never will be a better time. So woohoo... here we go! Let the ride begin!
(And who knows- maybe it all just doesn't work out and I'll not get preggers. That would create a whole different set of questions. But hey, one day at a time!)

I'm actually quite relieved to see (a) the number of people who seem to be thinking the same way as me on this and (b) who are taking pragmatic approaches.
At the moment we're in our first month of try for a little one! So these were timely posts.
Good luck everyone, and well done to everyone who's managing to balance everything!

pamplemousse,
that's exactly what i thought when i saw this thread.
may i ask how far into your PhD you are?

and, have you joined momsnet yet? ;-)

good luck! i hope it all works out.

Shani and Pamplemousse - best of luck! xx