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How to best be there for your kids as a single working parent

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Being a single parent can be one of the hardest ways of bringing up kids because as much as you love them and do just as much, usually more than other parents, you’re still down 50% on other parenting teams. So sometimes tough choices will need to be made. How to balance work and childcare is a very tricky challenge, and here we are going to look at how to best navigate these.

Calculate The Cost Of Going To Work

You need to accurately calculate the cost of going to work, and this does not just mean transport, lunches, and coffees, etc. these are important but there are more costs to consider. But what about getting the kids to school on time and still getting to the office, and the sometimes extremely high cost of out of school care. I know of plenty of parents who have gone back to work and once they see how much they end up spending then they are actually worse off.

How Much Time Can You Give Them?

There is a fine balance to be found in whether working is giving you enough money to provide a nice life for you and the kids and allowing you enough time to enjoy this nice life together. So if you are struggling with this, as most parents do to some extent then always remember that you can always make money but you can never get time back.

Do You Have Contingency Plans If You Can’t Work

If you are managing to get a good income in, and managing the work life balance then it’s going to be tempting to take on a lot of new financial commitments. If you do it’s important to know what happens if you suddenly can’t work? This can happen to anyone but the consequences as a single parent would be more severe if it did, so be sure to not get too committed to long-term financial plans you may struggle to fulfill, and if you are earning well then you may want to take out insurance which protects you financially if you can’t work, more info here on that.

Part-Time Or Full -Time?

This is a really big question for a single parent, full-time hours can be attractive as the bigger paycheck seems attractive, but as we’ve touched on earlier it isn’t always as big a net earner as it first seems once you’ve taken all the expenses into account. Also, many employers are more understanding of the need for family-friendly hours, and what employees that require these can bring to the firm, part-time hours or flexible hours that can help.

What About Other Options

You can always consider other options such as self-employment or home-working ideas to make money such as writing, designing or even retail online from the comfort of your own home. Find something you are good at and consider how to make money from it? This can mean you can set your own schedule and work your hours around the kids.

Are you a single parent managing to balance everything? Let our readers know how you do it.

Career CamelHow to best be there for your kids as a single working parent

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