Parents struggle to maintain work and life balance
Is the 9-hour office life getting so much in the way of your life that you hardly see your kids?
The stress of maintaining work-life balance can get to any working parent. And it gets even more difficult when you are working in the IT field. The long working hours not only take a toll on the parents, but it also gets hard for the kids. While some parents might feel family responsibilities hinder their work performance, others feel work often comes in between their family obligations. But every working parent just doesn’t seem to find enough time in the day to do everything, and meet everyone’s demands, both at home and at work.
How times have changed?
Leaving kids alone every morning can end up making us feeling guilty, but at the end of the day, we have to do it. India is a hard working nation; our parents sacrificed a lot to give us the education which got us amazing jobs. But now, we feel, it’s our time to make the sacrifices and provide for our kids. But things have changed since then. The wife is not the one staying at home, and taking care of the kids. Today, the mothers earn just as well as the dads, support their families financially and still find time to take care of home chores.
With urbanization, families live separately now. While the wife and the husband live in the always bustling Bangalore, the parents live in a small city, where they have always lived. This means they cannot always be there to take care of their grandkids. And of course, somewhere we just don’t want to ask for help. It might be because we are too proud, or because we don’t want them to know how much we really struggle every day. And even if we do call them in to stay with us, they really cannot live there forever. They have their own lives in another town, they have done their duties for a long time, and now it’s time for them to relax and enjoy.
Without the parents, or someone trusted in picture, the main issue for working parents is finding the right and secure way of keeping kids safe until they get back home. There have been many reports of maids mistreating kids, and leaving your beloved kids with someone you have hardly known for a month can be even more difficult. That’s why most parents in Bangalore prefer crèches.
Finding the right crèches for kids:
In a city like Bangalore, there is really no dearth of crèches, but it’s not about finding ‘a’ crèche, it’s about finding ‘the’ right crèche. There are a number of crèches in every neighbourhood, but its difficult finding the right one. An ideal crèche should be run by a trained staff, including nurses for medical emergencies. They should be providing a balanced meal and have the right security measures. Apart from that, they should also organize daily activities to keep the kids engaged.
Since parents spend so much time away from their kids, a good crèche or a day care centre can make all the difference for them. Every parent knows that, and the problem is that there are only a handful of good crèches, and they often have long waiting lists because everyone wants to enrol their kids.
The constant desire to make the kids happy:
Because the parents are away from their kids a lot, they do anything they can to get over that guilt and make up to their kids. This means getting them anything they ask for, and presenting them with gifts and chocolates, even when they have just behaved badly. It might seem like a bad thing when you are looking at it from a distance, but only the working parents know the real struggle.
But being a working parent also means giving your kids responsibilities from a young age and making them aware of their surroundings. Parents train kids well before they go off to a crèche all alone. They make sure kids are helping them in small house chores. After all, when a parent is trying to build a life through hard work, they want their kids to understand the value of it too.
To summarize, being a working parent can be hard, but it’s not impossible to find a work life balance. It can be a struggle in the start, but as time goes by, things only get easier.
Is the 9-hour office life getting so much in the way of your life that you hardly see your kids?
The stress of maintaining work-life balance can get to any working parent. And it gets even more difficult when you are working in the IT field. The long working hours not only take a toll on the parents, but it also gets hard for the kids. While some parents might feel family responsibilities hinder their work performance, others feel work often comes in between their family obligations. But every working parent just doesn’t seem to find enough time in the day to do everything, and meet everyone’s demands, both at home and at work.
How times have changed?
Leaving kids alone every morning can end up making us feeling guilty, but at the end of the day, we have to do it. India is a hard working nation; our parents sacrificed a lot to give us the education which got us amazing jobs. But now, we feel, it’s our time to make the sacrifices and provide for our kids. But things have changed since then. The wife is not the one staying at home, and taking care of the kids. Today, the mothers earn just as well as the dads, support their families financially and still find time to take care of home chores.
With urbanization, families live separately now. While the wife and the husband live in the always bustling Bangalore, the parents live in a small city, where they have always lived. This means they cannot always be there to take care of their grandkids. And of course, somewhere we just don’t want to ask for help. It might be because we are too proud, or because we don’t want them to know how much we really struggle every day. And even if we do call them in to stay with us, they really cannot live there forever. They have their own lives in another town, they have done their duties for a long time, and now it’s time for them to relax and enjoy.
Without the parents, or someone trusted in picture, the main issue for working parents is finding the right and secure way of keeping kids safe until they get back home. There have been many reports of maids mistreating kids, and leaving your beloved kids with someone you have hardly known for a month can be even more difficult. That’s why most parents in Bangalore prefer crèches.
Finding the right crèches for kids:
In a city like Bangalore, there is really no dearth of crèches, but it’s not about finding ‘a’ crèche, it’s about finding ‘the’ right crèche. There are a number of crèches in every neighbourhood, but its difficult finding the right one. An ideal crèche should be run by a trained staff, including nurses for medical emergencies. They should be providing a balanced meal and have the right security measures. Apart from that, they should also organize daily activities to keep the kids engaged.
Since parents spend so much time away from their kids, a good crèche or a day care centre can make all the difference for them. Every parent knows that, and the problem is that there are only a handful of good crèches, and they often have long waiting lists because everyone wants to enrol their kids.
The constant desire to make the kids happy:
Because the parents are away from their kids a lot, they do anything they can to get over that guilt and make up to their kids. This means getting them anything they ask for, and presenting them with gifts and chocolates, even when they have just behaved badly. It might seem like a bad thing when you are looking at it from a distance, but only the working parents know the real struggle.
But being a working parent also means giving your kids responsibilities from a young age and making them aware of their surroundings. Parents train kids well before they go off to a crèche all alone. They make sure kids are helping them in small house chores. After all, when a parent is trying to build a life through hard work, they want their kids to understand the value of it too.
To summarize, being a working parent can be hard, but it’s not impossible to find a work life balance. It can be a struggle in the start, but as time goes by, things only get easier.
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