Gemma Hartley. Ep 67

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Speaker 1: Hi. This is Laura Vanderkam. I'm a mother of four, an author, journalist, and speaker. And this is Sarah hart Hunger. I'm a mother of three, practicing position and blogger. On the side, we are two working parents who love our careers and our families. Welcome to best of both worlds. Here we talk about how real women manage work, family, and time for fun, from figuring out childcare to mapping out long term career goals. We want you to get the most out of life. Welcome to best of both worlds. This is Laura. This is episode sixty seven. We are going to be talking about emotional labor with guests and Jemma Hartley, who's just written a book on that topic called fed Up. So we're really excited to speak with her about emotional labor, what that means, what it means for couples, what it means for women in general, and how we move forward from here. So we've I have a funny note from Sarah who had once told me that she never suffers from planning fatigue, and now it seems that Sarah has planning fatigue. You want to unpack that for us? Yeah, I have had some planning fatigue, And now I know what you mean, because when you asked me, I didn't really. But We've had a lot going on, and I've done some deep thinking about why all of a sudden things are feeling more overwhelming, and interestingly, I think this is a great and timely topic considering our guests today. But I think it has to do as many things do with the baby and the fact that typically I'm a morning planner and I like to get up really early, and I have really good, kind of laser focused planning type power in the morning, like I can really think through a lot of things very quickly, and I haven't had those nice, rested mornings. And when I try to get up early a lot of the time, she still beats me to iting if it's four am. And you know, that is what it is. And maybe I will get to that magical sleep training place or sleep resolution place, but right now it's just been less time to sit there and actually go through things in a timely manner, and it's just made it harder. So I'm finding those loose ends and those sidy items and the mounting, you know, requests from both of my kids' schools just more difficult than they have previously, and my kind of mojo to sit there and think about what I want to do in a given weekend has been less fun and more just like another thing. So I guess I'm having planning fatigue. Yeah, so how are you getting through it? Because I sort of, you know, made sure to delegate some of the major planning things that I was not wanting to do and kind of not taking on stuff. I mean, that was certainly part of it, and accepting that some weekends weren't going to be well planned. I have been. And for example, we last weekend, my husband was on call and I didn't really bother to like look at his schedule. We had a bot miss but to go do, and I normally what I would have done probably weeks in advances realized you're on call, you need to change your schedule, but I just haven't had time to do that, and I'm like, whatever, I don't care, it's not my problem. And so when he realized it, he figured out how he could handle it, and that would have been something that I would have dealt with, for better or for worse. I also have been delegating specific things. Now our guests will probably say, well, the fact that you say that you have to delegate them is emotional labor to begin with, but whatever, it's a survival tactic. And my daughter had a and yet another fairly involved first grade of project involving the creation of a bottle buddy doll and a country report with various facts, and I just told him that he was doing it, and it was great because I you know, he was fine with it, and then I just completely erased it from my existence, like I just didn't think about it anymore. Whereas even in the future, even if I had asked them to do it, I probably have been like, note to self, still put it in my planner, make a box to follow up, make sure it's done. No, so I'm being more more aggressive about my delegation, I guess, and sometimes I'm just dealing with the consequences of less planning. We didn't really have any planned ahead anchor events this past weekend, but it actually turned out fine. We had a family over, we got takeout, we went to Target, we enjoyed it. We did that together and it was fine. And then finally, I've been leaving a lot and Laura had tests this because this includes some of our podcasts from to my days off, Like I just can't necessarily get to them during the week. If I can, I can, But if I can't, then I know that like I'm going to have the mornings when I'm off my nanny is here. That's like my time to catch up on all the kinds of things that I don't get to do other times. So it might mean working less far in advance or triaging a little bit more, but kind of letting things float until my next day off. Yeah, And I mean I think that the way you and I tend to plan our lives, there's a fair amount of slack in there if we stop planning stuff, I mean pretty quickly. My husband and I had our calendar meeting last night, and we were already looking at like stuff at the end of November and December and figuring out potential, you know, weekend conflicts that you know, the kids have multiple things at once, and I'm like, wow, you know, it's good. I think that we're looking at it. But on the other hand, like we'd probably still be able to deal with it the week of if we needed to. And so there's some aspect of this that we're so far ahead planned that. It just there is quite a bit of space to deal with, you know, problems if we then don't plan. I was saying with this podcast, you know, we had our guests schedule. It's not like, you know, we didn't have a guest schedule and we're scrambling to figure out an episode. And by the way, these episodes aren't airing told November and we're recording them in October. So it's, uh, you know, the planning thing is we may be pretty far on the spectrum of of what normal people might do. Yeah, there is black built in so that it's actually you know, the world doesn't fall apart if on a given weekend, it's just like, eh, we're just gonna let chips fall because you're right. I mean, I still have like multiple date nights planed for Novent, Like there are things that I had set up previously. I mean, if I were in the slump forever, then yes, in January we could start to have issues were I think we'd get pretty burned out. But then maybe that would motivate me to get my planning mojo back, or maybe our guest, Gemma, is gonna teach me how to share this duty a little bit better, and I think that's a good segue. Yeah, let's see what she has to say. Well, we are so excited to welcome Jemma Hartley to the podcast today. Jemma is the author of the book fed Up, which is out today when this is airing November thirteen, So that's really exciting to have her on for this. She lives in Nevada and is the mother of three children. Young children, and a lot of people got to know Gemma when she wrote an article for Harper's Bazaar a little over a year ago about emotional labor that women aren't nags, were just fed up. So that's where the fed Up title comes from. Jenna, thanks for coming on, Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here. Anything else you want to tell our listeners about your life, your setup that I didn't say on the intro there, I think that about covers it. I'm in Nevada, I'm taking care of three young kids, and you know, writing writing, it's just wonderful. So we're very you know, this idea of emotional labor, it's definitely something people are talking about a lot more now than in the past. What exactly is it? How do you define emotional labor. So when I'm defining emotional labor, I'm talking about all of the invisible, sort of behind the scenes work that women are doing to keep everyone on track and to keep everyone comfortable while they're keeping them on track. It's the scheduling the doctor's appointment, planning the holidays, reminding your partner to do the dishes, but making sure you don't do it in a way that's nagging. And it's not so much the tasks themselves, but the fact that it's on a constant loop in your head because you're the only one that thinks about these things. Okay, so it's the thinking about the So it could be planning, it could be relationship management, could be household management, all the all the thinking about it, I guess is that what you'd say, would you? And would you say? It's sort of the feeling of being in charge or being the ultimate one responsible, even if you're not the one executing. Yes, absolutely, it's about being the one who thinks about all these things and make sure that they get done. So you might have a partner that does half of all the housework, but you're the one that's saying, hey, remember to do the dishes. Remember to call your mom. Remember to do this because you're sort of the brain for the whole family, and I think a lot of moms can relate to that. So one you know, on my this is Laura, by the way, the on the on my and sometimes on this podcast. One of the solutions we often suggest when there's inequality in a situation like this is to care less, so that the person who cares less winds up doing less. Now, in your book, The fed Up, you seem to suggest that this isn't necessarily the way to go on a lot of this emotional labor stuff. Why is that? So? I'm really against the whole let it go mindset which has been really popular in feminist literature for the past few years, that if we don't want to live up to this standard, or if our partners don't want to live up to the standard, that we should just let it all go. And I think that really undermines the work that we're doing in emotional labor. It says that it's not important, that it can be easily given up, and that no one will suffer in any way when you do that. And I think the main reason that I am against this other than it devaluing our work, is that it doesn't demand any change of our partners. It's saying you have a problem, so you need to fix it. And I don't think that that's a really great solution. When you're looking for more equality in your relationship. You shouldn't have to make all of the compromises while your partner does nothing to change. So that has a good sort of theoretical idea to it. But I mean, I guess one of the reasons we do say the care less is that it's the easiest way to get to the equality. So if you're saying that's not the way to go, what are some practical ways to get a partner to take on more of this emotional labor that you're talking about. Well, I think one of the most important things is that we have a vocabulary to talk about this. So I'm hoping that my book really gives us the language we need to describe the type of work that we're doing and why it's important, why it's exhausting, and why we need our partners to step up and take equal initiative. So I think a lot of it has to do with having a really open, honest, conversation about the inequality that you feel in your relationship, and that can often lead to defensiveness. A lot of the times I hear men saying, well, I do so much, and usually when they're saying that, they're saying I do so much compared to the men I know. And I think we really need to shift the conversation from comparing men to other men to comparing yourself to your partner? Is it really equal within the home? Is it equal within your relationship? And you know, one of the things we also hear from, you know, some of our listeners is I'd like to share more of this, but I worry he wouldn't do it the way I think it should be done. And I know you write some about this sort of gatekeeping idea. Do you think this is something that plays into the emotional labor conversation. I think it absolutely is. I think that women are really conditioned toward perfectionism, and so there is this very specific way that we want things done. Now. A lot of the times those expectations that we have are reasonable. They're based in what is the most efficient way to do this, what keeps everyone comfortable and happy? Those are standards you should keep, and then you have to sort of reevaluate. So what things am I doing that are just for the sake of control, for the sake of perfectionism. What do I feel like I should do that maybe is not necessary or not helpful. So when you're creating that shared standard, it doesn't mean throwing out everything that you do. It means reevaluating what you do and why you do it. So what would be a practical example, like from your household, of figuring out what the shared standard is and what both parties can live with. So in my household, I think a lot of it came down to me giving up having everything done exactly how I wanted it. Things like loading the dishwasher a certain way or having the laundry folded a certain way. Those were really just these strident examples of things that I did not need to have total control over. It does not matter how the towels are folded, as long as they are folded and put away somewhere. It doesn't matter how the dishwasher is loaded, as long as all the plates get cleaned. But having shared standards on, you know, let's eat dinner at this certain time so our kids don't turn into hungry monsters is a really good one to talk about when we're switching off on who's cooking dinner. I think it's going to be really different for each relationship which standards you want to keep and which ones you want to sort of readjust or let go of. But I think that once you take a step back and really look at it and work on it together, it becomes a lot easier to see what your priorities are. How do you reconcile this if well, speaking from personal situation, you know what, if one partner's job is, from an hour's standpoint, more significantly more demanding than the other, do you feel like you know that obviously doesn't give any partner a free pass, but it may mean that an unequal division of labor, or even division of emotional labor makes sense for that particular family. Because I found myself definitely doing a little bit of that comparing as I read, but also doing a lot of justifying, like, well, I also don't work fourteen fifteen hour days, but that's a job requirement for my husband's field. Yeah, And I think the balance is going to look very different depending on your individual situation. The thing is, you can't be in charge of all of the emotional labor when your partner comes home. I think that is one of the big things that I hear is that you know, you have a partner who works a very demanding job, but they come home and then don't take on any of the emotional labor. And it should really equal out when there are two of you there. And I think that while the balance will look different, while some people will take on considerably more emotional labor just because it makes sense with their situation, with the hours their partner works, it should never be that one person is taking all of it on and the other person is doing nothing. Perhaps there might be an uneven split, and that could be okay, Yeah, absolutely. I don't think we're looking for fifty to fifty. I think fifty to fifty is a pipe dream. But you can find something that works for you. Well. I said that, even no matter how demanding your partner's job, they can be primary really responsible for managing the relationship with their family. For instance, like it's you know, if he's an adult, it's his responsibility to whether he's calling his relatives often enough. I mean, that's that's just one of those things I feel is like, it's not has to be on you unless you tell yourself it's on you, and it really just does not have to be. But Jim, I want to back up a little bit, because I was this Harper's Bizarre article. It took one quite some legs. As you saw, I'm sure you were getting, you know, notes from people who like met you when you were two or something. What did your husband think of it? Like, I mean, because he's being written about as the guy who's not putting the gift wrap away and an article that millions and millions and millions of people have read, I'm very curious how he reacted to that. Yeah, so I think when the initial article came out, it was a little bit hard for him because obviously this is the first time in my entire freelance career that I have written anything remotely negative about my relationship, and of course when I do that for the first time, it goes megaviral. So it was a really strange situation to be in talking to him about that. He knew that I had written the article, and he's very supportive that whatever I feel that I need to write, I am welcome to write. It's not He's never going to put limitations on what I can say about our relationship and how I feel about it, and so in that way, it was great. But he also had this reaction to it where he thought people were going to think he's the bad guy. He's like, everyone's going to think I'm this awful person reading this article. And I think what I kept telling him was, no, one's going to see you when they look at this article. They're going to see themselves and their own partnership. And I think that made it a little easier. And then when it came time to writ write the book, we had to have a very serious conversation about how this was going to be a lot of our personal business out there in the world. Obviously, how I have written the book tells a lot about our journey and our marriage towards making emotional labor equal. And it was not an easy process. It was not always casting him in the best light. And he has done great. He's been really supportive and he's one hundred percent on board. So I am really grateful that I have a partner who is really sure of himself and does not I don't know, it doesn't scare easy. He's really got some thick skin when it comes to the things that I've written. Yeah, it's just it was the one thing that I kept kept wondering about it. I also thought, I wonder what would happen if if my husband, you know, were to complain about me in a publication, So, you know, because there's a lot of things that I don't do either, Right. I think that's something that's always been helpful for me when I think about this conversation, because I know that sometimes I have issues with my husband and who's doing what. But then I think of the various things that I don't even bother to take on. But we can talk more about that in a minute. I I want to get into your book writing process because you were one of the things that actually changed a lot in your household while you're writing this is your husband was between jobs for a significant chunk of time while you were writing the book, right, I mean you'd mostly been home with your kids and then you guys had almost a complete role reversal. Yeah, it was a real It was really good for the book, actually, because I agree it was a great and you couldn't have planned it better. I could not have It was really wonderful and it was really necessary. Honestly, when I think back on it, I don't know that I could have written this book the way it is now if my husband had not gotten laid off at pretty much the exact moment that I got my book deal, because it really just shoved us headfirst into dealing with emotional labor twenty four hours a day because he was at home for four months during the writing of this book, and we did go through almost a complete role reversal where I was working very long hours every day and he was at home with our kids all the time. So it was a totally new experience, and I think it really jump started our progress with emotional labor because he was suddenly thrust into my life and into understanding all of the things that I do every single day, and that was really eye opening for both of us. Well, what was easy for him to figure out how to take over, and then what was more complicated for him to figure out how to take over? I think everything was difficult for him to figure out how to take over. I've I'm not kidding. It was really challenging for him to take on this role, and I think probably the hardest part for him was learning the I mean the physical stuff was not terribly hard for him to start to take on, but realizing all of the things that need to be thought about. When I sort of shoved all the emotional labor on him and was like, I'm sorry, I have to be in my room and write for like fifteen hours a day, he had to figure out what needs to be done, what needs to be thought about, and you don't think about how much mental capacity that takes until you're the one doing it. And it was a totally new experience for him. And I think that's really difficult because emotional labor is a skill that we hone throughout our lives and to be just thrown into it is really difficult. This is a skill that takes some time to learn, and my husband had to learn really fast. Well, what was there anything that sort of got dropped? We're just trying to get some sort of practical examples of what emotional labor looks like and when when somebody learns to figure it out. I mean, was there something that didn't happen and then he learned to do? Oh gosh, there were so many things I'm trying to think of, like a specific example, I use a few in the book. There was one where I write about in the book when I got my wisdom teeth out during this time, and I was like, Oh, he'll be fine, He'll get everything taken care of, and I thought that he had everything under control. I also thought that I was going to be fine the next morning, and I woke up in immense pain, like couldn't couldn't move, and a lot of things went undone that morning, my son didn't have all the things he needed for school. He hadn't checked the school email to see that it was like his special electronics day, so he didn't have that. He didn't have a snack, he hadn't packed lunches for half the kids. I mean, it was it was just a mess, and it was I don't know, he just dropped. He dropped a lot of stuff that day. And there were many days like that where things would just go to hell because he wasn't used to constantly being on He wasn't used to constantly thinking about this needs to be done, then this needs to be done, then this needs to be done, and so he'd get a few of the things, but not all of the things. This does make me question if my standards are lower though, And I can't blame it on the fact that you have fewer kids than I do, because we both have three, But like the number of dress up days for elementary school that I have been like, oh well, and I realized it on the way to work or something. And then yesterday I even said to my daughter, I was like, you can read now, so here's your school calendar, and if you want to dress it up, that's your problem because I can't like remember all these days. So I guess, like, I mean, well, it just speaks to a little bit, like you know, depending on where you're I'm not saying that that fits into the like let it go context that you mentioned, but I mean, I guess I just to play Devil's advocate, was like it was all that emotional labor, labor that truly needed to happen that day, or was it a lesson in like you know what your kids dressed and that they get to school pretty on time. I mean, your husband figures out that that's okay. My son was definitely crying when he got to school because he realized that he didn't have everything that he needed and he was not having a real great day. Because of it, I try and do things that matter for you know, each kid, and so I think I think it really does depend on your kid and how your family operates. Yeah, I don't know. The things that went undone that day were things that I was like, no, these definitely needed to be done. And it's just because my son had been really looking forward to this day, Like having the special electronics day was a big deal to him. There have been a lot of like crazy hat day and hair day things that I'm just like, I didn't even know this happened. It doesn't matter. This was like a bigger thing that he had been looking forward to that did not get done. Yeah, I say with Sarah though, there I mean there's certainly I know that we all have a tendency, I think men and women to not see the work our partners do. And so when you know, obviously a lot of the labor that women have done over the years has just been completely ignored by everyone because it's not male and so therefore it hasn't been valued at all. But when I think about it, I mean there's things that, like, to give one example that I was talking about with Sarah earlier, so my husband's extended family has this fantasy football league, and he has enrolled three of our children in this. Let's just say, I find this whole thing like kind of stupid, Like why on earth would anyone spend their time on the fantasy football But in order to keep these children happy that they're not losing to Grandma constantly, you know, he's monitoring their trades. He's making sure that you know, they've they've thought about it, checking in with them, you know, talking with them about the wide receivers. Have they done it? Like I have done nothing with this, right because I don't think it's worth anything. On the other hand, like he may feel the same way about piano practice, right, so like, certainly my husband's never telling the kids to practice the piano, but I think he kind of views that as like I viewed fantasy football that you know, why on earth would we be doing this? You know, if the kids don't want to do it, why are you making them do it? So I don't know. I wonder if there's some aspect of all of us have a bit of a blind spot when we see the things that our partners do. I'm sure that that's very true, and I think what you're describing your husband doing is absolutely emotional labor, and that's wonderful to be taking that he is taking that part in their lives, and you know, doing all of this that's very very much emotional labor, because he's doing this work that's sort of invisible and thankless, and also is caring deeply about your children and their happiness. And I think that it's really easy to miss that. But I think by and large the reason that I was writing fed Up was that it's so much more common for women to be doing this type of work and for it to go completely unnoticed that I think it deserves looking at sort of the culture that we were raised in and why women so often feel that it's necessary to do this work and that there is no changing it. No, I agree with you, and I think I think you know the fact that we tend to come up with examples, you know, we can't come we almost can't come up with our own examples because it's just so everything. So it's like the exceptions that we think of where where the husbands tend to take over, and you know, career aside, it does tend to be extremely consistent across families, whether or not both parents work. When parents works, who has the biggest job. So I think you're overarching. I think this book was a really important one, and I think I'm really glad you've brought somebody's discussions to light. So what does a day in the life of Jenna look like now? I mean, obviously things are changing a lot. Your kids are all in school now, right, That's one thing that's changed a little bit. Yes, that's a big change having all three of my kids in school. The youngest is only doing half days three days a week, so I don't have that much more, you know, just solo time. I have nine hours a week where I am at home and there are no children. But that is nine hours more than I had in the last eight years. So that's a lot to me. Right now, my life is definitely in flux because I am currently, as of this recording, waiting for the book to come out, and so I'm doing a little bit of freelancing here and there. But what my day typically looks like now that my husband is back at work i'm gearing up for my book release, is that I get up, I do all the stuff to get the kids out the door, I no longer make their lunches. My husband has just taken it upon himself now to get up every morning and make everyone the lunches. I don't know if it was the fight that we had after the wisdom tooth removal, and the lunch is not getting packed, but they are packed every day, and I get the kids off to school. They go to two different schools because the younger is in preschool and the older two are in elementary. On the days that they're all in school, I'll usually come home do work of some sort, whether that means doing interviews for the book, or working on freelance, or working on creating a proposal for my next book, and it's very quickly those three hours fly by, and then it's time to go pick up the kids. Usually I like to spend some time just getting my younger one outside in the backyard and I sit back there and read. Reading's a really big priority for me, So I'll usually spend a couple hours reading and you know, doing the occasional tending to snacks and playtime and whatever. You know, the needs of a three year old are before I go and pick up the older ones. And then it's sort of home, doing homework, getting everyone ready for dinner time, and my husband comes home around the time that the kids are having dinner. I'll usually go to an evening yoga class and then sort of wind down, have dinner, and go to bed. I don't do a lot of watching TV. I usually track my time. I've been doing it all since I've read I don't know how she does it, and so I'm really I'm really strict about my schedule. I can kind of see what it looks like every day. Usually before I go to bed, I do a little bit of planning for the next day. If there's anything that I want to fit in, I'll make sure it makes it into one of my time slots. But yeah, that's what a regular day looks like for me. And when did you do your writing when you were you know, when you had little kids at home underfoot the whole time. I would do my writing either very early in the morning or at night. I would get up at five point thirty and write for a couple of hours or hour and a half, however long it was until the kids woke up. Generally, when I was doing morning writing, they would tend to wake up really early, so I would just a best with you. Right. Yeah, I was just like, I'm going to get up at five today and I'm going to get so much writing done. Someone would wake up at five fifteen every time, so I that is like the current story. It was so difficult, especially when they're really young, and so I would do a lot of my writing when my husband came home from work. I would set hours so that I would, you know, hit the goal that I wanted to. I also have my kids in sports that allow me to write. So I have my daughter in gymnastics and that's just like an hour and a half block of work time. My son does rock climbing. That's a couple hours of worktime. And both are really convenient places to work where my kids are off doing their thing and I can work. But yeah, it was really a lot of stolen hours on the fringe edges of my day. And it's a lot nicer to have these set hours every every other day where I'm working. Yeah, and you don't do a lot of outsourcing. No, I don't do any outsourcing. I should probably do more. Yeah, we're big fans of that here, and I know you know you mentioned and there was a couple of mentions of outsourcing. And I definitely agree that not every you know, hired nanny or babysitter is paid fairly or well. But there's no rule that says you don't that you can't pay them fairly or well or hire someone that's educated or truly to give them a truly good job. So I guess, again just playing double advocate to something that you mentioned, it's not necessarily something that can be written off with the you know, with just a statement like you know that we're using low paid labor or that we're getting worked done on the backs of low paid people. Because I you know, I really did appreciate a lot of what you said, but I just felt like there was a little bit of a commentary or a counterpoint I wanted to make to that side of things. Yeah. No, I mean, there are absolutely people who pay well for people to you know, clean their homes or to watch their children. The point that I am making in the book is that by and large, we as a society do not value this work, and we really do not pay well for this type of work. So the point being with there that I mean, all this sort of female labor has long been undervalued right, and that this is one aspect of a female labor that has been undervalued over time. You know, we maybe maybe Sarah and I will do a follow up episode sometimes on the things we've done to move some of our emotional labor to other people. But you know, it's it's definitely a conversation that all all couples should should have in terms of what you do, what you care about, what shared you know, shared standards and all that. So it's great to have a new language to deal with that. So Jemma, we do a segment each week where we talk about our loves of the week, like things that we are really liking this week. We can go first, so you can kind of figure out if you want to do something totally different or similar or whatever. So Sarah, how about you? I will mention the single Bob running Stellar. So we my husband and I are both runners, and we have both a single and double Bob because they've come in handy in different situations where the kids are different ages. The single had kind of been like in the back of our shed and not used for a long period of time, and then we kind of realized, like, hey, Genevieve's our baby is old enough for this and in his ome foor kid, I you ever know. But so before I get her, I will just say that she has loved running in it and it has made it much easier to run when she gets up early sometimes, which has been a boom for the other parents. Yeah, Now, I said those moments when you've woken up at five am to get stuff done and the kid is up at five fifteen, Now Sarah can go do her run with the with the single bob. So my my thing is is, you know, some of the toys we've bought like get no use, and some toys have been used by all the kids. As just saying, we bought this like tractor that you can drive around the backyard. And I was outside with my three year old who's our youngest, the other day and he's just having such a grand old time driving at loops around the backyard, you know the fall leaves. I realize, like all of my kids have done that, Like all four of them have driven around in this tractor in the fall leaves, just having a grand old time. Hopefully it'll make them better drivers when they are sixteen years old. Know that they already know how to put something in reverse that that's a that's a skill that's about But yeah, that's we've we've really enjoyed those those things and hasn't torn up the grass too bad? I guess, Jemma, are you got anything for us? So this week I discovered this new app called Libby, and it's just a simple e reader app that hooks up to your library card. And I have never been much of an e reader, but now that I have this app on my phone and I can just check out books from the library, I find that I'm reading a lot more when I would be like tempted to hit Instagram and scroll mindlessly. So it's helping me get a little bit more reading done and I love it. Oh great idea. We're always looking for ways to use our phones better rather than just scrawling your app. I also made sure I put the app where my Instagram app was, because that's the thing that gets me, like I'll click on Instagram and just mindlessly scroll. So I switched where my Instagram app was and put that one in its place. So I'm just like, oh, I can read a booh ooh that's good. It's good. Yeah, that's been awesome. Well, Jimma, thank you so much for coming on. We really appreciate it. Yeah, thank you for having me. Well, that was fascinating. Thanks for that. So our question this week comes from a listener who has a childcare and related question. We get a lot of those, but we love them, so please keep sending them in. Anyway, She's a postdoc who plans to transition into an industry position within in the next year or two. Her particular field. She says her work and theory can be done anywhere, and currently she works from home three days a week and commutes into her institution on the other two. She has three kids, ages five, four, and one. Well, the day she works from home, she stops working when the kids come home between three and four. The day she does commute, she does not come home until five thirty. They currently have a babysitter come to the house from four to five thirty because obviously her husband is working too, and so the one year already figured out, is in daycare during the day, so the sitter is mostly because the older kids are done with school at four. Anyway, in the past year, we've gone through four babysitters with varying degrees of success. Some of them did not work out long term, they didn't get a well along with the kids or with her. Finally, they have on the fifth try someone awesome and they are absolutely thrilled. However, the kids are still complaining about the whole idea of coming home to a sitter in general, and asking whether this could be a day where Mommy could be home. They are definitely intense children, she says. I think they just feel after a long day of daycare in school, they just want a parent. Around the point of this, as she transitions into a full time job, is she is wondering how important it is for her to be there when her kids come home. Basically because of her location. She's in a suburb outside of big city. You know, the suburb is where her husband works, but her commute, she's probably going to wind up in the big city, so she's going to be commuting like an hour and half of her feels like, you know, she just needs to get over that and deal with it and accept the fact that her kids are going to come home to a sinner and that's the way it is. The other half is wondering if she needs to find some sort of job where she can leave at two thirty pm to get home in time that maybe she needs to have a part time or less than ideal position that's in her local area in exchange for the ability to be home for her kids. So basically, her question is any strategies if the kids aren't happy being watched by anyone other their parents, Any comforting research that knows she's not damned her kids, and any advice on the general balance between making your kids happy by being around for them emotionally versus just, you know, making sure that they're physically safe. So, Sarah, did you want to quick say what you had thought of when you got this one? I wrote her a longer answer. Yeah, I mean I haven't. I have a few things well, and none of the one just came to me now as you read that last part. So she I'm going to repeat what she said, general balance between making your kids happy by being around for them emotionally versus making them happy by providing for their physical needs. I think one factor she left out of this equation is her own happiness and fulfillment, because that is not a super variable. How happy she is and how while she feels like she's doing at work is probably going to influence how she behaves around them, how happy she is, how you know, does she feel like she's fulfilled so she can really attend to them, or does she sort of have a yearning to be doing something else the whole time? And is I'm happy? So I think that's like not an independent variable. It's kind of something that's important to integrate into the decision making itself, even though it might not seem obvious. So her happiness and her career fulfillments. So I think this requires a lot of soul searching. I think she needs to think less about what is best for the kids necessarily, and Laura will speak to that in a moment, because I don't think that's going to be something obvious to figure out and figure out what she really wants to do. And I think this might be an instance where it's worth a pilot period, because even if she did convince herself that maybe it was going to damage her kids or alter their behaviors in some ways, I don't think anyone would argue that trying it for six to twelve months to see what happens would be a damaging thing. And I think it would be much easier to ramp down from a more ideal job than to take a less than ideal job or a part time job and then trying to ramp up later. So I think that she should go for what she wants career wise, even if she thinks of it in her mind as a trial basis, and then take it from there. Yeah. No, I think that's good. I think, you know, first, I'm really sorry for her. She had to go through five sitters, but I mean, I think one, and that's going to be tough on her and the kids right there, Like part of what she's you know, seeing as the intensity and neediness, is partly that the kids have gone through a lot of people. But I mean, part of what's going on there is that she's only hiring a sitter for three hours a week, right like four to five thirty two days a week, and there's not that many people who want that job, like unless you are paying one hundred dollars an hour, and there's not that many people who want to work three hours a week, and so your pool is going to be necessarily more limited, which makes it harder to find and keep good people, which made me say, you know, first of all, why did they choose this as their childcare setup. You know, it may be that they thought this was most economical to have the little one in daycare and then have this the sitter afterwards, versus having a full time nanny for the one year old right, who would then be there when the other kids got home from school, would be the person who was always there and so they'd get to know that person over time and probably build the relationship from there. So you know, that could have been an option otherwise. I mean, maybe the one year old could stay in daycare for more hours and the four and five year old could go to some sort of aftercare program where there'd be other kids, there'd be their friends, or even if it was like a more informal one whereas a group setting, so they'd be hanging out with their friends, that might be something they were more happy about in that sort of steff. So first I would say, like, maybe the childcare setup is not ideal. And you know, again, she's been at school, she's now transitioning into a full time industry job, she's going to be earning more money. That may be somewhere to look to put the money right that that might especially if she's going to be commuting an hour into this big city. They may wish to have another adult around to deal with a lot of this stuff that is going to be hard, you know. For if her husband's job doesn't have a whole lot of flexibility, if there's like an early day for snow or a sick kid or something like that, they may be wanting to look more at the NANAE option. Anyway, you know, I think I don't buy that they're really unhappy about being cared for somebody other than their parents. I think they obviously prefer their parents, but the older children go to school and they're not complaining about going to school per se, like they're being there with their teachers their whole day. So they're into other adults. It's just this particular setup that I think they're also sensing that mom feels some misgivings about it. And I feel like kids, when they know it's complicated for their parents, will push on that too, Whereas if the mom is just like, well, this is the way it is, then they don't. There's absolutely no research that she's hurting her kids by not being there when they get home. Of course, there's no research that she's helping them either. It's just that there's no way to do a good study on this. And I mean, what variable are you looking at and how a kid turns out? Like are you looking at you know, if they had a sit or when they were six, whether they graduate from high school? I mean, I don't know, Like, are you looking at whether they're happy when they're twenty five? What is your endpoint variable? I have no idea. You wouldn't be able to design a study that way. And you know, these things are also intertwined in the sense that kids need time and money. Obviously, if mom is working more hours, there's less time with the kids. Often, on the other hand, there's more mone and for many families, it's not an insignificant question whether mom works or not in terms of the family's well being. So I think there's also you know, hard to tease that out. So you know, I think that as Sarah said, you know, she should try to find a really good job she loves and is happy about, and then she can figure out what would be the situation that the kids would, you know, find best how they could the childcare should support her at our job if a year in it is completely not working and they are unhappy, and she's had her best go and created a childcare situation that does afford her a lot of support and it's still not working. Than fine, you know, figure out something else. But you're probably better off trying and then seeing where you need to go from there, rather than just assuming it can't work because of some story you're telling yourself that you absolutely have to be home when your kids get off the bus or else you're a bad parent, which I think is a good story that's going there. Yeah, I'm gonna throw in one other thing that I've I thought of as I'm listening to this in the newness, which is that perhaps they if they did decide that, you know, the kids are better off having a parent home twice a week, that could be her once a week and her husband once a week. So perhaps she could find a dream job or use pto where she leaves work early a couple of one one day a week, you know, and then maybe he could leave one day a week, and then they've gotten the same kind of balance that they have with this current set up without well that as much of a sacrifice. So that was one other, yeah idea, and it's one of those also ones where you want to do the gender flip and see how this would sound if a dad was writing it, And I can't really picture that. Yeah. And I also, I mean, her idea that she's somehow hurting her children by having them with three hours with the sitter. Now, I just I have trouble seeing this. I mean, these kids are so incredibly lucky to have two loving, caring and employed parents. I mean, I really don't think it's the three hours at the sitter is one way or another in the whole grand scheme of things. So anyway, this has been best of both worlds. We've been talking with Jimma Hartley about emotional labor, so tune in next week for more on making work and life fit together. Thanks for listening. You can find me Sarah at the shoebox dot com or at the Underscore Shoebox on Instagram, and you can find me Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. This has been the best of both worlds podcasts. Please join us next time for more on making work and life work together.