Will Children Change Your Career?

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You've worked hard to earn the position you currently hold. Years of school, overtime, networking, and excellent work ethic brought you this success. The work is enjoyable; your compensation is good enough, so you plan on continuing the same work after your marriage vows.

Remembering your own upbringing makes you hopeful your spouse will stay home from the office to become the primary caregiver of your children. Maybe your future spouse only remembers the hardship of having a parent stay home, and hopes for a greater budget for less stress and worry through a second income. Being a parent will be the hardest, but most rewarding, job you'll ever have, however you decide to negotiate career with family goals.

However, be prepared to discuss this topic with your intended spouse, because this decision greatly impacts family life. Be honest in identifying for yourself and your future spouse your weakest virtues.

Explore how your choice will provide opportunity for you to strengthen those virtues, as well as identify the vices to which you fall prey. Ask yourself which position leads you to greater temptation?

Career Goals

  • How important is it to your personal growth to maintain your career, expand your resume, and reach your professional goals?
  • How do you plan to keep your ambition, pride, and greed in check?
  • Are you seeking a career away from home as a means to escape the personal transformation Christ is asking of you (to lay down your life to give more fully of yourself)?
  • Are you staying at home when God is calling you to a greater need (for example, your specialized gifts and talents are needed for the community at large)?
  • Do you have specific career goals that you're working towards? What will you do when you've reached them?

Time Management

  • How do you plan on spending the time you do have away from work with your family? Are you purposefully carving out time for your spouse and each of your children? What does that look like week to week?
  • How friendly is your workplace to telecommuting?
  • How does technology play a role in your family? What limits will you set for screen time (not just for children, but adults, too)?
  • Are you keeping daily time away from work just for your spouse and children, separate from screen time?
  • How does your decision help you make time for regular prayer, discussion, and worship for God?

Family Life

  • Which circumstances would change your mind about your work preference, either way?  (for example, you're the primary caregiver of your children, but would return to work only for financial necessity, or you're a working professional, but would consider resigning for a special needs child, etc). Identify each of those possibilities with your future spouse.
  • How do you plan on educating your children? Through public school, private school, or homeschooling, or changing it year by year?
  • How does your career/job accommodate family life in regards to participation in your child's education?
  • For how long do you plan on working away from home/staying home as primary caregiver of your children? Why? How important is this timeline to you and your family?
  • Are you harboring resentment towards your spouse for unbalanced division of household chores? How can you navigate these challenges?
  • Will your current career threaten the fidelity of your marriage, either because of the time commitment or the proximity to sin?

Finances

  • Is it financially advantageous to seek employment as a second/supplemental income? Or does the cost of commuting (car, gas, insurance, maintenance), daycare and aftercare from school, work wardrobe (dry cleaning, laundry services), convenience meals (commercial prepared, fast-food, or restaurants), hired help (lawn, house cleaning), and convenience shopping equal the additional income or nearly cancel out any profit?
  • How does your current or potential income provide for your necessities?
  • Are you able to adequately set aside savings while maintaining generosity to those in need?
  • Do you have specific financial goals that you're working towards? What will you do when you've reached them?
  • Whose employment offers the better health insurance/benefits? How do you negotiate a change in insurance or looking for another option all together?

Keeping it in Prayer

One of my friends wisely told me early in my motherhood years, that as a mother, I am irreplaceable.  While I've sat on the employment fence most of my married years (I've worked from home self-employed, also as the primary caregiver for my children), I do see the necessity and benefits of both sides.  Throughout your engagement and married years, remember to:

  • Be prayerful in your discernment with your future spouse to see where God is leading you.
  • Remain open to what you consider is the impossible, and remember to seek humility through it all.
  • Revisit your decision on a regular basis, and be prepared to change to accommodate your family's needs.

My prayer sounds like this: "Lord, if there is another person who is better suited to fulfill this open position, so be it. If there is another person who would better serve Your children as the primary caregiver than myself, or, if Your children need to be present in another person's life on a regular basis, then so be it. If my gifts and talents are needed outside my family, then show me the way. Amen."

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