In the last four months I’ve been working from home, much like a number of people around the country. However, when you say working from home you envision waking up 15 minutes before work starts, rolling into the shower and then making it downstairs with a coffee in front of your laptop with a minute to spare before work starts.
Working from home when you have two children, one of whom is a newborn, is completely different. Here’s a typical day for my wife and I.
5am – drag myself out of bed after broken sleep thanks to our awake newborn. Stumble to the fridge for an energy drink and sit down at my laptop. My work has been incredibly flexible with parents, so I get up early to make up for my ‘patchy’ attendance in the day.
7am – go upstairs to get Rupert – our 20-month-old – out of bed. Quick change, milk and breakfast before running around like a loony, or reading ‘Buster’s Day’ for the 7,000th time.
8am – My wife Jess gets up, showered and ready to tag in so I can have a quick shower and get downstairs.
8.20am – back downstairs to carry on working, make second cup of coffee and try not to get the shakes.
9.30am – Rupert joins me on my morning Teams call, Emilia cries for a feed/nappy change/attention.
10am – Jess takes the kids out for a walk or for a play in the garden. Rupert runs in every 10 minutes to make sure Daddy is still there and OK.
12pm – lunch. Jess is a saint and often makes lunch, so I can roll from the work chair to the dining room chair, then eat, before cleaning Rupert up and taking him for a nap.
1pm – Rupert is down after reading two books and protesting that he didn’t want to sleep (he did.) Daddy can get a couple more work hours in.
3pm – Rupert is back up and begging to watch Hey Duggee!/have a snack/go outside, even if it’s pouring down. Jess intervenes and distracts him with any of the above or his favourite show – Tenable.
4pm – Log off work mode, log in to parent mode.
9pm – bed time (if Emilia allows.)
