This episode is really special because Robin and I are both able to really dive into one of the hot topics that’s come up in the past few months: How do you run a business while you have a baby?
Now, for Robin and I, we’ve been able to accomplish this through a concept called Equally Shared Parenting.
It’s something that’s fit our lifestyle and our goals so incredibly well, since we both work from home running our business AmbitionAlly.
Now, we’re in a fortunate position to be able to establish our own lifestyle without getting a lot of judgement from the outside world. This comes as a result of not having a traditional office job to have to commute to everyday, and it’s also saved us from having to deal with a lot of those gender stereotypes that tend to come from other peoples’ comments.
Traditional Versus Shared Responsibilities
In a more “traditional” role, we often see that the husband works full time and the mom stays home – or vice versa. Or another common situation is where both parents work and the child(ren) are in daycare. But this gets so tricky because neither parent really feels like they’re getting the best of both worlds.
If one parent is the dominant worker, they might struggle with the fact that they’re not able to be as present with the baby. The stay at home parent, on the other hand, might struggle with the fact that they’re not helping to bring any income to support the family.
Humans, as Robin points out, are multi-dimensional. We enjoy doing a little bit of everything…and that’s the joy of equally shared parenting.
It means that you don’t have to choose which “100%” you’re going to spend your time with. Instead, I can balance my time. Some days I work more, some days I spend more time with the baby.
Lifting Burdens & Staying Happy
Robin shares in this episode that one of his favorite things about equally shared parenting is that he can make sure that everyone he cares about is happy. Personally there’s no higher purpose than making sure that all of his family’s needs are taken care of.
If he was working 8 hrs a day at an office, there’s no way he could help with household, take care of baby and Nathalie. But – with our lifestyle, the burden is lifted from him.
For Non-Entrepreneurial Families
In this episode, we also talk about how you can do this while still gaining a good income.
Because realistically, not all families are entrepreneurial families. Some choose to scale back their hours to 20 or 30 hours a week, allowing them time to trade off working and taking care of the child.
Maintaining Your Own Unique Identity
Another great thing about both parents being on equal footing is that, overall, we’re spending equal amounts of time with baby and household duties.
And being able to share in all of this means that it draws the couple closer together. One fear that a lot of couples have is that after baby’s born, they won’t be able to spend as much time together.
But because we’re sharing all of this (parenting and work), we still have so many areas of shared topics, and are being brought even closer together.
Because it’s not just about career and baby: it’s also about the couple themselves.
It’s incredibly important that we still maintain our identity before and after anything that happens in life.
For us, we’ve added the role of “parent” to our lives…but by sharing the duties, we can maintain our own identities and interests and stay focused on the most important things in our life.
Questions?
If you have any questions about how we’re able to make equally shared parenting work, leave a comment!
Equally Shared Parenting