When you can’t just work anywhere anymore

Sophie Rayment - 10 Nov 15

Like a lot of contract workers, temps, or professional freelancers, I didn’t have a job to go back to when my eldest was born four years ago. I have to admit to not caring at the time of going on maternity leave, since I couldn’t wait to put my feet up for a whole year, maybe take-up baking and crafts and be all wholesome and homely.

When reality hit me round the face with a massive spade, coincidentally about the time my stat mat payments were coming to an end, the sad realisation dawned on me that it was no longer feasible to commute into London for work anymore. The care-free lifestyle I’d taken for granted before-child would no longer be possible – after work drinks, going to the gym, or spunking £100 in Topshop, just because I felt like it and it had been more than a week since my last fix. The kind of indulgent but mental-health saving stuff I did when work stressed me out would be no more.

Then you’ve got the actual pain-in-the-arse can’t avoid reasons, rendering efforts to make it to nursery by closing time virtually impossible; an unavoidable deadline, having to wait for a call, getting stuck in a meeting, or delayed on a slow-moving train with bogey-picking men in suits.

So I set up as a sole trader to do some freelance writing work, a decision I didn’t take lightly, but one I’ve largely not regretted over the past four years, though I will freely admit there are times when you question yourself and fantasise about a having a secure, permanent source of income. This happened quite recently; I was going through a period of self-doubt, had a bit of a mental wobble and applied for some jobs I didn’t really want so I could look like a more useful, contributing member of society to the people who ask what I do for a living.

I got an interview for one, which went badly. “Don’t worry about it, forget this ever happened”, said the woman who interviewed me and was now stuck in the lift with my apologetic ramblings, delivering me safely back to reception where she could make sure I was leaving the building.

Somehow, and I really don’t know how, I got a call to go back for a second interview. I can only assume they’d got me mixed up with someone else, or they fancied a few shits and giggles at my expense. My instinct told me not to bother. I’d f*cked up once and couldn’t take the embarrassment of a replay. They’d made it clear there was no flexibility to work from home, change hours or days of working – and deep down I knew this job wasn’t for me.

It was a commute to north London (I live in Kent), which would make my mornings (and afternoons) hell as I pictured the reality of struggling with school and nursery drop offs. But I saw this job and became a bit in love with the idea of having a proper job to go to again – it would tick the ‘working mother’ box just nicely. I romanticised about having a nice sleep on the train, drinking a cup of coffee while still hot, top-quality watercooler bants about last night’s TV, a lunch hour to shop, read the Huffington Post, or just eat something that’s not toddler food debris. I had it all planned: I would be a glamourous Zara-clad mum, no whiff of a Choices bargain here, and everyone would say that there’s no way I’m a middle-aged mum of two, “how can she be, she’s so cool, I hope I look like that when I’ve had kids”, they’ll all say.

But nah, I mucked it all up. They asked me quite a normal question, “what’s your greatest achievement?” I’ve had loads over the years, gotten PR stories to front pages, ghost-written stuff for important people, but all I could think about were the big happy smiles and beautiful eyes of my two lovely boys. “Having my two sons” is how I replied. Because it’s true. We experienced enough personal heartache on the way to parenthood and raising our kids remains the biggest, funniest, heart-melting, at-times-patience-destroying challenge of my life. Everything else pales into insignificance.

Course, I can’t say that was the nail in the job coffin for the four nice people sitting across the desk, but it was certainly my reason for wanting out of there. It didn’t feel right for me, talking to these strangers about my children, being so far away if one of them was sick and I had to get back in a hurry. In a way, it was a relief to not get the job.

So for now, I think I’m sticking to the freelancing gig. Right now, I’m ‘director of domestic logistics’ (housewife), while I continue the painstaking task of trying to find work that fits in the two days a week the littlest family member attends nursery. I’m lucky enough to get paid for what I love doing and have a patient husband who supports the path I’ve chosen. It’s just a bit slow-going sometimes and I hate having to explain to other mums at the school gates, who are off to an office, that ‘I haven’t got work today’ – some feel sorry for me, I can just tell (though I appreciate my perceived failure is probably only in my head), while others have said I’m lucky. And I spose I am; when I get a commission, I get to do it from home, in my lounge-wear, without the distractions of office politics (though some TV banter really wouldn’t go amiss). And I’m available for my kids at the drop of a hat, a privilege that you really can’t put a price on and I by no means take for granted. If there was a tick-box for ‘I’m not working today, but I do work, just not conventional hours, and I only want a permanent job if fits in with my family, and yes I feel guilty that my husband works all hours instead’, I’d be in that one. For now though, the Zara office-wear splurge remains an online shopping basket wish list.

Sophie Rayment

I am a freelance copywriter and mum of two little boys, Alex and Louis. I live in Kent and I like telly, tea and shoes.

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