Sunday, October 21, 2007

After University





After graduating in 1980 my fiancee, having been through the "milk-round" process, took up his first marketing job with a firm in Yorkshire and once his location was determined, I signed up for a Post Graduate Certificate of Education in a college close by as we were planning to marry the following year. Many of our university friends were on the same timeline and it seemed the norm to be engaged within a year or so after leaving university and marrying at about 23 or 24. Much has changed on that front with marriage being postponed until careers are really established. The choice to have a family later in life has also become more of an acceptable solution, medically and professionally. When we were beginning to consider having children, the age of 35 seemed to be too old whereas today that is really a very acceptable age to start a family.





My choice of teaching as a career turned out to be the best option for us as my fiancee was moved several times in the first few years of his employment. Teaching offered more flexibility than many other careers and I was able to find work each time we moved. After marrying in 1981, we lived in Putney, south London. We had made the decision that it was impossible to really plan two careers at once and as we knew that I would stop work at some stage to raise a family, we agreed to let his career dictate our movements in the early years of our married life.





After six years of working and once we could afford our own home, I had my first child and became a stay at home Mum. I had no hesitiation about this and never regretted this decision. I think my generation was very much on the cusp of the superwoman era-the woman who had a career, had a baby and went back to full time work within a week! Some of my contemporaries chose different paths choosing to return to work after a short while whether for personal or financial reasons but we were a generation that knew what we wanted and I felt no pressure to return to work and my working peers felt no pressure to stay at home: we did what suited our individual circumstances. While our family was young the DINKIES emerged-dual income, no kids. They seemed to have more of a "me first" mentality and their priorities seemed to be rooted in material wellbeing and professional success. I was glad to be out of the workplace where those pressures existed.

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