Parents as Cabin Crew

[flapsforty]

CCMNo1 3 of the Mods on this forum are both CC and parents. It is not an easy combination but it is possible.
For me, I waited with getting pregnant until I could go part-time (after 5 years with my comp). Then we had Au Pairs for many years. For us, it was the best (if not always ideal!)solution even if we lived in a very small house and the Au Pair often cost us about the same amount of money as what I made at work.
But there are many other ways of doing it. replacement Granny, host family, flexible airport day care are a few examples I know are used by colleagues.
When our kids got too big for an Au Pair, Grandparents stepped in. When they got too old, and the kids got old enough to look after themselves, we hired a lady to do the driving to their various activities.

I recently asked them what they thought of their childhood in regards to my job. The 18 year old said she had always loved the fact that I flew because it got me out of her hair for a few days at a time. The 16 year old confessed that he had consistently hated my job taking me away from home for those endlessly long stretches of time.

There is no such thing as perfect parenthood, and I often did feel like a bad Mum leaving them. I also loved the job, it gave me the chance to be somebody besides a wife and a Mum and it fulfilled me in a different way.
Looking at our kids now, they seem well balanced and not to have suffered any great harm from growing up with a partly absent parent.
Hope this helps and good luck with the next 15 years!!