G'day Izzy
I took my first flying lesson when I was 38 years old. Seven years later I'm now an FO for QLINK.
It took a lot of sacrifice, and an understanding partner. We don't have children, but I had financial commitments for all that period. I've lived in our home for around 1 year out of the past 2 1/2, and consider myself lucky to be based only a 6 hour drive from home. I'm hoping to be based back home within a few months.
I'll be unlikely to ever make the money that I was earning when I was in I.T. But on the other hand, I made the decision to change careers when I would regularly start counting down the hours for Friday knock-off at 10:00 am on Monday!
I wont get any more grey hairs from the stress, don't have to listen to morons telling me "I'll tell you what I want AFTER you've designed the system", and wont be expected to design, write, test and deliver a 12 month project in 4 months!
In my current job the hours are great, and the view from the window is fantastic!
You can do the flying part-time (like I did) while you're still working at your main job. Work hard and study should have your CPL in a little over 12 months. Another 6 months for IREX, MECIR and ATPL. (Prob longer for you since you've got the kids, but you could aim to do it all in around 2 years). All up cost around 80k.
My 2c.
DIVOSH!