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Ask HN: Did your life as a parent affected your life as a developer?

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Ask HN: Did your life as a parent affected your life as a developer?

#1

Post by johngorse »

I have a full time job as full stack developer, wife and 2 kids. I commute every day 1 hour in each direction. On a work day I woke up at 5:30 am, wash, dress and jump in a car at 6:00 am, so that I can be at work at 7:00 am. I usually go home at 3:00 pm and if there is no traffic jam I am at home at 4:00 pm. I eat something, change clothes, clock says 5 pm and I try to spend some quality time with my wife and kids. Kids go to bed at 8 pm and at 9 pm I am exhausted as hell, and I fell to bed. And this repeats every work week.

On weekends I barely have time for my side projects (one is familyokjobs.com, which I created over several weekends when wife and kids were sleeping), because there is always something to do around the house. What I'm trying to say: where do you take time for your side projects or studying new technologies?

Re: Ask HN: Did your life as a parent affected your life as a developer?

#2

Post by ddorian43 »

1. Be good. 2. Be good enough to remote. 3. Move to someplace cheap (or be born there). 4. Work remote part-time while making a killing at the same time(compared to local). 5. Profit time with your new/current procured family.

My plan basically. Only step 5 to go.

Re: Ask HN: Did your life as a parent affected your life as a developer?

#4

Post by vbsteven »

Try to get rid of the commute. That's two wasted hours every day.

I have a similar 1hour commute but I only need to be in the office 1 day a week. On the other 4 days I get up at the same time (5:30-6:00am) and I work on my side projects until 8am when I bring my daughter to school and my home-work day starts.

Re: Ask HN: Did your life as a parent affected your life as a developer?

#6

Post by kerrsclyde »

You have to accept that your lifestyle is going to change. It really kicked in with me when my kids started school, the evenings became shorter and now with them as teenagers there is basically no time between them going to bed and me turning in.

I cut down my workload dramatically to spend more time with them and I don't regret it for a minute, they grow up so fast. I look at pictures only taken a couple of years ago and the change in them is vast.

You might look to commute less but working at home just didn't work for me, kids get home at 3:30pm and forget trying to concentrate after that. I can still find time in the mornings before they get up at 7:30 if I need it.

Enjoy the ride, for me (and we're all different) my family is more important than any side project.

Re: Ask HN: Did your life as a parent affected your life as a developer?

#7

Post by __d »

I get up at 5:30am, shower, eat, and start at 6am. Work until 5pm, and then pick up my kid from daycare. Bath, cook dinner, kid's bedtime at 8pm. Do another 2-3 hours work.

Work from home, so no commute. Work 6-8am Thursday, and then rest of the day off to look after the kid. Usually do a couple of hours on a weekend night, depending on what my partner's doing.

I try to do side-projects, learn new stuff, etc, at nights. It doesn't work too well because I'm exhausted.

I switched to remote hourly contracting so I'd be able to take the Thursday off, but trying to fit in a full week's work on the other days is exhausting. Losing the commute was great; the social isolation and loss of work/home separation sucks.

I think it's just tough.

Re: Ask HN: Did your life as a parent affected your life as a developer?

#8

Post by feistypharit »

I moved from full-time to stay at home dad with some consulting and side projects on the side. Family is #1, everything else is secondary. However, wife works, is well paid, and is a national expert in her field. We're In the Midwest.

Kids are essentially another full time job, with varied and unpredictable overtime.

Re: Ask HN: Did your life as a parent affected your life as a developer?

#9

Post by johngorse »

dyarosla wrote: post #3

Just a comment on your side project: replacing the font would help tremendously. Super hard to read through listings in a font not suited for legibility.

Tnx for suggestion. I did a change. More like it or do you have any concrete suggestion about font?
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