parents who travel for work

Moms Who Travel For Work: How To Balance Work Travel and Family

• share  
• save  

As parents, we all know there is no “right” or “wrong” way to complete another day of parenthood successfully. For most of us, parenthood is a huge part of our identities, and it prompts us to reflect on our efforts as a parent. If you are like most working moms who travel to work regularly, you may often feel a sense of guilt for leaving your child home each day, especially when those days become overnights.

Work travel is tough on everyone in the family, especially the kids. There are a few things to cope with the short-term disruption and refocus your energy on what truly matters: ensuring that your child feels safe, happy, and loved, no matter what .

1. Announcing The Upcoming Trip

Kids, young kids especially, like visuals. Tell your kid where you are going and show them some pictures of the location. Follow their lead, and share as much or as little information about the trip as needed.  Explain the trip as an exciting adventure you can’t wait to tell them about when you get home. Once back, don’t forget to share the fun – spend time talking about the things you got to see. Consider bringing back a piece of where you went. You may ask him, ‘ What foods can I bring for you? Should I bring the Spider-Man or the Peppa Pig socks?’ In that process, your kids will come to terms with the emotional part too.

Google Calendar is a great tool scheduling and events tool. You can keep track of everything from trip info to scheduling any events before the trip. Spend a few minutes at the beginning of the week to make sure your important info and the week’s activities are on there. 

If you feel overwhelmed and out of ideas, there’s help in the form of books. Many books particularly address the problem of parents who need creatives while traveling for work. 

2. Packing Together

It all comes down to the prep, no matter whether you are preparing for emergencies at home or traveling for work. “ But we hardly maintain the level of preparedness when we get into our car, van, or truck ,” says Karen Morris , author of Mom on the Run: Prepping for Life’s Emergencies When You’re Away from Home . In this book, Karen has offered practical advice in easy-to-follow ways, so moms on the go can leave no stone unturned in preparedness.

Also, let your kid help you prepare for the trip. Helping you pack will make the child feel included in your plan and reduce their anxiety. They may even have a few things they would like for you to take, which could bring you a well-needed laugh in the days to come. You can also use it as an opportunity to teach them how to pack a suitcase properly. Getting children to make their very own lists is a straightforward method to begin. With a decent packing list, you are off to a great start.

First, tell your kids about where you are going, what you will do, and when you will return. Help them pick a suitable suitcase for you. At this point, urge them to make their lists and remind them they all need to fit in the suitcase. Then go through the lists with them and help them make changes. Get them to include things they’ve ignored and exclude things you don’t need. Urge them to be selective and think light. Let them pick and assemble the things they know about, placing them in a heap and marking them off the list while you take care of the important stuff. It will be a worthwhile investment in their learning process and your travel sanity.

“Try to maintain the routine. My husband knows the drill as we don’t deviate and my kids know what to expect,” one mom on a Reddit group suggested. 

3. Leaving Behind Reminders

Children of all ages experience separation anxiety when their mother is gone. Giving a child something that reminds them of their mom can reduce separation anxiety. Leaving gifts or notes behind for them to find is a good strategy to aid your anxious child. You can also give them a special object to hold onto or, for infants and younger kids, a piece of clothing or a photo will keep your presence in the home.

The night is the time when kids need their mom the most. They miss the bedtime stories when you’re away. You can either record yourself reading a bedtime story or sit down together and read a book before you leave to help them identify, cope, and work through their worries. When I Miss You is a perfect book for a mom to read to her little one. This wonderful book gives a sneak peek into what happens when you and your child separate in a very reassuring and child-friendly way. Kids love to see themselves and their feelings reflected in visuals and stories, and this book fulfills just that.

4. Saying Goodbyes When You Travel for Work

It’s important to say goodbye and let them know that you will be back. Share with them things you will do on the trip and things you will bring for them. Having something to look forward to will bring a smile to their face and will set the tone for smooth goodbyes.

Many of us try to slip out the door when they aren’t home or while they are sleeping because we don’t want to see them upset or chasing after us. This approach can have some potentially negative impacts on your kids.

It’s best to keep goodbyes short and sweet when dads or moms travel for work. Learn how to make those goodbyes go a lot smoother, like when the kids are immersed in painting, out riding their bicycles, or heading over to a neighbor’s house for a playdate , and come up with tactics for making mom or dad’s time away from home more bearable, and even fun.

5. Using Technology to Stay Connected

In today’s connected world, staying in touch with kids is easy when moms travel for work. But you need to figure out first what works best for your kids and your travel schedule. Most moms either use their iPad or Phones for video calling. So if your schedule permits, you don’t want to miss the bedtime stories! And finding your little kids are happily going on with their day may help you go on with yours.

However, it doesn’t work well for all in the way of video calls. In these situations, encourage your kids to do something whenever they miss Mom: Draw a picture of Mom or make a video to share with Mom .

The Nixplay Digital Photo Frame is a great tool for sharing family photos and videos. Anyone can send pictures directly to the frame from anywhere. Every time you get a new picture of your kid, it will feel like a present when you see it in your frame. It’s such a wonderful gift to keep them connected with you.

6. Return with Lots of Love and Gifts

And, of course, remember to bring them some souvenirs when you return. It will bring a smile to your child’s face and remind you of your wonderful time on the trip. And if you come home empty-handed, don’t worry about it. You can fix that. Amazon has authentic souvenir items from the 50 states and countries ranging from Canada to India. With an Amazon Prime membership, you can choose to receive FREE Same-Day Delivery on a broad selection of souvenir items.

Don’t forget to appreciate your partner once you get home. It’s fine if you find the house a total mess. Instead of being overwhelmed , give yourself and your partner some time to decompress. Take a slow approach to work around the shift in parenting and responsibilities. 

7. Take Kids with You if Possible

Like most parents, you might think traveling with your child is a horrible idea. Yes, it’s stressful, but there are benefits to bringing your child on a business trip. When your child is with you on business travel, you squash the intense mommy guilt that’s common among most working moms.

It also offers opportunities to explore your child’s understanding of just how large and diverse the world is. If you travel for work at least somewhat regularly, don’t miss such a wonderful opportunity to expose your child to new languages and cultures now and then.

Finally, To All The Moms Who Travel For Work

Preparing for work travel depends a lot on your child’s age and your family situation. When you are a new mom, make travel a topic of discussion with your boss. Lean towards no international travel for the first year of motherhood and limit travel as much as possible during that time.

It still can be challenging if you have older kids. However, you can approach the opportunity in a positive light. A little parental separation can be healthy for kids. It gives your husband and kids some special time together and helps the kids gain more independence in their typically mom-centric world. With some little trial and error, you will figure out how to prepare your child for your travels and the best way to feel close when you’re far away.

Similar Posts

20 Fun Summer Activities for Kids

You know summer is just around the corner when the air starts to feel warmer, people are getting their barbeque stands ready, students are rejoicing at the end of school, and everyone is making plans for a vacation. Everyone loves summer. However, during this 3-month vacation, kids tend to get unproductive and lazy because there…

10 Best Animal Movies For Kids & Families In 2023

We all love movies featuring animals, especially kids. There are countless animal-featured movies out there. Even new movies are coming out every month. Well, 2023 is already looking like a very good year for kid-friendly animal movies. A good number of animal-featured movies expected to come out this year include Netflix’s The Magician’s Elephant, Disney’s…

Is It Safe To Drink Liquid IV During Pregnancy?

It is important for pregnant women to stay hydrated, as proper hydration is necessary for the health of both the mother and the developing fetus. Dehydration can lead to complications such as preterm labor, low amniotic fluid, and impaired fetal growth. Many individuals use sports or energy drinks to help prevent or alleviate symptoms of…

10 Best Dinosaur Movies That Kids Will Absolutely Love

Kids love roaming in the land of dreams, especially those with giant and unearthly living beings. If you ask them what kinds of movies they like, there’s a strong possibility they’ll answer- the ones with dinosaurs! Now you don’t have to worry when your kids ask you for some dinosaur movie. Here are some great…

Is Chamomile Sleepytime Tea Safe During Pregnancy?

Sleepytime teas are popular among individuals who have trouble falling asleep at night. They usually come as a unique blend of soothing herbs such as chamomile, cooling spearmint, lemongrass, lavender, etc. The herbs and flowers in sleepytime teas give the body a relaxing feel for better sleep at night. Among the ingredients, chamomile is prevalent…

20 Best Basketball Movies for Kids and Family

What makes basketball movies so popular? The reason is that they are fun for people of all ages. Run the gamut from college and high school to kids’ basketball movies; there’s a wide range of movies to choose from. For this article, we have made a list of the best basketball movies for kids. These…

Mommy Points: The Balancing Act of Work Travel as a Parent

"Mom, why weren't you at my school party today? All the other moms were there."

I was hoping she wouldn't notice. I was hoping that there wouldn't be a critical mass of parents who came, so that my absence wouldn't be so obvious. Or maybe I was just hoping she would forget by the time she saw me, so I could dodge this guilt bullet. But my 3-year-old was right: I wasn't there. I was away for work.

When you are a parent whose work requirements include travel, you're going to miss things at home with your kids. Let me repeat that for the overachievers in the front: You cannot do it all. Eventually, you're going to miss something. Something big.

I haven't only missed a school party. I've missed theater performances, rodeo days, themed lunches, a school play and end-of-year celebrations. Sure, I'll never forget seeing my eldest daughter walk for the first time, but I didn't see it happen in our backyard or in the living room or on a beach. No, I saw her first steps on a grainy, jerky cellphone video that I got by text while I was eating alone at a restaurant bar on a work trip on a cold, dark night in 2010. FaceTime may have made the picture clearer in the intervening nine years, but it hasn't at all numbed the sting of missing important moments like that.

Before my tiny violin becomes too ear-piercing, let's clarify something: I know I'm lucky to have a job that includes travel. But you never stop questioning whether your career and the opportunities and experiences it brings will ever erase the memory of that look in your kids' eyes when you tell them you won't be there at the big or recital. Add in a line or two about how all the other parents were there, and you're on the express train to I'm-a-Crappy-Parentville.

So how do you manage traveling for work and being an involved parent? I'm almost 10 years into this balancing act, and there's still not going to be a pretty bow to tie up the story, as it's just not easy. But some things do help balance being a parent with being a work traveler.

If you can go, go

You're going to miss some things, so don't miss the things you don't have to. I go to some second- and third-tier kid events because I'm going to miss some of the big ones. (I hope I don't miss the huge things.) It really does help if I show up for things that feel optional. I've been the rock star of reading day at the elementary school for three years running, while most parents opt out. I may have been out of town for Donuts With Divas (aka female-caregiver appreciation day), but I read the heck out of "The Day the Crayons Quit ."

Make up new events

I recently caught wind of an early Mother's Day brunch at my 3-year-old's preschool that I am 98% sure is on a day I have to be out of town. My Plan B is to make up a new event. If I'm missing this special lunch at school, I'm going to instead work with the teacher for me to come and eat lunch there another day that week. It's not going to erase my not being there, but it will create its own special memories.

Find a surrogate

We moved to the town where I grew up just a few months after my first daughter was born because we quickly learned that, as two working parents, we needed reinforcements. We're still there nine years later. When Josh and I can't be at something, we call in the grandma and grandpa. It doesn't have to be grandparents, but try and find someone to fill in at big things when you just can't make it.

Talk every day — if they want to

I don't care where I am, with the ease of FaceTime, I'm going to talk to my kids each day I'm gone. Other families like to record videos and send them to each other during the day, which can be handy should your travels take you to significantly different time zones. Set an alarm or reminder if you must, but step out of whatever you are doing at some point in the day and see how the day went at home. The one caveat to this is that if the kids don't feel like talking that day, they don't have to. They can just say a brief hello and keep doing what they're doing.

Last in, first out

Long gone are the days when I'd tack on a weekend (or even an extra night) to weekday work trips. I'm going to arrive as late as I can and leave as early as I can. Ideally, I like to get the kids off to school and then head to the airport instead of leaving before they wake up. I also do everything I can to not miss a weekend day at home, even though that can get tricky with Monday-morning starts. Some of this can't be entirely controlled when you're not the boss, but 100 times out of 100, I book the absolute shortest time away possible.

Don't overpromise

I've messed this one up more than once, but try not to promise the moon. Don't mention you may get to come home early if you aren't sure, or unless you've found a way to control weather, maintenance delays and air-traffic control (in which case, call me). Approximately one out of five flights in the United States is delayed, so tell your kids your travel schedule, but say things like "I'm scheduled to fly home to you tonight" instead of "I'll be home for dinner" until you know for sure.

Put the school schedule on your calendar

You have a work calendar and you have a school calendar (and dance calendar, baseball schedule, performance schedule, etc.). Merge all the separate calendars into a single schedule early, and update this main calendar often enough that you know what is coming up and can at least be aware of potential conflicts, if not outright avoid them.

Points, points, points

Turn those work trips into family vacations by earning points. Register for every hotel promo you can find, enter that frequent flyer number on your flights, and make work pay for play. You get a gold star if you can teach your kids about the value of points and miles so that they get at least a little excited for that part of the equation.

Clear the schedule when you return

I work some nasty hours on the road because I want to have a minute or two to focus on the family when I get home. Skip that inflight movie binge on the return flight home and instead knock out a few hours of work so that you might have a little more time the next day to focus on the people who matter the most.

If all else fails ...

If all this fails, consider good, old-fashioned bribery. I do not bring home gifts for my girls from every trip, but if I've really missed something, or if they just really missed me, I try to bring a peace offering back with me. This is not sustainable with regular travel, but it is an ace in the hole every once in a while.

Bottom Line

Work travel gets exponentially harder as a parent of a young kid -- doubly so if your partner also travels for work, and even harder still if you're a single parent . But work travel isn't something you have to avoid as a parent, it's just something that you manage as best you can and then pick up the pieces when best-laid plans fall apart.

And I'll be real: Right now, with multiple work trips and multiple end-of-the-school-year big events going on in my kids' lives, this is all a work in progress, so please share your tips for balancing work travel and parenting.

• Share full article

Advertisement

Supported by

Parenting Can Get Complicated When One Partner Is Away

We asked experts about how to leave and re-enter with minimal friction.

By Catherine Pearson

Catherine Pearson’s husband has traveled for work several months out of the year for the past eight years.

The moment my husband walks through the door after traveling for work — something he does about a third of the year — is pandemonium. Our two sons pounce on him. Our dog loses her mind. And I feel a mixture of love, relief and resentment.

Caring for our kids while my husband travels is nothing at all like single parenting. I do not bear the full emotional, logistical and financial weight of raising our children, nor do I face the isolation and overwhelm single parents so often experience . During the years when he left me alone with our baby and toddler, I could still cry on the phone with him. We split the bills and share a home.

Still, our arrangement often feels disorienting. When my husband is away, my two children and I are an efficient unit. Then comes “Dada,” with his bear hugs and spicy tacos — and a need to be reminded of who gets picked up from what after-school activity when.

Terrence Real, a family therapist and author of, “Us: Getting Past You and Me to Build a More Loving Relationship,” said direct, regular communication is especially important in arrangements like mine. He believes couples need to prioritize regular check-ins and explicitly “contract” household duties with each other, making their respective expectations and commitments clear.

“When one partner travels a ton, the other one often de facto becomes more of the primary caretaker,” Mr. Real said. “How does everybody feel about it? Well, nobody knows. Nobody ever talks about it.” I asked him and other experts for strategies that can help couples manage the emotional and logistical complexities of “solo” parenting.

Focus on teamwork, even from afar.

Eve Rodsky, the author of “Fair Play" — a book about divvying up domestic labor, which has also spawned a documentary and nonprofit — said it is important for couples to agree that the partner who remains home is not the sole parent, and to proceed accordingly.

That means the traveling partner must stay engaged, Ms. Rodsky said, and not just with phone calls or FaceTime. Find practical ways to help from a distance, she recommended.

Perhaps the traveling parent can order groceries online from a shared shopping list, she said, or manage an extracurricular activity or two. That might mean doing things like making sure the soccer schedule is-up-to-date on the family calendar (itself an important tool) or coordinating weekly car pools.

Treat arrivals and departures with care.

Military spouses have extensive experience with solo parenting, said Stephanie Allen, marketing and communications director for the Military Spouse Advocacy Network, whose husband has served in the Navy for more than a decade.

She noted that “homecoming briefs” for military spouses tend to emphasize the importance of clear conversation around expectations. Before her husband returns from a deployment, for instance, they will discuss on the phone or in an email: What has the routine been? Are there any new rules or conventions in place?

They will also talk about their own needs. Will her husband need some time to decompress? Or can he dive into being the primary caregiver for a few days so she can catch her breath?

Ms. Rodsky urged all couples to have a “re-entry check-in” within the first 24 hours. Put it on the calendar, and keep the conversation around 10 minutes, she said. Though you might be eager to catch up or even unload on each other after being apart, your sole focus is: What tasks do each of us want to handle this week?

Dive into the “daily grind.”

I am much happier when my husband is home. We all are. But the first 24 to 48 hours feel chaotic, as our rhythms and routines shift.

Ms. Rodsky believes that having the returning parent focus on “daily grind” tasks may be a useful strategy for many families looking to mitigate some of that initial turmoil. That means housework (dishes, laundry and taking out the garbage), grocery shopping and making meals — tasks that are eternal and largely unchanging.

Of course, some returning parents will be eager to dive back into child care, and families will settle on different arrangements, Ms. Rodsky said. What matters is that each partner takes full ownership of their given tasks, from conception through execution, she said — noting that doing so can be an important antidote to the longstanding gender gap in housework and the mental load carried by the parent who stayed behind. So, if you are on garbage duty, you don’t just empty the bin; you replace the liner and take it out to the street.

“Think of your home as an organization and not just some place where you say ‘we’ll figure it out’ or ‘we’re going to default to the woman because of gender expectations ,’” Ms. Rodsky said.

Beware of letting the traveling partner play the part of the “ fun parent ,” Mr. Real said. Instead, think of diving into the more tedious parts of caregiving as an act of enlightened self-interest, Mr. Real said.

“You’re dog tired, and you don’t want to,” he said, “but you do it because it’s an investment in your happiness.”

My husband and I have not done the kind of deliberate contracting the experts I spoke to recommended, but now it’s on the family calendar.

I will also give credit where it is due: He used to come home from the road and flop on the living room rug to play Legos, or doze off for a few minutes while the boys babbled on about their week. Now, he often comes home with arms full of groceries — then heads straight to the kitchen.

Catherine Pearson is a reporter for the Well section of The Times, covering families and relationships. More about Catherine Pearson

A Guide to Parenting Now

Some anxious parents are choosing “sleepunders” picking kids up just before bedtime  — or even staying over with them. Here are the pros and cons to that approach.

Many parents feel the need to stuff their children’s days full of activities to keep them entertained and engaged. But boredom has its virtues .

Being a modern parent means juggling many opinions on how to do it correctly. The good news is that there’s no one way to do it right .

Parental burnout is real. Take this test  to clarify how depleted you feel — so hopefully you can get the help you need.

More American women are having kids later in life. We asked mothers who had children after 40  to share their experiences.

Millennial parents, guided by influencers, are now proudly try-hard, and they're embracing a new “gentle parenting” approach .

For Working Parents, the Return to Business Travel Hasn't Been a Smooth One

Paid partnership with Delta

When Dr. LaQuista Erinna, a Georgia-based therapist, was presented with the opportunity to go on a work trip this summer—the first in more than two years—she was thrilled at the prospect. She would be going to California for a few weeks, interacting with her peers in person and jumping back into an aspect of her work that she had missed.

But as a mother of two boys, she couldn’t just jump at the chance and get on the next flight. First, she needed to find someone to watch her children. Then she had to grapple with whether her sons, especially her youngest who is neurodivergent, could cope with her being away. She reached out to her friends and family to see who would possibly be able to care for the boys if she went on the trip. Thankfully, her mother was available and willing to help.

Still, she was a little nervous. In her 21-year career with the U.S. Army, she traveled regularly and even after having children, her family was used to her being gone for extended periods of time—but the pandemic completely changed that dynamic.

“My youngest son, who is six years old and has autism, is really attached to me and we have this really close relationship, so he's very used to his routine, which involves me being there,” Erinna says. 

This experience is emblematic of the many challenges facing parents who regularly travel for work and their employers. Even for parents who are eager to get back on the road, with limited childcare available (and that care costing more than in the past) and children who might not be emotionally ready to deal with being separated from their parents for the first time in years, the hurdles to getting back to business travel are many.

While many companies have adjusted their business travel practices by encouraging Zoom meetings, cutting back the volume of employees who need to travel, reducing the number of trips some people have to go on, and shortening the lengths of trips, many still feel the expectations are not reasonable. Some employees say that although companies are making adjustments, there’s a sense of a real desire to simply return to the way work was before 2020.

Cali Yost, chief executive and founder of Flex+Strategy Group , a company that helps companies and employees embrace flexibility in the way work is done, says that both employers and employees need to understand that business travel today is not like it was before the pandemic—and there is no going back.

“A lot of things can be done perhaps remotely still, but there are certain things that we do enjoy and that have more impact when we're together, so we have to remember that there's a purpose now to why you're on the road, but we also have to accept that travel is different,” says Yost. 

Among the things that have changed are the logistics. With rampant delays, cancellations , and costs of travel shifting, people need time to get used to traveling again and they need space and grace for readjusting.

“There’s going to be a transition period and it’s just going to be weird the first couple of times you do it and it’s important that we let each other be in the weird,” Yost says. “Recognizing some of the less positive aspects of all this right now and doing what you can as an employer to help support that transition, recognizing there's good stuff that's going to come from this, but there are some real things that need to be facilitated and supported as we transition through to what's going to be next, is essential.”

For some companies, support is coming in the form of making it possible for parents to bring their partners and children along on trips —even if only for a few days at the tail end. Other companies are expanding backup care , sometimes offer the service on-site or nearby.

Erinna went on her trip and learned, after arriving in California, that at least one of her colleagues had been able to bring children with some support from the company, an option she says she will take advantage of in the future, but was not aware of previously. “Help with childcare is just such a big incentive,” Erinna says.

Yost says, instead of panicking through the transition or trying to rush back into traveling like people did in the past, parents should try to use this shift as an instance to teach kids about navigating discomfort and adjusting to new ways of moving through life.

“I hate the phrase ‘teachable moment,’ but this really is one of those teachable moments for parents to say, ‘we're going to have to all just sit in this discomfort of being apart together and work through it with each other,’” says Yost.

Michael Wodzicki, founding partner of Nexus Cooperation, a boutique consultancy guiding companies, organizations, and governments as they go through transitions, is perhaps a perfect example of someone who is trying to navigate the new normal.

After two years at home, Wodzicki began traveling for work again this year. While he was excited, he was also nervous about leaving his family.

“For nearly three years, the family was always together and you just don’t realize how much that becomes normal,” Wodzicki says. “When it came time to leave, I was surprised not just by how emotional I was, but by how extremely emotional the boys were.”

As a lifelong traveler, who has missed the experience of seeing new places and experiencing different cultures in last couple of years, he is trying to remember the joys of traveling. Wodzicki says that he is now “much more in the moment,” when he travels, and he is more appreciative of what travel has to offer and how it can help children develop strong relationships with their parents.

“It’s an opportunity for the kids to have some time with each parent individually and have their own relationship,” he says. “The family still comes together, but there is also this special time to bond with each parent while the other is away.”

By signing up you agree to our User Agreement (including the class action waiver and arbitration provisions ), our Privacy Policy & Cookie Statement and to receive marketing and account-related emails from Traveller. You can unsubscribe at any time. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

An official website of the United States government

Here’s how you know

Official websites use .gov A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS A lock ( Lock Locked padlock icon ) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

International travel documents for children

See what documents a child needs to travel to or from the U.S. alone or with a parent or relative.

Non-U.S. citizen children traveling to the U.S.

All children, including infants, must have their own travel documents, such as a passport or visa to enter the U.S.

Additionally, if the child is traveling alone, with only one of their custodial parents, or with a guardian to the U.S., they should have:

• Each country has its own rules for the specific documents it requires for a child to be allowed to leave their home country without both of their custodial parents or with a guardian. Contact the embassy or consulate of the country the child is a citizen of to find out what specific documents the country requires to allow the child to leave their country.
• The letter should say: "I acknowledge that my child is traveling outside the country with [the name of the adult] with my permission."
• A parent who frequently crosses the border by land with a minor should always carry a letter of permission from the other parent.
• A parent with sole custody of the child they are traveling with should carry a copy of the custody document.

If your child is traveling alone by air, the airline may require you to submit an unaccompanied minor form and pay a fee for unaccompanied minor service. This service provides an airline employee escort for your child at the airport and on board the plane. In addition, you and the person picking your child up at their destination may also need to provide the airline with identification and contact information.

Contact your airline before your child’s trip to find out:

• What age requirements the airline has for their unaccompanied minor service
• If you can book a ticket with a connecting flight
• What documents and fees are required

U.S. citizen children traveling outside the U.S.

Children traveling to most other countries are required to have a U.S. passport. 

Learn how to get a passport for a minor under 18.

Depending on the country, the child may also need a visa and other travel documents. Search for the country the child will be visiting to find out what documentation that country requires.

Providing parental consent when a child travels without both custodial parents

Ports of entry in many countries have security measures to prevent international child abduction . If your child is traveling alone or with only one parent or legal guardian, they may need a letter of consent from the other custodial parent. 

• The letter of consent, preferably in English and notarized, from the other parent (if the child is traveling with one custodial parent) or signed by both parents (if the child is traveling with a guardian or alone) should say: "I acknowledge that my child is traveling outside the country with [the name of the adult] with my permission."

Additionally, if a minor is traveling abroad alone:

• Contact the embassy or consulate of the country your child will be visiting and ask about entry and exit requirements for that country.

U.S. citizen children traveling to Canada or Mexico

Traveling by air.

All U.S. citizen children who are traveling by air to Canada or Mexico must have a U.S. passport or Trusted Traveler Program card. 

Traveling by land or sea

• U.S. passport, or
• An original or a copy of their birth certificate, or
• A Certificate of Naturalization, or 
• A Consular Report of Birth Abroad 
• Age 16 or over: show a U.S. passport or Trusted Traveler Program card

Parental consent documentation for travel to Canada and Mexico

A child traveling with only one custodial parent or a guardian or who is traveling alone may need to present a written letter of consent at the border. 

LAST UPDATED: June 28, 2024

Have a question?

Ask a real person any government-related question for free. They will get you the answer or let you know where to find it.

CorporetteMoms

Updated: Nov 13, 2020 12 Comments · by Kat

Business Travel – As a Mom

Career · Parenting · Work-Life Balance | business travel

This post may contain affiliate links and CorporetteMoms may earn commissions for purchases made through links in this post. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

How do you handle business trips as a mom? Is there anything you can do to prepare your kids for your business travel? How do you balance everything? Reader A wonders:

I am a working, single mom and happen to be taking my first of quite a few “extended” business trips next week. My sister and parents are helping out with my lovely 4-y/o for the 4 days/3 nights I’ll be gone, but I want some tips on how to make the whole thing easier. I’ve read the pieces on business trips on Corporette, but haven’t been able to find one on the Moms side of things. Can you help?

Interesting! Whenever I have to travel away from my family there is a mix of dread (I have to leave them for X days!) as well as eagerness (I get to leave them for X days!). I’m curious to hear what the readers have to say, but here are a few tips:

Maintain routine for your child.  Emphasize to your caregivers that you really want your four-year-old’s life to continue as it normally does. Attend all the usual classes… see the usual babysitters (if any) during the week for the same amount of time he normally does… Particularly, the bedtime routine should all be as close to “normal” as possible. That said…

Skype or FaceTime regularly.  Build in a regular time for your child to Skype with you — the regular check-in should make him, and you, feel better. If you don’t already Skype or FaceTime regularly with your childcare team, walk them through the process so you know that they know how to do it (or so you can see where confusion or other problems might come up).

Leave a printed itinerary in your house with your contact information and whereabouts at all times.

Make sure your caregivers have the emergency information they need, as well as any insurance info.  I keep a photocopy of my sons’ insurance cards in the diaper bag, and we have a laminated sheet on the fridge with the numbers for their doctor and poison control, as well as what their last recorded weights were (and on what dates).

Prepare yourself for a gamut of emotions.  Your child may barely know you’re gone… or he may be excited to see his caregivers… or he may resent you for leaving him for so long. Brace yourself for whatever comes, and make sure you allow for extra time to get out of the house for your departure.

Tell your son about your trip when you get back.  Why you were gone, what you saw and did — share some of the wonder.

Psst: here are Corporette readers’ business travel must-haves :

Readers, what do you do? Do you have any tips for traveling without your kids? How do you coordinate things at home and at work?  Here are some other articles on the topic that may be helpful:

• Juggling Family and Work Travel [ Motherlode ]
• Survive Your Time Away: Tips for Traveling Moms (And Dads) [ Devex ]
• 10 easy, no-tears tips for working moms who travel [ MBA4Success ] (great tips with a lot of fun ideas!)
• Keeping Mom’s Business Trip from Being Mom’s Guilt Trip [ Smart Women Travelers ]
• Travel Without Kids [ Kids’ Health ]
• The Working/Traveling Mom [ Proud Working Mom ]
• When Mom Travels for Work [ NY Times ]
• Parents’ travel for work puts strain on families [ Chicago Tribune ]

Current images (airplane aisle) via Stencil. Originally pictured (2014): Airplane , originally uploaded to Flickr by Shai Barzilay .

MomAnon4This says

10/15/2014 at 1:11 pm

Put pictures on the calendar! I draw a plane taking off, and me waving out of the plane windows, so when the kid is outside playing and sees a plane he can think of me. Then I draw big numbers on the calendar to count down the days until arrival again – 2 more days, 1 more day, and then I draw a plane landing, with an arm sticking out the window waving. Also on the days in between – draw happy faces for the child & his/her caregivers – distinctive hair, glasses, favorite stuffed animals, stickers, whatever. Then, when you arrive home, just be sure to realize the kid doesn’t really register that you were Somewhere Else. The kid just thinks you were Not Here. So s/he is not going to ask too much about Somewhere Else, but want to tell you all about what happened Here.

10/15/2014 at 1:15 pm

Your caregivers should also have a power of attorney to deal with medical issues, which should be included with the medical information summary (which should also include any relevant health information, not just weight). Also, my kids like it when I send pictures of where I am…

10/15/2014 at 2:20 pm

Yes, I’ve always left a notarized letter with my caregivers that basically says the caregiver (my parents, usually) has my permission and is authorized to seek medical treatment for my kids.

Meg Murry says

10/15/2014 at 1:28 pm

Don’t make any promises to your kid that you can’t keep. For instance, don’t say “I’ll Skype you every night before you go to bed” – because if your flight is late or your hotel or home internet is down and it can’t happen, your kid may flip out at their caregiver “but Mommy promised” and make both their lives miserable, and you feel guilty. We had better luck with my husband texting me pictures of the kids in PJs or bed blowing me kisses – they liked sending pictures to Mommy.

Have your kids spent the night with your sister or parents before? Are they staying at home with parents coming to them, or going to the sitter’s house? If going to the sitter’s house and they live nearby, can I suggest a one night trial run sleepover? Also, since this is the first of several trips, I’d caution your parents and sister not to set up anything too elaborate that they will have to keep up. If they start the first trip with ice cream for dinner and special trips to the zoo, the 4 year old is going to expect that for every trip, which could get ugly when it stops happening. Special dinner or staying up 1/2 hour past bedtime is one thing – over elaborate special days when there is preschool the next day is asking for a disaster.

mascot says

10/15/2014 at 1:49 pm

We don’t travel that much for work, but we’ve left our child at our house with the grandparents or sent him to stay at the grandparent house (for up to a week) many times for school breaks or adult trips. We keep a healthcare power of attorney and a copy of his insurance information/pediatrician contact that travels with him and we leave written instructions/tips about his routine for reference. We text pictures back and forth and sometimes talk to him on the phone, but don’t bother with video chats. At this point, he is really comfortable with them as caregivers and he’s getting quality time with family so we don’t worry much about leaving him.

10/15/2014 at 2:04 pm

there is a great chapter on this in “Balance is a Crock, Sleep is for the Weak”

10/16/2014 at 10:10 am

I have occasional travel to annual meetings of professional associations. This year after lengthy deliberation, my husband and 24 month old daughter will be accompanying me. Our family has experienced some recent transitions and new childcare situation for my daughter. I felt that it would be very challenging for me to be unavailable to her. It means some compromises in that we’re flying out of an airport that is further away to save money on the cost of my husband and daughter’s tickets (my employer is paying my expenses.) I’m also leaving the conference a half day early to accommodate my husband’s work schedule. We’re fortunate that my husband has a relatively flexible work schedule and that the event is in a geographic location with family-friendly activities nearby.

I know not every mom would be able to do this and it would not be appropriate for every occasion, but this is what we’ve decided in this instance.

10/16/2014 at 1:29 pm

This is great and helpful to keep in mind as an option! Thank you for posting!

oil in houston says

10/16/2014 at 1:45 pm

just one anecdote I’d add – my mum flew a lot at one point when we were kids, she was a single mom at that time and felt VERY guilty. So she’s try to call us as much as she could, all this was before the days of internet, skype or mobile phones of course, and she was travelling to Africa where reliable phone networks were a challenge. Long story short – one day she called for maybe the second time, and my 6-year old baby brother told her ‘ why do you keep calling?’ and hang up … she stopped feeling so guilty after that! good luck to you all!

In House Lobbyist says

10/17/2014 at 11:22 am

I travel a lot and luckily my husband stays home so that helps with our childcare issues. If I am going to be gone for several days, I try to leave a small present to be opened later. Usually it is a new book or coloring book. Then my 4 year old can tell me all about it because usually 4 year olds don’t really want to talk more than 2-3 minutes on the phone or FaceTime. He likes me to send pictures of where I am and I try to send him a pic of thr planes at the airport. Also don’t fall into the guilt trip of bringing home a present. The few times I find something thst he would really like, he asks for a present the next 4-5 trips.

I have also taken my husband and kids with me for shorter trips. Hopefully as they get older, they will be able to travel more with me.

Not a Mom says

10/17/2014 at 1:28 pm

I’m not a mom but this topic made me think of something important. I originally thought of it when the ATL article about the mom bringing her baby to court was posted. Even if you have zero family in the area and no close friends, it is imperative that you find one person, even if it is a boss that you could call in a dire emergency if no one else was available. Put this person’s contact info attached to your registration in the glove box.

My husband is a former first responder. He saw many car accidents where baby was just fine but mom/driver was unconscious. What happened next varied by who was on duty, what hospital mom was going to, etc. They will know from your license who you are but will they be able to figure out who to call to come get your baby? They weren’t allowed to take the baby home. One hospital would allow the baby to go w/ the driver for up to 48 hours. The other hospital would not allow a baby to go w/ the driver if they were at all unconscious or impaired from the accident. They didn’t want the responsibility I guess. Basically, if no one came forth quickly, they would have to call social services and baby would go to an emergency foster home.

I can’t imagine being a semi-conscious mom and telling the cops that your family and husband are a flight away and learning that your baby would be going with social services until your family arrived in town. That’s assuming you could talk and tell them who to call. Sorry to be a total downer but everyone has to think of emergency contingencies.

If baby is staying with grandma and grandma has a heart attack, who will watch baby until mom gets back? In reality social services did a great job in those cases and the babies were so safe and loved on but my husband always felt like the evil jerk because even severely injured parents freak out about the baby going to “social services” even for a day. When you think about it, why would you trust the nurse or the fireman or the police officer with your baby more than social services but most people wanted him to “just keep her until my husband can get here.” He wasn’t allowed to do that for more than an hour or so. He had to get back to his other calls.

AcedemicMom says

10/21/2014 at 10:09 pm

I have found short videos of me (at airport, in new city, etc) saying hello and telling my son that I am having fun and I love him work better than Skype for us – especially if there is a time difference or it is hard to make the pre-bedtime call work. You can make one during the day to watch at night and one later a night to watch in the morning.

• Contact Kat

WORK WITH US

• Product Review Policy

SERIOUS STUFF

• Copyright 2014-2024 Katfry LLC.
• Corporette® is a Registered mark in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
• Terms of Use
• Privacy Policy
• Affiliate & Advertising Disclosures

Parents Who Travel for Work: Preparing Your Teen for When You Hit the Road Again

• July 9, 2021
• Family & Home Life , Parenting , Parents

Written by Evolve's Behavioral Health Content Team :

Share this blog about parents who travel for work: preparing your teen for when you hit the road again., planning for a new (old) family dynamic.

Last month, we published an article called “ As Parents Return to Work, Teens May Not Handle It Well. Here’s Why. ”

The title explains the content. It’s about how we can help families adjust to the end – fingers crossed – of the coronavirus pandemic. Specifically, it’s about the fact that over the past year, teens with parents who worked from home during the pandemic– who previously didn’t – adjusted to having their parents at home all day.

Some kids loved it. Some kids may not have loved it.

In either case, transitions can be tricky. No one had time to prepare for the transition from life as usual to life during a global pandemic . Life as usual meant we followed predictable routines around:

• Socializing

For parents who traveled a lot for work, as usual meant being away from home several days a week, several weeks a year, or more. Some would get on a flight in the morning, attend an afternoon meeting, then get on a plane and return home before midnight. Others in business would spend a week on an intensive assignment, helping open a new location, for instance. Public health scientists would go on assignment overseas for weeks and months at a time.

People who work in performing arts, such as live music, theater, or the event industry – think convention planners or even coordinators – may have been on the road more than they were at home. Their lives changed dramatically during the pandemic. Now, with vaccination rates increasing and case numbers dropping across the country, travel is bouncing back.

That includes recreational travel, mostly, for now. But we expect that by fall, business travel will be back, too.

That means another transition. Now we go back to normal.

Or rather, we move forward to the new normal.

This Time, We Have Time

When the world slowed down and most business travel stopped last year, very few of us had any time to plan for it. And the plans we did make revolved around pressing issues, from how to survive with no work – a very serious problem for people in the entertainment and event industry – to how to set up a home office free from distraction or how to manage kids doing virtual school.

Few of us made proactive plans to handle how this would alter the family dynamic.

This time, though, we do have time. That’s because the typical, pre-pandemic volume of business travel is months away. But we know it’s coming. Businesspeople are planning trips. People in entertainment and events are booking gigs. Some are already booking flights.

We’re sure parents who travel for work are being proactive about the practical, brass tacks aspects of going back on the road. What we’re not sure about is whether they’re planning on how their family dynamic will change once travel resumes.

This article is for those parents.

A Mindful Transition

If you’re one of those parents, we want to help you make the shift as smooth as possible. We want it to be smooth for you and your teenage kids. We want you to be prepared for the unforeseen consequences of returning to work and returning to a situation where you may be away from home as often as you were in the before times . Whereas the articles we wrote a little over a year ago on transitioning to working from home or being home more than usual focused on things like keeping a regular schedule and setting up a workable home office or virtual school space, this article is different.

This one is about relationships, rather than about schedules or sharing the wi-fi. Relationships will change, and your family will find its next dynamic. This time, though, you can take proactive steps to ensure that dynamic is intentional, rather than accidental.

On The Road Again: How to Make It Work

1. acting out.

Teens are tricky. Over the past year – whether they told you outright or not – they may have loved having you around all the time. They got used to having you there to answer questions. They grew accustomed to your help with everything from homework to yardwork to playing guitar. Maybe they groaned their way through family game night, but on a fundamental level, your presence may have soothed them and made things feel safe, easy, and secure. Now that you’re going out on the road again, be prepared for an emotional response manifesting as unwanted or disruptive behavior, a.k.a. acting out. To be clear on what we mean by acting out , what we mean is any behavior that’s impulsive, driven by emotion, and not thought out in a rational way.

If you’ve been home all year, it’s unrealistic to think your teen did not adapt, on an emotional level. Therefore, when you head back out, it’s equally unrealistic to think they won’t adapt again, on an emotional level – which could mean acting out. We want you to be prepared, be calm, be rational – and be ready. That means that if and when your teen acts out, try your best to respond from a place of compassion and empathy, and understanding.

2. You and/or Your Spouse Might Act Out, Too.

After all, you’re human. We said above teens are tricky, but the fact is, all humans can be tricky. Parents are not immune. Your presence at home all year affected your emotional state as well. It’s unrealistic to think it didn’t. Therefore, as with your teen, it’s also unrealistic to imagine that going back on the road won’t have emotional consequences that might cause you or your spouse to act out , as it were. And if you don’t act out – meaning you have the coping skills to prevent your emotions from manifesting in disruptive speech or behavior – then you may feel emotions you don’t think you should .

For instance, if you’re the spouse who stays home, you may resent the spouse who travels.  Or if you’re the spouse who travels, you may resent the spouse who stays home. And to top it all off, you may resent your kids – yes, even though you had them – for being the reason you need to travel. Do those emotions seem irrational or illogical or off limits? Yes. Might they happen anyway? Yes. Again, we want you to be prepared, be calm, be understanding – and be ready. That means that if and when you or your spouse acts out, try your best to respond from a place of compassion, empathy, and understanding.

3. Stay Connected

Given that this transition will influence the emotional dynamics in your family, the best way to mitigate any negative consequences is to communicate . Think about the connections you made during the pandemic. You may have found routines that included informal conversations at consistent times, which you may have found comfort in. You may have had family meals for the first time in years. Or you may have had family movie nights, backyard campouts, and gone on evening walks or morning jogs.

Here’s something important to realize: all that doesn’t have to go away when you return to traveling. We now know that with video conferencing, movie watch parties, and all manner of creative applications of the internet and smartphones, most of those things can still happen. In altered forms, of course – but the point is you can stay connected .

You can eat dinner together , virtually. You can schedule those chats you learned to love. You can play video games, scrabble, or trade silly videos. Physical presence is important, but what that physical presence does is enhance emotional security. In your new normal, we encourage you to find ways to keep that emotional connection strong, despite the distance. Keep that emotional connection, and you’ll have a good chance at keeping your teenager feeling just as safe, secure, and easy as when you were home.

4. Plan Mini-Reunions

Before the pandemic, mom or dad – meaning you – going on a work trip was no big deal. It was old hat. Part of the routine. We speculate, but we assume you took trips when you left early in the morning without an official goodbye and returned from trips just in time to pick up your kid from [soccer, ballet, violin lesson, school] without any real acknowledgment that you were gone. Maybe you had a quick how was your trip/oh it was fine moment. But if your teenager now misses you down in their bones when you’re gone, we think returning from a trip is cause for a family celebration.

A mini-reunion of sorts.

It doesn’t have to be a huge deal, but we do think it should be more than what happens after you get home from a trip to the grocery store. Plan a family dinner.  Plan a family event. Prioritize making a genuine connection with your teenager when you return. That might look different for every relationship within every family, which may mean effort and forethought – but the energy you put in will be well worth it – we promise.

5. Support the Traveler

The parent who travels needs to know their family understands why they travel, and that their family has their back, back home. If you’ve never had an intentional conversation with your kids about the reasons mom or dad travel, now is the time. However, an intellectual understanding of why a parent travels doesn’t change the fact that for a teen, it might hurt when the traveling parent goes back on the road. This situation requires an understanding of emotional nuance: it’s possible for your teen to be mad or hurt about your traveling and support you when you travel .

It’s possible to hold two contradictory emotions in your heart at the same time, just as it’s possible to hold two opposing intellectual concepts in your mind at the same time. Your teen needs to know this, and you need to help them work through how that feels. In addition to understanding nuance, this requires maturity and sophistication. We bet both you and your teen can do it. If you implement the advice we offer above – mainly staying connected – then the obstacles you face will be manageable, and your family can retain the cohesion you may have developed while the traveling parent was home.

Moving Forward: Embrace the New

Thankfully, you have time to prepare for this transition. You can start talking to your kids about it today. You can think forward. You can work out exactly how to stay connected to your teenage kids and keep the lines of communication open. Because that’s really the root of all the advice above: communication. Communication and empathy. Parents need to understand their teens might respond negatively to their return to traveling. Teens need to understand – and feel – their parents love them and are there for them despite the fact they need to leave the home for work. Parents and teens need to recognize all the feelings around these facts, get them out in the open, and work through them.

That’s why it’s a good thing that this time, there’s time. We advise you to put that time to good use and put in the effort now in order to help things go smoothly in three months. It will take thinking and planning. It may take some serious family talks. Whatever time and effort it takes, though, will be well worth it. You can keep your family dynamic healthy, strong, and vibrant, despite the distance and despite the time away. And there may be a hidden bonus, too. The family talks you have as you prepare for this transition may bring you closer together. Which, of course, would be a very good thing.

Our Behavioral Health Content Team

We are an expert team of behavioral health professionals who are united in our commitment to adolescent recovery and well-being.

Alyson Orcena, LMFT

Shikha verma, md, melissa vallas, md, lianne tendler, lmft, ellen bloch, lcsw, megan johnston, lmft, featured posts, enjoying these insights.

Subscribe here, so you never miss an update!

Connect with Other Parents

We know parents need support, too. That is exactly why we offer a chance for parents of teens to connect virtually in a safe space! Each week parents meet to share resources and talk through the struggles of balancing child care, work responsibilities, and self-care.

Call Now For a Free Assessment

More questions we’re here for you..

Beyond Parental Leave: Ways to Support Moms Returning to Work

ANNOUNCEMENT - Thank you for your interest in WorldatWork.  We are currently experiencing a temporary issue with e-commerce.  Our team is working to resolve.  For immediate order placement, please contact our Customer Support Team -  email at  [email protected]  or Call U.S & Canada  1-877-951- 9191 , Outside U.S & Canada 1-480-951-9191.    We apologize for the inconvenience.

• Build holistic parental benefits programs. Working mothers, and all working parents, have diverse needs and values. Ensure your benefits address their financial, time and support needs.
• Offer a return-to-work phase. A formal transition period with clear expectations and support provides parents returning from leave with an opportunity to adjust gradually to working again while caring for new family members.
• Adjust existing benefits to actual needs. Use employee feedback and expressed needs to design benefits that are motivating and meaningful. Unused programs or funding could be redesigned or reallocated to benefits that employees are seeking.

Although stay-at-home motherhood is a goal for some moms, many others seek to balance their family roles and responsibilities with careers.

It’s an aim that’s often easier said than done, with a portion of mothers feeling forced to choose between their professions and their kids. According to McKinsey & Co.’s ninth Women in the Workplace report , 38% of mothers with young children said they would quit their jobs or go part-time if flexible work wasn’t an option.

Caring for younger children, who often require more active care, likely prevents some women and other parents from working as much as they would like. A recent report by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) showed the labor force participation rate for mothers reached 74% in 2023, up 1.1% from 2022. Mothers with older children had higher participation rates (77.8%) than mothers of children under the age of 6 (68.9%).

To attract and retain working mothers, and parents in general, organizations are using total rewards strategies that promote flexibility on the job and in benefits packages.

Parental Benefits: Money, Time and Support

Parental leave is growing. WorldatWork research found the percentage of employers offering paid parental leave to some or all their employees grew from 46% in 2016 to 70% in 2022. This benefit is far from universal, though. According to a BLS fact sheet , 27% of all workers in private industry have paid family leave of any kind, including parental leave.

However, parental leave can — and should — be just the start when it comes to benefits. Many organizations are revisiting what they offer and soliciting employee feedback to better meet traditional and emerging needs.

“Moms need the same things all working parents, regardless of gender identification, need from their employers. Parental benefits fall into three categories: money, time and support,” said Amy Beacom, EdD, founder and CEO of the Center for Parental Leave Leadership and author of The Parental Leave Playbook (Wiley, 2021).

“The first two, time and money, require crafting a paid parental leave policy designed to reach your unique company goals while considering best practices, the law and employee expectations. Support has to do with benefits that impact the employee experience in practice, like resources from the company.”

Formal Transitions for Parents

Having an established process, Beacom noted, clarifies organizational priorities and expectations while providing parents with a clear map forward. The off-boarding process prior to leave and onboarding after leave occurs are critical moments where communication, accessibility and professionalism should guide policy and conversation.

Employers can help parents transition back from parental leave by establishing a clear process, said Tina Lawler McHugh, a senior research associate at the Boston College Center for Work and Family. “There is high demand for a formal, phased return to work and [work-related] travel to ease the transition. While these policies remain the exception, more employers should consider them for anyone returning from an extended leave.”

Read: Returnships Open Doors to Experienced Talent

The Center’s research on parental leave found almost one-third of new mothers were less satisfied with their work after returning from maternity leave, McHugh added. The main culprits behind dissatisfaction included higher workloads and increased expectations from managers.

McHugh encouraged employers to consider the invisible demands on their employees outside of work.

“For starters, total rewards professionals should ask working mothers and all employees about their caregiving responsibilities and the supports they most value. Very often, a new program isn’t needed; it’s more important to connect employees to existing solutions when they need it,” McHugh said.

If TR pros know how to enhance and communicate the value of existing benefits, she added, organizations are likely in a better position to meet employee needs.

Implementing New Parental Benefits

When considering a new initiative or revisiting existing benefits, some organizations may be able to consider onsite childcare, while others could start with a monetary amount or care allowance set aside for each employee, said Jennifer Barnes, CEO of Optima Office, an accounting, C-suite and HR services firm.

Barnes, a working mother herself, realized quality childcare was a top priority for her employees and decided to transform unused office space at her organization into an onsite childcare center, staffed by hired caregivers.

“It’s sometimes easier said than done, but it can be done if you have the right environment and the right location. Childcare offers a huge value to families,” she noted.

Aside from onsite childcare, Barnes suggested adding more choices so employees can design their own benefits. This could include offering a caregiving credit (e.g., $500 per month) toward the cost of childcare or caregiving.

Some employers are paying for benefits employees don’t want or need, Barnes said, and such benefit funding could be better allotted to fit actual demand in the organization.

“Maybe we reimburse you for educational programs, or nanny assist or additional training in other areas,” Barnes said, pointing out diverse offerings for diverse employee needs. “Maybe we have three different options. That would probably be more engaging and inspirational.”

Editor’s Note: Additional Content

For more information and resources related to this article, see the pages below, which offer quick access to all WorldatWork content on these topics:

• Employee Benefits
• Total Rewards
• Finance and Budgeting

Please try a different combination of filters or categories.

Stay current on hot topics, research, upcoming events and more. Unsubscribe at any time; view our privacy policy .

Please share your feedback!

• Search Please fill out this field.
• Newsletters
• Sweepstakes
• Raising Kids
• Working Parents

The New Face of Working Parents

In the wake of the pandemic, major shifts in work-life culture—like opportunities for remote work, job sharing, and flex schedules—mean parents are creating their dream careers. Here's how you can too.

We've all heard the pandemic work-from-home horror stories: Dogs barking in the background during a super important Zoom. A clueless spouse passing by without pants on. Forgetting to press mute before yelling at your kids. But those embarrassing moments barely scratch the surface of the real dilemma facing most working parents. Pandemic parenting has been daunting at best and excruciating at its worst. Lack of child care and virtual schooling, then the unpredictable nature of school closings once schools actually opened again kept families in a near panicked state.

A new report from researchers at Ohio State University reveals that 66% of working parents have parental burnout , which is characterized as feeling exhausted, irritable, emotionally detached, or overwhelmed. This struggle to find balance between work and family responsibilities, in part, led to a massive professional exodus in the United States. Of the 4.5 million people who left their jobs during the Great Resignation, half cited child care issues and lack of flexibility, according to The Pew Research Center .

Not surprisingly, this issue has disproportionately affected women, who carried most of the child and elder care responsibilities. But something has shifted in the last two years. The pandemic highlighted the many ills of American work culture. For a century, work has meant a five-day-a-week schedule, long and late hours, and hardly any flexibility when it comes to family life.

Those days are over, according to Benjamin Granger, Ph.D., head of employee experience at Qualtrics . Employee output and performance no longer supersede personal needs. "Workers want more flexibility and companies are finally defining flexibility more broadly," explains Dr. Granger. "We might as well throw that old playbook away." That means changes to how many days a week you work, how performance gets evaluated, what times you are on the clock, and employers offering resources for mental health needs.

Fearful of losing good talent, companies are embracing a different level of work-life integration, explains Camille Fetter, founder and CEO of digital business executive search firm Talentfoot : "For the first time parents can work when and how they want. It's a great time to pivot and pursue opportunities that are best for you."

Benjamin Granger, Ph.D., head of employee experience at Qualtrics. 

Workers want more flexibility and companies are finally defining flexibility more broadly. We might as well throw that old playbook away.

Learning to embrace and exploit this new normal can be hard for employees. It's natural to be risk-averse. Change can be scary, but if your current work situation is not making you miserable, a change is exactly what you need. Take tips from bold parents who have created a more meaningful work-life balance for themselves and their families in this post-pandemic world.

The Leap of Faith

Who hasn't fantasized about being their own boss? Most of us dream of calling the shots and doing something we really love. That was the motivation behind Shawn Hill's decision to kiss his corporate gig goodbye.

Working in advertising sales, he says the industry had morphed into something he could no longer feel good about. "One of the folks I sold advertising to went under because the ads were actually costing them so much money," he says. "They weren't getting any return on their investment. It was kind of a moral compass check. I texted my wife and said, 'Hey, I can't do this anymore.'"

Though he didn't have a clear-cut plan as to what to do next, he and his wife, a stay-at-home mom of seven, had always dreamed about exploring different parts of the country during retirement age. "But we wanted our kids to experience that too," he adds. With the money they had saved up, they bought an RV and hit the road in March of 2021. A few months earlier, Hill had launched TheGrillingDad.com , a blog about one of his favorite pastimes—grilling and smoking meats. When he wasn't driving and spending time with the family, he wrote for fun. But landing another job was still in the back of his mind a few months into the journey. "We actually started getting to the point where it's like, 'hey, eventually, we're going to run out of money here,'" he admits. "Like, 'what the heck are we going to do?'"

That's when he started to use his advertising acumen to make money from his blog. By November of 2021, he was generating a full income from it. The drawbacks of being your own boss? "I'm always thinking about work and checking the analytics for the site," Hill says, who's now based in West Virginia. "I don't get that drive home to turn work off and transition into dad mode; it's all on me—the success and potential fail."

Despite that, the benefits have been tremendous for Hill, whose family has settled in West Virginia, one of the many states they drove through. "We can travel whenever we want," he says. "I can spend more time with my family and help with the small stuff I usually would've missed out on."

Best advice: "Start where you are with what you have," Hill says. "Whatever your business idea, you don't have to go out and get the most expensive equipment and pay a ton of money to get started. Just start where you are, with what you have. You can do it really low cost. Most people recommend that, if you have a steady job that you don't absolutely hate, just keep that income coming in and start building something on the side. You're gonna sacrifice some sleep, you're gonna sacrifice some fun, but in the end, you know, if your dream's big enough, you'll definitely make it work."

Sharing the Load

Ever wish you could clone yourself to get everything done that you need to get done? Navreet Dhillon, M.D., found the next best thing. An internist in San Jose, California, she splits her position with another mom physician. "I started job-sharing after I came back from maternity leave with my first child," she says. "I realized even before I went off to have my baby that I would not be able to do both properly." That's an issue many working parents face—how do I balance a career I love with a family I love even more? This type of work set-up could be the closest thing you can find to having it all, giving parents the unique ability to prioritize both.

Moms Jennifer Zimmer and Meghan Kludt pitch themselves as a package deal. Since 2018, the marketing execs have worked at several companies together and currently share the role of director of brand partnerships at Motherly in Chicago, each working three days per week. "Meghan is on from Monday to Wednesday and I am on from Wednesday to Friday," explains Zimmer. "Our Wednesday is a day to catch up together and schedule most of our client meetings. We are both incredibly flexible with our days and times and able to jump in if an important client or internal meetings come up when it's one of our 'off' days."

It's a similar setup for Dr. Dhillon, who overlaps one day with her job-sharing partner. "I work three and a half days a week and she works three days. We primarily take care of our own patients, but we cover each other's patients when the other doctor is not in." Given the nature of her job, it helps to have the same qualifications and treatment style, notes Dr. Dhillon. And good communication is key on the one day they overlap.

There can be downsides, cautions Kludt. "Sometimes details or communication can slip through the cracks, but very rarely as we have great communication," she says. "There is also potential to miss information from meetings you are not in attendance for on your days off. In addition, since we are usually considered part-time employees as individuals, we aren't eligible for benefits of any kind, like 401k, insurance, employee enrichment offerings, and expense accounts."

Additionally, with a split salary, your take-home is significantly lower. Plus, not all companies and organizations are open to the idea, so you may have to offer a trial period until everyone is on board.

It can also be tricky for fields like law and medicine, warns Dr. Dhillon. "In my practice, we are the only two people doing this," she says. "I'm part-time, but I definitely put in more hours than are on the books and I know my partner does as well. So even on days we are theoretically off, we do log on."

Still, the benefits of job-sharing are clear. There are flexible schedules and more time with family, while still having a fulfilling career. "This has helped me fill my cup so that I can be there for my patients," says Dr. Dhillon. "We are seeing a lot of burnout and just really tired physicians during COVID. I get to paint in my spare time. I use that to recharge." Employers are also at a unique advantage: there is always coverage and they get two great minds for the price of one.

Best advice: "Know what each individual can bring to the table—the strengths and weaknesses—and how their job share partner can complement each other with their skill sets," says Zimmer.

Adds Dr. Dhillon, "The older I get the more I realize it doesn't hurt to ask for what you need. Don't be afraid to ask for a shared position. If you have a valuable skill, your employer will want to accommodate you."

Remote Control

It's a dilemma that every working parent has faced at some point: attend the kid's recital or skip it for a work commitment? That was the unyielding tug-of-war that plagued Orlando-based mom Cindy Marie Jenkins in the early years of parenthood. It's always been a precarious balance for the busy marketing professional. A year ago, on staff at a family magazine, she felt fortunate when they would let her stay home when one of her kids fell ill.

Now, however, she is freelance and fully remote, which enables her to craft a schedule that works well for her family. She and her husband, who works full-time, tag team taking care of the kids' needs. He shuttles them to school so she can begin her first meeting by 8 a.m. and, aside from braking to walk the dog, she remains laser-focused until a hard stop at school pickup time. What follows is a busy afternoon of activities before dinner. Once the kids are settled for the evening, it's back to work at night.

"It's always been a matter of working in the margins," says Jenkins. It's hard at times and there are moments she squeezes in work while waiting for swim class to end. If she puts work on the back-burner to volunteer at her son's school, she makes it up on the weekend. Though, with such a tight family schedule, it's difficult when something new is thrown into the mix. "My son now needs extra help with phonics and, even though I am the reader and writer and I love phonics, when I heard that, all I could think is, 'When is that fitting into our day and how do we keep our routine?'" she explains. But having control over her own work schedule allows her to make the adjustments her family needs.

Still, there are real disadvantages to a solitary work life. Many full-time freelancers miss the energy of an office. Being around colleagues creates a natural camaraderie, can spark creativity, and make work feel less wooden and transactional. Then there is the added burden of paying for health care out of pocket if you don't have a spouse or partner who has coverage. Though, for Jenkins, one perk makes the struggle worth it. "I am here when one of them has a stomachache, I can drop off stuff for teacher appreciation, or any of the other things that come with having children in school," she says. "It's hard, but I think having the flexibility is definitely better."

Best advice: Being a full-time freelancer may mean juggling several contracts or projects at once, so you need good time management skills. Jenkins also emphasizes the need to avoid burnout by carving out time just for you. When feeling overwhelmed, she tells her husband, "'I need to check out and be by myself for a bit.' And Saturdays, I let him sleep in and on Sunday he does the same for me."

Side Hustle Success

For her entire career, Tomika Anderson has had a lot of plates in the air. She is a writer, editor, freelance project manager, life coach, and runs her own PR firm. The pandemic fueled the Virginia-based mom's entrepreneurial spirit even further. While the changes in work-life sent so many of us into a tailspin, it had the opposite effect on Anderson. "I learned how to operate more efficiently because my son was home during remote schooling," explains the Woodbridge, Virginia mom. "So I was juggling him, my clients, and my dog. I had to learn how to outsource. I learned how to choose better who to have in my little support community. So I became more efficient, more organized, and therefore more confident about what I could achieve."

And what she achieved was turning a Facebook group into a full-fledged business. Anderson started the forum Single Parents Who Travel in 2013 to share her wanderlust with other like-minded people. The forum quickly grew to 10,000 single parents globally from Dallas to Dubai. In her copious free time Anderson organized meetups, vacations, and group excursions for members. But it wasn't just about travel for the quickly expanding community. They came to rely on each other for parenting advice, forging friendships and connections, especially during the devastating quarantine.

In June, Anderson launched SingleParentsWhoTravel.com , a full-service travel agency that does literally everything to make the trip special for single parents and their children. "We print your travel documents and mail them to you, we allow payments over time, and never charge interest or a processing fee, and offer 24-hour assistance during your trip," promises Anderson. "I am serious about our tagline of giving our children the world. I looked at ways to help single parents whether it be financial or having support when they get to where they are going."

Admittedly, it's a lot to take on. Eventually, her plan is to scale her other business back. For now, however, she keeps all her endeavors in play. Anderson credits much of her drive and success with therapy. She says there were experiences in her past holding her back, causing fear of taking the risks she needed to take. "There was an inner journey for me," she explains. "I healed things that happened in my life. The pandemic has made a lot of people dig deep. So many of us had to ask ourselves, 'if not now, then when?'"

Best advice: "Leverage your resources," Anderson suggests. "Let friends, neighbors, and family members help when you need it. I feel so many parents feel like some sort of failure if they don't do everything themselves. You're exhausted all the time because you're trying to do everything by yourself. You don't have to. We don't win any awards for doing it all. How long can you keep that up? It's not healthy. Ask for help. Accept help."

Off the Grid

Ever dream about a sunny beach overlooking crystal blue waters as the backdrop to your work day? That dream became a reality for Aja Rutledge when she traded the concrete jungle of Atlanta for the resort town of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, in March of 2021, during the height of the pandemic quarantine. She had worked remotely for years, but with her son, 15, home too, she thought it was the perfect time to make the move. "Having the remote for my son and the remote for me definitely allowed it," she says.

But the goal wasn't just about landing in a sunny locale. Feeling burned out and stressed, Rutledge, the COO of a small business, suffers with some chronic health issues. Before the move, she had reduced her hours just to make it through the day. She chose Puerto Vallarta because it was walking distance to the beach, had a reasonable cost of living, and affordable health care coverage. "It's more balanced overall for me and my child," she tells Parents from a beach near her home. She proved that she could be just as productive and effective working a five-hour day, Tuesdays through Thursdays. "I only took clients where the time frame of when I worked didn't matter so I could determine how to manage my day. To get to less hours, I cut back the number of clients I had." So far, her little family is thriving.

Yet, she admits a major move like this comes with some struggles. She'll spend four years as a temporary resident before she can file for permanent residency. Her son misses his friends back home, but now that people are interacting once again, she sets up activities so they can both meet new people. And while she misses family and friends, "I am a true believer that people who love me will make time for me," she says. "My siblings fully supported me. We speak weekly, some have visited. It's as if we lived in the states."

Making the leap "definitely takes courage," she says. "You are walking into the unknown. You are moving away from everything and everybody you know. Even if life will be better, you don't know that yet. And doing it with your child adds a whole other level of fear versus doing something like this by yourself." Ultimately, it was fear of regret that helped her get over those concerns. If she hated it after a year or two, she knew she could always move back home.

Best advice: "It's normal to worry. How are you going to make money abroad? How do you land a remote job? Open yourself up to more than just what you are trained to do," says Rutledge. "Let go of old ideas about what your work life should be. You may have gone to school for a certain thing, but that doesn't mean you can't apply your skills to do something completely different and unexpected."

Taking Control of Your Work-Life

There are not many social upsides to the pandemic, but the shift in work-life culture is certainly one of them. Change can be scary, but this is a time for boldness, advises Dr. Granger. "Organizations are no longer in the power position," he says. "The balance has shifted in your favor."

With so much demand for talent, the experts say you can leave a job without having another one lined up (if you're financially able to do that). There is a great chance you will find another, better position quickly. Still skittish about making a shift? Fetter offers these tips for prepping for a new career:

• Find a mentor, someone who can offer advice and guidance
• Know the hard skills you bring to the table (a love of numbers, the ability to write well)
• Avoid being a jack of all trades
• Share the value you bring to the table.

"We now know that working remote is actually working; job-sharing is working; not having to commute three hours a day makes you more productive," adds Fetter. "I truly feel this is the moment when parents can essentially decide when they want to work, how they want to work, how much they want to work, and where they want to work. Now more than ever, go make it happen for yourselves. "

Related Articles

More From Forbes

Working parents are in crisis: new data and the 5 best responses.

• Share to Facebook
• Share to Twitter
• Share to Linkedin

Working parents are struggling.

The future of work doesn’t look good for working parents, and especially for working mothers. New data from multiple sources demonstrates working parents are concerned about their children, struggling with work-life and taking steps back in their careers. They are also especially stressed about global and national issues.

But among all the bad news, there are actions individuals, communities and employers can take to have constructive effects on working parents and tilt the balance back toward a positive work-life experience.

The Good News

It’s important to start with the fact that the news isn’t all bad—there are some glimmers of good news. In particular, according to a study by KinderCare , 69% of working parents feel they’ve been able to be more involved in their children’s lives because of more flexible work schedules. Hybrid work and greater autonomy about where, when and how people work has many benefits, and quality of life and time with family and children certainly top the list.

The Sobering News

But there is also a raft of negative impacts of the pandemic, the economy and the current conditions for working parents.

Parents Are Concerned About Their Kids

According to a study by the American Psychological Association (APA) , parents are concerned about their children based on the conditions created by the pandemic:

Best Travel Insurance Companies

Best covid-19 travel insurance plans.

• 73% worry about their children’s social life or development
• 71% worry about academic development
• 71% worry about emotional health and development
• 68% worry about cognitive development
• 65% worry about physical health and development

Parents Are Concerned About Childcare

The APA study found 72% of working parents were stressed based on disruptions and uncertainty about school and childcare schedules. In addition, the KinderCare research found 39% of working parents said finding quality chidcare was getting in the way of successfully navigating parenting.

Parents Are Concerned About Surrounding Conditions

And according to the research, parents are also more stressed than non-parents about other issues as well.

• 80% are concerned about money (compared to 58% for non-parents)
• 77% are concerned about the economy (compared to 59%)
• 72% are concerned about housing costs (compared to 39%)

Parents Are Enduring Rising Costs And Career Hits

Parents’ concerns about costs are well-founded as they are also experiencing increasing costs for child care. This is according to a report by LendingTree , which found parents have seen an average annual increase of 41% in childcare costs for center-based services. Families with children under five were hit the hardest in terms of cost increases. And parents in Hawaii have it worst, experiencing childcare which demands 29% of average wages.

The impact on working moms is especially great. According to a study by the to a Pew Research Center , working moms were significantly more likely to leave their jobs as a response to childcare challenges. In fact, about one third of working mothers have left their jobs since the start of the pandemic. This is according to Seramount .

Supporting families must be a priority.

The Best Responses

Given the number of parents who work (89.1% of families with children have one working parent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics), effective responses are critical. When parents are supported at work, it’s better for them, for families and for communities. But it’s also better for business, because people can bring their best effort when they’re supported in all aspects of their lives.

So what are the approaches to support working parents—on the part of communities and companies?

#1 - Provide Predictability

One of the best ways to support working moms and dads is to provide predictability in terms of schedules and work hours. A tough challenge for parents is when they can’t predict working hours, or when childcare or school hours are in flux. Predictability can be relatively easy to accomplish for businesses which provide work schedules and set clear expectations for when people need to be reporting for work. It can be a tougher challenge when daycares must close for health reasons or when bus schedules change based on a lack of available drivers.

But the takeaway message is clear: Create as much predictability as possible in terms of when, where and how people work and in terms of children’s schedules. When there are changes that must occur, provide as much notice as possible so parents have time to make backup plans.

#2 - Provide Choice and Control

Another classic way to reduce stress on anyone—working parents included—is to provide as much choice and control over schedules, benefits and work as possible. Multiple studies have demonstrated when people feel they can control their schedules, their routines and their life choices, they experience greater quality of life and less stress. They also report that they parent better. Again, this is good for individuals, families and communities, but it’s also advantageous for business—because people can be more effective at work when they feel more on top of the demands they face.

#3 - Provide Community

Another significant way to buffer stress, foster happiness and increase wellbeing is by creating the conditions for plenty of connection and community. People need the support of others—whether through a culture which fosters great teamwork or an employer which sets up effective mentorship programs. People benefit from affinity groups where they can share their challenges and experience listening ears, and they benefit from leaders who are empathetic and compassionate. Employers can take these kinds of steps, and employees can take the initiative to advocate for these kinds of programs as well.

#4 - Provide Childcare

Perhaps one of the most impactful ways employers can help with the parenting crisis is by providing childcare. In addition to the obvious benefits for parents, families and communities, employer-provided childcare can also positively impact attraction and retention. And the data proves this. The KinderCare study showed:

• 60% of working parents reported they would stay in their current jobs if they had subsidized child care
• 55% said they would take a pay cut to work for a company that provided quality childcare
• 81% of working parents said a company’s childcare benefits were a key criterion in the consideration of a job

In a related study by with Yahoo! Finance , 68% of working parents said they would be more likely to accept an offer from an employer that offers flexible scheduling for childcare needs, and 62% said they would be more likely to accept an offer when a monthly childcare stipend was on offer.

For companies considering childcare supports for parents, the business case is easy to make based on these data.

#5 - Ensure Equity

Overall, companies must—of course—create equity across all kinds of workers. Ironically, this means not providing greater benefits, flexibility or goodies to parents as compared to non-parents—a risk as companies seek to support parents.

In fact, a study by ResumeLab found non-parents sometimes feel discriminated against because they don’t get as much flexibility, vacation or control over their schedules. While companies seek to offer substantive and comprehensive support for parents, they are also wise to ensure they’re not overcorrecting and leaving out those who are not parents.

The pandemic has been hard on everyone—for sure, and communities will feel the effects for many years to come. But it has had disproportionately greater negative impacts on working parents and women.

As organizations consider their roles in lives, families and communities they are wise to adopt comprehensive support measures. Likewise, employees are empowered to initiate, advocate and create the conditions for themselves and colleagues to support the work-family experience.

Work is a fundamental way people contribute their talents and skills to the community and feel a sense of value and meaning. Likewise, parenting is one of the most precious and important roles people can fulfill—for themselves, their families and communities. Contributive justice demands people of every ilk have the supports they need to contribute fully—and support for working parents is one aspect of this requirement.

• Editorial Standards
• Reprints & Permissions

Join The Conversation

One Community. Many Voices. Create a free account to share your thoughts. 

Forbes Community Guidelines

Our community is about connecting people through open and thoughtful conversations. We want our readers to share their views and exchange ideas and facts in a safe space.

In order to do so, please follow the posting rules in our site's  Terms of Service.   We've summarized some of those key rules below. Simply put, keep it civil.

Your post will be rejected if we notice that it seems to contain:

• False or intentionally out-of-context or misleading information
• Insults, profanity, incoherent, obscene or inflammatory language or threats of any kind
• Attacks on the identity of other commenters or the article's author
• Content that otherwise violates our site's  terms.

User accounts will be blocked if we notice or believe that users are engaged in:

• Continuous attempts to re-post comments that have been previously moderated/rejected
• Racist, sexist, homophobic or other discriminatory comments
• Attempts or tactics that put the site security at risk
• Actions that otherwise violate our site's  terms.

So, how can you be a power user?

• Stay on topic and share your insights
• Feel free to be clear and thoughtful to get your point across
• ‘Like’ or ‘Dislike’ to show your point of view.
• Protect your community.
• Use the report tool to alert us when someone breaks the rules.

Thanks for reading our community guidelines. Please read the full list of posting rules found in our site's  Terms of Service.

Brasier Law

Oregon family law attorney, how will traveling for work effect custody.

May 23, 2017 by BrasierLaw

If you travel for work, it can create havoc for your custody and parenting plans. For the most part, a travel schedule doesn’t impact spousal support or property division.  It can impact, indirectly, your child support order only in how it might influence the number of overnights you are awarded with the children.  Overnights are a major factor in the state’s computation of child support .

However, for custody and parenting time , it really hurts your case in some ways. So how will traveling for work effect custody and parenting time ?

First, the question of custody is one where the judge can give custody to whichever parent will be best for the children to have custody.  In Oregon, the primary deciding factor is “who is the primary caregiver”.  This says nothing about financial care, but refers in Oregon to which parent can show that they typically are the one providing the day to day care for the children.  If you go to court, where the evidence shows that you are going to be traveling 30% of the year for work, you will have a very steep climb to prove to the judge that you are the primary caregiver.

Situations Are Unique, So Will Traveling for Work Effect Custody For Me?

This isn’t to say that you can’t win a custody case under if you travel for work, but it certainly can’t help such a case.  Everyone’s situation is unique, and the judge is supposed to consider all evidence that is relevant to the decision concerning what is best for your child.  For example, if you are out of town 4 nights a month, that might not matter much.  If you are out of town 22 nights a month, you will have a much harder time.

Also, there are many other factors, not just the primary caregiver assessment that the judge should consider.  It may be that you can put together a strong case on other grounds for being awarded custody.  Again, everyone’s situation is unique, the best way to know where you stand is to consult with an experienced family law attorney in your area.

Parenting time is a different situation that custody.  Parenting time is the actual day to day plan for when your children will visit with each of you.  Often one of the first questions on a judge’s mind when charged with deciding a parenting plan is “what is everyone’s work schedule?”.  The reason for this, is that Oregon wants to maximize time spent with parents.  Any time one parent is working, and the other isn’t, Oregon judges try to give time to the non working parent.

When one parent travels for work, they certainly can’t have much parenting time during those trips.  However, it can be a blessing in disguise sometimes, as your judge might be willing to give you extra time when you aren’t traveling to make up for the time missed while on the road.

Depending on when you travel, and how long each trip is, it can create havoc with arranging for a consistent schedule.  This is particularly true for parents who’s work trips are variable, and are likely to change at the last minute.  Judges will do the best they can to maximize your time with your children, but of course some situations are more delicate to balance than others.

Share this:

• Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Pocket (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Telegram (Opens in new window)
• Click to print (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on WhatsApp (Opens in new window)

• For Employers

Get Started

Read our newest research on the R.O.I. of Caregiving! Download the report here .

We're here for you.

Sign up for our newsletter here.

• for employers

Search by keyword or content type

How to Ace Work Travel as a Parent

We’re here for you.

Share your email, and we’ll share our world.

Work travel before kids may have felt exciting and glamorous. If work travel as a parent sounds like the exact opposite—you’re not alone.

As our world continues to become more global, work travel is a very real component to many careers. And that may not change just because you become a parent. But with the right tools and tips, you really can ace work travel as a parent. And maybe even enjoy it a little.

Kimberly Didrikson is the founder of Learning Motherhood , a platform that works to keep parents in the workforce by providing resources to employees and employers that allow parents to thrive both in their careers and at home.

“My goal is to help parents feel supported, heard, and empowered as they build their family and aspire to meet their career goals,” Didrikson told Vivvi. “And for many parents, that means traveling for work.”

Here are Didrikson’s most tried and true tips for nailing both parenting and traveling for work.

1. Make a plan.

Work travel means there will have to be some element of letting go, and for parents who find themselves in the Type A category, that can feel debilitating. That’s why Didrikson recommends making a plan for your work travel days. Putting a plan in place with your partner, co-parent or caregiver sets you and your child up for success. A work travel plan is not one-size-fits-all, but having an idea of what you want the time away to look like for your child and your home is helpful in setting expectations. “For employers and managers of caregivers, one of the most important things to consider when having these conversations with new parents is that this is their experience—so it’s crucial to listen to any concerns they are feeling about upcoming work travel.” Didrikson said. “Another thing to keep in mind in these conversations is that the make-up of every family has its own unique differences.” The plan that makes your family comfortable may look like: lunches and dinners prepped or ordered in advance and a set bedtime routine . Maybe you want to write a daily schedule in advance to help caregivers stay on track with your goals. Your plan is for your family, to help you be comfortable during your work travel—it can be whatever you need it to be.

2. Invest in dependable child care.

Part of your work travel plan should include dependable child care. Nothing will make your work travel life run more smoothly than good child care you can count on. Find out if your employer offers a child care benefit like backup care or care reimbursements through a company like Vivvi. Depending on your individual company’s benefit, you may even be able to access backup child care at your work destination, and travel with your little one in tow! (If your company doesn’t currently offer a child care benefit, this worksheet can help you figure out how to advocate for one.) If your company doesn’t offer a child care benefit, take time to line up trusted resources for while you’re away. Set clear expectations and leave emergency contact info easily accessible with any caregivers that will be with your child. And remember, even if you have a partner that can take on the lion’s share of caregiving, investing in child care support can ease the transition.

3. New, trusted caregivers are good for your child.

Whether you’ll be staying down the street for one night or are in another city for a week, one of the scariest things about being away from your child for work is the anxiety of whether things will be done exactly the way you wanted them. Spoiler: they won’t. And that’s okay. Welcoming new caregivers into your child’s world requires the acknowledgement that in your absence, other caregivers will do things differently than you—and that’s healthy for your child. “My biggest advice to parents who are going through this is the importance of allowing your children the opportunity to experience different ways to learn and experience other caregivers,” Didrikson said. “This is such a gift to your children to have them learn new ways to do things, and a huge gift to your partner, co-parent, family member, or child care provider to build a stronger bond with your child.”

4. Allow yourself time to reboot.

Yes, the guilt may creep in – but try to take this time away from your family for what it is: alone time. So often as parents we become touched out or mentally overloaded. Take this time on the road to read a book about something that has nothing to do with Peppa Pig or sleep a few minutes later than you might usually when you’re on morning duty with your child. “Taking care of your needs is an important box routinely to check in order to be the parent you want to be. We are a better employee, parent, spouse, and friend when we give ourselves the opportunity to practice our own self-care ,” Didrickson said. “I remember struggling with this thought process after our first child; however, it was a game changer once I understood I was a better mom and employee when I took care of my needs. Now my calendar is blocked off routinely to support the things that fill up my cup, and we make sure to model this for our children.”

5. Lean on other parents for support.

Work travel may be a must for your job. And maybe you even sort of like it. But it’s still okay to admit being away from your baby feels hard. Didrikson recommends sharing those feelings with your trusted circle or turning to other groups of parent work colleagues for support. If your employer has an Employee Resource Group for parents, this is a great time to ask for work travel tips or just some camaraderie from others who have been there. “Don’t ignore the feelings you are having around work travel. The best way to navigate what you are experiencing is to address it with your boss, employees, and your partner/co-parent or supported caregiver,” she said. “You need to feel good just as much as those around you. Your needs matter.”

More Parent Travel Pro-Trips:

• Think about what you can outsource. Consider investing in meal delivery or a cleaning service while you’re away if it fits the budget.
• Increase child care support before, during, and after to support caregiving responsibilities while gone.
• Encourage your caregiver to stick to daily routines for your child.
• Avoid tough goodbyes that can be unnecessarily upsetting for your child—and you.
• Prepare your child ahead of time by telling them what the goodbye will look like and don’t linger once it’s time to leave.
• Connect when you’re away. For long trips, set up scheduled times to video chat and or send postcards in the mail for older kids to enjoy.
• Make the time away special for your child. You may want to introduce “travel rules”, empowering your caregiver to create special playdates or field trips to a favorite spot. 
• Bring back a little gift.This does not have to be a giant teddy bear that says HOUSTON, TX on its t-shirt; it can even be something you pick up before you hit the road.

Experience the Vivvi™ difference for yourself.

Meet us online for a safe, smile filled open house.

We use cookies on our website to enhance site navigation, analyze site usage, enable advertising, and provide website functionality. To learn more about the cookies we use and how to amend your cookie settings, please read our Cookie Policy .

6 Tips for Parents Who Travel for Work

When you have children, traveling for business can be a real burden. Regardless of where you stand along the work-life balance equation, keeping your obligations to your career, your family, and yourself is extremely challenging. When you have small children, this is even harder. So what do you do when travelling for work is starting to negatively impact your family life? Here’s how to cope.

Share the details

Don’t avoid the topic of work travel with your children just because you know it might cause anxiety. Tell your family when you’re leaving, where you’re going, what you’ll be doing, and when you’re returning. Even better - plot these dates on a shared family calendar like Picniic where everyone can see. Let your kids know who will be looking after them and who will be there to help take care of them. The more questions you can answer, the better.Put your trip into context. Younger kids may not understand what August 15th means, so in our household, we explain return dates to my son in terms of number of “sleeps.” For example, if my trip or my wife’s is 3 days, we tell him that I—or my wife—will be back “after 3 sleeps.” Help your children understand where you’ll be by showing them photos or pointing to the location on a map or globe. My family has a map with a large pin that marks home. When explaining my travel destination, I’ll put a smaller pin on that city. This way, my son can have an idea of where I will be traveling to or how far, and even make connections if it’s a city we’ve travelled to before.

Schedule family time before the trip

Dedicating undivided attention to your family for a set period of time is better than giving them unfocused attention all the time. In other words, if you’re short on quantity, focus on quality.If I’m not careful, I can find myself running around the night before I leave picking up dry cleaning, grabbing toiletries at the drug store, and all the other errands that pile up so easily. When I’m not able to give my full attention to my son before I go, he can tell. The guilt I feel about those poorly spent last hours makes for long plane rides, so my wife and I have developed habits that help us avoid that. If you start a list a few weeks before you go of all the small things you need to do before you go, it will be easier to check them off. Even better, share your lists with your partner using a platform like Picniic so both of you can chip in on ticking off those little tasks. Block off family time on your calendar and commit to being fully present during it. Before a work trip—and especially if it’s a longer trip—my family likes to plan a fun activity for the weekend. It’s a great opportunity deepen our family connection and also leave on a positive note. Plus, getting outside and active with your family will make you feel more relaxed on your trip as well!

Maintain routines

With a parent missing from home, it’s important to keep everything else as close to normal as possible to minimize additional stress. Regardless of who will be looking after the kids, it’s a good idea to provide detailed instructions on bedtimes, dietary preferences, after-school schedules, and other necessary info to minimize disruptions to your child’s routine.Your absence, though temporary, is a big change to your child’s day-to-day life. Help them adjust faster by keeping everything else constant

During your trip, try to touch base with your child and caregiver every day. Daily chats will allow your child to hear your voice and gives everyone time to share their day and discuss any concerns.My wife and I always try to Facetime with the kids everyday, with the exception of when it’s too close to bedtime. During those days, we prefer to leave them to their nighttime routines and allow them to settle down. Even then, it’s important to be in constant communication with your spouse or caregiver. If the travelling parent and the parent at home are on the same page about how to handle communication, it will make everyone’s experience smoother.

Keep in mind too that sometimes kids get upset when they miss you, especially little ones. This is natural and part of growing up. If you’re worried that a call might bring a bout of tears from your child, check in with your partner first. Touching base with them to see whether it’s a good idea to chat will make all of your lives, including your kid’s, a little bit easier. Hopefully tears are just a phase that will pass, but being cognizant that a phone call can be upsetting is a way to save some heartache for everyone. And if a phone call home goes sideways, don’t beat yourself up about it. It can be easy to dwell in guilt when you’re away from home, but it can’t be helped. It goes the other way too! Sometimes my son is way more interested in watching PJ Masks than Facetiming with me. Now, admittedly, that stings a bit. But ultimately I’m much happier knowing that my son is relaxed and happy than getting a full chat with him each night that gets him worked up about missing me. Don’t let your ego get in the way of what’s really important

Plan your arrival

If you’re anything like me, you’re absolutely exhausted when you get home. After a busy week of travel and meetings, I really need some time to kick off my shoes and relax before I can take on anything more. My wife and I have developed a routine where we will always try to take the kids out when the other is returning home. That way we’re always able to take a quiet, restorative shower, sit back, and maybe even sneak in a nap before it’s back to our busy family routine. By taking care of this up front, I feel great knowing that I’m properly able to show my family just how excited I am to see them again. It’s also very, maybe even more, difficult to be the parent that stays home. It’s tough work managing a household solo, and your partner may have had a tough couple of days. Try to be considerate of this when you return. The more you can pitch in, the better everyone will feel about work trips.What works, and what doesn’t work, will be different for every family. My wife and I have struck on a formula that works for us, but that didn’t happen right away. The first few trips I took after becoming a father were challenging for all of us. But, we made sure to take a note of what worked for us and tried to replicate these little things for the next trip. If you stick with it, you’ll be able to find a rhythm of your own and soon work trips will be a breeze!

6 Ways My Family Made Me a More Successful Entrepreneur

Family Men Like Me Can Be Entrepreneurs Too

Fostering Your Children's Entrepreneurial Spirit

An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

• Publications
• Account settings

Preview improvements coming to the PMC website in October 2024. Learn More or Try it out now .

• Advanced Search
• Journal List
• HHS Author Manuscripts

Children’s Experiences of Time when a Parent Travels for Work

Anisa zvonkovic.

Professor and Department Head of Human Development, Virginia Tech

Andrea Swenson

Assistant Professor of Human Development and Family Studies, University of Wisconsin – Stout

Zoë Cornwell

Doctoral Candidate in Human Development, Virginia Tech

This qualitative study focuses on different ways time is experienced by children in families who face time challenges due to a family member’s job that required work travel. Data are from a family-level study that includes interviews of all family members over the age of 7. Using grounded theory methodology, this study illustrates ways in which job demands and family processes interact. Analysis centers on the 75 children’s perspectives from 43 families. Holding together assessments of having enough time while wanting more time with their parents, children express emotion, generally unrecognized by parents, around the topic of family time. Children’s experience of time with parents is rushed or calm, depending on the activities done in time and the gender of the parent with whom they spend time. Findings are interpreted through a feminist social constructionist lens.

Everyday lived experience is important for what it reveals about family life ( Daly, 1996 ; 2001 ; Ochs & Kremer-Sedlik, 2013 ). This study focuses on how family members experience time and has, at its nucleus, children’s experiences of time. Children’s voices provide a refreshing and unique view of family life, especially when connected with the viewpoints of their parents ( Clark, 2011 ). There is little qualitative work on children’s experiences with family life in general, much less related to parental work, an important gap to address ( Clark, 2011 ; Gibson, 2012 ). The bidirectionality of the parent/child relationship has been widely accepted in child development and family studies literature ( Harach & Kuczynski, 2005 ; Maccoby, 1992 ), yet little work examines how children feel about time with parents and family time, beyond parents’ perceptions and worries ( Daly, 2001 ; Galinsky, 1999 ). Incorporating multiple points of view about time from within the family are challenging but necessary steps in understanding time in families.

The larger literature on work and family life documents that North Americans today perceive a time crunch or speed-up (e.g., Jacobs & Gerson, 2004 ). This project sampled families who were highly likely to experience time challenges ( Jeong, Zvonkovic, & Acock, 2013 ), families who have at least one parent who travelled frequently for work. While there is a literature on the consequences of high work hours and high job demands in general (Bakker & Demerouti, 2007; Bakker & Geurts, 2004; Hochschild, 1997 ; Voydanoff, 2005; Wharton & Blair-Loy, 2006), there have been few studies of work travel and its impact on individuals and families. Recent research on workers’ feelings about their jobs since the recession indicates that workers perceive that their jobs are unstable and they therefore are likely to acquiesce to high work demands, including travel, in order to present themselves as dedicated workers ( Zvonkovic, Lee, Brooks-Hurst, & Lee, 2014 ; Pugh, 2015 ). This study adds to the growing need to understand how work demands impact families by assessing the experience of time within families with children; exploring not only how children experience time, but also how children’s experiences of time converges or contrasts with other family members using a grounded theory methodology from qualitative interviews with children and parents, discussing how they make meaning of their time with each other. Families who experience work-related travel were chosen for this study, because the intermittent coming and going from the household has the potential to evoke nuanced thoughts regarding family time.

Time Pressures for Today’s Families

Family members’ backgrounds, expectations, and experiences get played out in time , inclusive of both long spans of time as well as daily events. Mattingly and Sayer (2006) demonstrated how gender differences in feeling pressed for time operate for married couples, as they articulated the connection between objective free time and the perception of time pressure, such that women’s time pressure increased significantly over time, but men’s did not. In addition, more free time reduced men’s, but not women’s, perceptions of feeling rushed. One study of how upper-middle-class children experience time, from the vantage point of nannies, illuminated that there can be different views of how much interaction time with parents occurs and how important spending time with their children is to be a good parent ( Brown, 2011 ).

Bianchi, Robinson, and Milkie (2007) made the point that, although parents increasingly feel the pressure to devote more time resources to children, parents are in fact directing more time, resources, and attention toward their children than thirty years ago. Especially among parents with higher socioeconomic status, parents have been found to provide more resources, on average, to a child during childhood and adolescence than parents in lower socioeconomic conditions ( Fingerman, Kim, Davis, Furstenberg, Birditt, & Zarit, 2015 ). When interviewing middle-class children directly, Galinsky (1999) reported that they rarely stated that they wanted more time with their parents. Instead, they wished for more money and for their parents to be less stressed. It is possible that the stress children observed resulted from what leisure studies scholars Robinson and Godbey (1997) termed “time deepening” by parents. Robinson and Godbey probed the effects of high work hours on free time among parents and documented the phenomenon of “time deepening” (or multi-tasking) when adults are at home. Sayer (2007) further examined this phenomenon and found that dual-earner parents spend more than 30 hours a week multi-tasking. In a qualitative study on middle- and upper-middle class parents, Snyder (2007) identified the most prevalent type of definition of quality time focused on structured planning for specific activities, with the next prevalent type being child-centered, focused on the communication that occurs when parents are accessible to their children. No matter which type of construction of quality time parents espoused, they experienced problems with getting enough quality time with their children.

Scholars and social critics have called attention to the high number of activities outside of school in which children, especially middle-class ones, are involved ( Arendell, 2001 ; Darrah, Freeman, & English-Lueck, 2007 ; Lareau, 2003 ). Not only does children’s involvement in these activities present a time demand, it also adds a layer of work for parents who arrange transportation and manage the schedule as well as a potential overlay of stress-related symptoms in children (e.g. attention-deficit, psychosomatic symptoms, and other) ( Arendell, 2001 ; Garey, 1999 ; Hochschild, 1989 ; Ochs & Kremer-Sadlik, 2013 ). Mothers, more so than fathers, have been found to be responsible for organizing and carrying out such labor ( Craig, 2006 ), which seems particularly prevalent among the middle-class who appear intent on the concerted cultivation of children in order to provide them with the best chance for academic and career success over time ( Hill, Tranby, Kelly, & Moen, 2013 ; Lareau, 2003 ). The term “helicopter parenting” refers to parents’ intensive involvement in their children’s lives, including participation in organized and structured activities of children, starting in young childhood and continuing throughout emerging adulthood ( Fingerman, Cheng, Wesselmann, Zarit, Furstenburg, & Birditt, 2012 ; Nelson, 2010 ). While optimal levels of involvement are a matter of some debate, what appears clear is that the level of involvement has increased and that interactive time with children is different than simply being in the presence of their children and providing care without interaction ( Crosnoe & Cavanaugh, 2010 ; Milkie, Kendig, Nomaguchi, & Denny, 2010 ; Milkie, Nomaguchi & Denny, 2015 ; Offer, 2013 ).

Work travel literature in studies examining Scandinavia and the United States indicated that close to one-third of full time workers traveled for work ( Casinowsky, 2013 ; Lassen, 2006 ). There is evidence that jobs requiring work travel have increased in prevalence and has broadened in the types of workers affected ( Casinowsky, 2013 ). Further, there are hints that the gender of the traveling parent makes a difference. In a study by Westman and Etzion (2002) , women whose jobs required travel sometimes experienced a sense of respite, suggesting the importance of understanding the experience of work travel by situating men and women in a frame of family responsibilities for household labor and child care ( Bianchi, 2011 ; Bianchi, Milkie, Sayer, & Robinson, 2012 ; Davis & Greenstein, 2004 ; Greenstein, 2000 ; Nomaguchi & Milkie, 2003 ; Sayer, Bianchi, & Robinson, 2004 ) along with their work responsibilities. While children’s perspectives have not been gathered and the dominant form of data collection has been from the workers only, a series of studies of World Bank employees established that frequent work travel was associated with poor health among workers and also among their families (e.g., more visits to health professionals) ( Liese, Mundt, Dell, & Demure, 1997 ).

The pace of family life today suggests that work travel, along with other job demands, finds family members in a potentially vulnerable situation, as adults in the family are faced with work demands that occur at the same time as intensive parenthood norms (reflected in children’s high involvement in activities) ( Blair-Loy, 2005 ; Daly, 2001 ; Hochschild, 1997 ; Pugh, 2015 ). Parents make decisions about how they manage and spend family time ( Darrah et al., 2007 ). Studies of parents’ experiences of time, some of which they control, have revealed strains ( Daly, 2001 : Hochschild, 1997 ; Pugh, 2015 ). Children’s perspectives on time provide unique insights on intrafamilial processes, from the viewpoint of family members who are less able to control family time.

Theoretical Underpinning

The broad theoretical underpinning of this work is the social constructionist branch of symbolic interactionism. Daly (1996) applied this theoretical perspective to the concept of family construction of time, by undergirding his inquiry with Durkheim’s 1915 assertion that time could be something other than objective: “What the category of time expressed is the time common to the group, a social time, so to speak.” (p. 15). More recently, Stephen Marks’ (2009) expansionist model suggested that our experience of time aligns with commitment and enjoyment in roles or activities associated with roles. Linking the experience of time with identities and roles related to work and family life is a symbolic interactionism project. Time is regarded as socially constructed, relatively elastic, and in interplay among each individual and their environment ( Daly, 1996 ). Furthermore, each family member’s experience of time may be different, grounded in their own identities and roles, expectations, and the larger social demands impinging upon them.

This project forefronts children’s experiences of time and compares these experiences to parents’ experiences. Our inquiry aims to be in the tradition of Barrie Thorne (2001) , a feminist scholar who started her inquiry with a focus on children’s experiences from their own perspectives, rather than filtered through their parents. Toward this focus, she carried out an ethnographic study in which she presented the concept of “child time” which was relational and communication based, and she contrasted that with “adult time” which was regulated by the clock and often resulted in conflicts and emotional upset for children who were pushed to modify their views of time to be in line with adult time – during drop-off and pick-up time at a preschool. Similarly, we aim to examine family members’ experiences of time in families as we include children who are old enough to talk in an interview setting about family time and their time with parents. With a keen feminist interest in juxtaposing different family members’ perspectives and attending to the power dynamics inherent in family relationships ( Walker, Allen, & Connidis, 2005 ), we focus on children’s voices but incorporate the viewpoints of their parents as we attempt to understand the experience of family time.

We apply a feminist social constructionist perspective insomuch as we recognize and seek to understand the gendered and generational nature of the experience of time at work and in families. It stands to reason that family members may differ in their experience of time to the extent that they are trying to accomplish different activities within time (e.g., we apply a feminist critical lens to the findings from the literature on household labor and child care that continue to document differences in time use and responsibilities between fathers and mothers; Bianchi et al., 2012 ; Mattingly & Bianchi, 2006 ). Work exerts structural influences (such as travel) into how adults might perceive their time and how their time might be negotiated and valued within their families ( Daly, 1996 ; 2001 ; Tubbs, Roy, & Burton, 2005 ). Also consistent with feminist perspectives, we validate children’s voices and their perspectives which tend to be muted in the literature on work and family, in line with the growing recognition of children as active participants in their lives ( Neale & Flowerdew, 2003 ). In this inquiry, we examine gendered and generational experiences of time by utilizing a grounded theory methodology that centers on school-aged children’s perspectives of family time while incorporating parents’ perspectives.

Research Questions

The overarching objective of the paper is to shed light on how middle-class families with a common work demand experience time by drawing from interviews we conducted with family members over the age of seven years old. We interviewed family members separately. In this situation, our general research question is: How do children and their family members experience time? We anticipate different perspectives and experiences within families. Specifically, we consider children’s perspectives and parents’ perspectives from the same families regarding the amount of time they share, their emotions related to how they experience time with each other, and the ways they experience time (including what they do in their time and how they feel about its pace).

In our grounded theory inquiry, we seek to reveal processes that link the within-family perspectives on time and, in line with feminist social constructionist frameworks, we consider different structural and other aspects within and between families that might contribute to similar and divergent perspectives. Our grounded theory analysis resulted in three themes that connect the experience and activities in time to the way children and parents feel about time.

This paper uses data from the Work-Related Travel: Effects of Families and Health research project. This multi-method project assesses the experience of work travel in families in which at least one member frequently travels for work, defined as at least 20 nights per year. This study utilizes the component of the project in which we engaged in qualitative interviews of all family members in the household over the age of 7 years. Interviews were transcribed verbatim and imported into MAXQDA 2007 ( Kuckartz, 2007 ) for analysis.

The sampling strategy was to be representative of the occupations and industries of frequent work travelers in the National Study of the Changing Workforce ( Families and Work Institute, 2008 ) and MIDUS data set ( Brim, Baltes, Bumpass, et al., 1995–1996 ). It must be noted that the families in this study were generally of middle-class socioeconomic status. See Table 1 for more information regarding the breakdown of occupation and industry in the current sample. To be eligible for the study, families were required to have one adult who frequently traveled overnight for work, in the same job for at least one year, and partnered or married for at least one year. Participants were recruited from the worksites of the frequent traveler, job fairs, and other mechanisms, to identify frequent work travelers (including having them identify others for participation). When a potential participant was identified, they were directed to an online preliminary survey to assure eligibility according to our criteria. Everyone who completed the online survey was eligible, and reachable by phone was interviewed. A total of 100 families were recruited and participated in the project. All families were interviewed in their home.

Sample Characteristics

The current study used a subsample of the families we interviewed with children in the target age range for the qualitative interviews: 75 children (between the ages of 7–18 who lived with a parent whose job required travel) from 43 families. The 43 families resulted in a total sample size of 161 individuals (86 parents and 75 children). Of the 43 families, 22.7% were families in which both parents identified as traveling frequently for work. The father was the only or most frequent work-traveler in 63.6% of the families, leaving 13.7% of families with mothers and not fathers who traveled. Over 72% of parents had earned at least a Bachelor’s degree and 36.4% had a yearly household income of $120,001 or above (median income category = $110,001–120,000). There were six parents (7% of sample), who reported not working for pay. The sample was primarily white, non-Latino (85.9%). Children over the age of seven have been described as able to participate productively in interviews ( Garbarino & Stott, 1992 ; Irwin & Johnson, 2005 ). The average age of children in the study was 12.13 years old ( SD = 3.00), with 51.3% being female. Table 1 presents means for the travel variables, as well as children and parent ages and family size.

Study Procedures

Families were interviewed using semi-structured interviews in their homes by a research team that included one interviewer for each adult and separate interviewers for children in the family. Children were interviewed individually and provided information about their relationships with family members, their school activities, and their feelings about parents’ travel and parents’ work. Interviewers underwent an extensive training process in the mechanics and style of interviewing adults and children, including role play, training interviews, observation, listening to recorded interviews, and continuous improvement (see Garbarino & Stott, 1992 ; Gibson, 2012 ). Written and verbal consent and assent were obtained at the time of the interview with both children and parents present. Family orientation to the project and individual interviews took approximately two hours. Adult interviews lasted approximately an hour, while child interviews averaged 30 minutes. The multi-method project included self-report standardized questionnaires and a daily diary component in which each child and adult in the household was provided with their own Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) onto which was loaded a daily behavioral self-report questionnaire (these components of the data collection are not addressed in the current paper).

Demographic information such as age and gender of child, family size, which parent(s) traveled for work, and their travel schedule, were drawn from the qualitative data and were included with the transcript information. All family members were given pseudonyms (for ease of connecting family members’ interviews, all pseudonyms within each family started with the same letter of the alphabet). All participants from a family were compensated $50.00 each for their participation. All methods were approved by Institutional Review Boards.

The procedures of the children’s interviews were informed by child development knowledge and experience. Consistent with practices in child development, trust and rapport was established by contact being at the family level, in the family home, before the interviewer and the child began their private conversation ( Eder & Fingerson, 2002 ; Gibson, 2012 ). Throughout the child interviews, interviewers were vigilant for signs that the child was getting tired or bored with the interview. Activities including physical activity, responding to questions by the use of figures on laminated boards, sorting cards, and other materials were used as adaptations ( Garbarino & Stott, 1992 ). All child interviewers had extensive experience in working with children in other settings. Specific questions asked of each child were designed to be parallel to the questions posed of parents and were also drawn from Galinsky’s (1999) book, Ask the Children . These questions included: what would you wish for your mom (asked separately for dad): to have more time, be less stressed, have more money, or to be less tired. Interviewers probed for explanations to what children answered. Further, children were asked about time with each parent (the amount and whether it was rushed or calm) ( Galinsky, 1999 ), to explain why and give an example. Children were asked what the best and worst things are about each parent who traveled, specifically probing for feelings. Identifying feelings was added through the use of a graphic with faces representing a range of emotions (e.g., happy, sad, great, lousy).

Parents were asked parallel questions about the calmest and most rushed time of the day, and were probed for detail about those times. They were also asked about the general pace of their family life, including how much they would like to change the amount of time they had with family, along with other questions ( Daly, 1996 ; 2001 ). Parents were asked how travel influenced family, including probes for emotions, parallel to the child interviews. Interviewers were trained to probe for detail and feelings, as well as to gauge children’s understanding of the vocabulary used ( Feldman, 2011 ).

Data Analytic Process

Interviews were digitally recorded, transcribed, and then imported into the MAXQDA qualitative data analysis software program. The file of one child interview was, unfortunately, corrupted and hence rendered unusable. Using grounded theory methodology, the research team read over interviews. Using initial coding as an entry point into the data ( Charmaz, 2006 ), profiles summarizing the initial coding of each interview from each child and parent were developed, which were then abstracted into detailed face sheets for each entire family. This process allowed us to summarize large amounts of information, and made commonalities between members of a family more clear (for example, the Atkins family in which the mother, Ann, said her time with family was rushed because “I’m trying to get home, get supper ready so that everybody can do their activities in the evening,” and her daughter, Amy, age 17 said time with mother is rushed because, “Normally I come home from school, practice about 6, and she has to fix supper and go do a report…”). Looking for how children and family members experience time using constant comparative methods within each family and across families ( Glaser & Strauss, 2009 ), the research team arrived at a total of 20 subcategories that fit within 5 categories (see Table 2 for a list of categories and subcategories). The 5 categories matched up well with sensitizing concepts from the literature and theory ( Blumer, 1954 ; Bowen, 2006 ). For example, our category of “never enough time” matches closely to the theme of “chronic under-supply” of time for families uncovered by Daly (2001 , p. 289).

Code System for Families’ Experience of Time

Each transcript was then analyzed using focused coding ( Charmaz, 2006 ) by two researchers to ensure consistency and refine categories and subcategories. All coders met to discuss coding and reach consensus. For example, there were times when one coder coded into the subcategory of “family activities: structured”, but the other coder coded “family activities: unstructured”; both codes fit within the same overarching category; such as for this quote from Tessa Thompson, age 13, “Sometimes when we come home, they’re arguing…So we just kinda have to sit in our rooms basically until everything gets better.” The coders meet and discussed why each one coded the segment they did and reached an agreement; in this case family activities: unstructured. Agreed-upon codes were entered into MAXQDA 2007 ( Kuckartz, 2007 ). As a result of the large quantity of data and the nested nature of the data (160 transcripts nested in 43 families; Humble, 2012), the decision was made to use a qualitative data analysis software program, MAXQDA. A total of 6,075 coded segments were identified. The use of the software program was limited to grouping codes by categories for refinement, identifying patterns of codes within individuals and families, and locating codes within transcripts (at individual and family levels).

The next step (axial coding) analyzed these categories assessing patterns in how categories and subcategories varied and for themes to emerge ( LaRossa, 2005 ; Corbin & Strauss, 2008 ). Analysis was aided by the judicious use of charts, grouping together children within families by what they wished for in terms of their parents (e.g., time, less stress), their perspectives about whether they have enough time with each parent, and about whether the time is rushed. These charts incorporated demographic and structural information about families. For example, we used charts in which families with different numbers of children and families who had children only school-aged versus families who had school-aged and younger children were compared, so that we could discern that such information did not make a difference in how time was perceived (for example, regarding age of children in the household, families with children who participated in the study who also had children under 8 years old did not discuss being more rushed for time than families without younger children).

Preliminary theme development was assisted by theoretical coding and theorizing ( Charmaz, 2006 ). To facilitate theoretical coding, we constructed charts and examined codes in MAXQDA to explicitly examine and probe the emerging themes by examining the coded texts and how codes related to each other. These later sets of charts allowed for establishing connections and clear comparison within families, as well as between different families, and for analyzing how salient different issues were for each family member, in their own words. These charts ensured the inclusion of the voices of all members within families as well as all families. From the use of charts, we examined different possibilities on how categories related to each other in the data. For example, we examined how structured activities compared and contrasted to unstructured activities using what individuals said regarding rushed and calm time.

We also examined the face sheets of individuals and families to identify families that had particular patterns of similar and divergent perspectives, and we re-analyzed entire transcripts of individuals within families that related to different combinations of experiences and codes (such as emotions). In order to gain a family perspective, we first examined the categories that children and parents within the same household used when describing their time (i.e. very rushed, somewhat rushed, somewhat calm, and very calm) and then we examined what they said in their individual interviews, profiling families based on the match and mismatch of their responses. Responses related to the pace of time at the family level were analyzed in order to understand the similar and different perspectives of family members on how their time was experienced. For example, we would examine what Seth Smith, age 9, said regarding calm time with his father as “whenever my dad and I are hanging out, you know, just son and father. We sometimes go to the batting cages or play catch with the football” which was coded as calm and unstructured family activities. We would compare Seth’s statement to what the father, Steve Smith, age 48, said in response to a similar question: “The kids have homework. They go to either a tutor or they go to twirling or baseball practice or ballet. The kids have a lot of stuff going on” which was coded as rushed and structured child activities. From a constructivist grounded theory perspective, consistent with our theoretical perspective, we are focusing on how families experience time and why they experience time the way they do ( Charmaz, 2006 , p. 130). The activities of examining charts, face sheets, and re-reading transcripts enabled us to analyze from the individual coded segments to theoretical concepts while focusing on the experiences of the families ( Charmaz, 2006 , p. 135). From this examination, the themes presented in the results emerged.

Analysis centered on the guiding research question of how children and their parents experience time: how they perceived the amount and pace of time together, how emotions were tied to time experienced together and apart, and how they described the activities done in their time together. The results are organized in order to present a portrait of overall family life from children’s points of view by highlighting three emergent themes regarding how family members experience time at a family level. Three themes emerged: (a) “We Have Enough Time and We Want More Time” in which children constructed narratives in such a way that they hold together wanting more time while professing they have enough time with family; (b) “I’m Lonely, I’m Sad, I’m Excited My Parent’s Back” in which children expressed emotions about time with parents while parents seldom expressed their own emotions or recognized emotions of their children; and (c) “Sprinting or Chilling through Time” in which it is revealed that children narrated their experience of time with parents (especially fathers) as calm while parents (especially mothers) actively worked on creating an experience of time in families, such that they (in particular mothers) rarely felt calm. These themes build on the experiences family members described. The first theme reflects how children talked about their experience of time with their parents, while the second theme expands the previous theme to examine the emotional implications of the experience of time within families. The final theme analyzes specific activities and how children and parents considered the quality of time to help explain why family members experienced time in different ways. Within the presentation of the results, theory is used to interpret the findings.

We Have Enough Time AND We Want More Time

One of the findings revealed by our analytic process was that children and adolescents tended to respond that they have “just enough” time with each parent. That is, 59 children (out of the 74) said “just enough” when asked to choose a category to describe their time with their mother, and 43 said “just enough” about their time with father. However, following this declaration, and throughout the rest of the interview, they provided little supporting evidence or elaboration of how they have enough time, even with probes and requests for examples. Rather than discussing having enough time as would seem evident from the responses to the first question, the focus of children’s stories about their experiences was on not having enough time with their parents.

When children’s experiences focused on not having enough time with their parents, two explanations emerged. The first and most frequent explanation was that children were not having enough time with their parents as a result of the general unavailability of their parents, as could be seen from children’s interviews and from a family-level analysis. This lack of time was perceived as a result of parents’ travel, long work hours, a “mismatch” between their parents’ schedules and their schedules (particularly with after school activities), and a belief that they could not interrupt their parents when they were busy. For example, Willa Williams, age 10, (all family members were given pseudonyms with first and last names beginning with the same letter of the alphabet) whose father has been a long-haul trucker for 15 years and the primary traveler, described her time with her dad as impeded by work and travel: “We don’t get to see him very often, and when he does come, he’s here for maybe a day, and that’s usually in the afternoon, so we don’t get a full day with him.” The “long arm of the job” and the demands that jobs placed on their parents were forefront on children’s minds, reflecting the 24/7 work pace and culture today. These forces illuminated the precarious position of children (family members who do not earn income) and the value ascribed to those with the most income earning potential as socialist feminist theories would suggest.

In addition to children mentioning not having enough time because their parent was not available, they discussed wanting more time with their parents when parental time was not otherwise engaged with activities. They described a general desire for interaction with their parents as well as mentioning specific activities they would like to do with their parents. Some children noted that they thought their dad was only home for a short time and then had to leave again, some said that they thought dad did not even really live with them, and that their home did not seem right when dad was at home rather than traveling. For example, Renee Robl, age 8, reported that time with her traveler dad Rick, a regional manager for a food sales company, was somewhat rushed and she wished for more time with her dad because “most of the time he goes out of town and everything…because he travels a lot.” The father appeared to have an accurate idea of his daughter’s perspective, saying: “If you talk to the girls, I work all the time” (Rick, age 42). While he understood his daughter’s perspectives, he talked about staying home and avoiding going out with friends (“hanging out”) when he was not on a trip.

Few children linked not having enough time with their sense of the quality of their relationships with their parents. When children did discuss this link, they reported that even though they did not get to spend as much time together as they would like, they still had a good relationship, and that having more time together would strengthen their relationship (for example, by being able to talk more). For example, Anthony Andrews, age 13, whose father was a senior director for a business development technology firm, talked about the amount of time he had with his dad even though he was framing his declaration of a good relationship with his father: “During the week and on the weekend, I know it’s not his fault, but I feel like I have too little and try to make every minute count and what we do is fun.” Abner, the father, mentioned that he thought “Anthony is at an age where he needs me around more…” He mentioned that Anthony and his mother clashed a lot when he was not around. Travel has been a part of this family’s life since Anthony was born, and Anthony has 2 younger sisters. There was a sense of wistfulness in his description and the answers provided by other children. In the Ulrich family, in which the father traveled for work as an anesthesiologist, daughter Uma, age 12, elaborated: “We never spend, I mean, we very rarely spend time with each other, and it would be nice to have more time for him to, to just spend with him or things at my school and who my friends are…” In responding to what spending more time together would look like and how not spending time together affected her, Uma elaborated: “We’d get along a lot better. We fight a lot…It kinda makes me sad ‘cause, because, like when my friends start to talk to me about their dad, I can’t say anything back.” Her father, the family’s primary traveler who stated that he gave up most of his free time for his work-related activities and that he worked to arrange his travel schedule on weekends to accommodate their weekday schedules, when asked about schedules and spending time together as a family, identified dinnertime: “And, maybe a little bit in the evening, Unis, Uma, and I will watch TV together or something. Uma and I [spending time together]? Pfff…not very often.”

Juxtaposing answers to a fixed question about their time with parents with the narrative information children provided revealed the meaning children make of time with parents, and the construction of meaning related to family time more broadly, a point on which we elaborate later ( Daly, 1996 ; 2001 ; Nelson, 2010 ). Differences in children’s perspectives on time with each parent were uncovered, with far more children talking about insufficient time with their fathers than their mothers, in part a reflection of the fact that men were perceived to be main breadwinners (though many women in the sample were also breadwinners), as well as a reflection of gendered parenting ( Bianchi et al., 2007 ; Coltrane, 2010 ). We note as well the power some fathers appeared to exercise about how they spent their time with their children, a point we extend in the final theme that concerns family activities and pace of time.

I’m Lonely, I’m Sad, I’m Excited My Parent’s Back

Both the children and their parents were asked specifically for feelings regarding how the work experience of travel and the coming and going of a parent influenced family life. Most children identified feelings associated with not having time with their parents and how they felt related to their parents’ comings and goings. Family time was different when the parent who traveled was not home. For example, children reported that family life was too quiet so that they were lonely without one parent at home; other children reported that family life was rushed or even chaotic without both parents to manage household and child activities, so the children felt overwrought or anxious. In the Hamlin family, a blended family with five children in which both parents traveled (Helyne working for an auto auction company and Howard working as a retail supervisor and a sport referee), the 13 year old daughter, Heaven, said, “I just wish she didn’t travel sometimes, cause I just feel like, ‘Man, it’s like so boring around here.’ “Cause she usually brings up action (laughs).”

Rarely did a child talk about the ways their parents attempted to alleviate feelings of boredom or anxiety. Anthony Andrews, age 13, said his mother, who volunteered at a school two days a week, worked to construct positive emotions during times when his father was traveling as a Senior Director of Business Development for a technology company. “She tries to minimize the amount of time that we are alone at home doing stuff that is not that fun while my dad is not here.” During his interview, he also mentioned his mother’s guilt relying on someone else to care for him, “We used to have a babysitter that my sister loved, but my mom feels guilty calling her all the time.” Though his mother’s interview gave little indication of this effort or her feeling of guilt, it is noteworthy that her son presented a picture of their family time when the dad was away as trying to fill gaps and keep them positively entertained. Children revealed how parents constructed the experience of time through the recognition on how the experience of family changed when one parent left the physical interaction of the family.

Children also reported feelings of sadness and missing their parent when parents were not home. “I get really sad and sometimes I get really angry and I start crying.” (Fabian Fry, age 10). Although central to the experience of time apart from parents by children, missing and feeling sad regarding family time was not only related to travel. Parents working late hours or being unavailable for interaction also prompted negative emotions. In the Graves family, the mother, who was 37 and director of global accounts for a company, was the frequent work traveler. The rest of the family includes a father, who was an operations manager, and two children, one of whom was a preschooler, and the other was Gwen, age 9. Gwen described her feelings about the unavailability of her mother by saying: “It sort of makes me feel—Sometimes she’ll ask for a few more minutes [when she attempted to get her mother’s attention away from her work computer] and then say it again and again. I feel like she doesn’t love the time with me.” Getting parents’ attention away from their computer was mentioned by several children and admitted as a problem by a few fathers.

Finally, children expressed concern and worry when parents were traveling. Children mentioned being concerned for their parent’s safety during travel. Children centered their concerns on the safety of either the traveling parent or the parent who remained at home. Priscilla Potter, age 8, whose mother traveled internationally for work in a technology company, explained: “We are really sad when she goes, and each night we pray that she’s safe on her airplane and she comes and arrives safely.” Nisha Norris, age 11, described how her mother, Natalie, a stay at home mother, age 31, did not feel safe without her dad, Nathaniel age 32 who traveled for his job as a mechanical engineer: “She put her blow-up bed in her room, because she doesn’t feel safe without Dad. She wants us to sleep with her and she puts a green pot in a chair under the door (laughs) so no one can get in. I think it makes Mom feel safer to have someone in the room with her. I’m sure it makes my brothers [age 9 and 6] feel safer too. It’s fun.” Other children talked about taking care to close draperies, lock doors, and some spoke of co-sleeping while a father was on a trip. Feelings regarding safety were echoed in the reunion experiences of children. Zane Zeneberg, age 12, said, “It makes me feel a whole lot better to know that he’s safe at home.”

Children mentioned feeling relieved, happy, and excited when a traveling parent returned. Curtis Carver, age 14, explained that things were exciting when mom returned from a trip because “I’m happy to see her.” Positive emotions surrounding returning from a business trip were echoed in the responses of parents. Parents mentioned “I just want to be back.” However, distinct from children, parents’ reasons for wanting to return from a trip were grounded in responses related to the stress and work associated with travel. This stress accumulation was echoed in children’s reports on what parents did when they returned. Zack Zeneberg, age 17, whose father was a long haul cattle driver, said, “He still does everything with us, but whenever we are home, all he does is sleep. He goes to our games, and he goes to the grocery store and all that stuff, but he just sleeps when we are home.”

Children provided several varied emotional responses to family time, in contrast to parents, who rarely described emotional responses or feelings related to family time. When parents did acknowledge emotions, it was about an emotion experienced by a child, such as “the kids miss him when he travels” or “the kids miss me.” More often, the parents reflected that travel did not bother the children because the children were used to the travel experience or children were at a developmental stage in which they no longer wished to spend time with their parents anyway. Congruent with this notion is that, when emotion was connected to children by parents and when parents reported an emotional response, it was connected to having younger children in the household.

Whereas children discussed missing parents, parents discussed missing events. The only time they said they “missed” things was “missing out on child activities” not emotion, which is interesting in light of the parents’ focus on structured activities. Parents with children who were, for example, seniors in high school, did talk about missing activities of senior year (in a sense, they were referring to their child’s developmental life course and the notion that their child would only have one senior year). But they wrapped up their notions about missing events with the idea of a trade-off between being home more and making more money. Parents downplayed their children’s emotions related to missing them, even saying they hardly noticed they were away. Nowhere in the parents’ interviews did a reader get the sense of poignancy conveyed in the children’s interviews.

Sprinting or Chilling through Time

The tempo of family experiences in time was readily described and elaborated on within the interviews we conducted and offered a unique lens into how family members’ viewpoints on time contrasted and converged. From doing this, we saw that overall, being busy was a constant, due to activities. The theme addressed how some family members (especially children but also fathers) could see time as calm and relaxed, in part because parents (primarily mothers) constructed the time to be experienced by different family members at a certain pace. The nuance of this theme is that it was possible, indeed common, for children to feel relaxed and parents to feel hurried, and in these cases, parents could talk about how they construct time so as to be experienced (at least by some family members) as relaxed. We analyzed the responses to pace at the family level in order to understand the similar and different perspectives family members had on how their time was experienced. It should be pointed out that a minority (less than half) of family members responded in the same way to how rushed or calm their time was. This analysis revealed a difference between children’s and parents’ perspectives. The most typical mismatch within families was children reporting that time was somewhat calm and parents reporting that time was somewhat rushed. This dynamic occurred, we found, because parents were focusing on doing activities within their time while children focused more on how time is experienced rather than what activities are accomplished in time.

Interviews provided numerous family-level examples that illustrated children’s feelings of calm combined with less-than-calm parents. When asked about overall family pace, Samantha Schnacke, a 38 year-old traveling retail sales field developer, said: “I’d like to meet the family who says their time is calm” – yet her children all categorized their time with her as calm. Her son, Saben, age 15, reported that time is very calm: “Usually when I’m talking to her, she’ll be on her computer. If we have something to tell her, then she’ll listen. She can stop what she is doing and …she pays attention to what we say” with her daughter Sophie, age 9, agreed: “Because mostly if she’ll go to the store or something, I’ll go with her, and we’ll talk on the way there and back.”

Another family, the Naylors, (in which the husband was the main traveler, working as a loss prevention manager in the insurance industry) exhibited a similar dynamic. From the perspective of the children, time was not described as being rushed. Noah, age 9, categorized time as somewhat calm with his mother, because “Well, she helps me a lot with my pigs, so that helps it stay calm too.” Naomi, the 38 year old mother working as a nurse, declared: “I’ve got three kids all under the age of 9 … all three of them are involved in different activities. So we have one night a week that somebody is not in an activity…” However, she discussed her viewpoint that how she responded to the need to get children places could occur in a manner that left everyone feeling rushed, or it could occur in a different way. The father, 38 year old Nicholas, agreed that time was rushed, explaining, “If it was just the job, then it would not be rushed at all. But when you throw in all the other things we have going… [provides listing of various sports activities] … so you know, it’s rushed because of all those other things in there.”

Parents’ relentless lists of tasks to be accomplished in time

Parents converged with each other within and across families on of the experience of time being crammed with activities (“compressed” as one father put it) and as a result, they experienced time in terms not having enough and the time they had being rushed. Parents by and large mentioned structured child activities, while their children mentioned unstructured activities as they spent time with their parents. When parents focused on structured activities, particularly child activities, they perceived time as rushed. Most parents delivered a long list of activities in which all their children were involved and their own schedules often included evening meetings that one parent or the other had to attend for their jobs. One example came from the Thompsons, in which the father was a 57 year old litigator lawyer and the mother was not employed. This family had two children, 13 year old Tessa and 8 year old son Tye. Even with this relatively simple family structure in which the mother did not have paid job demands, the dad reported time was rushed because “usually after work, somebody has a meeting, somebody’s got an athletic commitment, somebody’s got a school commitment, I’ve got a community board meeting or some other kind of meeting. Tina’s (his wife) got a meeting,” illustrating that time after work and school was filled with structured activities by all family members, including extra job demands typical of middle-class occupations.

Conversely, parents and children who chose calm as the category to describe their family time mentioned unstructured family and child activities. For parents, the connection between unstructured activities and the calm time was related to three different experiences. Experiencing calm time related to unstructured family and child activities was something parents seemed to engage in only after all the structured activities were done for the day. Paula Potter, a 31 year old service delivery manager whose husband traveled as a sales manager for a food company, mentioned that her calmest time of day was just after her four children, whose ages ranged from 18 months to 8 years, have had their baths and before they put them to bed. She remarked it is calm “just because everybody’s there. All of the ‘whatever’ we had to get done that day is done, and sorta just kind of enjoying the time.”

Paula’s reflection of calm time was also illustrative of a second experience of calm time being tied to unstructured time for parents. This time occurred when everyone in the family was together, such as dinner time, time when they would play together (such as playing Wii or board games), and general hanging-out time. Finally, the third experience parents reflected on is that they experienced calm time when the family was engaging in parallel leisure activities, especially watching TV and to a lesser extent, reading. The Frys mentioned this throughout their transcripts. The mother, Fawn age 37 and a CEO of a marketing and promotional items business, reported that nobody was rushed after school, providing an example of what the family was doing before the interview: “I was laying on the couch reading a book, they [father Fernand, age 37 and a senior application engineer who travels for work, and son Francis, age 6] were looking at something, and Fabian was on the computer.” Fabian, age 10, mentioned a similar pattern of interaction at night, “We do our homework and then we watch TV. … On Saturday mornings, we come into his [the father’s] room and he’s laying there…we get to go in his room and watch TV.”

These findings are reflective of previous literature that views the ideal notion of family time as something unstructured that is relaxing ( Daly, 2001 ; Darrah et al., 2007 ). Furthermore, this finding ties into the theoretical framework of social constructionism. People attempted to make meaning of their time and used different processes when they made meaning of unstructured time as compared to structured time. Unstructured time may have had similar meaning for all family members, if they were engaging in a task together or in the same room or area during unstructured time. Compare unstructured time at home to structured activities which, due to their schedule constraints, were more likely to be regarded as rushed (imagine a parent rushing to get the child to an athletic practice on time) and in which participation levels among all family members might have vary (e.g., the child at an athletic practice versus the parent).

Family time is talking time

Communication was a salient manner through which unstructured activities were connected to the experience of children perceiving time with their parents, especially their mothers, to be calm. Having a parent who made time for talking or was available for a conversation if needed was important to children. For example, in the Smith family (the father is a primary traveler and CEO for a technology company), 11 year old Sadie elaborated on her response that she did not have enough time with her mother, by saying, “Normally she is hardly able to sit down and talk.” The importance of time to talk was underscored in many children’s interviews. Inasmuch as symbolic interaction suggests that meaning making is subjective and relates to how interactions are experienced, we could see that a parent making efforts to communicate with their children during their time together assisted in the child constructing a calm and relaxed meaning around their interaction. Such efforts may not happen automatically — though the efforts involved might be apparent to the parent, they may not be obvious to the child. Furthermore, the efforts could be conceived as a form of invisible household and emotional labor ( Erickson, 2005 ), which tends to occur more for women than for men, but also for which there are heightened gendered expectations.

A family that illustrated the child’s perspective on communication and the mother’s explanation of what she did to create an environment rich for communication was the Browns. In this family, the father of the two children, Bambie age 13 and Bonnie age 9, was the primary traveler and president of a technology company. The mother Beth, age 37, who worked part time as receptionist for a dentist office, classified time as somewhat calm, explaining: “It’s my choice. I get up a little earlier on the days I go to work, and I get myself mostly ready, so that by when they get up, I’m fixing them breakfast and helping them get ready for school, and that just kind of helps the whole mornings go smoother. So, I don’t have to, I’m not rushing around and getting me ready and trying to get them ready and trying to get them out the door and things like that.” Her daughter Bambie, who chose “somewhat calm” to describe her time with her mother, explained: “We’re both really organized and we both keep a schedule. So, we know when we need to be some place and we’re not rushing around.” She categorized time with her father as very calm, elaborating: “We just chill out. He lays on the couch at night. He just stays home and watches sports, you know? Just kinda like chill. … We play Wii. We like the Wii. Sometimes we drive around. Sometimes, we run. It depends.” Note that she did not highlight communication with her father, but rather, an unstructured, relaxed activity, sometimes involving interacting with her father and sometimes simply being in the same room.

Time with their mothers, when discussed in terms of being calm, centered on talking. Mothers could be seen to actively plan and arrange to construct time with their children when they could talk. It appeared that children and parents were co-constructing their experiences of time with each other differentially based on their individual focus within their interactions. Family members constructed meaning out of time based on the gendered expectations of parents. For example, fathers were not expected to plan, orchestrate, or be responsible for as many activities as was expected of mothers. This differentiation in responsibility was especially evident if the fathers were the primary work travelers and family patterns had been established that required less involvement from fathers in instrumental tasks (though family members reported fathers carpooling, chauffeuring, and attending practices and games – “involved fathers” by most measures). Conversely, the expectations of mothers to run the household were reflected in concerns about family pace and rhythm, especially when fathers were on the road.

The families in this study revealed time crunches and the children in the study articulated a different perspective on family time that enriches what we knew about family time from parents’ perspectives in the literature ( Daly, 2001 ; Mattingly & Sayer, 2006 ; Snyder, 2007 ). One of the most important contributions of our analysis was the ability to analyze children’s perspectives on their family life and to make connections at the family level between family members in how they experienced work and family life. The themes revealed several issues that were salient to children but appeared to be not on parents’ radar screens. In this way, this paper adds missing voices to the study of families and work and families and time.

Children considered the amount and quality of time they had with their parents. Then evaluated their time with fathers quite differently from how they evaluated their time spent with their mothers, and these gendered differences reflect, at least in part, the value in which men and their time is assigned, such that fathers’ “just being there” at home is highly valued. Previous literature has found fathers engaging in leisure with their children; in this work, we uncovered how much children valued unstructured time with fathers ( Bianchi et al., 2012 ; Coltrane & Adams, 2008 ). This research demonstrated the importance to children of time to talk with mothers, and how such time comes about through mothers’ construction of their time. According to the literature, mothers spend more time with children than fathers ( Bianchi, 2011 ; Bianchi et al., 2012 ), and in this research, we uncovered that mothers not only need to spend time with their children, they need to establish a communicative and calm atmosphere to earn children’s praise in terms of time.

Children did not mention the work parents did on their behalf, which accounted for much of the mismatches between parental and children perspectives. No value was ascribed by children to such work; they just articulated that “we are busy,” not that their parents were investing in their future by encouraging involvement in athletics, music, and church activities. This labor parents do on behalf of their children is consistent with feminist examinations about the lack of value for care work, the invisible work of organizing the household, and the work women do ( England, 2005 ). Thorne (2001) argued that “child time” had a different quality than “adult time” and our findings reflect such a qualitative difference.

The different ways children regarded father time as compared to mother time also can be scrutinized from a feminist perspective. The quality of time with mothers was seen as rushed, because this work is largely unacknowledged and unvalued. As children reported on enjoying unstructured time with fathers, a discrepancy between how children experience time with mothers versus fathers emerged, with mothers viewed as “rushing around” because they were doing work for the child and household, whereas fathers were considered “pretty chill” as children focused on their unstructured leisure.

The findings are readily interpreted via feminist and social constructionist perspectives ( Daly, 1996 ; Walker, Allen, & Connidis, 2005 ). Children have little power in how the family spends their time – while it might be thought that children have a say in what activities they engage in, the literature on parenting today indicates parents have a great deal of power in structuring and making decisions about children’s lives ( Lareau, 2003 ; Shannon, 2006 ). However, parents do not necessarily feel powerful – they feel unable to limit their work involvement, they feel obligated to travel for work, and they strive to uphold standards of intensive parenting including being available to their children, for example, by attending children’s events, though not necessarily being available for conversation with their children ( Coltrane & Adams, 2008 ; Cooper, 2014 ; Pugh, 2015 ). The work role limits control to some extent, and parents varied in the amount of flexibility they had at work, though all families were touched by the relatively rigid demand of work travel. This predominantly upper-middle class sample did experience work hours and workplace flexibility more than many families, combined with high work commitment, comparable to those in the Conley (2009) and Darrah and colleagues’ (2007) samples.

Control over the experience of family time illustrates the agency, and the limits of the agency, that family members have regarding family time. Interpreted through a feminist and a symbolic interactionist lens, adults are operating within the constraints of their paid work and within the expectations of family roles, while also linking these expectations with their lived experience and their ability to produce interactions with their family members ( Zvonkovic, Manoogian, & McGraw, 2001 ; Daly, 1996 ; LaRossa & Reitzes, 1993 ; Walker, Allen, & Connidis, 2005 ). Parents were “doing family time” in a similar way to how people have been revealed to “do gender,” ( West & Zimmerman, 1987 ) within constraints and with effort, as well as attentive to the performative nature of doing family time ( Butler, 1990 ), including visible involvement at children’s activities ( Coltrane & Adams, 2008 ; Garey, 1999 ). In our interviews, mothers were more aware of this control than other family members. Mothers made choices related to their family time, such as to get up early, to organize their day, and to make themselves available to their children by being responsive. Control for fathers came from being available to their children in unstructured activities at home. Note that fathers could opt out of many household task responsibilities and orchestrating household tasks, giving them access to “chilling” with their children.

Parents control family time within the constraints of paid work, how they conceptualized the parent role, and how busy they believed they should keep their children. Children, however, were less able to control family time, and in some ways, their parents’ work situations required them to be flexible about time with their parents, even when the boundaries of this flexibility were stretched taut ( Pugh, 2015 ). Children sometimes expressed wistfulness and longing for a different quality of time with parents. How children dealt with the conundrum of wanting more time, but valuing time with their parents and loving their parents, was through their emotions. Children made a certain type of meaning of their parents’ control over time for their families when their parents established a slower pace of family time and engaged in more unstructured time, facilitating communication with each other, in which case children were able to reconcile their experiences with the positive view they wanted to hold about their families and time. In other cases, when children felt rushed and that their parents did not take time to communicate with them or know about their lives, they struggled with reconciling their experiences with the view they wanted to hold about their family time.

The literature on family ideology and the views people want to have about their families has focused on adults’ experiences, as parents demonstrated the difficulty of holding to a myth of a certain type of family ( Daly, 1996 , 2003 ; Galinsky, 1999 ; Hochschild, 1997 ). This research demonstrates difficulty children experience, as they hold close to loving their parents and feeling that they have a good quality relationship with their parents, yet they acknowledge that they want more time with their parents and sometimes express uncertainty about how much their parents value the time with them. The poignancy of the contrast between the family image we hold and the way children experience family time is illustrated in this research.

As with all research, this analysis is not without limitations. The sample, while reasonably reflecting the demographics of frequent work travelers, was predominately of high socioeconomic status. The sample was a two-parent sample and all participants in the larger study who had children were in heterosexual partnerships. Again, these limitations are typical of frequent work travelers with children. A sample of working class families would be a useful supplement. This sample also reflected the gendered nature of frequent work travel, so that more intensive scrutiny of the family dynamics when mothers travel would require a different sampling strategy. Lastly, there are methodological limitations to the qualitative design of this study, for example, an ethnographic analysis could have revealed the pace of time without being filtered through parents’ and children’s viewpoints, whereas the approach in this analysis contributed novel features in terms of the positioning of children’s voices.

Given the age of the children, it is possible that the totality of parental work demands (e.g. long hours, high accessibility to worksite, working with teams on projects with unpredictable timelines as well as travel; Cooper, 2014 ; Pugh, 2015 ) are experienced by children as a package. Younger children might have a harder time distinguishing travel from generally long work hours than older children ( Gibson, 2012 ). And it may well be that the totality of parental work demands sets a pattern for family life even when the frequent work traveler is at home. In this way, the voices of children and parents in the study seem consistent with the trends in the literature (Bianchi, Robinson & Milkie, 2006; Darrah et al., 2005; Jacobs & Gerson, 2001) related to time demands of highly educated workers and upper-middle class families.

This paper developed several insights on family life among a group of families in which at least one parent had an extreme work demand. Drawing from social constructionist symbolic interactionism, the findings demonstrated how children view mothers and fathers navigating between somewhat rigid work demands and their family lives and the emotional consequences for children of how parents arrange family time. In addition to the contributions to feminist thought in revealing gendered parenting, the project also employed a feminist perspective in the value in which children’s points of view were held. Obtaining a family perspective by interviewing all family members over 7 years old in each household allowed for multiple voices to be accounted for and heard. It revealed contrasts between how children wanted to think about their family time and what they wished for and experienced emotionally. It revealed contrasts between how parents experienced and constructed family time, in particular, mothers and fathers, as well as between parents and children. The benefits of family-level data are great: divergence in perspective shows the vantage point of each family member, and keeping account of the entire family group provides a coherent view of the family dynamic, allowing for a rich understanding on family life when there are high work demands.

Acknowledgments

This research was funded by the National Institutes of Health (R01 HD047783). The authors would also thank Abbie Goldberg for her thoughtful comments on a version of the manuscript.

Contributor Information

Anisa Zvonkovic, Professor and Department Head of Human Development, Virginia Tech.

Andrea Swenson, Assistant Professor of Human Development and Family Studies, University of Wisconsin – Stout.

Zoë Cornwell, Doctoral Candidate in Human Development, Virginia Tech.

• Arendell T. The new care work of middle class mothers: Managing childrearing, employment, and time. In: Daly KJ, editor. Minding the time in family experience: Emerging perspectives and issues. Amsterdam: JAI; 2001. pp. 163–203. [ Google Scholar ]
• Bianchi SM. Family change and time allocation in American families. The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. 2011; 638 :21–44. doi: 10.1177/0002716211413731. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Bianchi SM, Robinson JP, Milkie MA. Changing rhythms of American family life. New York, NY: Russell Sage Foundation; 2007. [ Google Scholar ]
• Bianchi SM, Sayer LC, Milkie MA, Robinson JP. Housework: Who did, does or will do it, and how much does it matter? Social Forces. 2012; 91 :55–63. doi: 10.1093/sf/sos120. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Blair-Loy M. Competing devotions: Career and family among women executives. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; 2005. [ Google Scholar ]
• Blumer H. What is wrong with social theory? American Sociological Review. 1954; 18 :3–10. doi: 10.2307/2088165. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Bowen G. Grounded theory and sensitizing concepts. International Journal of Qualitative Methods. 2006; 5 (3):12–23. [ Google Scholar ]
• Brim OG, Baltes PB, Bumpass LL, Cleary PD, Featherman DL, Hazzard WR, Shweder RA. National Survey of Midlife Development in the United States (MIDUS) Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor]; 1995–1996. ICPSR02760-v8. [ Google Scholar ]
• Brown TM. Raising Brooklyn: Nannies, childcare, and Caribbeans creating community. New York: New York University; 2011. [ Google Scholar ]
• Butler J. Gender trouble: Feminism and the subversion of identity. New York: Routledge; 1990. [ Google Scholar ]
• Casinowsky GB. Working life on the move, domestic life at standstill? Work-related travel and responsibility for home and family. Gender, Work & Organization. 2013; 20 :311–326. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-0432.2011.00579.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Charmaz K. Constructing grounded theory: A practical guide through qualitative analysis. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; 2006. [ Google Scholar ]
• Clark CD. In a younger voice: Doing child-centered qualitative research. New York: Oxford University Press; 2011. [ Google Scholar ]
• Coltrane S. Research on household labor: Modeling and measuring the social embeddedness of routine family work. Journal of Marriage and the Family. 2000; 62 :1208–1233. [ Google Scholar ]
• Coltrane S. Gender theory and household labor. Sex Roles. 2010; 63 :791–800. doi: 10.1007/s111999-010-9863-6. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Coltrane S, Adams M. Gender and families. 2nd. Lantham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc; 2008. [ Google Scholar ]
• Conley D. Elsewhere USA: How we got from the company man, family dinners, and the affluent society to the home office, BlackBerry moms, and economic anxiety. New York, NY: Pantheon Books; 2009. [ Google Scholar ]
• Cooper M. Cut adrift: Families in insecure times. Berkley, CA: University of California Press; 2014. [ Google Scholar ]
• Corbin JM, Strauss A. Basics of qualitative research: Techniques and procedures for developing grounded theory. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; 2008. [ Google Scholar ]
• Cowdery RS, Knudson-Martin C. The construction of motherhood: Tasks, relational connection, and gender equality. Family Relations. 2005; 54 :335–345. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3729.2005.00321.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Craig L. Does father care mean fathers share?: A comparison of how mothers and fathers in intact families spend time with children. Gender & Society. 2006; 20 :259–281. doi: 10.1177/0891243205285212. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Crosnoe R, Cavanagh SE. Families with children and adolescents: A review, critique, and future agenda. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2010; 72 :594–611. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3737.2010.00720.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Daly KJ. Families and time: Keeping pace in a hurried culture. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; 1996. [ Google Scholar ]
• Daly KJ. Deconstructing family time: From ideology to lived experience. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2001; 63 :283–294. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3737.2001.00283.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Daly KJ. Family theory versus the theories families live by. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2003; 65 (4):771–784. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3737.2003.00771.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Darrah C, Freeman J, English-Lueck JA. Busier than ever! Why American families can’t slow down. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press; 2007. [ Google Scholar ]
• Davis SN, Greenstein TN. Cross-national variations in the division of household labor. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2004; 66 :1260–1271. doi: 10.1111/j.0022-2445.2004.0091.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Davis SN, Greenstein TN. Household labor [Special issue] Journal of Family Theory & Review. 2013; 5 :63–158. [ Google Scholar ]
• Durkheim É. The elementary forms of the religious life. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd; 1915. [ Google Scholar ]
• Eder D, Fingerson L. Interviewing children and adolescents. In: Gubrium JF, Holstein JA, editors. Handbook of interview research: Context and method. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; 2002. pp. 181–201. [ Google Scholar ]
• England P. Emerging theories of care work. Annual Review of Sociology. 2005:381–399. doi: 10.1146/annurev.soc.31.041304.122317. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Erickson RJ. Why emotion work matters: Sex, gender, and the division of household labor. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2005; 67 :337–351. doi: 10.1111/j.0022-2445.2005.00120.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Families and Work Institute. National study of the changing workforce [Data file and codebook] New York, NY: 2006. [ Google Scholar ]
• Feldman RS. Development across the lifespan. 6th. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall; 2011. [ Google Scholar ]
• Fingerman KL, Cheng YP, Wesselmann ED, Zarit S, Fustenberg F, Birditt KS. Helicopter parents and landing pad kids: Intense parental support of grown children. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2012; 74 :880–896. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3737.2012.00987.x. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Fingerman KL, Kim K, Davis EM, Furstenberg FF, Jr, Birditt KS, Zarit SH. “I’ll give you the world”: Socioeconomic differences in parental support of adult children. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2015; 77 :844–865. doi: 10.1111/jomf.12204. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Galinsky E. Ask the children. New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishers Inc; 1999. [ Google Scholar ]
• Garbarino J, Stott FM. What children can tell us: Eliciting, interpreting, and evaluating information from children. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass; 1992. [ Google Scholar ]
• Garey AI. Weaving work and motherhood. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press; 1999. [ Google Scholar ]
• Gibson JE. Interviews and focus groups with children: Methods that match children’s developing competencies. Journal of Family Theory & Review. 2012; 4 :148–159. doi: 10.1111/j.1756-2589.2012.00119.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Glaser BG, Strauss AL. The discovery of grounded theory: Strategies for qualitative research. Piscataway, NJ: Transaction Publishers; 2009. [ Google Scholar ]
• Greenstein TN. Economic dependence, gender, and the division of labor in the home: A replication and extension. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2000; 62 :322–335. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3737.2000.00322.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Gustafson P. Work-related travel, gender, and family obligations. Work, Employment and Society. 2006; 20 :513–530. doi: 10.1177/0950017006066999. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Harach LD, Kuczynski LJ. Construction and maintenance of parent-child relationships: Bidirectional contributions from the perspective of parents. Infant and Child Development. 2005; 14 :327–343. doi: 10.1002/icd.393. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Hill R, Tranby E, Kelly E, Moen P. Relieving the time squeeze? Effects of a white-collar workplace change on parents. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2013; 75 :1014–1029. doi: 10.1111/jomf.12047. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Hochschild A. The second shift. New York: Penguin Books; 1989. [ Google Scholar ]
• Hochschild A. The time bind. New York: Henry Holt and Company LLC; 1997. [ Google Scholar ]
• Irwin IG, Johnson J. Interviewing children: Explicating our practices and dilemmas. Qualitative Health Research. 2005; 15 :821–831. doi: 10.1177/1049732304273862. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Jacobs JA, Gerson K. The time divide: Work, family and gender inequality. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; 2004. [ Google Scholar ]
• Jeong YJ, Zvonkovic AM, Acock AC. The occurrence and frequency of overnight job travel in the USA. Work, Employment and Society. 2013; 27 :138–152. doi: 10.1177/0950017012460328. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Kuckartz U. MAXQDA 2007 reference manual for Windows 2000 and XP (J Poppe, Trans) Marburg, Germany: Verbi Software; 2007. [ Google Scholar ]
• Lareau A. Unequal childhoods: Class, race, and family life. Berkley, CA: University of California Press; 2003. [ Google Scholar ]
• LaRossa R. Grounded theory methods and qualitative family research. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2005; 67 :837–857. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3737.2005.00179.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• LaRossa R, Reitzes DC. Symbolic interactionism and family studies. In: Boss PG, Doherty WJ, LaRossa R, Schumm WR, Steinmetz SK, editors. Sourcebook of family theories and methods: A contextual approach. New York: Plenum; 1993. pp. 135–163. [ Google Scholar ]
• Lassen C. Aeromobility and work. Environment and Planning. 2006; 38 :301–312. doi: 10.1068/a37278. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Liese B, Mundt KA, Dell LD, Demure NB. Medical insurance claims associated with international business travel. Occupational & Environmental Medicine. 1997; 54 :499–503. doi: 10.1136/oem.54.7.499. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Maccoby EE. The role of parents in the socialization of children: An historical overview. Development Psychology. 1992; 28 :1006–1017. doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.28.6.1006. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Marks SR. Multiple roles and life balance: An intellectual journey. In: Matuska K, Chirstiansen C, editors. Life balance: Multidisciplinary theories and research. SLACK Incorporated and AOTA Press; 2009. pp. 43–58. [ Google Scholar ]
• Mattingly MJ, Bianchi SM. Gender differences in the quantity and quality of free time: The US experience. Social Forces. 2003; 81 :999–1030. doi: 10.1353/sof.2003.0036. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Mattingly M, Sayer L. Under pressure: Gender differences in the relationship between free time and feeling rushed. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2006; 68 :205–211. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3737.2006.00242.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Milkie MA, Kendig SM, Nomaguchi KM, Denny KE. Time with children, children’s well-being, and work-family balance among employed parents. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2010; 72 :1329–1343. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3737.2010.00768.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Milkie MA, Nomaguchi KM, Denny KE. Does the amount of time mothers spend with children or adolescents matter? Journal of Marriage and Family. 2015; 77 :355–372. doi: 10.1111/jomf.12170. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Neale B, Flowerdue J. Time, texture and childhood: The contours of longitudinal qualitative research. International Journal of Social Research Methodology. 2003; 6 :189–199. doi: 10.1080/1364557032000091798. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Nelson MK. Parenting out of control: Anxious parents in uncertain times. New York: New York University Press; 2010. [ Google Scholar ]
• Nomaguchi KM, Milkie MA. Costs and rewards of children: The effects of becoming a parent on adults’ lives. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2003; 65 :356–374. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3737.2003.00356.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Ochs E, Kremer-Sadlik T, editors. The fast-forward family: Home, work, and relationships in middle-class America. Berkley, CA: University of California Press; 2013. [ Google Scholar ]
• Offer S. Family time activities and adolescents’ emotional well-being. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2013; 75 :26–41. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3737.2012.01025.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Presser HB. Working in a 24/7 economy: Challenges for American families. New York, NY: Russell Sage Foundation; 2003. [ Google Scholar ]
• Pugh AJ. The tumbleweed society: Working and caring in an age of insecurity. New York: Oxford University Press; 2015. [ Google Scholar ]
• Robinson JP, Godbey G. Time for life. State College, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press; 1997. [ Google Scholar ]
• Sayer LC. Gender differences in the relationship between long employee hours and multitasking. In: Rubin BA, editor. Workplace temporalities: Research in the Sociology of Work. Oxford, UK: Elsevier; 2007. pp. 405–435. [ Google Scholar ]
• Sayer LC, Bianchi SM, Robinson JP. Are parents investing less in children? Trends in mothers’ and fathers’ time with children. American Journal of Sociology. 2004; 110 :1–43. doi: 10.1086/386270. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Shannon CS. Parents’ messages about the role of extracurricular and unstructured leisure activities: Adolescents’ perceptions. Journal of Leisure Research. 2006; 38 :398–420. [ Google Scholar ]
• Snyder KA. A vocabulary of motives: Understanding how parents define quality time. Journal of Marriage and Family. 2007; 69 :320–340. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3737.2007.00368.x. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Sullivan O. What do we learn about gender by analyzing housework separately from child care? Some considerations from time-use evidence. Journal of Family Theory & Review. 2013; 5 :72–84. doi: 10.1111/jftr.12007. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Thorne B. Pick-up time at Oakdale elementary school. In: Hertz R, Marshall NL, editors. Working families: The transformation of the American Home. Berkley, CA: University of California Press; 2001. pp. 354–376. [ Google Scholar ]
• Tubbs CY, Roy KM, Burton LM. Family ties: Constructing family time in low-income families. Family Process. 2005; 44 :77–91. doi: 10.1111/j.1545-5300.2005.00043.x. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Walker A. Gender and family relationships. In: Sussman MB, Steinmetz SK, Peterson GW, editors. Handbook of Marriage and the Family. New York, NY: Plenum Press; 1999. pp. 439–474. [ Google Scholar ]
• Walker AJ, Allen KR, Connidis IA. Theorizing and studying sibling ties in adulthood. In: Bengtson VL, Acock AC, Allen KA, Dilworth-Anderson P, Klein DM, editors. Sourcebook of family theory & research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; 2005. pp. 167–190. [ Google Scholar ]
• West C, Zimmerman DH. Doing gender. Gender & Society. 1987; 1 :125–151. doi: 10.1177/0891243287001002002. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Westman M, Etzion D. The impact of short overseas business trips on job stress and burnout. Applied Psychology. 2002; 51 :582–592. doi: 10.1111/1464-0597.00109. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Zvonkovic AM, Lee KH, Brooks-Hurst E, Lee NY. Recession jitters among professional class families: Perceptions of economic strain and family adjustments. Journal of Family Issues. 2014; 35 :755–775. doi: 10.1177/0192513X13476503. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Zvonkovic AM, Manoogian MM, McGraw LA. The ebb and flow of family life: How families experience being together and apart. In: Daly K, editor. Minding the time in family experience: Emerging perspectives and issues. Amsterdam: JAI Press; 2001. pp. 135–160. [ Google Scholar ]

I'm a millennial in a 'digital nomad family.' My retired parents and I are living in a rural town for under $300 a month.

• Stella Guan, 34, is a digital nomad who has been traveling the world for the past year.
• Her parents, in their early 60s, retired last year and decided to join her for the summer.
• The trio moved to a rural part of China where rents can be as little as $90 a month.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Stella Guan, a 34-year-old graphic designer, educator , and digital nomad retreat organizer about her experience living in China alongside her retired parents. The essay has been edited for length and clarity.

I started as a digital nomad , almost entirely unplanned. And this arrangement was unplanned as well.

My parents are in retirement right now, and they're finally in a place where they can just travel and not worry about anything else. They lived in Guangdong Province, which is right next to Hong Kong .

They're still young enough to not have mobility issues, so they packed up their house last year and wanted to travel more.

My mom worked for a clothing company and my dad was an engineer. In China, women retire a lot earlier than men, so she has basically been waiting for my dad to retire before she traveled.

My parents are on social media and watched all these other people close to their age — in their early 60s, other retirees — traveling. And they wanted to do that as well.

They were inspired by other people more than their own child.

We chose a rural part of China for our two months of living together

We moved out to Yunnan, a rural region, in June.

The weather is perfect. It's in a mountainous region — it's just high enough that you feel cool, but it's not too high that you can't breathe.

I just love mountains, and mountains are everywhere. It reminds me of California , but I'd say that the weather is even better than California.

Related stories

Lunch can be as little as $2 and rent is under $100

The cost of living is really, really amazing. It's like half of what big cities are.

It really is supercheap to live here .

Just yesterday, my mom and I were taking a walk around the neighborhood, and my mom saw this building with available apartments for rent. So she asked this guy in front of the building, "How much do you pay for rent here?" And then he said, "600 renminbi," which is actually about $90 a month for a one-bedroom.

We went and looked. It's not luxurious or anything, but it's pretty well-lit and a decent place to live.

Right now, my parents and I rent two apartments that together cost $200 a month.

Even with food for the month, it's under $300 to live here. You can get a really delicious bowl of noodles for the equivalent of $1.50 to $2.

I work during the day while they shop at local markets

They usually go out to the market in the morning, because they like to buy fresh food every day.

They like to drive around, go to different markets . My mom takes her time haggling, choosing different vegetables. My dad is less interested, but he drives her.

I stay at the house to work.

I'm mostly done by early afternoon and if I'm not, they sort of force me to take a break. In this regional town, people just hang out. It's just super relaxed.

We'll spend our afternoons doing family time. Right now my dad is teaching me how to drive . He'll take me out to practice.

Recently we've done a few small weekend trips. There was a local fire festival that's really cool — it's one of the biggest annual events in the region. We also went to a small town with this really unique folk architectural style 30 to 40 minutes away.

I definitely encourage other families to do it. It's not very often you get to spend this much time with your parents as an adult .

We have such limited time with them. I think traveling is its own form of bonding, too.

You definitely have to understand the physical limitations of your older parents, because they may not be able to keep up with you. But that's perfectly fine.

It really is all about the family time.

Watch: Inside the hidden hotels that keep Mount Everest running

• Main content