[GoddessKristie]

DH and I have been having a lot of discussion about him going back to school. The program he is considering is very rigerious and he would be gone 12-16 hours a day 5 days a week. We really REALLY value me being a SAHM, and if he's in a crazy hard program we'll need my complete focus to be on running the family. Here's the problem: noone is working in this scenario! How will we pay our bills?
I would have put this over in the finance thread, but I've posted there about SAHMing and finances before and I get some real snarky comments about needing to work. So, for those of you who really value SAHMing, what would you do? The program would not start until next fall, so we could save a good amount of money between now and then, but I'm not sure how we would cover our expenses! Have any of you mamas done this? Did you just take out more in loans (it's a very expensive program to begin with)? Did you recieve any kind of grant money because your husband supports a family? He makes a good deal of money right now, so I'm conscerned about eligibility for grants since funding is based on the previous year's income.
Have any of you mamas made this work?

 

[user_name]

yep == dh was just starting his 2nd year of dental school when we had our first child. i resigned from my job early-on in my pregnancy, so apart from selling our house the next year (and making a fair amount in profit), selling one of our 2 vehicles, and my part-time income for 2 months later on in the pregnancy, we really lived on loans for the remaining 2 1/2 years that he was in school. dh did get a small stipend one summer working in a research lab (as the only 'approved' job he could have while in school), so that pretty much covered the extra "new baby" expenses. no grants here either due to qualification issues w/ regard to his previous employment's income.
of course, almost 2 years later we're swimming in debt now...but he is doing what he loves, i'm doing what i love (still staying home raising our 2 kiddos), and we see at least a faint light at the end of the debt tunnel. so, at least for now, we think it was totally worth it!

hth & good luck to you guys!

 

[GoddessKristie]

Thanks User_Name. The thought of having to more than double the debt load to cover our living expenses freaks me out. There are scholarships and even full tuition options if he qualifies, but we wont know any of that until next year. That would be a tremendous help, but we're certainly not counting on it. If he's only working summers and if he has an assistantship during the year we will certainly qualify for some government assistance. I don't feel terrible accepting government assistance while a SAHM (I know some people do), because I believe that SAHMing is one of the best things we can do for the next generation (there are studies on this too). PLUS, it would only be temporary and we have always been tax payers and will be tax payers once he's out of school. We would certainly cover what we recieved and more (if we haven't already) in future taxes. So, that would help with food costs (we don't need a lot of help there as I garden and we buy meat from a farmer), utilities, and medical coverage. But, that's definitely not everything.
Has anyone else been in this situation?

 

[SweetPotato]

We haven't been quite in this situation, because my dh did grad school in a field where he always had either a teaching or research assistantship and full tuition remission-- so we were lucky that we had some (small) income, no extra debt, and a bunch of savings. We never had to accept assistance, but we did qualify for some amazing tax credits, etc.- so definitely look into that (even though it won't come until next spring- it's nice to know it's coming!) I'd also recommend cutting way back on expenses right now-- it really surprised me to see how little we could live off of, once we prioritized things- and any extra bit in savings will be that much more peace of mind. Best of luck to you both. I've always found that the long hours are much more of a hardship than the low income.

 

[hotmamacita]

Quote:

Originally Posted by GoddessKristie DH and I have been having a lot of discussion about him going back to school. The program he is considering is very rigerious and he would be gone 12-16 hours a day 5 days a week. We really REALLY value me being a SAHM, and if he's in a crazy hard program we'll need my complete focus to be on running the family. Here's the problem: noone is working in this scenario! How will we pay our bills? I would have put this over in the finance thread, but I've posted there about SAHMing and finances before and I get some real snarky comments about needing to work. So, for those of you who really value SAHMing, what would you do? The program would not start until next fall, so we could save a good amount of money between now and then, but I'm not sure how we would cover our expenses! Have any of you mamas done this? Did you just take out more in loans (it's a very expensive program to begin with)? Did you recieve any kind of grant money because your husband supports a family? He makes a good deal of money right now, so I'm conscerned about eligibility for grants since funding is based on the previous year's income. Have any of you mamas made this work?

My husband worked while he was in grad school while I stayed home with four children under four. We moved into a small apartment and reduced our bills. We had one 15 year old car which he took with him.

I would talk a lot with my dh about this. If he wanted me to stay home, I would ask him how he thinks we should handle things. I would give him time to think about it and develop a plan for the family. WHile he is, I would think about what I wanted to do How I wanted to save money and help him. Then when you both come together to flesh out your plan for the time ahead, you both will be able to contribute to the conversation and work out a plan.

 

[Harmony08]

Hi,

We're currently in this situation. We saved my previous income to sort of patch us through and we basically live on ( and over) our loans. DH can work in the summers which helps. We are pretty confident in his ability to get a well paying job when he is finished which helps with the debt fear.
Before we finally TTCed I would freak out all the time making charts and trying to figure out how we could swing it but we didn't want to wait until he was done and we never even considered that I would work once the baby was born. I still don't understand this. Hello, I would have to pay someone to watch my baby while I go get paid. What do I end up with in the end?

Anyway, we went with the life's to short mentality and had the baby. We couldn't be happier. We are also surrounded by people in the same boat. I could name at least ten couples doing exactly this as we speak. I'm not sure how everyone manages but they do. I too was horrified my the ZERO income thing but like I said I know many people doing it so it isn't wierd to me anymore.

 

[happyhats]

I'm in a similar situation as well. My dh used to juggle work and school, but he left his job to finish internship and unfortunately there aren't any jobs available now in his field or not. So he's doing schooling, we're taking on loans and grants, we both work odd jobs (he just got an online bill processing job, and I'm babysitting), and we're also on public assistance. So yes, we're struggling a great deal, but there's healthy food on the table and my dd is being taken care of by her parents instead of some stranger. It defenitely can be done, and with your position of being able to save for a bit you will probably be in a much better situation than me and dh are, though honestly I'm not complaining because I feel that this time in dd's life is especially important (she's four months) and at least my dh is bettering himself in this situation. Honestly there are no jobs in our area, so we'd probably be in the same boat anyway, lol.

 

[vegemamato]

my partner is about to start law school (in another state, where we will know nobody and have no resources).

If you can't tell, this is a huge stress on me

it's going to be up to me to stay home with the girls, clean, cook, take them to any and all functions, and provide the money for all of us to live..

so, I'm planning to nanny with the baby, and we have my dad moving in with us to help with the older kids (which would be a whole other post

). I don't know how it's going to work, hopefully peacefully

I hope you find an option that will be positive for your family..

GL!

 

[GoddessKristie]

I have some good news!
First, though; thanks for sharing your stories with me. It is encouraging to know that other mamas are making this work for them.
I just discovered that there is an option for my DH to get a well paying part time job after his first year of school. This is very exciting for us! Now, we're just looking at getting through the first year with little to no income.

For those of you who are living on loans while DH is in school (or have in the past), what's the ratio of your education debt to living expense debt? We've calculated we would have to take out at least double the education loan to cover living expenses. If that makes sense. If it's 2,000 for school we need 2,000 to live on, so we'd have to double it and take out a total of 4,000. (just an example, I wish it was that cheap!

)

What ratio did you have to take out?

 

[First Time Mama]

We will be in this situation soon. DH is starting graduate school in the fall. It is an intensive two year program for a doctorate. I currently stay at home with 19 month old DS. We are planning on me continuing to SAHM while he is in school and living on loans. I don't think he will be able to work at all. We value me staying at home, I like doing it, and really it doesn't make sense for me to work. With the little $ I would probably earn it would moslty go to daycare, and I would have a hard time being away from my son. Right now we are living with IL's to save on expenses for a few months, and then we're counting on loans. We don't know the specifics yet, I hope the university will be able to inform us of resources and help us with the loan process. We might even have a second child while he is in school, but that is debateable and remains to be seen. It's kind of scary to think of that much debt, but we are confident that DH will be able to earn a good income when he graduates.