"I gave up my banking job to look after my children. My husband works in private equity"

I've spent over a decade working as an investment banker in Europe, but after having my second child, I decided that I couldn't do it any more. 

Click here to follow our new WhatsApp channel. Get our updates straight to your phone 📱

Life changes. I used to be passionate about my job and my clients, but I have two small children, and I was barely seeing them at all. 

My husband has a senior job in private equity, and so the two of us were working all the time, while the children - who are three and six - were with their nanny. The eldest began asking when I was going to come and collect her from kindergarten like all the other mummies, and I started to question what I was doing with my life. I enjoyed working, and I even liked the travelling, but I wasn't exactly saving the world. I was working around 60 hours a week, missing time with the children and close to burning out. 

I made the decision to step back. It's difficult to do. I'd fought my way into the industry, and I'd worked hard. It felt weird to step off the path I'd been on. 

It was the right thing to do. I left a few months ago and my life is now completely different. I spent all my time with the children. We just hang out. It's nothing super-exciting. I exercise, I play the guitar, I read. I'm just present for them. They're learning a lot and growing up very quickly.

I know that I am in a fortune position. A lot of people in banking are forced to stay in their jobs because they need a steady stream of income, but my husband supports our family financially. He never questioned my career or asked me to step back, but we started questioning together why we were both doing corporate jobs instead of taking more of a risk. 

I'm still young - I'm not yet 40. Life changes and the way I want to live my life has changed now that I have children. I could have stayed in banking and tried to make managing director, but when I looked at the big queue of men and women also trying to make MD, I knew it was going to be a struggle. It's a political process, and it just wasn't that appealing. I also reached the conclusion that I just didn't want that job anyway.

I know this is a topic that resonates with a lot of people. A lot of women have reached out to me since I've left. My two key messages are: listen to yourself, and acknowledge that life isn't always linear. I'm looking at doing my entrepreneurial things instead: I can apply the skills I've learned in banking in other ways. 

Helene Stocker is a pseudonym

 Have a confidential story, tip, or comment you’d like to share? Contact: +44 7537 182250 (SMS, Whatsapp or voicemail). Telegram: @SarahButcher. Click here to fill in our anonymous form, or email editortips@efinancialcareers.com. Signal also available.

Bear with us if you leave a comment at the bottom of this article: all our comments are moderated by human beings. Sometimes these humans might be asleep, or away from their desks, so it may take a while for your comment to appear. Eventually it will – unless it’s offensive or libellous (in which case it won’t.)

Photo by Jenna Norman on Unsplash