We earn over £100,000 – but can’t afford our baby
Outrageous? Yes. But mum-to-be Jocelyn refuses to rein in her VERY indulgent lifestyle
ASUMMER sunset shimmered over the River Thames: my husband Ben and I watched it from the balcony of a smart hotel bar on the South Bank, quietly revelling in the glamour of our surroundings.
This was our domain, our regular evening meeting place whenever I was working in London. We’d convene there once a week with friends, and spend £100 or so on fizz and cosmopolitan cocktails before travelling home to Kent by train for a meal out in a gastro pub.
This conspicuous spending was routine, an integral part of our week. We justified it because we worked hard. We deserved it.
But that particular night this July presaged a huge change in our lives. Early the next morning, feeling an unaccustomed queasiness, I took a test and discovered I was pregnant.
Delight and excitement engulfed me. We had been trying for a baby for nine months. But the wave of relief and euphoria I felt was quickly usurped by another more insistent emotion: worry.
I was not concerned about our ability to be good parents. I knew we would be devoted to our baby. No, what preoccupied me was money. More specifically, how we would sustain our delicious lifestyle when I became a mum.
It isn’t that we have modest incomes. Between us we earn £100,000 a year — Ben, 34, is a marketing manager, and I am a freelance writer. Had we been judicious and salted away savings in anticipation of the day when we became parents, we would have had a pot of money to sustain us during the months of my maternity leave.
As it is, we don’t have a big savings pot. Instead, we have lived with unashamed extravagance. Although our earnings put us in the top income bracket — the average annual wage in Britain is just £26,500 — we have saved a miserly £1,500.
So, because I have no intention of living within our reduced means, I will have no option but to return to work, at least part-time, three to six months after the birth in March.
But expensive nannies or nurseries are out of the question. My mother will look after the baby for free. After all, we couldn’t sustain more expense on top of our substantial outgoings.
Am I selfish and vain? Many will say so. But I believe there are countless new mothers like me who are compelled to go back to work not so much by necessity as through their own profligacy.
THE problem is that I refuse to compromise. I am not prepared to forgo my regular beauty treatments, relinquish my luxury make-up habit or stop colouring my hair. I do not intend to let standards slip, to become mumsy, frumpy and anonymous.
After all, being well-groomed and fashionably dressed is an integral part of being me. I know I lay myself open to charges of materialism, shallowness and snobbery — and I admit to all three — but in my defence, I would argue that, at the age of 34, and having grown used to nice things, it is difficult to settle for the mediocre.
More than that, though, I believe we are defined and judged by our possessions — and I have never wanted to be known as the girl with the BHS handbag.
So the prospect of rummaging through ‘good as new’ sales for clothes for our daughter — we knew from my 20-week scan that we are having a girl — fills me with abject horror. I want her to have a wardrobe of pretty, new dresses.
And although I know we should buy a modest buggy, I would feel embarrassed to push a budget pushchair round the affluent streets of Tunbridge Wells where we live. So we’ve gone for the latest top- of-the-range model, costing £ 850. Thankfully, our generous parents have offered to chip in and help.
My refusal to rein in my spending has caused simmering tensions between Ben and me.
This week, I splashed out £70 on a private scan because I coveted some more photos of our unborn. Ben thought it was an extravagance, and he was probably right. But I reminded him the £175-amonth he spends on his golf membership and health club could be whittled down. He argues that he works hard so these self-indulgences are no less than he deserves.
So it is that habits have become engrained. We would no more wish to abandon our monthly massages than we would patronise the local Harvester instead of a fashionable restaurant.
I expect condemnation for saying all this, to be accused of being frivolous and ungrateful. But I firmly believe that many will secretly share my view.
When I look back to my childhood, it is hard to pinpoint when my taste for the high life began. I grew up in Biggin Hill with my younger brother, who’s now 24, and our parents.
Dad, an engineer, and Mum, a primary school teacher, were never profligate or flash. They saved their money, and helped pay for my accommodation at university, and bailed me out many times. When I started working, my spending escalated proportionately; my taste for the finer things in life became engrained.
I met Ben, through a mutual friend, in April 2011. He shared a ‘work hard, play hard’ ethos. Our wedding in April 2014 in the picture-postcard Sussex village of Frant, followed by a reception at Wadhurst Castle, was glorious. The day cost £25,000 and, once again, our parents chipped in.
WHILE some brides congratulate themselves on making petty savings — a few pounds on table settings; a dress bought in the sales — I felt compelled to spend as much as I could afford, and more. Many would argue that my £2,500 dress was a needless indulgence. But I felt I would be short- changing myself if I’d spent less.
Our honeymoon on Italy’s Amalfi Coast set us back another £5,000, but I do not regret it. The memories will stay with us always. We knew we should be saving money, but somehow we were caught up in a cycle of hedonism.
Yet even now I ask: would I feel better if I had saved? Would I be basking in a glow of self-righteousness if I’d spent countless dreary nights in watching telly, nursing a glass of cheap plonk? Would I now be congratulating myself on my parsimony and prudence?
The truth is, I do not rue a moment of my reckless spending.
And neither did I think about economy when, last year, we considered the home in which we wanted to raise our first child. I knew, again, I would not compromise and set my heart on a pretty three-bedroom Victorian terrace house in Tunbridge Wells. We took out a £15,000 loan so I can revel in the oak floors, granite worktop and bi-folding doors I’d seen in upmarket magazines.
I wonder if it has become a habit of my generation to seek instant gratification. But friends who have had children are happy to slum it in tents on rain-drenched holidays in Cornwall, to dye their own hair, forgo manicures and dress their children in hand-me-downs.
I expect more. I would feel cheated if we did not have a break abroad in the sun, and next year I have set my heart on Lake Garda.
Yes, parenthood will change us, but I am determined to bring my daughter up to share my exacting standards. When I buy her changing bag, I will choose a label that has cachet. It will say as much about my aspirations as my Michael Kors designer handbag.
Meanwhile, I have booked a private room at a posh little cafe for my baby shower. Champagne will be served with afternoon tea.
I wish I could pretend I’d be content with my girlfriends’ company. But, the truth is, I’m hoping for some pretty clothes for my newborn — and, be assured, I’ll be scrutinising the labels on any items I’m fortunate enough to be given.