<prompt> Human: Just had our first kid a few months ago, and at the 11th hour 11th week of her maternity leave, to be exact my wife hit me with I want to be a stay at home mom. Didnt see that one coming.I do well enough. But so did my wife, and although we used to live well below our means, we are acclimated to a pretty highfalutin lifestyle I guess.Some numbers for me: 95k base salary plus I usually get another 30k in stockbonuses House worth 350k at 4 interest, just got PMI released last year, owe 275k or so, 1700 payment Investments are good, 30k or so in cash plus much more in stock I can get to if needed most of my net worth is here in retirement accounts -- not sure how much detail I need to go in but its comfortable New family car Outback that I am choosing to finance thanks to 0 APR 60 months, 460 a month Other cars are paid for Bills arent bad: 145 service for two phones, 125-150 average power, 50 average watergas, 100 internet and super-basic landline just dropped TV service for antennanetflixprime, carumbrella insurance 200 a month Contributing 200 a month to kids 529 Assume 400 medical bills per month thanks to some long-term physical therapy needs I have plus high deductible this will come from an HSA to save taxes, but its still significant Folks live across the country so its 1.5k or so every time we go visit 2x a year or so Plus groceries, yearly gifts, vehicle repairs, basically all the normal stuffMy wife was making close to 100k though, so I think Im in for a pretty big lifestyle shift even though our bills look pretty good. From 225kish gross down to 125k. I know Ill probably save 12-15k of that due to a significantly lower tax bill new kid deduction much lower marginal rate. Plus with her quitting Ill probably save 13-15k in yearly daycare expenses. But its still probably 50-60k of lost income and 401k contributions.On a sheet of paper I know Im fine for the short term; my fear is the future. Wife may no longer be professionally marketable after several years out of the workforce, and if my job gets sent overseas at some point then we have a lot of risk of being in a really bad spot.So I guess my question is -- how do I best prepare for this? Is all I can do to put together more of a budget and try to save more? Any lesser-known programs or tax benefits I should be trying to dig out? Should I be talking to a CPA? Are there things she could be doing at home that would be super easy while the kid is napping that might bring in extra? Any ideas are appreciated.EDIT: A lot of common themes with questions here, so Ill try to put some answers. Our ages: me late 30s, her early 30s. My job: engineer, mixed focus in software and process engineering Her job: analyst in the healthcare industry. She does some of the traditional actuary type work, and has even taken a few of the actuarial exams. I have suggested that maybe she could continue to work on actuarial exams while being a SAHM, to hopefully keep her marketable. She could potentially get an ASA designation which is a really good thing in her field. Many have suggested talking to her about this most of the suggestions seem more relationship advice-ish as opposed to personal finance, but fair enough. That said, weve talked at length, on multiple occasions, to the point of my bringing her to tears with my overabundance of logic and fear of the future. I think the ultimate conclusion is that she values her time with kiddo much more than our fancier lifestyle, and is willing to budgetcleanetc. Although this proposal to stay-at-home was brought up late in the game, it was actually over a week ago and she has gone back to work, at least temporarily, to see how she feels about it. This is a more-than-reasonable compromise on her part I think, to give her some extra time ensure that its what she really wants to do. Her work is letting her do part-time 25 hours, but still five days a week and they will only give her three months like this. They do let her work from home most of the time but they have a rule that there needs to be a caretaker at the home for any employee telecommuting. Other than the daycare cost 15k year and the tax savings due to reduced income, we dont save too much else by her quitting work. There isnt a big commute to the daycare to cost us mileage, and my work is very flexible with lost time for sick days. We do have a housekeeper that comes once a month to do a deeper clean that would save me 120 a month, but she does such a good job that shes almost worth keeping anyhow.Assistant: Is there any way your wife might be willing or able to work part time? I totally understand the desire to spend more time with kids, but it is difficult to walk away from a 100K a year job. With the economy the way it is, it is really difficult to explain a 5 year absence from the work force. I know a number of women who opted out for a few years, only to find it very difficult to opt back in when the kids started school. I dont know how flexible her employer is, but cutting back on hours might allow her to spend more time with the new baby while still keeping a foot in the door at her workplace. Human: She already had an agreement for part time, 5dayswk at 5 hours a day 9-3 with lunch. But a. her work wont let her sustain this for more than three months, and b. what she would really prefer would be like two longer days a week for 16-18 hours giving us the rest of the week for time with kiddo. The two dayswk would also be MUCH better for the daycare cost too as even with her part-time schedule were paying for full-time care. Two days of daycare would cut the rate in half.Im wondering hoping that maybe with an ultimatum -- something like either give me two dayswk or Im out -- then they may reconsider. Shes perceived as kind of a superstar there so I guess its possible they would go for it.  <response>: This! Tell her to go for the ultimatum. She can frame it in a very nice kind of way, but at the end of the day its true so what does she have to lose? She could offer to do a half time position 2 days one week 3 days the next, assuming she is paid bi-weekly and maybe she could even offer to do one day per week from home, if that is feasible in her position.I work 3 days and have 2 kids and we love this lifestyle. I will hopefully go to full time some time in the next year, but for now it works really well for us. And I get to keep abreast of my very technology driven career. 