re: OT dads with small kids and a job that travels, how do you like it?

I make great great money for south Louisiana. I made the choice to step back though from my career.

I could be in that corporate life pushing the career arc, making more and more money if I was ok with relocating and traveling.

Instead, I'm work from home and raising my children.

Its a choice I'm grateful to have and lucky to have had help realizing it. I almost chose career.

I’ve been traveling the last 11 years…average about 110 nights away from home. When I started my sons were 3 and 7. It has been very hard. Having said that, I have a great relationship with my wife and boys. It takes work though.
Advantages (for me):
I love my work
Love the people I work for
Able to provide a good income for my family
Have been able to take them with me on trips
Never pay for hotel rooms on vacation
Week off at Thanksgiving
Three weeks off at Christmas
Disadvantages:
Just being away….missing events, not being there to help with sick kids, etc…

Your travel sounds very appealing to me, but we are coming from different directions. I’m on the road more than that and you aren’t traveling at all.
Do I think you could be a great husband and father with that schedule? Absolutely, but it takes more work.
I don’t know if I would make the same choice again. I’m often tortured with what ifs. You eventually start doing the math on how long you’ve been away altogether. That’s hard.

Question….how much say do you have in when you travel? Could you adjust it to your home schedule?

Also…don’t listen to “Wish I Would have Been There” by John Anderson!