Y Combinator, a Two-Year-Old, and a Pregnant Wife
I love articles on this topic because they're uplifting and hopeful, I hate them because they are unrealistic.<p>Y-Combinator's expectation for start-ups is that they are to be "all-consuming" (1)<p>From Sam Altman's "Before the Startup":<p>"If you start a startup, it will take over your life to a degree you cannot imagine. And if your startup succeeds, it will take over your life for a long time: for several years at the very least, maybe for a decade, maybe for the rest of your working life. So there is a real opportunity cost here."<p>In my personal experience start-ups are terrible for young families.<p>If you expect to have a balanced-family-life and still also out-work / out-hustle 20-year olds or 40+ year olds (older kids) that are out for your blood you are setting yourself up for failure.<p>I've been through this exact grind with young children born 18-months apart and you are FORCED to choose.<p>That uninterruptable family dinner?<p>Wait until an investor flys in to SFO unexpectedly and wants to go out on the town.<p>Being around for more of the "little things”?<p>Wait until you are forced to marginalize the importance of being there on your kid's actual "birthday" because heck, you'll be at the birthday party this weekend and you need to be in Dallas for a sales meeting.<p>I am writing those two anecdotes from my own personal experience.<p>Working up on start-up #XX with plenty of success under my belt, pre-set expectations that I'm going to do this "balance" now, etc.<p>It's unrealistic, and I have been forced to choose my start-up and my team over my family to succeed, and it sucks.<p>But that's my path, and that of many others here.<p>I have incredible respect for anybody juggling y-combinator, a working spouse, and two kids.<p>But you have to be made of steel to undertake this path and look at the sacrifices you will make as a husband and father in the eye.<p>(1) <a href="http://www.paulgraham.com/before.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.paulgraham.com/before.html</a>