Another "how am I doing?" thread, sorry. Considering going part time at 38. Thoughts on family-work-life-fire balance appreciated!

Thanks to everyone who helped me get my head around retirement age and pension pot sizes previously. Apologies for another type of these posts but I promise it pivots towards the end into a bit of a philosophical thing.

I think I have been sort of doing fire without even knowing what fire was it seems, since I only recently found out about this approach.. I came from poverty and always worked hard and saved/invested even harder, never bought flashy things, I always wanted to work hard and fast then get out clean.

I'm 38. Spouse is 38 too. We have been together 21yrs (yes!). We have 500k in our combined pension pots.. Growth rates were high/lucky because I am decent at investment picks. Our mortgage (locked in at 1.09% for 5yrs, rate expires q1 2027) is 180k remaining. We have 225k in stocks and shares ISAs which we will use to pay off the mortgage next year. I expect it to be 250k in s&s isa by that point. We think this is a peace of mind decision and understand the pay off vs don't pay off debate. This is a large 4 bed detached house with additional office and dining rooms, large garden, double garage in a nice quiet village. Enough to stay in if we want to.

I earn roughly 100k salary + bonus and am wary of the 100k+ tax trap. Overall pension contributions are roughly 10k from me and 15k from employer per year. Spouse is stay at home parent (2 very young kids).

At age 58 my pension is projected to look like 1.6m and spouse is projected to look like 400k assuming they never work again. With 4% growth rates.

We've always seemed to be able to live comfortably off 3-4k per month including the mortgage so I am expecting to retire in my 50s, draw down below 50k/year (below 38k if I ever get state pension), 12.5k or a bit more draw down on the spouse (modify all this to account for tax free portion of course) and to be more than comfortable.

My goal then turns to ensuring the kids are well looked after and inheritance tax avoided where possible. They already have 10k premium bonds and I will up this to 50k ASAP and do what I can to their pensions, and then figure out what I can class as surplus income for the sake of gifting.

All of this looks great to me at a glance (and your expertise and experiences here is appreciated). This may sound strange but I didn't realise we were in this position because we have always just done these things, saved, invested etc on auto pilot. We don't have trackers or budgets or plans... So when I actually looked into our long term finances over Christmas we were surprised and it also triggered a crisis of purpose in me : why work my ass off and save so hard if we are already going to be okay and I just want to play with my kids more?? As a result I am thinking of tapering down to 4 day weeks (80k) and 3 day weeks (60k) over time, probably sacrificing more money into pension to qualify for child benefit because it seems optimal at this point. The "work hard, earn lots" voice in my head since I was a child is screaming at me that this is wrong though, so on an emotional level I would love to read whether it resonates with your fire methods.

And finally I want to drop a bombshell. I mentioned I came from poverty, that is true, however, we are due to inherit millions. Probably at least 2m after tax dust settles. This may be in the next few years. This as you an imagine has hung over me for many years and made everything I do feel pointless, even more so still working full time with young kids and the financial position we find ourselves in. I find myself thinking in terms of risk mitigation rather than wealth accumulation ; physical and mental health, relationships with kids, spouse, family, friends, hobbies etc. Sorry this has been a very long post and this last paragraph likely nullifies the entire point of fire and how I have lived my life, but I wonder if any experienced hands in this subreddit have juggled fire and the mentality which comes with it with kids, reduced working hours, and sudden (or not sudden but looming I guess) wealth.

Thank you if you read this.