To ask if you couldn't imagine leaving your baby and then young dc with strangers?

If more women did this then putting careers on pause etc wouldn’t be so looked down upon by employers.

You could equally say if more women went back to work and held senior positions, more employers would have family friendly policies

But the reality is that women can do what they want and you don't get to control their choices because it would suit you better

Why should women put their careers on hold - I didn’t want to. DT’s thrived at nursery.

There needs to be more emphasis for fathers to put their careers on hold instead of the mother

Working for £10 while other people look after your children all day is insanity. People act like careers can’t be re-built once kids are a bit older. Working effectively for free just to avoid doing the extra work of rebuilding it once kids are school age just makes no sense. Women can have it all but not at the same time. Careers can be rebuilt, the fundaments of a child’s brain of which 90% is developed in the first 3 years, cannot. I am a high earner and spent years studying and gaining my professional qualification but I still choose to prioritise the kids during this short season of life. If more women did this then putting careers on pause etc wouldn’t be so looked down upon by employers.

But don't you see you had a choice most people returning to work don't. I'm still waiting for someone to answer who pays your bills when your a sahm

@cloudjumper yes, the 'looked after by strangers' phrase is always a giveaway of the OP's intention!

I don't know a single person who has ever left their child with a stranger.

I do know many, myself included, who researched and visited many professional childcare options, did settling in visits with our children and then left them with people they loved being with (my kids talked about their nursery workers for years after) and in an environment where they thrived.

This.

You count how many words they can say?

My DD can say all sorts but I don't know how many words she can say in total. I do know she talks all day, to me, to nursery staff, to her dad on the way home and when they get home, to the dog, to herself, to her toys...

And she has an amazing vocabulary, I'm always surprised. But I don't count the words.

My DD wasn't in childcare at 5 months.

I was just commiserating about the poster's late speaker.

Edited to say: When my DD did go to nursery, which was PT and when she was 3, she had more than one room she could go in. The nursery was chosen due to it's facilities and the fact it didn't take children under 2.

Your child could tell you about their day at 5 months? Haha. I have an extremely early talker who knew 500 words by 18 months but even he wasn't saying anything intelligible at 5 months.

OP did you really need to start a thread though if you're saying you're really happy with the choices you made? Was it really beyond your imagination to think that other women do things differently?

These threads are started just to attack working mums (though interestingly not dads!) and it's really unpleasant.

I kind of agree with OP that most mothers who use childcare for very young children aren't doing it because they have no alternative. Childcare is so expensive that financially it doesn't stack up for the lowest paid anyway. With the exception of single parents who get universal credit to pay for most of it.

I think plenty of mothers prefer to work than stay at home all of the time, for lots of perfectly good reasons. Including career progression, a better standard of living, retaining financial independence from their husband, status, job satisfaction, boredom from staying home, needing a break from demanding toddlers, not enjoying household chores, etc. None of these are wrong. It's ok to make a balanced decision for the family rather than to put your child first 100% of the time

The idea that the mother looks after the child all of the time is a new one and not something that has historically happened (except maybe for a brief period after the war). It's totally normal for other people to help with childcare and even to be paid for it.

There's good and bad childcare just as there are good and bad parents. I don't think full time nursery is Ideal for any age child simply because they are in one room in a very restricted situation, which if it is 8-6 5 days a week is not great, but using some nursery hours or a childminder is not inherently worse than being with a parent or grandparent.

It's pretty important for women to continue to work and be self-sufficient. Even with high childcare costs.

Look at all the threads on here about single mums struggling. Including the one about the school today where the "D"P upped and left when the baby was 5 days old.

By all means, stay at home to save your child from "strangers" (they'll have to go to school eventually anyway - are all the teachers "strangers" too).

But don't then whine when your partner buggers off with someone else and you're left with no career and no money.

I would say that a certain societal anxiety exists with regard to women reaching parity with men in the workplace. It's no coincidence that the rise of helicopter parents and extreme supervision of children occurred at the same time as more women were succeeding in professional careers that used to be the preserve of men. (Women have always worked outside the home, but the job options available to them were limited until relatively recently.)

The idea that women could achieve exactly the same as men from a professional standpoint was threatening to some elements in society. I don't mean this in a conspiratorial sense, and for many people the source of this anxiety was probably completely unconscious. But mothers began to receive a strong social message that allowing their children a measure of freedom and independence was wrong. Instead, mothers had to watch their children like hawks at all times. And if they were at work, how could they provide that intense form of supervision?

These trends have damaged both women and children IMO. Many women are disadvantaged professionally and materially by putting their careers on hold or working part-time. Childhood has changed radically with the current limits on freedom and independence that many children experience, and this change has not been for the better.

I'm sorry that your DD was so backwards in being able to speak. My DD started speaking at 5 and half months. This is common in my extended family as the majority of her older cousins all were speaking at similar ages.

Incidentally they were all in childcare with childminders before they were a year old.

Oh and I'm the higher earner so yes we were better off after I went back to work full-time while her dad worked part-time. Simply because I work standard office hours there as her dad can often work at weekends and nights if there are shifts.

Of course or I’d never have been able to return to work, and I didn’t want to be a SAHM, nor would it have been possible. I have two well adjusted kids who have excelled so it’s not harmed them in any way

@Confusionn its funny you say that. I am not highly paid and yet clear almost £1000 post nursery fees so I beg to differ.
its a huge amount for us

We had to to work and keep our house and buy food. We found a wonderful childminder we trusted. With my second we had to use a nursery for a while and that was good too and the staff although younger seemed very competent and caring and all their policies were well thought out. I checked things like safe sleeping arrangements, car seats, whether grapes, sausages etc were cut into safer shapes, kids sat up when eating, furniture was securattached to walls. They had all already thought of all those things.

Wow!
I live in a small 2 bed terrace and it takes two people with MSc's and 35k jobs to pay the bills.
Who pays to support you?

This. For a lot of people it’s not an option. I’m sure a lot of mums and dads would love to not put their children into nurseries but unfortunately there are bills to pay.

Well as a parent to "only" (who is an adult now), it seems no matter what I did it was wrong either way.

Don't put her in nursery I'm depriving her of the chance to socialise with other children and she'd end up lonely with no friends, or put her in nursery and I don't care about her well-being.

You do what you think is best for your DC OP, and let others do what they think is best for theirs and stop with the judging.

When my eldest was about 6-12 months I left him for a few hours one evening with my friends husband while we went out. They also a a baby the same age.

Now I think 'what was I thinking'! I'd met him quite a few times before and he seemed sound but still... I didn't do that with younger dc.

Around the same time another pal wanted me to leave dc with her boyfriends pal who I hadn't met before to go out. They thought I was weird for saying no!

But nurseries etc I have no problem with.

No one is reacting to “your life choice” they are reacting because you have come here to lord it up over the people that can’t afford to make the same choices you did.

You think you are a superior parent because you are in a privileged position to be able to stay home with your children. Good for you.

I think it’s unfortunate your privileged position didn’t buy you any empathy. Implying other parents aren’t as good as you for going out to work, in order to keep a roof over their heads makes you look terrible- not them.

Mine didn't go to nursery until the term after he turned 3, as that was the point he could go for free so I sent him for his own development, not because I needed the childcare.
I was happy that he was potty trained by then although he still had the odd accident staff had to help him with. And yes I was also happy he could talk at that point and tell me basic information about his day.
I'm aware that other people need to use nurseries for babies though and I was privileged.

The judgement on here is unbelievable. I do have some questions for the posters who believe children shouldn't be left with strangers.
At what age would you put a non verbal child in to childcare? What if they are still non verbal at 4 or 5?
Do you think that all childcare workers work long hours for shit pay just so they can hurt children?
Nursery staff don't lone work so when exactly are they going to abuse children?
Do you know that over 50% of staff are qualified?
What awful things do you think are happening in childcare?
Being a SAHM doesn't make you a better parent.
And I have been both a working mum and SAHM.