To NOT feel guilty that my kids are in childcare?

Yes there is the idea of the 'good enough' mother, but that doesn't mean 'good enough' in terms of 'seeing your baby for x hours per day is 'good enough.' That's a totally separate issue relating to the mother's capacity to be responsive or not.

The fact remains, that child developmental stages are real.

Hopefully you’re actively raising your children to be less judgemental and more tolerant than you.

edited because the language was unnecessary 🤦🏼‍♀️

If they were doing their best they would be actively raising their children in the important early years rather than handing them over for someone else to do it.

Honestly some of these comments have my blood boiling. I couldn’t care less whether someone stays at home or works, if their kids are happy and healthy, and they’re happy and healthy, then it’s a winner in my book. But some of the nasty, judgemental and frankly vindictive posts on this thread (and any similar threads) are so cruel and unnecessary.

What possesses someone to come onto a thread, clearly trying to uplift working mums to not feel guilty for their choices, and rip into them making shitty remarks about they could be have done it as their babies are “precious” , they’ve harmed their children etc. It’s absolutely revolting language to use against other mums just doing their best.

I think it’s pretty naive to assume anyone getting irritated at posts clearly aimed at guilt-tripping working mothers must just feel guilty - there’s an obvious uptick in recent years of both online and real life discourse suggesting women should get back in the home, and that feminism has robbed us of our true desire (baking sourdough surrounding by four children while wearing a prairie dress).

Whether individuals are knowingly part of that wider trend or simply mindlessly sniping at strangers online, people are going to bristle at posts that appear to do little more than castigate women for wanting to work while having small children.

edit: hit post four words too early!

I find nursery incredibly good for our DC. They have learnt new skills, become far more confident and they've barely ever cried being dropped off.
Of course they are so happy to see us when we pick them up as are we! Thry don't go full time though, but that's just because of our circumstances.

Do you feel better about yourself and your choices now? You’ve come onto a thread primarily aimed at working parents, and made comments trying to make them feel shit about themselves. “What they’ve done to their child” is judgemental, sanctimonious bullshit, especially given most posters on here have said they send them part time.

You're entitled to your opinion of course, as am I. But I don't understand why post the thread if you're so guilt free about your choice. As I said, for many it's not a choice but I can't fathom those who have a choice but choose to send their child to be cared for by young, badly paid, over worked (often disinterested) carers. I certainly could never have entrusted my precious babies to nursery staff.

Of course you aren't unreasonable.
The only people who are unreasonable are those who tell sahps that it's not a "job".
whilst paying someone else to look after their dc
🙄😊

My children have a wonderful attachment with me, thank you. They also love going to nursery and all the fun things they do there.

That “research” you’ve quoted is, in our case, a load of complete bollocks.

When babies are born, they are obviously already familiar with mum and dads voice, sounds in the home etc and have been familiar with these sounds snd rhythms for some months.

Before the age of 6 months, a baby is in the paranoid-schizoid phase, meaning that they have no sense of themself as a 'whole' being and no sense of mum as a whole being either. They cope with feelings of disintegration by their relationship to familiar 'parts' of the mother - eg. the breast (if bf), her voice, smell etc. This is the only thing that helps them to 'hold themselves together.' They have no sense of separation to the mother, they only exist in a world of 'part objects.' Eventually, by 6-9 months, babies acquire a coherent sense of the mother as a sum of parts - a whole body - and by extension, they realise they are a whole body too. But with this comes the realisation that the mother, as a separate body, can actually leave them or be separate to them. This is why, separation anxiety can only really set in at 6-9 months. It's why babies, who may have seemed fairly settled in childcare, might suddenly become highly distressed at drop-offs or pick up times. Before this, they have only a disorganised sense of self so can't organise a reaction to anything, if that makes sense.

So a 10-week old baby going into a nursery, all day, is a highly stressful and disorientating experience. A bit like being suspended in space, without any familiar reference points. They have to build up defences to mitigate against the sense of disintegration because they don't yet have a concept of object permanence.

It's only beneficial if a parent wants to and is happy to stay at home, not to mention if it's affordable. It's also beneficial for a child to have a roof over their head and food in their stomach.

Yeah. It’s weird. I say this as someone who has to use nursery but has bent over backwards to flex hours etc to ensure my DD is in there the minimum amount of time possible.

There is far more research on attachment than the famous study you just cited. A quick search on Google scholar will demonstrate that.

They don’t actually think that. They’ve convinced themselves of it to hide the guilt they would feel if they actually realised what they’ve done to their child.

It’s weird to me that people think their children could be genuinely better off in an institutional setting for full time hours, only seeing their parents for a couple of hours per day and weekends and perhaps five weeks annual leave a year. Do you have so little faith in your own parenting that you genuinely think that balance is best?

Okay, so you don’t feel guilty. That just makes me think even less of you as a person.

You can pretend the research doesn’t exist if you want, come up with whatever excuses you can muster as to why they don’t work, but staying at home with a parent for a child under 3 is more beneficial.

But of course to acknowledge that you would have to actually think about what you’ve done to your child’s important early years, and you won’t, so 🤷‍♀️

Are they? Very few babies in the UK go to nursery at 6 weeks old, let alone for 10 hours a day.

@AquaPeer - yes, but what I'm saying is, when babies are born in extreme circumstances (eg unsafe home environment, mother with addiction or serious mental health issues), social services don't put the baby into daycare 8-5, and then facilitate contact with mum for a couple of hours in the evening and weekends. They bend over backwards to keep both the mum and baby together, which may mean mother and baby foster homes, residential clinics or a home support worker moving in. It costs thousands per week.

Yet in 'normal' cases (ie none of these issues), the govt are quite happy for families to potentially put babies in childcare from 6 weeks old for 10 hour days - ie. the vast majority of their waking lives. It makes no sense really. Well it makes sense from a GDP perspective, but not from a baby's perspective.

That’s totally different though, that’s a baby who will never live with or see mum again if it doesn’t work.

YABU for lumping in all nursery together. Sending a 4 month old to nursery full time is very clearly not ideal, all the research backs that up. Sending a 2 year old to nursery a couple of days a week can be beneficial. Sending any child (including a 4 month old) to nursery could well be net positive when balanced with parental stress/lack of money if parents have to stay home to look after them instead.