As my name states I am totally clueless about what I am entitled to and honestly my midwife is awful. So hard to get in contact with and doesn't tell me about anything available to me.
With the current coronavirus situation my husband has no work (worked in the entertainment industry and self employed so no money coming in. The company is still ticking over but not bringing in any money and in fact is going to have to reimburse clients meaning they will actually be in negative). I start maternity leave in 9 weeks. My maternity pay will be full for 13 weeks and the statutory £148.68 a week for 26 weeks which will not cover our mortgage payments or anywhere close to our bills.
We would have been fine, it would have been tight but just about doable as my husband was planning to keep working during the week then do his evening and weekend work every night and weekend. This was causing me anxiety and I knew I was going to feel like a single parent and he was sad at how much he knew he was going to miss but this pregnancy and house purchase came just before we got a huge devastating financial blow I won't go into. It was necessary that he work that much. He was looking at other work he could do from home but couldn't find anything workable. Obviously things are very different now. UC payments won't cover our bills either. I know about the Surestart grant but nothing else. Is my best option to try and do some side hustle whilst on maternity leave? I don't know what skills I have that I could utilise. I'm getting very worried about whats going to happen to us financially. It was already going to be a struggle, now it seems impossible.