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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to consider leaving my children for a year to study?

546 replies

secondcity · 06/02/2011 07:36

long-time lurker here. I am braving AIBU and am bracing myself for the onslaught....

I live in New York with my husband and children, We have been here almost two years and everyone is very settled......except me!

I have been offered a (fully-funded) post-graduate course in the UK in september 2011.

If I were to accept the course, I wouldn't bring my children, but I would aim to come back once a month, and they would obviously come to me for all the holidays. My husband is very capable and we would probably get some part-time childcare sorted (secondary aged kids)

I swing between thinking it would be absolutely fine, (their father used to work away for up to 2 months at a time!)to thinking what kind of mother would contemplate leaving her children.

Anyone have any experience or advice? Thank you

OP posts:
TooColdForPenguins · 06/02/2011 15:55

Actually I do it about every two months, often with one or both of my kids, and by the time we have settled down, eaten a meal and watched a movie its time to prepare for landing again. We only ever do 90 min check-in and refuse to be stressed in airports...it's all part of the holiday. We pack light, make sure the mp3 is fully charged and everyone has a book. It's way less hassle than a lot of the hideous coach and train journeys I have had to do (think Sunday timetables, engineering works, buses replacing trains, cold stations, dodgy or no food facilities, stinking toilets etc). I would much rather my kids were on a warm safe plane coming to visit me than an unreliable Nat Express with its rude drivers or a train with no seats avaialable, vomit on the floor and the aisles full of litter/bikes/druggies/drunks. (Most decent airlines also offer an Unaccomapnied Minor service too).

spidookly · 06/02/2011 16:09

It's not a bad journey, but it's NOT like being a bus ride away from the people on the other end. Except maybe some bus in Russia that cross four time zones where the journey takes a few days.

People on the other side of the Atlantic feel far away, because they are far away. If something happens and they need you immediately you can't come. When you wake up in the morning it's the middle of the night there. When you come home in the evening they're at work/school.

It is qualitatively different from being in different parts of the UK and only seeing each other at weekends (although that is hardly ideal either).

Original poster
secondcity · 06/02/2011 17:10

Thank you all for your responses, this thread has moved on considerably and I will attempt to answer some of the questions raised, just need a little time to compose it.

OP posts:
Animation · 06/02/2011 17:12

Sorry, but leaving your kids to go on some course across the Atlantic is a definate no no. Kids need their parents. What's so more important about this course? Priorities are different when your kids come into this world - and you don't leave them for a year -particularly so far away. Crazy.

Animation · 06/02/2011 17:18

...and the male/female debate - (if men can do it women can do it) is comletely irrelevent. Hopefully men don't decide to go on these courses either if it means a year away thousands of miles away.

pixiestix · 06/02/2011 17:38

I can understand your need to do something for yourself, but if my mother had left me for a year at ANY point in my childhood I would have gone off the rails entirely.

As for all the sexist comments - if my husband proposed this I would be horrified. It wouldn't be "ok for the man to do it" at all in this household.

BeenBeta · 06/02/2011 18:40

secondcity - sending the children to boarding school is exactly the solution many parents do come to in these sorts of circumstances. You may wish to consider that.

I went to boarding school at age 11. I effectively left home at that point. My relationship with my parents and my siblings changed at that point even tough I went back in holidays and some weekends. I think that is what might happen here with the children. I was very happy at boarding school and if your children are independent they may enjoy it too. I woudl prefer my children at boarding schol than wandering around NYC and your husband left to care for them alone.

Having said all that, my wife went to Japan for 3 months shortly after we left university. We went to live in London and she lived with me a few weeks before going. I missed her terribly and would never want to be apart again like that again.

I get the sense form your original post that moving to New York has been something of a compromise and you still hanker for the UK and are not very settled there. I wonder if you need to talk to your husband more than to your children about what both of you want out of life.

TyraG · 06/02/2011 19:08

"I woudl prefer my children at boarding schol than wandering around NYC and your husband left to care for them alone."

Great idea, then neither parent has to take care of their kids.

Why didn't I ever think of that? I can just send the kids to boarding school and DH and I can finally fuck off on that world cruise we've always wanted. Oh wait, we're their parents and it's our responsibility to take care of them...yeah almost forgot about that part.

MojoLost · 06/02/2011 19:14

I don't think you should do it, kids needs their parents, whatever their age.
Sorry, but your family is more important.

ThePosieParker · 06/02/2011 19:16

BB...love your last couple of sentences,.

TyraG....lol.

bubblewrapped · 06/02/2011 19:19

Why do people have kids if they have no intention of being involved in the day to day task of raising them?

Boarding school? so wrong, so so wrong.

Alouiseg · 06/02/2011 19:21

Personally I couldn't do it and I have secondary school age children. I would either wait til they finished education themselves or I would weekly board them near where I was studying to maintain a relationship without having to concentrate on the daily grind.

jalopy · 06/02/2011 19:21

Secondcity Shock well, you did ask.

Alouiseg · 06/02/2011 19:22

Bubble wrapped, boarding school would be wrong for many teenagers but in hindsight I should have sent ds1 from the age of 13.

BeenBeta · 06/02/2011 19:29

buble - having experienced it and know many others who have I can genuiniley say it is the right thing for some and the wrong thing for others.

pointylug · 06/02/2011 19:29

I couldn't do it. My kids would hate it. My husbadn would hate it. I'd wait till the kids had left school.

But you know your own family, you know how important this course is to you. Hard for strangers to advise you.

scottishmummy · 06/02/2011 19:30

yes do the course.ignore all hand wringing and jibes about abandonment.it is a good opportunity,something you will derive satisfaction from.academic yr is short. dc are being left with dad not cast aside motherless.it will be a wrench, do email, phone and webcam. and grab the opportunity

thisismyboomstick · 06/02/2011 19:35

since the recession in the UK a lot of my collegues have taken secondments oversees for greater or lesser periods. I also work in an industry where 'working away' during the week is part of the job.

Don't know whether this has a particularly damaging effect on families; it's just how it is. Do it, or if not tell me the details and I'll do it.

QuickLookBusy · 06/02/2011 19:36

My DH works away all week so is gone from Mon-Fri. My teenagers really miss their Dad, but have been able to cope with it by looking forward to friday nights, and all visiting him during the holidays.

I find it bloody hard work being a single parent all week. If my Dh said he was off to New York to study I would not be happy at all.

I just think your DC will miss you too much. It is such an important stage, before the teenage years. Sorry but they need their mum around them.

emkana · 06/02/2011 19:37

I hope second city responds to the point about how the children would spend their time while visiting her in Britain - really would have my doubts if those holidays would be all that successful, unless you have loads of money.

scottishmummy · 06/02/2011 19:42

what are your long term plans op.what opportunities or advantages will doing the course offer you

RIZZ0 · 06/02/2011 19:44

I also hope OP you think of mistletoekisses 's good point about them not confiding in you in the way they would normally be able. At a time when they most need to.

3seater · 06/02/2011 19:53

Blimey, this has to be the most ethnocentric post I have ever read on mumsnet.
Good luck op

3seater · 06/02/2011 19:54

Pardon me, meant thread

emkana · 06/02/2011 19:57

Em...why ethnocentric? [dim]