To feel quite sick at the thought of my child starting school nursery?

[Slightlyneuroricnat]

Hoping at least a few of you can identify with the overwhelming sick feeling I get everytime I think about my daughter starting at the school nursery in April.
Luckily she will be one of the eldest ( 3 years 10 months ) but has never been in any form of childcare before and although a very confident little thing, she is known to panic and cry if she can't spot me at the park / sort play etc.
I know it's only 3 hours a day but the thought of letting her to to strangers to be cared for makes me feel awful.

I can promise you that even if she has a complete meltdown it will be nothing that they haven't dealt with before. I agree with previous posters - don't hover, just say goodbye in a really cheerful manner and walk away. You can melt down outside

DD started nursery at just shy of a year and was at the clingy stage that meant she cried if I left the room. I was convinced it was going to be awful! But she was absolutely fine - didn't even cry. Nursery staff are masters of distraction.

I hope so, she is a confident little thing but only when I'm there.
Did other people with small gaps have this concern with not having enough time with the eldest?

it really is important to see how they are when you pick them up.

tantrums or crying in the morning are not a problem as long as they come away happy, which means they actually had a good day!
that is my "rule" anyway

My dd starts nursery this week aged 3y3m. I'm a bit nervous because she's my youngest and ill have no more so it makes me feel a bit nostalgic but it's the best thing for her and it will really bring her on.

You're sounding very stressy about it, I hope you don't mind me saying that. I talk to dd about it but just in a sort of passing way and more tell her things rather than ask if that makes sense?

Also I don't really understand how the small age gap is relevant? Your dd just has to understand that things can't always be the same for both of them, just say she had time before your youngest was born and she's lucky because she gets to go do x,y and z. It's just a natural thing and doesn't seem, to me, to be particularly peculiar to having a small age gap.

I think it'd really help if every time you worried or had a negative thought about it you tried to stop yourself in your tracks and think about all the positive things.

If you want to send your youngest to pre school then why not but I think it should be an entirely separate decision and nothing to do with your older dd starting nursery.

Bea,
No of course not, I'm the first to admit I am very stressy about it!
But am making sure she doesn't pick up on that.
I'm sure she will be excited by it all when it comes to it and I'll make sure she thinks I'm very positive about it all too.
I will have a pre school lined up for my youngest to start if i think it's the right call once eldest is settled as the thought of attempting to settle 2 is too much at once I think!

Small gaps, big gaps, medium gaps... There is no perfect plan to having kids with optimum time between them. In my family, my older two siblings were born one 'school year' apart like your two and then 9 years later I came along. So my mum had both the closeness of the older two boys and rarely getting them alone as they were so close developmentally etc and then as they were getting older and doing all the hard growing up stuff She had a baby/toddler to contend with who you could argue 'unfairly' got more of her time in the early years... However we are ALL very close both to each Other and our parents, the older two don't feel deprived of personal attention due to close gap in fact they had a lovely childhood with someone always there. Anyway what I'm trying to say is don't feel guilty, families Have all sorts of different dynamics and you shouldn't feel bad and that you need to put your youngest in pre school just so your oldest is able to get 'one on one' with you. It's her turn to start nursery now, next year it will be the younger one's turn. You don't need to 'even out' the time you're spending with them both by doing this, as they get older they'll get different hobbies and interests and little lives of their own which will mean you get individual time with them anyway, at this stage it's not going to harm them to be doing different things. You sound like a lovely mummy and it's totally normall to feel anxiety when they are starting nursery but Believe me she will LOVE it and it will be so good for her!

Slightly hormonal as wrong time of the month but that last post touched me!
Thankyou.
I have loved every minute of having my eldest with me for nearly 4 years and I always wanted to do the same with my youngest.
I have felt very pressured recently to spend more alone time with my eldest, a few family members have commented that she won't take to nursery well seeing my youngest at home etc but until it happens maybe I shouldn't worry!

I would stop listening to your family members for a start; they don't seem to have a very helpful attitude here.

It is totally impossible to anticipate exactly how your dd will react to any change in life. She may love it, she may hate it, she may struggle briefly and then love it. Even if you could look into a crystal ball it is no given that the best thing for her would be to try to eliminate all upheavals. Learning to overcome challenges is an essential life skill.

One of the benefits of having siblings is that it confronts you with difference (you go to nursery, I go to school; you are good at sports, I am good at reading; you got invited to X's party, I didn't) at an age where we can still be guided through our feelings by a loving parent. Use that benefit to your advantage: help her (in an age appropriate way) to see that different ages do different things, that different people do different things and that this is part of what makes life interesting.

Very sensible post above
I guess a lot of it is me struggling to " let go "
But I will and she will be fine
Once I start believing that things will be easier!

My littlest started nursery last week (he was 3 in september), and I was worried too. I do have 2 older ones who have done it but that was at a different school, and a long time ago.
He has had a visit there before, walks past it a lot as it is next to the park, and they sent a booklet home to look at with him with photos of the different areas and equipment. As I was working, my DH took him on the first day - and was dismissed by DS3 within 10 minutes, he loved it and has been full of chat about it all week (and a bit sulky this morning that he couldn't go today!)

Have skimmed a bit but wanted to say have you met the people who will be looking after your dd? I have rejected a nursery in the past as I didn't want to leave my child with those particular individuals. However, if you have met the carers and feel they will do a good job then it is much easier for all concerned. Also, will she have keyworker, ie someone she gets to know quite well to help her feel more secure?

My dm withdrew me from nursery as she thought I was too shy/didn't really want me to go. Not surprisingly I was an equally shy p.1 who had no friends, knew no-one when I walked in and took ages (ie p.2!) before I got any.

If she'll be 3 years 10 months in April, surely she'll be starting full time reception THIS September?

She will be 3 years 10 months in september sorry, she wasn't meant to start until then but a place came up for a spring start so she will have a year and a term at nursery from 3 years 5 months to 4 years 11 months

I went to visit a local nursery with DD1 and she loved it I almost felt i could have left her and she would not have minded at all. She will be three in April so not eligible for free 15 hours until September. I am actually looking forward to her starting as it will be good for her she is very sociable. But of course I will feel a little sad too in a way.