I'm very, very torn and feel like I'm having a total sliding doors moment. Please MUmsnetters, help decide my future.
I'm 40yo and work as a HCP in the nhs. I work part time but a full time salary would be about 40k for me. So well paid, good pension. I have a fairly nice job in that i have a specialist role so don't have to work shifts. My job can be stressful at times.
12 months ago I had gone through a two year bad patch and applied for uni. Ive now been offered a place at uni. Things are better at work now. I wouldn't say I'm enjoying my job but I'm not hating it either. Work is work, I don't look forward to it but once I'm there it's ok.
I think now I'm part time I have a good work/life balance. Realistically I don't think I could do this job till I retire. It's fast paced, stressful, mentally hard and can at times be physically hard. I do spend quite a bit of my job direct patient contact on the wards but not as much as most people doing my job due to my specialist role. I'm not a nurse. There aren't really many avenues for me to explore in my current career...it's fairly dead end to be honest. Only other option is management which doesn't appeal and I can't do part time.
So the choice is stick with what I'm doing or go to uni.
Uni course is a two year postgrad physicians associate course. Course fees are paid and there's a 5k a year bursary. Financially it would be hard. Saying that I do have circa 50k savings, but I am a real rainy day fund kind of person and reluctant to decimate my savings. Part of me feels I would rather retire five years earlier than otherwise possible and keep me 50k to see me through retiring five years before I get my pension.
Dd is in year ten. If I started uni it would be full time for two years and involve commuting over an hour each way to uni and to placements. So I wouldn't be home until 6:30ish every day. Dh doesn't get home until around then. I currently get home about 4:30pm. I think although dd doesn't need anyone home it's too much for her 5 days a week to come home to an empty house, be getting dinner, etc
I also have a dog which although I would get a dog walker every day I don't think it's fair on her to leave her 5 days a week.
I feel if I turn it down I would be turning down the opportunity to train for a really amazing job. Which would pay slightly more than I currently earn. If I can get a job......there's not many advertised as it's still quite a new role. But I guess as more students graduate there will be more jobs plus people say a lot of PA jobs aren't advertised, jobs are just offered to PAs graduating. I know of one PA who got a job like this in a gP surgery, no advert.
I think it's the commuting that's putting me off the most. Not just the time but the expense. It's either £17 a day on the train or I drive about 45 miles on a congested road and there's no parking I could afford near the hospital or the uni. Cheapest parking is £2 for 4 hours and 4 hour max stay. No idea how that works in a full day! So petrol costs, £1 toll bridge and parking each day on a student bursary.
My local uni and hospital are seriously wanting to put on a PA course and I think it will happen in the next few years so I could apply there. But I might not get in. They may by then be charging tuition fees and currently they don't. They may not offer the 5k a year bursary. Each uni sets their own bursary/tuition fees thing and it differs. Most unis don't do a bursary. One last year did a 10k bursary but have now dropped to 5k. So then I may not be able to afford it.
So, follow my dream but have no money or time or family life for two years. Or gamble on waiting until dd is older and also maybe being able to do it closer to home. But if I take that gamble then accept I may have to trudge along at uninteresting and stressful job for possibly another 25 plus years or until I have a breakdown and Jack it in to work in a cafe! 