to decide not to return to work?

[30minsleepisnotenough]

Old employers from 2015 have just asked me to come back 2 days a week. They were awesome employers, I know I could do the job well, they want my specific skills, at 20-ish hours a week close to home and school and DH's work, it would be the perfect part-time job; and it could potentially go for many years (1-year rolling contract as funding is awarded for it yearly). We live somewhere where jobs like this don't come up often and I've had great difficulty finding worthwhile work - or indeed any work at all.

However, DS (20 months) is a horrifically bad sleeper, I've been surviving on 30 minutes a couple of times a day, for most of his life. I am so tired I can't balance, can't drive, am barely able to function. I am not sure I can actually cope with working. DS absolutely hates noisy environments full of marauding kids (and 10 weeks of 2 playgroups and music classes overseas recently showed that he doesn't settle over time: he seems to hate the noise more, the longer we persevere). He is inclined to be very "sensitive", crying at the slightest shove or snatch from another kid... indeed crying at the slightest frustration and working himself into a lather to the point of vomiting pretty easily, if not comforted. He's probably chronically and acutely overtired (I know I am).

Everything screams at me that this is NOT the age to start him at nursery, when other kids the same age problem-solve by hitting, biting, snatching, shoving because they're frustrated and insufficiently verbal to negotiate properly. I can't find any childminders that are close enough that I actually like (have found a couple that I definitely don't like much). A nanny would mean I was paying about 100 quid a week to work. No family to help.

Turning this job down is the correct thing to do under these circumstances, yes?

No, take the job.

Because you think that DS' sleep and social issues will solve themselves and that I'll be a good employee while this is happening?

I admit i have lost most of my sense of pserpective w.r.t. sleep but I can't see this resolving itself easily TBH...

I hope a nursery teacher answers soon but I can honestly say my (also very sensitive DC) never got pushed or shoved etc on a regular basis. I’d say your ds sounds like he’d benefit very much from a nursery environment.

You are in a really shit stage of parenting and SN aside it will most likely pass fairly soon.

I do agree he'd benefit a lot from nursery. But I think it'd be way better when he's just that bit older - 2.5 rather than just over 1.5.

The sleep issue doesn't seem to be about "tiring him out during the day enough" (which everyone keeps suggesting) -- we already do that. It's that he can't seem to stay asleep and gets more and more upset by being awake again as the night goes on. We've done sleep training 4x for 3 weeks at a time each, and it's just made things worse. Local hospital agrees he's got a big problem with sleep but as his development appears unaffected they're not going to do anything about it.

This sounds an incredibly difficult situation and I really sympathise on your lack of sleep. No wonder sleep deprivation is a torture method. However, this job sounds like a one-off opportunity and I would at least have a stab at it. A change of routine and environment might switch up your ds' sleep habits and I wonder if at 20 months, it would be worth starting to get him involved in more group situations with a longer term view of pre-school etc. He will have to get used to groups and noise at some point (before school at least) and avoiding them might not be helping (although I can clearly see from your post why you have been doing this).

I shoudl have added that many of us packed our kids off to nursery at 6 months old to head back to work, whether or not it was in our kids best interests or what we wanted in an ideal world. Maybe the option of staying at home is just confusing the issue....

Sorry to clarify, we have a regular playgroup that we attend 5 days a week, it's good and he likes it. He's doing OK with gentle social interaction there - the kids are all brought by parents who are pretty hands on with the activities, so the behaviour (and its regulation by parents) is a bit different from a 10:1 nursery room... the kids who do the shoving/biting/snatching are all ones who go to nursery as well, and their parents are the ones saying that this is what the local nurseries are like (while immediately correcting the kid and trying to get them to say sorry and learn not to do it).

Of course -- I recognise that having the choice of staying home is an unusual position to be in. I don't want to stay home forever. It's jsut that now seems really the wrong time if it's not essential to take the job.

The parents at playgroup who do work and also have their kids in nursery are all saying "turn the job down, you absolutely do not need the stress".

I'm torn. I recognise that the job is a good one. But i also know that I spend most of my life in a complete daze I'm so exhausted.

I personally, having been a SAHM for a number of years and returning to work, would take the job. Decent part time jobs are like gold dust and this sleep thing is a phase that will improve all by itself probs gradually over a period of a year or so. I went back to work 9 months 'the ideal' I had in mind for dd. She took to nursery really well and I've found it has regulated her daytime sleep and bedtime. But even if that doesn't happen, work feels like a holiday to me after all that caring for toddlers.

Thinking aside from your worries about DS, would you like to return to work?

I went back to work full time after having DD and she was a dreadful sleeper - when it got to the point that DH and I were sleeping on her floor and up multiple times a night we got a sleep consultant and it is the best £300 I have spent in my life.

Good point pencil (see what I did there!). Working and using a different part of my brain, focusing on a logical problem and communicating with adults was like time off from my dcs when they were little (and still is now they're pre-teens and teens) and gave me a chance to recharge and almost rest and come back with 100% attention on them.

Thanks for these perspectives.

Eventually I'd like to return to work, yes.

I am not sure I could focus sufficiently to even be an adequate employee. The job requires a good eye for detail and is producing reports for a government ministry, so it requires sustained focus. At the moment I feel like crying when I can't concentrate long enough to read an article in the crap local newspaper.

DS' sleep is pretty bad. He wakes up every 30 min on a good night. Many nights he does one or two 30 min stretches and the rest is micro-sleeps of five minutes at most. This is hospital territory rather than sleep consultant territiry (and we have done sleep training 4x -- it made it worse).

Is it you doing all the night wakings OP, or does your DH do any?

I'm in the USA and night nannies for mums returning to work (after the standard 6 weeks SMH) are common. Any chance that another wage might help with the cost of something similar?

Take the job. It won’t come again.

Your DH will have to take on some of the night wakings.

You will regret not taking your Gold Dust job.

I would take the job and give it a good try - part time jobs are very rare, you already know the employer and the work etc. Your little one may do well in a nursery environment (I don’t know any decent nurseries that leave little ones to snatch and bite etc) and a change in routine may help the sleep pattern. You do sound very anxious - I wonder if more adult time away from your little one might give you some head space and a different perspective on things too?

TBH, even if you didn't take the job (and I think you will regret it if you don't), putting him in nursery one day a week might be a good idea just so you can get some sleep.

If you're worried about a 10:1 ratio nursery then don't put him in one of those. And incidentally where would you find a nursery with that ratio anyway since it has to be 1:3 at your child's age?
Look for a nice child minder with a peaceful home environment. That's what we used for years and it was like a home from home.

Could you hire a part time nanny for the first 6 months to see how you all do? Would probably mean working for little financial reward after nanny's salary but may help ease the transition.

I would stay at home. You sound as though you and your ds both need that. Have you looked at food intolerance? I would cut out wheat and dairy for a couple of days and see if he improves any.

I had a chance to return to work when I didn't think I, nor my toddler, would cope. It sounds similar in that it was too good to turn down. Offering me flexible working, whatever hours I wanted etc because i had already worked for them. I took it and made a mess of it. Sat in toilet crying breakdown type mess. In hindsight they wanted me so much that I could have perhaps been very enthusiastic but put it off for a year. Instead I burnt my bridges. Is it really a now or never thing?

The sleep sounds a complete nightmare. I hope you get some soon.

Take the job. Pay for a sleep consultant. Give nursery a go, DS may gets lots out of it.

A decent part time job is the holy grail.

Unless you don't actually want to work, in which case don't. But if you do, don't be held back by current circs, there will never be a perfect time.