Working mum, judgement from employee

[Spiceb]

I'd be really grateful for views / advice. I work in senior management role in public sector. I think previously well respected by managers and staff alike and also have reputation for being conpetent, dilligent, hard working.

I dropped to 4 days a week after birth of my daughter and dropped a level at work (my choice).

I work over my hours but have the standard challenges of working mum - ie occasionally (rarely) sick child means I need to WFH / leave early / can't do v late meets

Most staff fine but one of my staff (unmarried man, no children) is clearly not impressed and makes passive aggressive comments / rolls eyes when I have to admit I can't cover something on my non working day, or because of nursery drop off. Today was final straw - was questioned (politely but clearly questioned) about fact I have an annual leave day booked tomorrow (child's 2nd birthday, been booked for 12 months). I feel really upset because actually I pride myself on working hard, and I protect my team / staff, including this man, and take work off them to make their lives better. He's crushing my self worth and I feel like I now how to justify every minute of my day to him. Any tips on how to handle. Do I confront or do I just accept this is what happens when you move to part time?

Similar position to you, was a single mum to, kids now older. I found the best bosses/colleagues were younger men with young children themselves. The worse ones were childless women. I had one terrible boss like that but I ignored her and raised a grievance when she tried to bypass a policy. She stayed away after that, then went away, came back, by the my kids were older and she gave me a promotion!

Honestly fuck him. My manager refused a flexible working request on zero grounds, hr put him right. You shouldn’t be working on your day off, you shouldn’t be questioned about annual leave!! Tell hr.

Dd was very unwell last week, vomiting and diarrhoea bug. My shift started at 3pm, but DH wasn't expected home until 3pm. So I rang the early shift manager and asked if I could take an hour to an hour and a half unpaid to ensure she was looked after.

He asked 20 questions, such as, can't a friend help? (No, they all work standard hours) Can a grandparent come round? (No, Dd's step nan is currently waiting for a hip replacement and struggles to get around, DD's GF is her carer. Enough on their plate) How old is she? (12, but she cannot be left alone for an hour with D&V?). Not exactly the same thing as he is superior to me in grade but it still pissed me off. Covering an hour wouldn't have cost him anything extra as there was spare staff...

The last time I had any time off for family reasons was 18 months ago!

I'll say this, it's usually a man complaining.

Oh why must people make it harder being a working parent, being a parent is hard enough at times without feeling like people at work don’t have your back.

You sound like an excellent employee, and a great role model for your daughter. I’m sure if/when the guy in question has children of his own he will be coming to you asking for more flexible working