You ok OP? I mean that kindly. I do remember feeling exactly how you feel.
I got out the calculator and I subtracted childcare costs from what I could, if I were lucky earn, Net, and there was nothing left. The figures were close enough to each other as well.
If you can work part time and use it as a top up to your benefits, just do that, there's no shame in it because I'm so damn sick of women, mothers, bearing the financial sacrifice of parenthood.
I had the disadvantages of not having a degree, not being particularly attractive or clever or confident. I also had a child with a sn, so I agree with you, it can feel like everything is conspiring against you to keep you out of the work place, keeping you trapped.
When my kids were very young I felt like I was being judged for not working by the same society that wouldn't give me a job that paid a decent fair wage.
And there was no magic solution for me, I did what is called a community employment scheme here in Ireland. It just topped up my sw a bit but I got to do excel advanced, payroll and customer services courses which made me a bit more employable when my kids were finally finally old enough to let themselves back in to the house after school. ie, it only became possible when my children grew older and I could trust them to walk the ten minutes home from school on their own.
I look back on that time now and I know that I couldn't have worked but maybe I could have had more faith in the future, more faith that it was all going to be ok one day and to have planned around that. Maybe I could have done an online degree while I had the time. I did used to go on coursera a lot but nothing formal obviously.
Do they have community employment schemes in the UK?
You have all of my sympathies, honestly. I remember feeling so judged by society, so rejected by society, so trapped, so powerless. So impatient for my children to grow up and free me, and then so guilty for feeling that way. By the way, pay roll is a good course, or accounting technician, both of those are gov subsidised fetAC TYPE courses in Ireland that will lead to job.
