To think I could study on maternity leave?

[SunflowerOwl]

Not sure if this is a crazy plan or not, but there is qualification I've been wanting to do for ages and I'm wondering I'm my upcoming maternity leave would be a good time.

The course takes approx 10 weeks to complete but there are online providers that let you do it over a year before booking onto the exam.

I'm due at the end of August but have a big chunk of holiday (around 6 weeks) that I was planning on taking before, and then I'm going to take 10 months leave when the baby is here.

Is it completely mad to think this is possible? It's all stuff I know bits about from my job so it would just be getting the formal training.

[georgarina]

If you have 10 months ML and some childcare I'd say it's possible. I went back to work when my first was around 6 months - so from my experience you're back to being a functional human by that point.

[Ariela]

I had to have 3 weeks M/L before baby's due date and frankly after cleaning and tidying the house I was bored bored bored. And that was with loads of lunches out etc.
Suggest if you have to have 6 weeks holiday before baby you do as much as you can then, and even see if you can take the exam then, if not schedule your DH some time off and aim to take it once baby & you are all settled in a routine but before baby gets truly mobile.

[Taikoo]

Depends on the baby.
You might have one who's a great eater and sleeper.

Or you might have one that never, ever stops crying, ever or An Incredible Non-Sleeping Baby or a velcro baby.
Or any combination of those 3.

[PinkSpring]

Noooo.....

I thought this as well, I even signed up for the training - it's been three years, I still haven't finished it (did have another baby as well, so that hasn't helped...)

[RockingMyFiftiesNot]

If 40'hours in total - as others have said, you could do it if you broke the back of it in your ML prior to the baby arriving (unless he/she comes early).
And you could finish it off later when the baby is a bit older and in more of a routine. But do not underestimate the demands a new baby makes on your time. I used to laugh when people said that as I was super organised and very domesticated- yet it could still get to 2pm and I'd not showered or eaten lunch in the early days.

[lilomum]

I also did it and didn't find it difficult. In fact, I found myself more efficient and using my time better. HOWEVER, I did have a very easy baby and excellent sleeper. I do agree it will depend on the baby but the workload you're mentioning sounds very light so I reckon you'll be fine.

[NiceGerbil]

I did it! Had shocking pnd as well.

If you have time off for a bit before the baby comes that would be a good thing to do.

After will depend on how things go.

Once the dust has settled and assuming you're taking a year I think it's doable.

How heavy duty is it, can you afford to lose the money/ and not beat yourself up over it if you can't?

Also with lockdown and not much happening outside, will give you something to think about other than baby

[JudgeJ]

I was so bored being a SAHM, two children under 5, so I did an OU degree, no problem. If the children were awake, eg afternoons, they would say that Mummy's doing her sums, and amuse themselves. They were very proud to come to my graduation. Go for it, babies aren't as time consuming as many tell you, unless you become a helicopter parent and martyr yourself.

[Dulcinae]

Also, reading to babies is good, but when they are new they don't know what you are reading to them anyway, so read out your notes.
Plus explaining to your baby what you have just learned is good revision, and they are a lot more tolerant of this than e.g. DH.

[DareIask]

The time you have before your baby (assuming this is the first) will be the last longish period of you time for perhaps 20 years.

Think hard.

[Confusedaboutlots]

@Wabe

I should say it was also not a very good book, *@Confusedaboutlots*, and while it got me an agent it's never been published. In case you think I was cranking out something exquisite in between feeds, naps, nappies...

it’s amazing! you should feel so proud 😊

[Babyboomtastic]

It probably explains some of the hugely varying views of maternity leave tbh. I can also fall asleep anywhere, even for a short period, or watch 10 minutes of something, and continue later, or work in dribs and drabs. If you need to get into something to nap, or to watch something or to work, then it's probably a lot more frustrating, and harder to do things.

[Wabe]

I should say it was also not a very good book, @Confusedaboutlots, and while it got me an agent it's never been published. In case you think I was cranking out something exquisite in between feeds, naps, nappies...

[Dulcinae]

I started my OU degree the week before I had my first. It was great. Breastfeeding baby in one arm, book in the other. I had to type one handed, but I could type and breastfeed at the same time.
I couldn't have done it if I'd been bottle feeding.
Fortunately DS was happy to be EBF until he was six months old, so I wasn't faffing with baby food till then.
Weirdly, the health visitor praised my commitment to breast feeding and looked confused when I said that my degree depended on it.
Downside - I mostly fed DS off my left breast to leave my right hand free, and ended up with lopsided breasts. But I'd have a degree than perfect breasts.

[Confusedaboutlots]

@Babyboomtastic

I think *@Oilpyi* may have found the key to this. Some people need a clear head to properly get into work/a task, and if they don't know if the 'slot' is going to last 10 minutes or 2 hours, then find it very hard to do. Others find that ok. Neither is the right way to approach things, and I'm not sure how easy it is to change from one to another.

yes agree with this. i need hours to get stuck in. wish i was different but am not.

makes me feel a little better that i didn’t write a book during mat leave though 😀

[Wabe]

@Babyboomtastic

I think *@Oilpyi* may have found the key to this. Some people need a clear head to properly get into work/a task, and if they don't know if the 'slot' is going to last 10 minutes or 2 hours, then find it very hard to do. Others find that ok. Neither is the right way to approach things, and I'm not sure how easy it is to change from one to another.

I think that's right. I was writing fiction (which you can plan in your head of unable to get to a desk), and academic essays which are just about manageable in short bursts, but I couldn't have written a full-length academic book on maternity leave.

I do think I personally have got less good down the years at just managing to fit work in available tiny slots without time to 'clear my head' -- probably because I haven't had to do it anywhere near as much. The type of project will make a difference, too. I'm pretty sure I couldn't have written the book I'm working on now on maternity leave.

[Babyboomtastic]

I think @Oilpyi may have found the key to this. Some people need a clear head to properly get into work/a task, and if they don't know if the 'slot' is going to last 10 minutes or 2 hours, then find it very hard to do. Others find that ok. Neither is the right way to approach things, and I'm not sure how easy it is to change from one to another.

[Oilpyi]

I think my first it would’ve been difficult, but maybe doable. With my third I carried on a year of my masters.
What you need is clear time though. Either a dp who will reliably leave you in peace at a scheduled time for a few hours (and not keep presenting with the baby is hungry/ doesn’t know how to stop crying/ wants mummy). Or a friend family member who will do this. You can’t mentally switch into work if half your brain is focused on the next wake up/feed etc. It’s more head space than anything. You may physically have time, but you can’t switch your brain to work.

[Wabe]

[quote bageljam]**@Wabe* @FTEngineerM* You are those people I'm talking about being in awe of ;-)

I made an effort to go to as many groups etc. that I could (pre-COVID), but I was generally racked with anxiety and guilt if I wasn't paying attention - assuming that DC would wake up whenever I tried to do more than washing up. Obviously I know better now - and realise how much my mental health had an impact, which I couldn't predict - although definitely don't want to do it again.

[/quote]
You're very nice, but I deserve no awe. I was completely miserable during maternity leave not helped by having to move rather hurriedly from London to a deeply insular village during a record-breakingly cold winter with a challenging small baby, where the groups were unfriendly and kindred spirits were thin on the ground and having a book on the go kept me from going completely mad. And the good thing about fiction is that you can do a fair bit of planning while walking/holding a baby who will only nap on you etc.

[IbrahimaRedTwo]

10 weeks at 4 hours a week? I would say easily.

I started my masters when my 2nd DD was 2 weeks old and was 2nd year of my PhD when my 3rd DD was born. Never stopped.

[bageljam]

@Wabe @FTEngineerM You are those people I'm talking about being in awe of ;-)

I made an effort to go to as many groups etc. that I could (pre-COVID), but I was generally racked with anxiety and guilt if I wasn't paying attention - assuming that DC would wake up whenever I tried to do more than washing up. Obviously I know better now - and realise how much my mental health had an impact, which I couldn't predict - although definitely don't want to do it again.

[FTEngineerM]

@bageljam

I am in awe of the people who study whilst looking after a baby - I was knackered (and depressed) and couldn't have done it.
DC was premature so I never got the extra weeks of holiday I'd booked before maternity leave and I'm still bitter some years on.

I mean, what do you do otherwise whilst going through the lost isolating period of your life to maintain intellectual challenge?

I’m in my final year, my final year project is due 3 days before my second baby.

This year has been rough, but being able to carry on using my brain at a time when otherwise for the first 6m at least life consisted of changing shitty nappies and sitting down whilst I fed him it has probably protected my mental health.

I cannot wait to graduate and concentrate on my two babies, I really can’t, but this will so be worth it when I can work less and be with them more for the same money.

[WorkingItOutAsIGo]

Sorry but no.

[Babyboomtastic]

I think what people don't always take account of is that baby work kind of expands to fit the time available. Most people when they have their first baby find it pretty all consuming, and wonder how people manage with more than one child, or twins. But people do. People often say on here that having a baby is a full time job, but then what is twins, or a baby and a toddler. It's not easy, but people manage. People might say 'when I had a baby I barely even had time to eat' and yet if they had an older child or twins, then they'd have to find that time, and generally they do.

Basically, it's human nature to feel your are at capacity until more gets put on your, and then somehow you manage.

It's how once you have your second child, if you only have the baby for the day, it feels like a day off, even though just having a baby for the day initially used to feel hard.

So I think it's easy to think it's impossible to work out study with a small baby, but people do all the time, and it becomes normal for them.

[Wabe]

@bageljam

I am in awe of the people who study whilst looking after a baby - I was knackered (and depressed) and couldn't have done it.
DC was premature so I never got the extra weeks of holiday I'd booked before maternity leave and I'm still bitter some years on.

Honestly, I hated maternity leave, which I found dull and isolating, and DS was a challenging baby who only napped on me — it was writing a book that got me through it and saved my sanity.