I'll preface this by saying I realise I am^^ not the same as a single parent, by any stretch of the imagine. I have a partner, he just works away a lot. So I do not intend to compare myself to a single parent and I recognise I do not have things as difficult as single parents do.
Disclaimer out of the way, here's what I'm struggling with. DH has a job where he works away (voluntarily) currently and has done since the start of the year. He works a week away and a week home (roughly, give or take a day or so). The only reason we do is this financial - he gets paid significantly more to do this than he would if he was based nearer home. Its significant enough an amount to make quite a difference to our monthly finances and it means we hardly have to consider money and we don't struggle with nursery fees etc for our toddler. When he's home we can have nice days out and not really think about what we are spending (within reason - we are by no means millionaires but it makes it significantly easier to just enjoy days/ meals out etc as a family).
Sounds great right? Except - it comes with a huge downside. When he's away I am left solo parenting our 2 year old, and I'm finding it a lot to be honest. I also work part time in a demanding job that carries a lot of responsibility and stress so juggling that with parenting can be so tough at times. We have no nearby family support so I'm just muddling through by myself. Toddler still doesn't sleep great so there's times I'm trying to cope at work on little to no sleep and it's not the sort of job you can get away with that - I need to be switched on and mentally alert as a lot is expected of me in my role. So that's tough.
On top of that added stress on me, my other concern is how much time DH is missing with our DC. I worked out that since 1st January this year DH has spent the equivalent of 4 months away from the family. With our DC being so young they are changing and growing every day and although we video call when we can (he works long shifts when away so this isn't always possible), it's really not the same and I do feel both DH and DC are missing out.
So we've had discussions about whether to call time on working away now and have DH come home (he can do this whenever he likes, he's not tied into a contract) so we can function more like a family for all the reasons stated above. But then we keep coming back to the significant drop in our income that would go along with this. Whilst DC is still in nursery (obviously very expensive) and under 3 (so free hours haven't kicked in yet), we both agree this would be a bit daft and maybe we should hold on until free hours kick in, then we can relax a bit about the childcare bill. This will happen next September so it's another year of gritting our teeth with this current arrangement.
I don't know what we should do... I'm so torn. What would you do? Anything I haven't thought of to make this situation better without losing the income we have come to depend on? Any thoughts welcome.