To think maternity leave looks lovely

[gillardd]

I like my job but it’s stressful. I’m probably unable to have children. I see mums with babies in the park pushing their strollers together, or having tea and cake with their babies together at a nice cafe, and it just looks so idyllic. No work stress, husband or partner funding things (if you have one - I acknowledge not everyone does), gorgeous chubby silky haired baby to cuddle all day, able to do things like nice cafes during the middle of weekdays when they’re not busy, sit as long as you want, chat to friend, cuddle baby, eat cake. Then go home, cuddle baby some more, maybe watch some TV.

It’s not actually (all) like this, is it? But this is how it looks from the outside.

I know some people are going to tell me IABVU.

I should note though I did have PND/PNA quite badly though which likely clouded my experience

I think in the same way some people had a lovely break from life during covid and some people had a truly horrendous time, it’s all subjective and down to individual circumstances. With rose tinted spec on, I really loved my first child’s 9 months of maternity leave. I had a very straightforward birth and easy baby. But you do still have to feed your baby every 2-3 hours (or seemingly constantly) so you don’t sleep properly anymore. I also got repeated mastitis (which makes you feel like you have flu) and found breast feeding excruciating for 9 weeks with bleeding cracked nipples so I wasn’t skipping through parks with lattes then. But I did love the change of pace. My second baby I just had 3 weeks off and my partner took the remaining months off as parental leave. Now he did have a lovely time!

Classic case of the grass is greener….

I used to sit feeding tiny baby ds1, for hours and hours and hours, watching the world go by, and sobbing that I was stuck with this mind-numbing tedium for the next however many weeks and months and feeling so jealous of anyone who walked by and didn’t have a baby and was (in my mind) living a wonderful carefree existence.

I think maternity leave is lovely in the way that lockdown/furlough was lovely. For some people it meant having a lovely time focussing on their relationship with loved ones. For other people, it meant being broke, lonely, stressed, exhausted, unsupported, sick and having to cope with a situation that was utterly outside any experience they'd had before while faking knowing what they were doing to everyone at work.

If maternity leave was so easy and idyllic, more men would take paternity leave!

It's dogshit. My baby and DS have winter vomiting bug and I would rather die right now

Looking back (with my somewhat rose tinted glasses) my maternity leave of 7 years was the happiest time. I was fortunately able to stay at home while my two were small and yes I remember the cafes, parks, baby groups and social meet ups as being so much fun. I have managed to blank out how skint we were, how messy the house was, how hard the baby and toddler stage was! I miss it though.

I loved my spell of being a SAHM after having my babies but I mostly enjoyed the baby and toddler stage more than my low paid stressful job.

Mine was lovely OP. Got a good maternity package and while my baby was tiny I just took her with me out for coffee, shopping etc with friends who also were on maternity leave. Of course it didn’t seem to last long and I’m back to work now but I treasured every moment. Now the kids are older free time is spent doing something that will entertain them!

As an aside to a previous poster.. children are not compulsory. If you are going to refer to looking after your children as ‘unpaid labour’ you probably shouldn’t have had them.

Some days are lovely. Most days are hard work

Views like this always come from people with zero idea or insight into parenting. I suggest researching a lot more/ spending time with people who've had kids before progressing your fertility journey with ivf etc.

Did you do that before you had your kids?

I was only on maternity leave for 6 months as I couldn't afford to take any longer but I found it boring.
Mind you my baby was also the kind to cry for no reason so that was tough to deal with.
Looking back though it was probably easier with a baby than it is now with a 3 year old.

Once my babies started sleeping better (about 2 to 3 months old - they weren't sleeping through at this point but were sleeping well enough that I got enough sleep) I loved maternity leave. Particularly the second time round when I had a baby and a toddler and we weren't in lockdown. I didn't really have a going out for coffee in cafes lifestyle though! Baby groups, playing with the kids, playdates for the toddler, yes. Coffee for me while I try to entertain two small people is not my idea of a good time.

OP all you need is one session in a baby music class to see the reality . Smiling and singing to shit music while banging a child sized drum. Then coffee with mostly boring mums talking about their mostly boring babies and how they’ve hit their milestones early and are reading Shakespeare at 1 years old.

🤣 this is so accurate

You’re seeing the good side. You’re not seeing the 5 feeds in the middle of the night, recovering from birth/surgery/tears etc. the hormonal rollercoaster when the milk comes in. The teething etc. Yes some days are lovely but some days also aren’t.

Plus I struggled with going from being a qualified professional with a good salary and independence to being on SMP (less than a quarter of my original wage). Yes my DH is one of the good ones and picked up the slack finance wise but I still had barely any money to treat myself and hated having to use joint money to have my hair done or buy some makeup etc.

Im about to go on mat leave again and am no where near as excited for it as I was with my first. I’m excited to have my baby and spend time with her but not the actual mat leave if that makes sense.

I think its both. You have an idealised view if it because you'd quite like the chance to do it. And it is lovely, but not for the reasons you've described for everyone.

I was lucky. Birth was easy and DC was easy in the sense of eating/sleeping/healthy. I walked in the park a lot, played a lot of games, had a lot of cuddles. I also have decent mat pay, but that doesn't cover a full year. So it got tight after a bit, despite DH having a decent job because we originally took on our mortgage etc with two full time (decent) salaries.

It also never stops. You don't get a break from the "job" of motherhood. Can't shut my laptop at 5pm and decompress. Can't take a half day cos I'm knackered. Those kind of things. And what you don't see are the tantrums, the bugs, the snot, the days after a night where even the best sleeping child has decided to have an all night party, but you still have go keep going and somehow keep them alive.

I loved mat leave. I love being a mum. I love my job and am lucky I can do it part time (although I think I do a full week's work in my part time hours). I'm lucky I have a flexible job and a great, understanding manager and team, which means I can do things I need to mum wise and still get my job done. Some days though, I feel like I'm failing at everything because I can't do it all. A d while, actually, I can, I think that's more realistic than the full time SAHPs with no money worries (because nursery fees and a reduction in my hours means we're still tight now), who only meet other mums for coffee while cuddling their happy, chubby cheeked children, while DH brings in 7 figures and funds their lovely lifestyle.

TL;DR....Yes its lovely. But it's lovely at a cost you don't see or understand if you haven't done it. I'd recommend it to anyone who wants it and I'm really really sorry you can't do it if you want to. Just don't forget that you're looking at it from a "grass is greener" perspective and that's not always the case x

@samupnorth 😂 I avoided classes like the plague for this exact reason!

Parts of it are nice. I felt like you did until I had a baby!!!
It’s hella stressful and you feel physically fucked. I resented working for free.. that’s basically what it felt like! Whilst my partner had loads of freedom even though he had become a parent aswell. It was the first time in my life I felt really really unequal to men (in the ways society values an individual!!) and it bothered me. Then time came to finally go back to work and feel like myself again, I found my employer made it hard for me and I was last in the line for everything because I had to work part time. After six months I left, partly forced and partly out of choice because the set up was unsustainable. So now I’m retraining in another field completely. Maternity leave is just the start of the shit show imo!!! A very long shit show With splattered moments of joy. Xoxo

Haha this has got to be a wind up.

There are lovely aspects, like there are lovely aspects of any lifestyle (even when at work you have fun / nice moments). It's like someone wandering around a park on sunny day and seeing all the office works outside having lunch together and chatting and saying it must be so idyllic to be working.

You're seeing a tiny snapshot, being out and catching up with other mums is probably the high point of the week and the rest is sleep deprivation, being puked on, your career heading south. Don't get me wrong I did enjoy mat leave and there were some great bits, but it's absolutely nothing like what you imagine it to be or how you describe it. You see them wandering around the park but you don't see that they had 3hrs sleep last night and are exhausted!

i loved every minute of it. We both saved and I used the savings if necessary my husband was happy though to pay for everything during maternity knowing I would be back to work in 6 months. It was 6 months of much more relaxing time than work. Like everything it had it’s good and bad days but I got much more sleep than when going to work (very unusual I believe ) sorry 😬

@lesserspotted

Aren’t you nice.

• traumatic birth
• major surgery (caesarean)
• no family support (in fact my mum passed when my first baby was young, during maternity so that was fun)
• unbeknownst to me special needs so baby was semi hysterical unless being held and always wanted on the boob
• DH working 12hr shifts

It was a lot and I felt traumatised.

But I’m glad you were happy, good for you.

I dont think your circumstances were particularly different to mine.

Judgemental much?

Having a baby is life-changing in ways you can't fully comprehend until you have one. People find different ages more enjoyable/difficult - a mum who doesn't enjoy the tiny baby stage won't necessarily struggle with other stages and vice versa, and that's before considering pnd/additional needs etc.

It's great that you've enjoyed motherhood but don't be too smug. Your experience is not every woman's.