nursery opening hours

[scottishgal09]

I need to go back to work so will soon be putting my 9 month old in nursery, only thing is that the earliest I can find any nursery open is 7 am to 7 pm. The 7 pm closing time is fine but I really find I need a opening time of 6 pm. I also work Saturday mornings so need something that is open 6 days. Start time should be at least 6:00 pm but I struggle to find this. Do these type of nursery’s exist? What are the opening and closing hours for your nursery’s? Why don’t nursery’s take into account that some parents need to work 6 days 🤨?

My husbands mother will hopefully come from Thailand but not sure about this at the moment.

That’s a lot of hours to work when you’ve got a preschool child. I think you’d struggle to find any nursery staff who want to start work at 6am for the pittance they’re paid!

No parent sees their child during sleeping hours – it's irrelevant. Picking her child up at 5pm is the same as another working parents utilising nursery hours til 6/6:30, then with a bedtime of 7, which is common in working couples.

The OP asked for childcare hours logistics, not for your sarcastic superiority complex.

OP are you at least listening to the people telling you that the hours you are taking about will mean your baby won't even get enough sleep to function?

It is cruel. Life changes when you have a child, whether you want to accept that or not. That baby and its wellbeing are the most important thing and you are not listening to anyone who is trying to explain that to you.

But you do get to choose your own nanny so can decide whether qualifications, experience etc are an absolute "must" for you. At nursery you are dependant on whoever the management decide to recruit. Not really relevant to this thread however, the OP can't afford a nanny although I don't quite know what the solution to the 6 a.m. starts can be either.

FWIW, kids pick up every germ and bug under the sun when they start nursery. If you’re worried about being seen to be unreliable by dropping hours, that’s probably going to happen anyway..

What's a time budget for childcare @scottishgal09

My comment is to dispel the seeming belief on this thread that nannies are overall better formally qualified, which they are not.

A nanny share would be much less than a sole nanny. OP should research this.

The nursery I used to use opened at 7am, and you could drop children there at 6.45 if needed, but it was on hospital grounds, so catered for hospital workers mainly.

Where does OP detail her child's sleep routine? The child can sleep 6:30/7 - 5/5:30. 10.5hrs overnight sleep is normal for an 18 month old.

Have the summer holidays arrived early?

OP, you're not going to find a nursery that you're (apparently) looking for

Your posts don't add up and you're finding reasons why a nanny wouldn't work for you

Perhaps one of you cutting hours somewhere may be what's needed to allow for childcare

And sorry, but a child being in that setting for 6 days a week will cause damage in the long term, stop trying to sugarcoat a shit

So sad for that poor baby, he will know nothing of a settled loving family life, he will hardly know you OP, you will be just another stranger in his life.
the alternatives are not job v benefit, they are job v a balance, that includes caring for your own child not farming him out to others like a pet.

@scottishgal09
Are you from a different culture? Perhaps that's why your posts are coming off as being unreasonable.

It is highly unusual for anyone to have that much childcare in Europe. Life balance is really encouraged.

Doctors tend not to have doctor partners so the split of childcare lies heavily on them.

If your child is going to be others care up to six days a week you will have to support them because their day to day primary carer won't be you and is likely due to staff turnover change regularly enough.

I did return to full time employment post my children but I changed career took a payout and reset my priorities. No job is once in a lifetime, no matter what you say. No employer will ever value your child's sacrifice. And you can never get this time back ever. There is a hell of a lot of choice between 80,+ hours jobs and benefits!

The two women I know who were in hospitality, 5 *, moved into consulting and made the same salary plus more on w third of the hours. Sometimes you need the challenges to change your perspective.

You need to be realistic. Your life will change with a baby. I was horrified at the fact that I wouldn’t be able to do my usual working pattern and adapted. Most people find that their little ones need down time. I had one child who did 3 days a week nursery and one who did 4. They were often ill, tired etc and needed some time. We have had to adapt as working parents that someone needs to be more present.

You can only both be doing long, irregular hours if you have a nanny and that costs. To a certain extent my career has taken a bit of a back seat but I have worked throughout. There are jobs I’ve not gone for or turned down as it would have tipped us as a email over the edge. Your current plans are not especially realsitic- there is a good chance you’ll still be sleep deprived ant the point your baby starts nursery. 6 days of 6am nursery drop-offs would break many people (which is probably why it doesn’t exist!).

@scottishgal09 this thread is full of the goody goody people who could never ever leave a child in a nursery...

My children went to full time nursery from 10 months old - 8 to 5h30 five days a week.

We still have very good relationships and what was worse for then wasn't the nursery - was freaking covid being at home with mummy and daddy who had to still work full time and couldn't give them as much attention as they needed then... not a nursery with loads of other kids (full time as well)

what we did was change shifts to manage drop offs and pick ups, i started earlier and my husband starter later. would that be an option?

good luck

Most babies arent in nursery 11 hours a day. If baby is getting dropped off at 6am they need to be in bed at 5.30 pm so they can be up at 5.30 am to get to nursery for 6am.
Op's going to end up burnt out herself with and incredibly cranky baby.

Well, good luck in your search for this nursery that opens at 6am as well as Saturdays.

Do come back and keep us posted, won’t you!

I get it
I never wanted to be a SAHM. I wanted to go back to work full-time and that's perfectly fine.
You don't deserve any flack for wanting to work or use childcare

But no-one owes you childcare and nurseries are not set up to provide the hours you want. Compromises need to be made one way or another.
Working full-time is one thing, working two jobs taking you over typical FT hours is quite another...and if you are only working two jobs to pay for childcare then I doubt its financially viable.

And it's not about benefits either. Most people who make Compromises when children come along don't get benefits. Many of us don't even get child benefit anymore.

So you either

• change your hours and/or job(s) to fit a nursery schedule

Or

• find a nanny or CM that will do earlier hours and weekends probably at a premium.

But as PP said surprised this is quite last minute.

Plenty of us work long hours and have big careers, OP. But no one puts their child in nursery 70 hours a week. No one. Kids need down time, they need time at home and 1 on 1 time.

People with your kind of working hours get a family member or, if that's not possible (I am immigrant myself so that's not possible), they get a nanny.

If you're in London, for those kind of hours, a nanny is not that much more expensive, maybe an extra 10k /year (which should not be a lot for a couple working 80hrs a week).

@TinyTear it's not full of goody goodies it's full of people who recognise nurseries are great to a point, beyond that the child still needs time with parents and 11hours in nursery is just not a viable option.

How many hours do you work a week op? I think you are getting a lot of hate on this thread which isn’t helpful at all. You are right a lot of parents do have kids in full time nursery, especially professionals in higher paid work who don’t get as much stick as this. Most nursery’s are open 10 hours a day - so full time kids are 50 hours. I would guess with an earlier pick up it would be similar to the 50 hour full time week.

you mentioned you both are restaurant managers, is this at the same restaurant so shifts can be managed according to childcare availability? For example if you work an early shift your husband doesn’t and vis versa so there is always one of you to do drop off and pick ups? Could you and your husband work every other opposite Saturday?

what is the second job you both have? Any flexibility on hours?

Yes, many professional couples do utilise full opening hours of nursery.

The OP is not asking for your guidance on infant overnight sleep (of which 12hours is the very top end btw, but anything to kick OP further, right?)

Can baby go to Thailand? Is there more family over there?
The problem is, for the first 6 months+ your child will pick up every germ known to mankind, some unknown too. That is hard on people with more flexible hours and lots of family support, it will be impossible for you. Then there's school and with that comes the holidays and there's lots of them, though i suppose you could find decent wrap around care that also covers holidays.
You won't get anywhere that opens before 7. Round here it's mostly 7.30.
Most of the people I work with who were born elsewhere, tend to send their kids to family in their home country for holidays over a week long.

I dont think there's a solution for this OP. Are you in your chosen career? Is your DH? One of you may need to retrain and find something family friendly. That's what I did many moons ago because I wasn't too fussed. Something worth thinking about long term.

I would look into sending baby to Thailand where they will be brought up with family, it will be better for them with regards to forming attachments. Due to the lack of flexibility both yours and DH's job allows. This is normal in some cultures.

But OP isn't asking for this information, nor moral opinions.

I don't think that's the case, putting your DC in nursery 8-5.30 gives plenty of time for them to sleep 12 hours with breakfast and tea/bonding time. Nursery 6-5 does not give that. The baby would likely need to be up at 5 or earlier to get to nursery. When picked up at 5pm they would be past it. I did actually put both my DC in nursery 10 hours a day, two days a week as toddlers. But the following day they were knackered and needed a very chilled day at home to recouperate.