Did you get into debt on maternity leave?

[HelloFrogs]

I follow Nugget on Instagram, it’s a self described page dedicated to money when on maternity leave. A video today said 26% of mums get into debt when on maternity leave. Tbh I can see how, not that I think we personally would. We would just go without as we are fortunate enough to afford the absolute essentials and bills on one wage. I’m taking 10 months off (and even that will be a stretch) but SMP just does not go very far. Cost of living crisis is horrendous and mortgage rates are sky high - we just fixed a new one and I could cry at how much our mortgage will soon be!

Before anyone criticises those who get into debt on maternity leave- don’t, you don’t know the circumstances: cost of living crisis, made redundant, unexpected twins, unplanned pregnancy, the list goes on!

Did you get into debt on maternity leave? Is it actually that common?

No I didn’t but I am well paid and one of life’s “planners”

I self-funded 2 x 13month mat leaves despite going back to work pregnant after the first

No, I didn't. We used to split everything equally but DH took over most of the bills and I converted holidays into money for months 9 to 12.

I'm not saying this to be judgy but I wouldn't have tried for a baby without one sufficient income between us and some savings.

It’s not judgy. But you do know circumstances can change? Relationship breakdowns, savings being eaten up by unexpected expenses, redundancy.

I didn't get into debt but only because we were able to save up beforehand. We weren't able to live within our income either during maternity leave or for the subsequent years until we became eligible for 30 hours childcare. We are in the SE however.

I can totally see why so many end up in debt. I also know couples who had carefully saved before ttc only to end up having to spend the savings on IVF.

It was such a long time to get to the stage of maternity leave that I had managed to save enough up to compensate for funds, which soon depleted! Xx

I didn't (but had to go back to work before I ideally would have liked to). We saved for a baby but ended up spending those savings on IVF when we couldn't conceive, so then I did overtime while pregnant and had to go bare minimum while on mat leave to make it last.
Now I'm pregnant again and it is a complete surprise as we weren't trying and had been told my egg quality is so low I shouldn't be able to conceive naturally.
At the same time, our mortgage has gone up and our more affordable childcare has fallen through (childminder unable to continue through injury), so DD has started nursery which is costing half of my wage. We won't be able to save up this time, so I may well end up in debt!

I did on my first, used an interest free credit card as well as some modest savings put aside for mat leave. We'd just got married and bought a house so didn't have much at all put away. it was fine and got paid off quickly. Second child was a few years later and in a better position financially so able to save enough over the pregnancy to cover ML without dipping into our savings. I'm the higher earner so couldn't rely on husband fully covering the drop in my pay, though he would've if he could.

We saved throughout my pregnancy and sold our sports car bought a cheap family car. Bought a lot of second hand baby stuff including clothes bundles from ebay. We managed but weren't swimming in it.

Our biggest saving was that my boss actually wanted me to bring DD into work when I went back to to work (small family business). That must have saved thousands in childcare.

Of course I do. I was made redundant 3 months after I went back to work.

That's quite different to TTC when you already know you need both your full salaries to cover your expenses, which I would never have done.

No, I wouldn’t want to get into debt on mat leave so if it came to it I’d go back to work sooner than planned if I had to. Everyone’s different though.

No. I had more disposable income whilst on maternity leave than I did once I went back to work a was paying for childcare and travel. A full time nursery place where I am is 2k, I pay £35pd for wrap around care and I pay over £10pd on my commute.

Nope.
We I budgeted and planned.
I can understand how some people might get into planned debt, with a reasonable idea of how they'll repay it - after all some pregnancies are surprises and they've not had time to save up enough.

No. We saved my income during my pregnancy to get us used to living on DH income and to build a safety net. Then we lived on maternity pay + DH’s income.

Yes I did. My eldest son is nearly 19 . However I was struggling to pay the rent and bills. Ended up badly overdrawn and the bank stopped my debit card. Took me a while to get back in the black but I've never been overdrawn since. It was a bit scary

I think because I had a little bit of debt before - which was manageable - having kids tipped me over the edge due to the shockingly bad SMP. So now it’s taking longer to get back on track. Wasn’t helped by everything creeping up in price too.

I think it’s probably more common for unplanned pregnancies and also for first pregnancies where you need to buy absolutely everything. I can see where if you fell pregnant accidentally and then only have the 9 months of pregnancy to save AND also have to buy all the baby bits you wouldn’t manage to save enough to cover the whole thing.

We planned our baby so we saved while ttc and then continued saving while pregnant, I will say though we saved more while trying than while pregnant as once I was pregnant we were buying all the bits every month, furniture, bottles, steriliser, clothes etc it does all add up so depending on your salaries I can see where it would be tough to save significant amounts during pregnancy while buying everything needed for baby

that is amazing 🤩

By the way I'm not saying nobody should get into debt, but just that I found mat leave a stressful enough year as it is!

I think it's really common because a lot of men are cunts and expect women on mat leave to contribute 50/50 while on reduced income. While also providing everything a baby needs.

I wouldn't have if the boiler hadn't failed and took the 6 k id saved up. I'm lucky I had dh but we literally didn't have money laying around we just bought the house. All sorted now.

No, I saved up to ensure I still had my full wage available each month. I got pregnant sooner than expected so I’m not taking a full year of maternity leave. I’ll actually be in a better financial position when I return to work due to some internal changes so will start putting small amounts aside as we want a second one quite close to this one and I’d like to be able to take the year.

I’m working 50+ extra hours a month until I physically can’t do it anymore to boost my maternity pot! DP can’t as his company doesn’t pay overtime, which is incredibly infuriating, but he does get a decent quarterly bonus which he saves. We also both have money from inheritance which we can use to see us through if need be, but we are planning to avoid dipping into that unless we have to.

Had to have a shorter leave than I’d have liked (7.5 months) to avoid going into debt. I can see how it happens.

No, but only because I got 6 months full pay before I went onto SMP. At the time, DHs salary wasn’t enough to cover all our mortgage and bills, so my salary was needed. More than what SMP would give us. So I wouldn’t have gone into debt, but I’d have had to go back to work after the initial SMP period of 90% pay was over, so barely any time with DS at all and I’d have hated it, so can see how people would go into debt to avoid it. As it stood, I went back at 9 months pp as we managed to save during the first 6 months to top us up a bit for the 3 months when I was basically getting nothing, and family helped us out as well. Otherwise I’d have been back at work 6 months pp. We couldn’t have saved it if I’d been on SMP the whole time.

If we did it again, we’d save up before getting pregnant to ensure we had enough to top up the SMP months fully to avoid having to rely on family assistance for the final few months. This time around DS was unplanned and so we couldn’t do that, as the 8 montbs of saving when I was pregnant only meant we spent most of it on baby things! We wouldn’t need to do that a second time and we’d be able to plan and save more appropriately.

I have friends who went back to work early and cut their mat leave short because the SMP just wasn’t enough. So I can totally see how people do get into debt over it.

It wasn’t the plan. However it looks like DH is about to lose his job so we’re fucked. Sat here with a 14 week old on me.