To ask if you couldn't imagine leaving your baby and then young dc with strangers?

[A2J]

As in nursery/childminder etc?
I was OK once they could talk but before that I couldn't have left them with anyone except very close friends (female) or family.

It probably stems from my own childhood although any abuse I experienced was when older. Weird friends of my parents.

Luckily I was bolshy and stuck up for myself. More than I can say for my parents.

Bowlby did a lot of work on the different attachment types. Children can be securely attached AND attend childcare. They aren't mutually exclusive and neither Bowlby's work nor the NSPCC are saying that can't be the case.

Look.

You're allowed your opinion. You're allowed to make your own choices. Let us do ours.

And if you absolutely must tell internet strangers why your choices are the correct ones, just make sure you cite sources that are reliable and appropriate. And actually, make sure that you're using relevant, reliable and appropriate studies to make your own decisions. Whatever the outcome of your decision is, that's my advice to anyone. Be sure that the work you're reading is done by people who genuinely just care about the wellbeing of children and have no ulterior motive. And that it's relevant to your circumstances / location etc.

@HJA87 but there are lots of critiques of Bowlby. One in particular is the particular focus on the mother-child attachment when more recent research suggests children are capable of forming attachments with multiple caregivers.

All of the research you are relying on is referencing a childcare system that is very different to the UK system.

I'm not sure why you are so determined to tell women who have used childcare that they have damaged their children when it's not even true!

You're referring to research done on families in the 60s. The shape of families, childcare settings and the job market is entirely different to those that Bowlby studied. With regards to childcare settings, this is in part because of the research.

This was going to be my next point!

Absolutely!
What's 3 years in Intensive Care Medicine? Err, vast changes that's what! And the PP's 3 years seems to assume there's a one child rule. But I have 2 children 2 and a half years apart so my 3 years at home would have been more like 5 and a half years. I'd have been unemployable, unless I retrained. Assuming I could even find anyone to retrain me - and why on earth should they, given I'd already had one shot and a big chunk of the public purse - the impact on a young family of having Mum undergoing retraining, quite possibly in another part of the country, would be massive. It's not like they stop needing parenting once they're over 3. I think I found the school years more intense than the baby period in fact.
In reality, we'd have got used to living on one salary in those years and I'd probably never have returned. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of doctors I know who have had a significant career break and returned to work, and none of them regained the seniority they left with. If a relatively small number of people do it it's not a huge issue but if every female doctor decided to have a 3 year career break after every child it would be a complete disaster. Same would be true of most other health care professionals. Aside from the deskilling aspect, who the hell would do the work whilst all these women were away for their 3 or more years? It's hard enough to get maternity cover in many roles as it is. If 3 years off was the norm I can't imagine what impact that would have on the recruitment and career progression for women, and we don't truly have parity even now.
I'm talking health care because it is what I know, but I am sure there are many other professions where the same kind of thing applies. I doubt there are many jobs where you can stroll back in after 3 or 4 years, have an afternoon's induction and pick up where you left off.
I'm all for choice. I don't think anyone has said otherwise. And there are, without doubt positives to a family of having one parent at home. I'm quite happy to acknowledge that there were downsides to me working when my children were very young. But there were lots of longer term positives too, for them, me, and wider society. As they're now happy, successful and not in the slightest dysfunctional adults I'm fairly confident that the positives outweighed the negatives, but yes, there would have been plus points if I'd stayed at home too. But it works the other way too and denying the longer term impact of time out of the workplace, both on the individual and society does nobody any favours.

If you think that putting kids in childcare is damaging children I would really urge you to make sure you tell this to

• the next woman who serves you in a shop
• the woman who does your hair
• the woman doing your next smear test
• the woman doing your nails
• the woman teaching your exercise class
• the woman teaching your school age children
• the woman who answers your call to a call centre
• the woman delivering your parcels
• the woman checking your tickets on the train

because a large number of them will have their kids in childcare and I’m sure they’d really love to hear your opinion. Or is it just strangers on the internet you want to tell are damaging their kids?

Yes 18 YO DS went to a childminder part time from 4 months old. I got six months full maternity pay and as a single mum I couldn't afford to take longer off. I felt it better for his general life outcomes and quality of life to have his mum in work than on benefits.

Absolutely this. I’m also a hospital doctor and mum of two. I took a year of maternity leave with each child and, if I’m honest, would have loved to have stayed at home with them for longer. But it’s not feasible for huge chunks of healthcare staff to take years off and deskill in that time. Given that many people are keen to denigrate doctors, I’m sure there would be threads on here berating women for daring to train in the NHS and then have a career break. I’m sure it would be the same in other industries.

I have already stated my disgust at some of the responses on this thread, but it really is amazing that we can’t just trust other women/men/families to make decisions that make the best of their own situations.

My DS first went to a 'stranger' when he was 5 months old. She was a registered childminder but I had only met her once before. I had to work so didn't have a lot of choice. Having said that she was the 3rd setting I had visited and there was no way I'd have left him with the first childminder I met or the nursery I looked at.

At the end of the day we all do whats right for our own families.

I wish my grandmothers were alive to read some of this. They had multiple children and worked. Not in careers, but in let's- not- starve- today jobs. They would have been bemused at the idea of staying home with one or two moppets to lavish all their attention on.

Yes, they loved their children, as humans have done throughout history, but this whole idea of placing children on an altar and being in service to them would have been bizarre. Your children needed to be fed, clean and well behaved. Ideally, useful round the house too(but not the boys).

I'm lucky enough to have been born in an era where I could have a career, but I suspect I have more in common with my grandmothers than my mother, who did spend a lot of time at home with us, as there was no one else to look after us and childcare was prohibitive (80s and shit wage jobs).

People always misconstrue attachment theory as it being solely about the child's relationship with it's main caregiver when it's not, it's only a component of it. His own studies of attachment and of theory have been criticised as being weak, too narrow minded and only focusing on the mother as an attachment figures.

https://www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/demystifying-attachment

Another study found that issues like antisocial behaviour, also found evidence of anti-social behavior, affectionless psychopathy, and disorders of language, intellectual development and physical growth were not due to a lack of attachment to a mother figure but other factors such as lack of stimulation and social experiences.

https://www.simplypsychology.org/bowlby.html

But still we have armchair experts on here and politicians use attachment theory as a weapon against mothers to shame them into staying home and out of the work place in this belief that the absolute best thing for a child is to have their mother at home with them and women being told its OK if they can take a few years out of work and they can just skip back into work. Women can offer so much to the working world and have contributed to economy and society in so many ways yet a large part of society still thinks the best place for them is at home.

I work in social care and older adult care. About 90% of our work force is women and a large percentage is working mothers. It's the same for most caring professions too such as caring, nursing and teaching.

People on this thread say its fine for women to take a few years out their career yet offer NO ALTERNATIVE for who are going to fill these roles when these women are out of work. These professions are already short staffed and would become even more so if everyone took a few years out to stay at home. So perhaps these posters would be mindful to remember this the next time they need a nurse to care for them or their family member in hospital, or a midwife to deliver their baby, or a social worker or carer to help an elderly relative or teacher to teach your child.

No idea... I'm started with a half day and I'll see how it goes. I need a bit of time in the day to catch up with jobs and workout. I think I'll send him and re-assess.

Do what feels right for you and your family. It doesn't matter what works for me, or didn't work for someone else. It's your family. Your child. Your life. You know what's needed and what's best.