To NOT feel guilty that my kids are in childcare?

[Kanfuzed123]

Inspired by the childcare eating a £45k salary and the anti nursery sentiment from a few posters on there as being inferior for a child.

anyone else not feel in the slightest guilty that there kids are in nursery and have been post maternity leave?

yeah when they cried at drop off was rough and I called into the check out they were but that soon settled. They do lovely events for the parents and upload lots of amazing activities they do, they’ve made fantastic friends.

I could’ve reduced my hours but I didn’t, we could’ve maybe managed on one salary (glad we didn’t when rates shot up) but I went back FT when dc 1 was 15 months (used annual leave for part time before then) and dc2 was 13 months.

anyone else just not feel guilty? I like the lifestyle we can get when we’re working, especially since the 15 funded hrs and now 30, it’s so affordable. (Eldest is in school and youngest now has the 30 hrs) bill is less than £400 a month inc club etc. I like having something else to focus on too.

im not alone or am I?

I don't completely understand sorry - but if you mean the parents are sharing care and both working part time on a reduced income then that's what I'm suggesting is optimal.

If you mean that both parents absolutely have to work full time and share care on top of that to afford the minimum, then yes, that's really tough and you've got to do what you've got to do.

I call that being sensible?

But they could wait till the kids are in school before upscaling?

We don't have to have everything right now - although we are under a lot of pressure to believe that is the case.

Despite the constant discourse about 'wellbeing' (ie mental health, commodified) and much more awareness of gentle parenting etc - we're in absolute denial about the fundamental needs of babies and small children.

No amount of gentle parenting is going to make up for the internalised anxiety created by industrialised childcare - and the related impact on attachment - in the early stages of development.

My children share a bedroom but I kind of wish we had moved before we had the kids. It would have been so much easier. Plus when you move when they are older you have less money available because they cost more. I don't see what the appeal is if a parent is looking after children at home in a house that is far too small for their needs. It just isn't fun. Childcare also isn't a new concept. There were nurseries in WWII.

It's better to move before your kids start school so that you're in catchment for the school you want/don't have to move schools

Lots of arguments for why it’s better to move before kids/when they’re small. Sure- it’s almost always nicer to have more space but that’s not my point. My point is, it’s doable to have a smaller space when they’re little. It’s about priorities. If someone really wants to be present in their children’s life when they’re little, they will make it work. In my experience, kids always want to play where you are so we all end up in one room (I.e. lounge) and the bedrooms are hardly used.

P.S. If you’re already in a studio flat and still have to work to pay the mortgage then obviously that doesn’t apply.

Wait until they are in school and then potentially move schools? I wouldn't want to do that unless absolutely necessary.

We bought this house knowing it has good schools in hopes that we won't have to move for a long time so our children can stay nice and settled. Moving somewhere with good schools comes at a price and is about thinking about what you want your child's school experience to be like and nothing to do with having everything 'now'.

But coping skills are a necessary part of life. There's too many bloody teenagers ( and grown adults) who don't have them.

Not that I think it is the case anyway. I had 2 go to nursery and one not. Not difference in their resilience and social abilities as adults

Both parents do full time on opposite shifts. So child has equal care. And why would it make a difference to the child whether the parents work full time as they want to, rather than need to?

I have a suspicion that your definition of a small space house is different to mine. My eldest often complains because my youngest wrecks what they are playing with. Having their own space is a good thing. Obviously your children aren't at that age.

But when they are in childcare they are all stuck in one room with 10+ kids probably wrecking their stuff. People get the big house which then stands empty all day while they’re in work (to pay for the house) and kids are in nursery. Make it make sense.

These are the sorts of statements that should really stop 'if someone really wants to be present in their children's life...'. Unless someone is a truly checked out, terrible parent they will be 'truly present' even if that means physically present outside the hours of 8am-5pm 5 times a week. There are evenings and weekends and holidays and cuddling back to sleep after a nightmare and any time the child is off nursery with some bug or another, and all sorts of home experiences for any child - regardless of where they are some of the day.

There are few people who truly manage 24 hours a day of childcare while being 'truly present' - even the best ever stay at home parent must cook a meal or clean something or go food shopping at some point. Most parents have grandparents or friends or someone else around in their children's lives. There are a million different ways this works in different families and the most important thing is that a child knows who loves them and can rely on it.

Mine aren't stuck in one room at nursery. They have an outdoor space, separate soft play room and go out on regular local walks etc.

Plenty of people WFH now too so the house isn't always empty all day.

Erm, no. Making friends, the ability to interact with other child in various situations, being part of a group, sharing and understanding, I could go on.

This isn't how nursery works lol

And also not how our finances work.

Because no baby or toddler wants both parents to work full-time. They want/need to be with their primary caregivers as much as possible.

We twist ourselves in knots trying to deny that truth - but all child development research says that is broadly the case, and we also know it in our hearts I think.

The truth is that kids don't just 'fit around your lifestyle'. To do the best by them, adults have to make sacrifices. I know that's not what lots of people want to hear, and there is a lot of social encouragement not to hear it too.

(The question of whether or not the care is shared is about women's equality - my earlier point was to show that these sacrifices don't have to be solely made by women.)

Thankfully, babies/toddlers don't get to decide because they are babies/toddlers and can't even begin to understand the bigger picture such as finances, better opportunities for schools and how it isn't always as simple as both parents working part time, especially if it would mean losing the flexibility that means both parents can flex around each other and do early pick ups from nursery 99% of the time which actually works out to be more beneficial as it doesn't come with a massive pay cut.

Making sacrifices doesn't have to mean the woman (because as you know, it is almost always the woman) throwing her career away and can't always be easily solved by both going part time.

Thankfully, babies/toddlers don't get to decide because they are babies/toddlers and can't even begin to understand the bigger picture such as finances, better opportunities for schools.. etc

You're right, they don't understand, and that's what makes it so awful I think. They are not adults or even rational - they just know that they are not with the humans who give them security in a huge and terrifying world which they don't have the neurological or psychological capacity to understand at even a basic level.

That results in a shutting down. Very small children don't 'learn to cope' - they learn to give up hope. These are not 'glitches' in the childcare experience as someone described them upthread - they are a natural and lasting response to trauma.

I understand that it is difficult to hear this on an emotional level, and difficult to mitigate on a practical level.

But I don't believe that, if we ignore aspirational pressures (see earlier point about capitalism/consumer culture), it would be impossible for many of us.

On your other point - you've missed me saying earlier that there should have been an organised societal shift, at the point when two incomes became more necessary, to normalise men going part-time when their children were small.

It's something that could be fixed if women made it a ballot-box issue, but as with many misogynies, we're trained not to see it, and to experience it as 'just the way things are'.

Women working full-time and having responsibility for the majority of caring and domestic tasks, most of the shitwork, and all of the mental load is the patriarchal norm, by definition.

You actually don't really know what pp was describing above because it was such a small detail known as 'blips' and nothing else, you are just assuming it was her child shutting down because it suits your argument. You also ignored the fact that pp says her children loved nursery.

Mine never cried going into nursery as babies and formed a bond with their keyworker who they were always happy to see. They continue to love nursery and I've never experienced anything that I would describe as them shutting down.

Men need to step up here and take some responsibility. Why is it women who should make it a ballot box issue? Why does it always have to be on women and why are they always to blame?

I'm glad your children had a good experience @SouthLondonMum22 . I think a lot of the time, though, babies and toddlers don't - and parents have to look the other way in order to stay sane in what is actually an insane situation.

Men need to step up here and take some responsibility. Why is it women who should make it a ballot box issue? Why does it always have to be on women and why are they always to blame?

I didn't say women were to blame - the exact opposite. I said it's a function of patriarchy (and any successful power structure) to make its optimal environment seem natural, and that therefore women cannot be blamed for not seeing their own oppression, let alone not making it a ballot box issue.

However, if it's hard for women to see that they are essentially boiled frogs even though it is absolutely in their interests to do so, it's even less likely that men, who universally benefit from the boiling pan of water, will choose to give up the privileges they enjoy at women's expense.

Sorry for the strangled metaphors, but I hope you get my drift.

[As an aside, on an ideological level, I think that calling upon on the privileged to act ethically and reasonably, against their own interests, for the benefit of all, is a liberal idealist trope which exists to suppress radicalism or revolution. It makes it seem as if change requires consensus, which feels (and usually is) impossible. But we are not in that idealised liberal world - usually the oppressed have to take action ourselves.]

I just don't see that at all and I see babies and toddlers at nursery every single day when I drop off and pick up.

Unfortunately, I don't see society changing any time soon. Especially something as drastic as forcing men who are parents to work part time. I do hope we can start with longer parental leave for men, use it or lose it to encourage equality during the very early days.

Do they? what are you basing this on?

I have known no one upsize in anticipation of a baby. Plus if they were living in a 1 bed flat, upsizing is a prudent and sensible choice

Just curious.. what do you make of the young children who are excited to go to nursery?

Like my DD (almost 4 years old) goes two days a week (mostly so I can go to appointments and catch up on housework) and literally cheers when I tell her it’s a school day. She likes to see her friends and her teachers, play with a different set of toys, make artwork, do activities, and play outside. We don’t always fit socializing, art, and outside time all into a day because I’m often very busy. Sometimes it’s hard to get her to put down whatever it is she’s doing and get her to leave, come pick up time

I think at least a little bit of childcare can be beneficial. And children eventually learn that you’re coming back for them at the end of the day, so they don’t get as much separation anxiety when others’ are caring for them.

But they are ALWAYS with one of their parents.

4 year old who can communicate is very different to baby/toddler who does best with 1 to 1 car and can’t communicate how they feel or tell you if something is wrong.