DD, age 22 months, started attending creche at our gym about 3months ago. I work 3 days a week, during which time she is either looked after by DH (depending on his own work shifts) or MIL. We attend various toddler groups, "rhyme-time" etc, which she loves, but this creche is the only setting in which she is not accompanied by a parent/grandma.
Initially she loved it and went running in happily each time I dropped her off. However about 6 weeks in, I found her crying when I picked her up, apparently she had become upset when the older (over 2's) children went off to do craft and she was left in the baby room with younger children. After that she didn't attend for 2 weeks as we went on holiday, and since our return (about 4 or 5 weeks), she hates it! When I pack her little backpack she gets upset and starts saying "no, no", and becomes hysterical when I drop her off. If I leave, she is generally fine within 5 minutes (I have been back to check on her!) but the nursery nurses tell me she is still a little tearful at times during the hour she is there.
Anyway-my question is this-would you persevere with this right now? I really worry that DD will struggle socially as almost all her peers already attend nursery or childminder- what if she is failing to develop the ability to socialise independent of me/DH/MIL? I worry that if we don't carry on with encouraging her to go to creche now, she will find playgroup/nursery harder when we try to leave her again in a few months/year. But I feel AWFUL leaving her sobbing when it isn't necessary, should we just abandon this and try again when she's older? Or will it be worse then? I'm driving myself mad trying to decide what to do!!