@anotheronettc
No, a 5 month old won’t be able to literally count days but that doesn’t mean they don’t have an understanding of time. 5 days is a fair chunk of their whole time on earth so far; it’s long for them.
You’re hung up on the comment about excursions helping your back; tbh that was a bit pass agg but the vast majority of the other comments in disagreement have been polite, for which we have been attacked. I’m apparently a martyr mum straight out the 50s cos I said a mum’s relationship with a 5 month old is different than a dad’s and that I wouldn’t want to be apart from a baby so young for such an extended period of time. Babies are capable of one primary attachment figure at that age; almost always the mum. It’s different for them to be separated from a primary attachment figure than a secondary. I didn’t say mums and dads should have different responsibilities in parenting, just that being a mother (particularly to a young baby) is different than being a father. I even said that surprised me and was not what I had thought prior to becoming a mother; but hey, worthy of attack. Thanks, @catell01!
You’re going; you always wanted to go, and you are dismissing all comments to the contrary as either just wrong (as above) or ‘baffling’; pretty passive aggressive yourself. I haven’t left my 22 month old for a night yet as he still breastfeeds to sleep and is super attached to me at night; if I’m out of an evening he will literally stay awake til I get in (10.30 and counting) and cannot / will not sleep without me home. Maybe that’s not ‘healthy’ but tbh not much I can do about it; I am also parenting the child I have and doing my best, so wind your neck in commenting on my decisions too. My DH is part of bedtime every night, I do stay out late seeing friends etc; DS for whatever reason just cannot sleep without me there. It would be a hell of a lot easier if he could; what a dream to just be able to drop at GPs and run. But I can’t, cos it upsets my son enormously if I’m not there at night and however late I’m out, he won’t sleep. My child is in childcare 4 days a week, has a super engaged and involved dad he loves and a grandma he adores and spends regular full days with. Daytimes are fine. I’m not possessive and clinging onto him and somehow denying him the chance to form healthy relationships and be away from me, as you and others imply. He just seems to need me, and only me, at night. If your 5 month old doesn’t, then amazing; crack on.
But own it: I do not for a moment think you will come back early; it is 5 nights not the 4 you’ve recently changed to (I think you said it’s leaving at 3am or something one night?) and if you are planning on restaurant trips, excursions (your own word!), and networking events then you are not going in order to rest a very painful back. That’s fine! Absolutely go and enjoy. But what has rankled posters I think is not owning your decision and your reasons for going and pretending to be conflicted; you didn’t really want opinions on whether you should go, you wanted encouragement to go. I’d have been happy to give you that, but as it is I answered the question you posed and have had my own parenting sideways-criticised in the process while you encourage posters who support you and throw shade at those of us who politely shared a differing opinion. It’s pretty unpleasant to be judgemental, very pass-agg and judgy yourselves about how we’re all ‘martyr mums’ and how it’s weird we haven’t left our older kids while simultaneously moaning about how whatever you do will be judged and aren’t women awful to each other.
But hey, you do you, and I do genuinely hope you and your husband have a lovely time away, and that your little one has a lovely time with his GPs. But I didn’t ask you what you thought of me not having been away from my 22 month old for a night yet; you did ask me what I thought about you leaving your 5 month old for 5.