Struggling with the transition from nursery to school as a single parent..

[SpaghettiAndMeatball20]

DD started reception this week.. Oh gosh, I am shattered!
I took the first couple of days off with her to settle her in with the school runs, she now uses breakfast and after school club. She does gymnastics and swimming also after school which I take her too after finishing work and collecting her.
But my god, I am struggling with all of the additional cooking and cleaning up after her and also getting things prepared, washing school uniform, keeping on top of things AND also working. By 9.00pm I am KO'd.

Tonight she has swimming, and I have made a picky bits type tea for her to eat on the way home as it'll be 7pm by the time we get back and don't really want to be cooking a meal.

I feel like I need to be better organised but really feel the "single parentness" now she's transitioned to primary school.

She has little involvement from her father and he won't be doing anything school related other than turning up to events etc.

Please give me your tips on how to get through the week without being hit by a bus.

I know the logical thing to do is meal plan, do mini-cleans and not be scared to do things like picky bits teas etc.. but anything else please tell me!!

Nursery did everything from 7.30am to 5.00pm and all I gave her when she got in was a light dinner ahead of bed as she's a 7pm to 7am sleeper.

Now feel like she needs a proper dinner in the evenings but really struggling. I also don't eat with her as I like to have a bit of an evening and usually eat after she's gone to bed so I can decompress and eat at my own pace.

Today was our busy busy day, DD has football club at school till 4.40pm, then Brownies starts at 6.15 and I have a 5pm to 6pm Team meeting video call, that I take on my phone.

So 1hr 20 mins to get her home, fed, changed and back out the door, while I'm also on a call.

Dinner for us both was crumpets and scrambled egg, tasty, quick, easy and filling.

Keep your standards and expectations realistic, you're not going to present a home cooked 3 course meal every day, and that's fine, we grew up with regular dinners of tinned tomatoes on toast or soup and a cheese toastie, or bacon and eggs and didn't feel hard done by in any way.

Is she having hot meals for lunch at school? When DD1 had hot meals at lunch we did an easier meal for tea, like soup, sandwiches etc. Also moved swimming to weekends as was too much in the week with work, school run etc

Stop all extra curricular activities, buy loads of uniform so you only need to wash it once a week (I always did mine on a Friday evening) Get a slow cooker and set it on a timer, prep it the night before and you come home to a cooked meal. Get a takeaway at the weekend to relieve one evening of cooking. Get your little one to help you batch cook to fill up the freezer.
You need to try to build some downtime into your weekend too, I remember mine being very tired at weekends when the started reception.

Rule number 1 cut yourself some slack
rule number 2 frozen veg will save your life
rule number 3 batch cook things like spaghetti sauce, shepherds pie mix, chicken supreme and put them in portion sizes in the freezer
rule number 4 as little as she is she needs to start learning to help out, I had my girls at 3 pegging clothes on the clothes dryer, it took a couple of years for her to get the hang of it, but start teaching her early so that in the years to come you have some help, and she learns that girls can do anything they turn their mind to…
I was a single mum till my girl was six, it was bloody hard but we had the best time doing everything our way, just the two of us.

you have totally got this xx