Stay at home mum - am I doing the right thing?

[Polina]

I'm probably being wildly oversensitive but I am well stressed! When ds was born (he's now 9 months) I made the decision to be a stay at home mum, principally because I had such a fab time with my mum and wanted to give ds the same thing, or as near as I can manage. I still do a tiny bit of work to keep my hand in but in the main am looking after ds and having fun with him 7 days a week. I loved my job and had worked really hard on getting a career up and running before I met dh so it wasn't an easy decision at all. HOWEVER three separate parents have told me that I am risking ds's development by not sending him to nursery as I will make him unsociable and delay his learning and basically cause him to start life 3 years behind the other guys. Am now distinctly stressed that I am fouling up ds's chances - we have a great bond and have a lovely time (most of the time.....) but as one mum said, I don't want him to have a nervous breakdown when I send him to nursery at 2.5yrs either! Has anyone got experience or advice on this?

Well my dd started nursery at 2.5 and cried like mad for a week - now she positively bounces in there and adores it!

I wouldn't worry about that aspect of it tbh.

I am sure Hellsi that many working mums would love to be able to afford to stay at home with pre-schoolers - I am sure that for many it is not a straightforward choice.

Hellsy - I'm a bit puzzled at your post. Is it that you think nursery is too competitive?

I am a SAHM and send my ds to playgroup 2 mornings a week. He has learnt so much in the short time he has been going. My dd is at Nursery at the local Primary and loves it to death. In fact she wouldn't have minded if I had worked full time as she is that sort of child. DS is a little less outgoing but getting there. I suppose what I am trying to say is there are advantages to both senarios and you just do what you think is best for your own child. I am now training to be an early years teacher as I am so impressed with pre-schools and I know this is what I want to do. when ds goes to full time nursery.

mummytosteven - it's not that they are competitive, but the curriculum has been pushed back further and further so they are starting such structured learning at such young ages now. I just feel that there are so many early school leavers and perhaps it's a result of being pushed too much too early. Having taught in an early years classroom and had pressure put on me as a teacher to get the results from the children, it has made me very wary about starting in the whole system too early. As for the expense side of staying at home it's hard and we too live off an overdraft in a 2 up 2 down semi.....just wanted to share my experiences

Hellsy - I had not meant to imply that you did not know how hard it is. The reference to the two up two down was just to make a point about how I can't even manage to pay the mortgage on two salaries yet alone one. Feeling a bit paranoid at the mo because SIL reckons I am being selfish by going back to work for 2.5 days per week and has suggested that we sell up and move in with MIL. MIL and FIL can't stand me because I won't move in with them.

Well according to India Knight in the sunday Times, she can tell which children have gone to nursery by the vacant, expressionless faces. Got to go now and bring my vacant expressionless children to the shops to widen their life experience!!

India Knight is talking out of her not inconsiderable bumhole, chipmonkey.

Is there nothing to be said for teaching children the social skills that they get from nursery? My DS complies with things at nursery that he won't at home, not because he's forced to but because he wants to...waiting his turn, sitting (unstrapped) at a table to eat with all the other children, drinking from a cup...self sufficiency basically...aren't these good lessons early on that start to teach children how to cope with school?
I'm not knocking SAHM's at all but I reckon a little exposure to nursery can be a positive thing.

I LOVE reading India Knight, she makes me sooooo cross

often you can spot an India Knight article by its vacant, expressionless nature too. she is queen of the smugly judgemental imo.

Didn't mean to start such a debate - was playing devil's advocate really - as long as children are happy and loved, everything happens whether they be at nursery or not, it's the experiences that differ. Mental note to buy the sunday times and read India Knight..:O

polina - i made the same tricky decision as you for the same reasons (DS is also 9 months). i loved being at home with mum when very little and it just feels right for us at the moment. don't think you should worry about what others say. i think the discussion on this thread just proves that only you can decide what's best in your circumstances - india knight should be ignored at all costs...

I agree that there are skills children learn at nursery like taking turns and sitting on a proper little chair for meals etc, (in my ds's case eating fruit!)

However the orginal post was a mother of a 9 month old being told she was delaying her child's development. Most of these useful things taught by nursery wouldn't be applicable for another year at least anyway.

When I sent ds to nursery all my friends expressed surprised saying they thought I would be the last one to do it. Then they immediately all sent their toddlers to the same nursery. I take it as a compliment to my taste, but equally it could have been a panic to "keep up".

Now I'm being unusual in that I don't think that I'm that bothered about putting Bob down for his free kindy place. But maybe I will feel differently when I meet a real live 3 year old.

Many thanks for all this - it is a huge help to think that I am not the only one to have made this decision. (This is not to say that I think what anyone else does is wrong - like you chaps said it is whatever works for you and your little ones!)

Thanks to all for advice and support - I'll get back to the coalface with renewed enthusiasm now!

Polina you sound like my friend who went through a similar experience. I am a SAHM to dst (3), her youngest dd is 6 months younger than my dst. She had seen how I enjoyed being a SAHM and thought she would do the same but it nearly drove her crazy!

Again I think it was because she loved her job, had a career as oppossed to me who just had a job I wasn't particularly enthusiastic about. It would have been worse had she stayed at home miserable and there is nothing wrong with either of her dd's who have gone to nursery from an age similar to your ds! In fact her dds are charming little girls (her older dd is now 7) and the nursery has had a very positive part in their lives and development.

Saying that, I wish people would make decision on their individual situations. Not everyone wants to be a SAHM, not everyone wants to be a working mother. There is room in society for both kinds of mother and all this guilt and one-upmanship is ridiculous and I for one am heartily sick of it. Choose what makes your family the happiest Polina!

Okay I re-read your post and realised I misunderstood which part you are coming from! Excuse me, have had a difficult month and my brain is taking sometime to connect properly! God, I am such an idiot.

So I'll add; when my dst started nursery in January just after their 3rd birthday they immediately settled in. We have had no problems at all, quite the opposite.

Nursery staff comment on dst constant good behaviour, their ability to integrate, their ability to concentrate. Also dst can do letters, numbers, colours and that has been their own pace, I haven't pushed them in any aspect of learning. My SAHM experience has been more about trying to develop their personalities as different boys not, as people treat them, as one in the same. For that nursery has been brilliant as they are in different groups and parts of their characters are coming out now. And to finish I have loved this time with them, as I said in my other rubbishy post, I never felt the fulfillment in a job as I do at home with my boys. It is good fun I would have been sad to have missed out on!

I am going to shut up now and go lie quietly in a dark room until I start making sense!

Glad it's not just me who has days like this!