Returning after maternity leave… and I’m pregnant

[MollyMarples]

We relocated during my maternity leave, so I have had to find a new teaching job. We’ve just moved house, in a new town, and I start my job in a few weeks. To me, I am returning from maternity leave AND it’s a new job. But to my employer, I’m just a new, fresh employee.

They’ve emailed to see if I can go in and spend a day there to meet the class etc, but I have had to remind them that I am on maternity leave and have no childcare. They have never mentioned or acknowledged that I am returning from maternity leave. (They are very much aware, I wrote it in my application, and mentioned my new motherhood in my interview many times).

I am worried they won’t offer me the support I will need returning from maternity leave. I don’t really know what I need, I’ve never done this before, but I don’t think it’s going to be easy leaving DD for the first time, and trusting the new childcare.

Also, I’m pregnant, and I’m so anxious how they will react.

Any similar experiences, or advice much appreciated.

I think there's a lot to unpick here and I'm going to be blunt.

To them, you are not returning from maternity leave but you have selected a job opening of your own free will and got the job. So I'm not quite sure what you mean by support returning from mat leave. This means you get yourself into a position where you do trust your childcare before you go into work. They do not have to offer you support for returning from maternity leave past their legal obligations. You may find yourself with 2 days parental leave per year and anything outside of this will be unpaid. I know when DD is sick I have to juggle it with relatives who can step in because ultimately I can't work from home in our sector and I can't afford to take unpaid days off. It will be sad when you leave dc with childcare that first day but you are not the only person to go through this.

Rather than putting this on your employer, you need to be speaking to your husband/partner who I assume is the reason you've relocated and asking him what support he will be offering you. You will be shattered from the new info of a new job, which will be worse from starting mid year, add pregnancy and a older baby to the mix, who will spend the first few months of childcare picking up every bug going, you will need to make sure you've got a tight support network.

I wouldn't worry too much about starting pregnant. You won't be the first and you certainly won't be the last.

Gently, OP, the school doesn't have a responsibility to ‘support’ you in any particular way and it isn’t their responsibility to remember that you are on mat leave. The same rights that will protect you when you disclose your current pregnancy are also the reason why they didn’t discriminate against you as a new mother, and why they won’t treat you any differently to another new member of staff.

Presumably you have childcare lined up for when you start. Schedule a settling-in session for the day when you go in to school. Alternatively your partner is entitled to parental leave and could potentially take a day to cover you when you go in.

We relocated across the country when I was on mat leave with DC1 and I returned to work to a new job. The only difference with your situation is that I wasn’t pregnant. We had no family support local to us. When I was invited to the induction day before we had made the move I arranged for my mum to care for DC and drove 100 miles each way to attend. The school didn’t ask if I had childcare and rightly so.

It is hard and I empathise with you but it is your responsibility to prepare for your return to work, not your employer’s to support you above and beyond other colleagues. You need to use these weeks to get your DD settled into her childcare and to make a plan with your partner for how you will cover the inevitable days when she has caught a bug from nursery.

Good luck

My school was hopeless when I returned even though I hadn't moved. I don't think schools do much at all whereas I have friends in other industries who had company-wide schemes to help ease them back in. I wasn't allowed to do any KIT days by either school I took maternity leave with.

Agree with this poster!!

I started a new job too after 52 weeks of Mat Leave. What support do you think you need @MollyMarples? I was still breastfeeding (you should tell them if you are) so had space to pump and store milk at work. That was it. You're pregnant - you should tell them so they can risk assess appropriately. What support did you have in place during your last pregnancy whilst working? That's probably what you'll need this time too.

If you were returning to the same school, you'd still need to go and meet your new class and you'd probably use KIT days paid for this whilst still on Mat Leave, so you'd still need childcare. What childcare have you arranged for when you return to work? What childcare did you use when you interviewed for the role? In the nicest possible way, your childcare arrangements are not the responsibility of the school. I'm another that arranged family member to travel all the way to have my baby for the half day I was in school meeting new class. They were tight their with baby as soon as I stepped out the school door.

On the issue of trusting new childcare - presumably you've done your due diligence in looking for childcare and have chosen one you're comfortable with, and you know their settling sessions and routines etc and are confident it is suitable. If you already feel uncomfortable trusting them then perhaps it's not the right fit?

When you start work, call childcare during the day (morning break, lunch break, after students leave for the day) to check in if it helps settle you, and leave promptly at the end of the day, you'll want to anyway!

Good luck

Thanks all. To answer some questions, childcare will be shared by a nanny and my Mum, so hopefully we’ll avoid some nursery bugs and illnesses. My husband took the morning off to have DD when I interviewed.

I think the support I need is just understanding more than anything, that I am a new Mum. Nothing special, just some empathy, I suppose.

I think I am feeling worried that I’ll be disappointed by the lack of relationship I have with my new employer. My last employer was so lovely, I didn’t want to leave that job, and I didn’t want to take this new job, to be completely honest. I had to, to facilitate the relocation for DH’s job.

I’m sure they will be decent once you start. Asking you to come in for an induction day isn’t an indicator that they won’t be and it’s not their fault you didn’t want to leave your previous setting. Again, gently, it is your responsibility to resolve your feelings about this, not your employer’s.

You are very privileged to have a nanny and your mum as childcare. I’m not clear why one of them can’t care for your child while you go in for an induction day but I am sure you have a good reason.

I’m about to be very nosy so feel free to ignore me or tell me to bugger off but based on your update I can’t wrap my head around the economics of your decision.

If a nanny is affordable even for part of the week then you must be fairly comfortably off. I don’t understand your choice to take a job that you don’t want and that you will only do for a few months before your next mat leave. You are unlikely to be there long enough to accrue full enhanced mat pay. Have you considered or costed up the option of taking an extended maternity leave, during which time
you settle into the new area and build up some support networks, before taking your time over finding a job that you really want for your RTW after your second mat leave?

Inviting you in to meet the class before you start (and hopefully get some handover with the person you're taking over from) is not a bad thing.
They don't know that you have no childcare available until your maternity leave starts - some people are using family childcare, and so this wouldn't be a problem. You could ask the nursery/childcare about one-off day, or your partner could take the day off, but if there's no option, then it's fine to say no thanks to the offer. If you were returning to the same school, this day would be a "keeping in touch (KIT)" day, and those are by mutual agreement - ie only if both school and employee want it to happen.

A relationship with your employer won't really happen until you get there and are actually having interactions that are not purely focussed on practicalities.