MNHQ here: We want to know all about your return to work experience.

[PeggyMumsnet]

Hi Mumsnetters,

Our Planning team is currently doing some research for a potential partnership and we wanted to know about your returning to work experiences.

Getting back to work after maternity leave can be an emotional rollercoaster, whether it’s your first, second or tenth baby.

For some of us, returning to work is an exciting opportunity to drink a hot cup of tea, have grown-up conversations and feel vaguely like our old selves again. For others it can be a much harder transition. Many of us feel the pressure of new deadlines, financial burdens, the ‘mum guilt’ of leaving the kids at nursery, and the overwhelming sense that you can’t do everything at once. It’s important to remember, you’re not alone.

But even though being a working parent is challenging at times, it can also be filled with comedy gold moments that make the hard times easier - you might even look back, years later, after several nights of unbroken sleep and laugh about it. Yes, even that time you stayed up until midnight to make a costume for Dress Like a Pharaoh Day because you only found out about it on the train home. (Schools send a LOT of emails, in your defence.)

We want to hear your stories about the funny side of juggling kids, a career and a social life - cos if you don’t laugh you’ll cry right?

From the unfortunate baby items you pull out of your bag in meetings, to sneaking in some shut-eye during your lunch hour or your kids merrily dancing their way into your zoom background - we want to know your experiences.

Thanks!
MNHQ

I quite often get to work, sit down at my desk and realise I’m still wearing the stretchy wrap sling after doing the nursery drop off.

I also pump at work and I’m always worried I’ll emerge from the pumping room with a boob hanging out. Hasn’t happened yet thankfully!

So you don't want to know about people's return to work experiences, many of which are shit, just the 'funny side'?

I don't remember anything funny about expressing in the public toilets at Kings Cross after a day long work meeting or my daughter screaming when I Ieft her.

Maybe change your title.

@WhatNoReally

So you don't want to know about people's return to work experiences, many of which are shit, just the 'funny side'?

I don't remember anything funny about expressing in the public toilets at Kings Cross after a day long work meeting or my daughter screaming when I Ieft her.

Maybe change your title.

This.

What @WhatNoReally and @DoorWasAJar said. Way to trivialise what can be (and has been, personally) a really difficult time for many of us @PeggyMumsnet. But lolz nappies in my lunchbox roflcopter, eh?

Yes expressing at work was seen as an odd thing to request. I felt uncomfortable and didn’t do it for long as a result

Oh god
Trying to peel my dd1 off to hand to my parents when I went to work. Horrific experience! My dad would say just go while I was trying to settle dd. Hated it.

1st baby I returned to get my long overdue promotion (I’d effectively been doing the job before I left anyway) to be told by massively sexist Line Manager that “you’re a mum now, you shouldn’t be looking for a promotion “. I promptly resigned and had to pay back all my mat pay. Bastards.

2nd baby, I returned to a different company and the pandemic hit, had to work full time with 11 month old and homeschool during lockdown. Boss said I could work flexible hours, so that meant working til midnight 7 days a week to get through my workload.

Nothing remotely funny about any of it.

That’s the reality for many of us.

Returning from Mat leave and finding I’d been moved to a different site. No consultation

"What do you mean you don't work Thursdays. Fuck sake why did they bring you into the team."
Working late to help meet deadline who's picking up the kids?"
Overnight trip for customer meeting "husband babysitting?"
Toddler DS ripped my skirt at handover at nursery while going through clingy stage. Rang up to explain I'd obviously need to go home to change. Phone hung up on me.
Dreaded phone call from nursery to pick up sickly child. Have to leave work. Eye rolls and mutters under breath.
During lock downs and hone schooling. "Can't you just claim you're a key worker some how and get them in school or something"

Oh, hahahahaha such hilarious stories. That the type of stuff you're after?
Happy international women's day

This thread has gone down like a lead balloon

I hope it’s not deleted

It’s an important issue

@WhatNoReally

So you don't want to know about people's return to work experiences, many of which are shit, just the 'funny side'?

I don't remember anything funny about expressing in the public toilets at Kings Cross after a day long work meeting or my daughter screaming when I Ieft her.

Maybe change your title.

This. I thought this thread was going to be an information gathering exercise for a campaign to support women's reintegration to the workplace.

Not lazily mining our experiences for funny content.

Read the room, mumsnet!

Quite frankly it's difficult to engage on any thread
Your settings are not working

Ah cookies 😬😲

🍪🍪🍪🍪🍪
Have a biscuit too

I returned to work after mat leave to be 'made redundant' first morning. My employer of 4 years had given my job and my team to the new sales director's wife. I was the only redundancy. They then threatened me for 10 months while I brought an unfair dismissal case, said they'd make sure I'd never work in the industry again.
I'd had a problem free pregnancy, hadn't been off sick at all, had my antenatal appts outside work hours etc. I hadn't missed a target or dropped a beat.
They finally paid me a year's salary the week before the tribunal date. Made me sign a non-disclosure agreement. This is a company that supplies local govt and nhs.

I was only able to fight them because I had family legal insurance which paid for an employment solicitor and a barrister. £15 on my house insurance saved me £60,000. No legal aid is available for such cases.
Now every time I hear someone is pregnant or trying for a baby, I tell them to check they have legal insurance first. It really should be on the mumsnet checklist.

@WhatNoReally

So you don't want to know about people's return to work experiences, many of which are shit, just the 'funny side'?

I don't remember anything funny about expressing in the public toilets at Kings Cross after a day long work meeting or my daughter screaming when I Ieft her.

Maybe change your title.

Exactly this. My return to work, like many others, was a discriminatory nightmare that ultimately led to me walking away from a job I loved and taking a massive step back in my hard earned career that I'd been building for a decade due to the resulting loss of confidence in my own abilities. Hilarious

Both times my return to work was basically fine - and I was fortunate to have supportive employers - though there was still a lot of emotion and exhaustion. But nothing funny ever happened and I can't really imagine how it would? It isn't an area of life full of 'comedy gold'. I don't know what you thought you'd get from this thread but 'funny stories about returning to work' really isn't a genre

As above. Mil and my mum laid on the guilt. Work partner laid on the guilt. I had massive stress and depression. Felt utterly useless and a failure because I couldn’t cope. Has caused massive misery and years of counselling.
There is nothing funny about it.

Hi everyone - we're sorry that we obviously didn't read the room here.

The intention was to hear about your funny moments among the chaotic juggling of being a working parent - and certainly not to diminish the hardships. We're all too aware of what a nightmare it is for many women who return to the workplace and the discrimination we face.

If anyone is in this situation, please take a look at the Pregnant Then Screwed site for free advice.

I decided to be a SAHM after my first, my work wouldn’t offer me a part time position and I didn’t want to go back to full time. DH was on board and watched his career go from strength to strength. When our youngest was about to start school I started planning to return to work only for my DH to pull the rug from me, have an affair and end our marriage. I managed to get a full time position to support myself and the kids only for the pandemic to happen 3 months in. I was back at home, working full time, two kids to home school and on my own. I was also remortgaging my house and finalising a divorce. I almost had a mental breakdown.
There were no funny stories here.

Nothing funny about juggling motherhood and work. Just tiring, emotionally and physically.

I'm not sure your going to get the content you hope from this thread because I don't think it exists!

You should perhaps advise your sponsor to steer clear from this topic because any ad campaign around this (I'm assuming that's what this is research for) will likely result in a similar backlash.

Agreeing with others that this is a missed opportunity to understand the difficulties faced by working mothers including the low level discrimination from work colleagues and the pressures and prejudices placed on women by society. I could talk about how it felt to cry all the way to work because DD a was inconsolable at drop-off and the guilt was crushing me, about how I used to read her a bedtime story by FaceTime because life a a litigation lawyer meant I was rarely home for bedtime, the feeling of been torn in two trying to juggle everything at work and home, the feeling of being trapped into returning by the fact I’d been paid occupational maternity pay or how I ultimately made the decision to walk away from a career I worked hard at when DS came along as the pressure of trying to have it all made me feel like a failure at everything. But maybe there’s a neatly packaged anecdote I could bring out instead 🤷🏻‍♀️

I've had to go back FT as my role doesn't come in PT roles. I also had the crazy idea to agree to the apprenticeship degree scheme so I'm currently a first time mum, full time area manager and a student all at once.
It's tough and I don't know how the hell I'm doing it but I just am getting by 🤷🏼‍♀️ however I find myself doing work the majority of nights once DS is down. This is normally 9pm-midnight, and then I'm up settling him every hour until I finally give in and co-sleep. For him to then be up and wide awake 5-6am.
I am like a walking zombie most days... I haven't yet found anything funny about it but I'm sure I'll look back in years and be able to laugh about how I was once the real superwoman...