Working mums

I return to work in two weeks and my son (10.5 months) is going to be going to nursery 2 days a week for two months and going up to 3 days a week after that. I’m feeling really sad about maternity leave ending and videos keep popping up about how nursery before 2.5-3 years old raises cortisol levels for babies, so I feel really emotional and down about it. Even if I changed jobs with more flexible hours to make it work finances wise, we want another 1-2 babies so I don’t think I could feasibly not work for 5+ years minimum to keep them all out of nursery until 2.5/3. Ours has an excellent rating and he’ll be spending 1.5 days with me and half a day with grandparents, plus all weekend with me and my husband.

I felt ok about nursery but as it’s getting closer and my algorithm is feeding me nursery research and evidence, I feel guilt ridden and can’t stop crying! Any positive nursery stories?

Is there anyone out there that decided to return to work early (financial reasons for me) and is really struggling trying to do mum and work? Am I alone, am I crazy? I'm really struggling to cope. My partner helps as much as he can but between regressions, teething and breastfeeding there's not a lot daddy can do but mumma is best at. I feel like I'm being ripped in 10 directions. Please tell me I'm not alone 😭

Can anyone advise - my work only allow a certain number of people to have leave during Christmas. This is given on a first come first served basis and is requested in January. My maternity leave started in September 2024 and I plan to go back in October 2025 - my work are saying I cannot have this off as all of the slots have been allocated. Surely I should be allowed to have this time off as I wasn’t working in January, or was I expected to log in to my work system to request the time off? I am totally confused right now

Anyone else the breadwinner with stay at home partner? I thought it would be more common but haven’t met any other working mums whose partner stays home! How is it for you?

I’ve just started going back to work in October tell me it gets easier leaving your toddler to go to work cause it’s killing me last night I got home late so I didn’t even get to spend any time with him because he was sleeping and he’s gone back a few steps with sleeping all he wants to do is sleep in my arms