Going back to work is the hardest thing in the world, especially when you have had the luxury of spending every minute of every day with your baby, had a lovely Summer in a new house, and had a lovely holiday to New Zealand where your own mother and father took care of you and their beloved granddaughter every day for six weeks.
But it gets even harder when you find out that your baby absolutely hates her child minder, and spends every waking minute she is there sobbing her little heart out. I've never felt so stressed in my life. In fact, until this past month, I didn't really know what stress was, such a charmed life I've led so far. I kept telling myself it was just part of the settling in process, and she would get better. But when it got to the third week, and each day I collected her I was told that she had cried all day long again, panic really started to set in.
It wasn't the fact that I was leaving her. She is in fine spirits on the days when Number Two's mother looks after her, so it had to be something to do with the child minder, or the child minders house. With each day that passed my feelings towards the child minder changed. In the beginning she seemed capable, caring and friendly, but as time wore on, she seemed less and less interested in looking after Number One, practically throwing her at me when I went to pick her up in the evening, and interestingly both myself, Number Two and Number Two's mother had all taken a dislike to her, just like Number One seemed to have done.
I decided to look for an alternative. Upon investigation, nanny services were out - I would have had to work six out of seven hours a day just to pay for it. So I rang round all the child minders in our area, and only found one with availability. Luckily she was happy to take on Number One, even after I explained all the problems we'd had so far.
So last Wednesday when I took Number One back to the original child minder she asked if I had time for a chat. Apparently she'd been losing sleep over the problem of Number One not settling in, and felt that it wasn't going to work out. The four week settling in period was over, and she hadn't settled, and it was becoming too stressful looking after her. (And when her friends came to visit they left after five minutes because they couldn't stand the sound of a crying baby. I'm not paying you to socialise with your mates!) So we mutually agreed to that day being Number One's last with her.
Ah, the relief. Number Two was away for work that night, and Number One came to bed with me, while I bawled my eyes out. After being close to tears every day for a month, and often actually in tears (mostly in the car driving to work), and suffering terribly with a cold, the flu, and a stomach bug, I finally felt like I could let it all out. And I did. Poor Number One must have thought Mummy was mad, but when I had finished I felt so much better. And have ever since.
So Monday was day one with the new child minder. The big test. There were no tears when I left, very few tears during the day, and a very happy, smiley baby when I arrived to collect her. She's almost at the end of her first week, and so far so good. I feel like I might be able to start getting on with my life again.
Fingers crossed.
