Baby bear starts crèche #mamaguilt
Evie’s crèche essentials
I feel guilty, oh so guilty…about EVERYTHING. We’ve had two big weeks. Our little baby bear has started crèche. Hooray for her. New friends to play with, hand print animals to make, baby birthday parties to attend, new foods to try…the list goes on. Now, I have never felt guilty about the idea of sending her to crèche. But, let’s face it, the reality is different.
I head back to work tomorrow (more about guilt on that later), so the mini #girlboss had a two week ‘settling in’ period to help her get used to her new 9-5. Days one and two went well. She was in for two short hours each day of which I was there for almost a half hour. But oh day three, how we cursed you. That was the day she realised that this was indeed the new reality. The look of despair on her little face, the fat tears threatening to spill over and those chubby little arms reaching for me before I had even let her go. I felt sick. My heart broke and then shattered a little bit more as I thought of her little heart. I could feel my tears beginning to rise and so I gave her another goodbye cuddle, told her that I’d be back for her and made my way down the stairs. By the time I had gotten two or three steps down, her crying had abated as she was expertly distracted with a story. Babies it turns out are fickle 😉 When I arrived to pick her up four hours later, sure there she was back turned to me sitting on the floor happy out munching on a rice cake. And then, as she realised mammy was back, the tears started again. It has been a rollercoaster of emotions for sure, but we got through week one followed by week two which was a little easier. She’s in great form. She has her new little buds and her minders and now ‘her’ place to go.
And so back to ‘mama guilt’…it is all consuming and will take over if we let it. These past two weeks I have felt guilty for;
- sending a tiny little nine month old off to fend for herself in the big, bad world
- not feeling devastated leaving her the first day. Was I a ‘bad’ mother?
- enjoying a bit of time to myself
- not making the most of the time I had to myself
- looking forward to going back to work
- not looking forward to going back to work
- gritting my teeth when she woke at 5.30am and not wanting to get out of bed just quite yet to give her a cuddle
…and so the list goes on. It’s not rational but it is human.
So these last couple of weeks have been tough weeks, but also great weeks. I have ached for my little girl, but baby bear is making her way in the world and well on her way to being the confident, strong, sociable and kind little girl that I know she will be. We’ve had new tricks—advanced crawling (eek, her curiosity for all things non child-friendly is heating up), pulling to standing (double eek) and clapping—new foods, new friends and cuddles galore.
So mama guilt, while I know you will continue to visit, I will acknowledge you but do my very best to ignore you. All we can do is our best and that’s different things for different mamas.
One Response to “Baby bear starts crèche #mamaguilt”
[…] Finally, and most important of all, the baby bear was prepped – as much as you can a nine-month-old — with a two-week settling in period in crèche to help her acclimatise to her new routine (read more about that here). […]