When you don’t ‘need’ formal childcare.

In this episode, Frankie Tortora and Steve Folland have a chat in response to a question from Detective Don Burns aka Anonymous:

“Hi Frankie and Steve!

I have a childcare question for you…

With our first born, we never considered putting her in nursery. I reduced my hours at my (employed) job and my partner and I shared looking after her by working alternate days.

This time around I’m self-employed, and with my partner now working 5 days a week, I’m only able to work after 4pm which is really hard. I’m getting work done, but it’s incredibly difficult to get motivated to work at that time.

Our youngest is now 2 and therefore qualifies for the 15 ‘free’ hours a week. But we both feel incredibly guilty about thinking of using a nursery, even for a couple of afternoons a week. 

I personally feel like I’m being selfish, because we are making it work at the moment without formal childcare, and the number 1 reason we’d put him in a nursery would be so I can work during the day a bit more.

Sooo, can I have your pros and cons for using paid-for childcare when you’re in a situation like mine? When you don’t NEED to.

Thank you

Ps. I’d like a detective name please”