This is it: after 9 months of fun with my little man, spending every single day together, it is time for me to go back to work full time, to a new job actually, and for baby O to go and play at nursery. Boy, that went fast!

Here in the UK, although the mat leave pay situation is not fantastic, and very low if your company doesn’t offer an additional contractual pay to the statutory one from the government (i.e 6 weeks at 90% of your salary and then 33 weeks with a meagre allowance. These weeks start as soon as you finish work, even if it’s when your only 6 months pregnant and subjected to bed rest. So you better not have a difficult pregnancy in this country or you may not spend much of your mat leave with your baby once born), most women still take close to a year of maternity leave. Quite different from France, where although women would have the right to take a year, most only take 3 or 4 months simply because any longer is not traditionally done and would get managers and colleagues to raise eyebrows. (Please correct me if I’m wrong).

I originally thought anything above 6 months would be too long. The first 2 weeks of baby O’s life, my husband was on paternity leave so we were discovering it all together. But once week 3 kicked in and I found myself tied to the sofa the first day because baby O was cluster feeding plus crying each time I was putting him down (I later heard about “the fourth trimester”, baby’s first trimester outside the womb, getting used to the scary outside world), I was afraid that this mat leave was going be veeeeery long… The 2nd day,  we just went for a long walk and our first mums and babies’ group (Bumps and Babies by the charity NCT “National Child Trust” for which I later volunteered as chair of our Ealing branch). From then on and until today, we had a very busy social calendar with our regular playgroups, café meet-ups with friends, our weekly baby swimming class (Baby O’s favourite), mum & baby yoga, mum and baby HIIT, NCT committee meetings, sensoriel classes etc… Because women go on mat leave for so long here, the great thing is that there is a wealth of activity available every day (lots of them for free).

We have also travelled a ridiculous amount of time as you would know if you’ve been following me on social media: every 2 months back to France for baby O, his Mamie and Tatie to enjoy as much time together as possible! But we also had a few weddings and other commitments in Europe, as well as the big trip to Australia to see the fatherland.

In between all that, I had the most efficient job search ever. For different reasons, I was considering moving jobs, one being the long commute, not compatible with nursery pick-ups and drop-offs. After updating my CV and sending it to 2 companies, one resulted to 5 interviews and a job offer (as I was in Australia actually) for the role I really wanted. We also got lucky enough to get THE nursery that we really wanted for Oliver.

It’s 8:25 and time for me to hurry up, finish to get Oliver ready before dropping him off at nursery. Mixed feelings upon me, between excitement and fear for Oliver: he’s been going to nursery every day for 2 weeks but only 1 hour everyalso day, so over 8 hours today will be a bit of a shock. And I’m going to miss him like crazy! But I’m also super excited about the new job! And the corporate Christmas party tonight (great timing, right?) ! 😉 And to be back to a working woman.

Stay tuned to know how I juggle it all, and start my marathon training in a few weeks!!