This is definitely a personal decision for sure. So for me personally, I can't picture myself being a SAHM. I like working for many reasons. I like having the structure & the extra income. Half of my pay goes towards daycare. I get paid twice a month & almost one full paycheck covers daycare so we still have extra money from the other paycheck. Then when the kids start school we'll have that whole other paycheck back in our pockets (like getting a raise lol). I also work for the State so I have awesome retirement i'm earning & get a lot of paid time off whenever I need it. So having to take off for sick days, etc, is not an issue. I just hit my 10 year mark so I am now vested. If I didn't have a great job that I didn't like then that might change my mind, but if you find something you enjoy & it is worth it then that is ideal. I get off work at 3:30 every day (Monday-Friday) so I have many hours in the evening to spend with the family plus the entire weekend & holidays. If I had to work nights or other off hours I wouldn't enjoy it. I have a great situation with my job so that is why I decided to not stay at home. You could always try this new job & if it doesn't work out to your liking & you are miserable then go back to being a SAHM. We all should do what is best for our own happiness or at least work with what we have if given no other option too.

Such a hard decision and so personal! I had planned to go back after my first was born because my husband was a solo practitioner, and my job provided regular paychecks and insurance. However I was totally miserable there, as in on the verge if tears every Sunday night because Monday was imminent. The pay wasn't great, and I was underemployed and under appreciated. However the job market here sucks for attorneys because the market is over saturated, plus there's a relatively new law school in town making the problem worse.

A few weeks before my (unpaid*) maternity leave ended, my husband and I took a good hard look at the logistics and finances. Putting aside my hatred of my job and the crazy stress it caused, my paycheck wasn't much more than daycare would have cost us, especially since I wouldn't be able to get much overtime, if any, and I would probably have gotten less hours due to a sick child/doctor's appointments/school closures. Plus insurance would cost more because I'd be adding a child to my policy, so my pay estimate kept going down the more we looked at it. On top of that, my office was in a scenic but remote area, so there was only one choice for daycare. It looked all fine and good, but my sister looked them up on the DSS site and discovered that they had some pretty egregious violations, so I was uncomfortable leaving my baby there even though I'd be about three minutes away by car. Then I added in my mental distress at leaving my baby and with hating my job (plus lost time due to baby --> even more stress at work because I'd be required to do the same amount if work in less time), plus commuting costs, it just didn't make sense. We figured that if I could take what little free time I had and devote it to my husband's practice, it would be worth it. So that's what we did.

(*My old firm did not pay maternity leave because they were small enough not to be required to by law. However I had paid for disability insurance, which covered 6 weeks of leave, but since I had accrued about 3 weeks if PTO, the insurance required me to exhaust that first - so basically insurance only paid out 60% of my pay for three weeks. If I'd known that beforehand I'd have used up my PTO beforehand, but I didn't complain because I got more out of the insurance than I'd paid in.)

As for finally sending our son to daycare, last spring my husband got into talks with a retiring attorney about taking over his practice and taking on his small staff. It ended up happening last summer, so in order to handle the increased caseload (and be able to afford higher overhead), I had to go back to work. I tried bringing our son with me, but I honestly got very little done with him there (he was about 18 months old). In order to be efficient in the office, he needed to go to daycare. We found an awesome preschool nearby that was running about the market rate but with exceptional facilities and standards. They had one last-minute opening as the school year was starting up last August, so we enrolled him. He got sick a lot through about October, then randomly in November and February, but since then he hasn't missed a day! They also run on a 12-month year with just a week break at the end of July. Otherwise they only close for major holidays and "teacher work days," which they try to schedule on "lesser" holidays (like President's Day) when one parent may be off of work anyway or may be able to miss easily. I really love the school, and I was getting bored of being a SAHM (I think some people are more cut out for it than others), plus I liked going back to work, using my law degree, and being my own boss!

My husband was supportive of my decisions (he had a say in it but was sensitive to my needs and feelings), and the only person who gave me a hard time about it was my dad. When I stayed home he told me I was wasting all that education. When I went back to work, he told me that my son wasn't getting anything out of daycare except sickness. I swear, I couldn't win with him.

Now that #2 is here (5 weeks old today), we are thinking about what to do. Our older son's school doesn't take kids younger than age one, and they must be that age at the start of the school year - so this little one can't go there until August 2014. There's no other good daycare nearby or between home and our office, either. We could afford to pay for a nanny if they were watching both kids, but our older son gets a lot out of his school - lots of great social interaction - that I think would be lacking with a nanny. We can't afford a nanny and still pay for daycare, so I think what will happen is that as this baby is a little bigger and has more of a schedule, I will come into the office as much as possible, then maybe hire a part-time mother's helper type, depending on our cash flow, until next August (2014).

Personally, I found I better appreciated the time spent with my son when I didn't spend all day with him, if that makes sense.

As for your situation, I think it's a great opportunity to go back, which means you'll have had a good amount of time as a SAHM and then you get to go back. It's only for so long before you become a SAHM again for a few years, and your resume will be better for it (plus more recent work, plus paid maternity leave again, plus any other benefits).

It's your decision, however children grow up so fast. You won't get that time back again. Bare that in mind when you decide. You have an opportunity of bringing up your child the way you want to. It's hard work being with them all the time, but it's also rewarding. Find other mothers and form friendships. You also may want to work part-time e.g. weekend only, nights, few hours during the day.

PS: I've worked, full time, part time and now I stay at home.

All the best.

I would love to be a SAHM but for us we can't do it financially.

I agree with what the others said. I don't think I could personally be a SAHM, part-time would be perfect for me. Luckily, my job is flexible so I stay home with him on Wednesdays and I have days I don't have to be in early, but have to work some late nights as well. For me, I love being a mom but also need my professional career too, and I love helping my people. I provide behavior services for deveopmentally disabled. But Miles also stays with my parents so I know he is well loved and taken care of, it might be different if he had to go to daycare. My mom was a SAHM, which was awesome, but I think it's important for kids to see working mommas too.

I would love to be a SAHM and if we could afford it financially and not struggle I would do it in a heartbeat. If you are able to stay home I say do it, I missed all of my son's firsts he walked for the first time while I was at work he rolled over while I was at work, he learned how to give kisses while I was at work. Now he is 9 and I wonder where the time went. Oh yeah I was at work. Now I have Jordan and I keep thinking how our babysitter gets all the fun. We just can't live on one paycheck. My husband basically works for health insurance and day care with an extra $80 per week to contribute to the household. If we were to cut out daycare and my paycheck we would never make all our bills. Its hard and my SIL tells me all the time that I shouldn't have kids if I can't stay home with them (My BIL and SIL live with her parents).

You are not a bad mom if you go back to work like so many tell me and kids do not suffer regardless what people say. I grew up in a house where mom and dad both worked outside the home and I was having to put myself on the bus and my sister in the 4th grade because they left for work before 6 am. We turned out ok, yes I would have loved to have my mother home but because she worked I went on terrific vacations, I was able to travel overseas 3x in high school, I had name brand clothes, a car at 16, and all the extracurricular activities and sports. Had she stayed home all of that would have been cut out.

Its a hard decision but I would of stayed home if given the choice.

It's your decision, however children grow up so fast. You won't get that time back again. Bare that in mind when you decide. You have an opportunity of bringing up your child the way you want to. It's hard work being with them all the time, but it's also rewarding. Find other mothers and form friendships. You also may want to work part-time e.g. weekend only, nights, few hours during the day.

PS: I've worked, full time, part time and now I stay at home.

All the best.

This pretty much summarizes why I stay at home. I think that, eventually, when my child(ren) are in school, I will want to go back to work, but for now, I want to be at home for all of his milestones. Right now, I have a babysitter come one day a week, just so I can go out, run errands, etc. And, honestly, I feel so incredibly guilty being away from him for even that amount of time. But that is just me. I think that whatever you do that makes you the happiest will make your child(ren) the happiest. I think there are many ways a child can benefit from seeing his/her mom working full-time at a job she loves.