We asked women who chose to return to work early after having a baby to share their experiences — without apology.
It's about knowing who you are
I think it all comes down to personality. My sister absolutely fell in love with motherhood — after her first child, she had two more in quick succession and has thrived in that role ever since. Watching her, I could see exactly what years at home with small children looked like up close. And I knew, even then, that it simply wasn't for me.
I adore my child. But being together around the clock is, honestly, a bit too much of a good thing. I'm not judging anyone who found their calling in full-time motherhood — I'm just being honest that I would have lost my mind if my entire existence had revolved around nappy changes for longer than three months. I went back to work after three months and I have absolutely no regrets. I'm a hairdresser and I love what I do. My philosophy is simple: a child shouldn't mean dismantling your life — it means reshaping it.
The career cost nobody warns you about
A lot of women don't fully reckon with how seriously having children can derail a career. When I say that out loud at dinner parties, people roll their eyes. But this isn't capitalism talking — it's reality. Let me give you a real example.
A close friend of mine trained as an ophthalmologist. She was already a resident when she got pregnant. She had her son, then two years later her daughter. When she was ready to return for the final year of practical training she needed to qualify as a specialist, she was told there were no positions available in the city — only far out in the countryside.
Her husband's job was in the capital. So were the kids' nurseries. Commuting four hours a day or sleeping away from home simply wasn't an option. She took an office job instead — one that, at the time, actually paid better than her ophthalmologist peers. Ten years passed. That company went under. She has been drifting from one office job to the next ever since, while her former colleague from medical school is now a senior consultant. Years of medical training, a genuine vocation — gone, because the system didn't bend. I'm an architect, not a doctor, but I always knew that if I had a child, I would not let my career quietly disappear. And I didn't.
The most rational decision we ever made
It was actually my husband who first brought up having children. He said he didn't want to be an "old dad" — the kind who can't kick a football around or climb a tree with his kids. I told him: fine, let's do it. But he'd be the one staying home.
At the time, I was earning twice what he made from his small business, and I had just been promoted to a role I genuinely loved. He thought it over — and his very rational brain arrived at the obvious conclusion: this made complete sense. So that's what we did. It has worked so well that I now recommend this approach to every couple I know. He has a closer bond with our child than most fathers I've seen. We haven't been financially crippled. And the load is shared equally — there's no burned-out mother doing everything while dad unwinds on the sofa.
Protecting yourself before you need to
My cousin Chloe's husband left her when their children were four years old and eighteen months old. He had fallen for a 22-year-old — no further comment — and moved out, leaving Chloe with two toddlers and 4.5 years of career gap behind her. Finding work was brutal. Employers are not exactly lining up to hire a single mother with small children at home.
I watched that happen and made a decision early in my own relationship: I would never put myself in that position. When my partner and I started talking seriously about having a baby, I set out my terms clearly. Either he transferred a salary-equivalent amount into a bank account in my name only every month — one he had no access to — or he helped find a solution that allowed me to go back to work within three months of giving birth.
Because he's a smart man — which is precisely why I married him — he understood the logic. Motherhood is essentially unpaid labour. While he continued building his career, I would have been dropping out of the workforce for years, only to return later at a serious disadvantage, starting almost from scratch. The solution we landed on: both grandmothers stepped in on a rotating basis on weekdays, while I worked a six-hour day. Three days a week I went into the office; two days I worked from home. I expressed milk in advance, and my absences conveniently aligned with the baby's two-hour nap window. It was entirely manageable.
I don't care what anyone thinks — this was the best arrangement for everyone: for me, for my husband, for the grandmothers who loved every minute of it, and for the baby too.
