More Mommy guilt...

Two years ago I decided that I either wanted/needed to get a part-time job, or go to back to school. Ideally I wanted return to work part-time when both kids were in all day school; however, two years ago there was a lay-off threat at Scott's work & it kicked me in the ass. So, I decided to pursue a career in nursing. I took the Nurse Entrance Test (like SATs for nursing programs) and started to apply to several programs. After interviewing and getting accepted, Scott secured another position within his company. Although the job scare was gone, I decided to forge ahead anyway since nursing programs are very competitive and I was thankful to have secured a seat in my school of choice. I've spent the past two years chipping away at the pre-requisite science classes, and nursing school seemed like light years away, but now it's here - it/I started three weeks ago. The pace was insane at first, but it's starting to level out. Thank God.

For the past three weeks Scott and other family members have taken care of the kids while I was at school. Brent is now in school all day and next week Allison starts daycare. This semester Allison will only need to be in childcare 4 to 5 days per month, but I'm still sick about it. I've never used chidcare for Brent and I feel so guilty not being a full-time SAHM for Allison. By no means do I think that being a SAHM is better than being a working mom (or in my case student mom, SM) - I was raised by a single mother who worked her arse off - and I intend on working once part-time when I'm done school. It's just hard. And different.

We will be using a home-based child care program. Her daycare provider has been running a licensed daycare out of her home for 10+ years and she comes highly recommended. She is in her late 50s and has grandchildren, so the kids all call her Grammy, which I find sweet. She runs her program as a preschool and even has the two year olds participate on their level. Allison will going to school with our neighbors’ daughter, who she likes to play with. Grammy also took care of a little girl from China for four years until she started school this year and she will start taking care of her little sister, who was adopted from China this past year - so we're thrilled about that, since IA is somewhat of a rarity in our area.

We have visited her daycare a few times to let her play with the other kids and to familiarize her with the place and she seems to love it. Allison doesn't cling to my leg when we visit and then she doesn't want to leave. Thank God she seems to love the place - that's the only thing that allows me to sleep at night. (on a side note: I get insomnia when I'm stressed or worried - so next week, there will no rest for the weary at my house. I'll probably be reading blogs in the middle of the night.)

I keep telling myself that it's like anything new - the anticipation is probably much worse than the actual thing/day/event, whatever. Maybe if I tell myself enough, I'll start to believe it.

So, advice and/or words of wisdom to help me deal with the guilt are welcome (Especially from those parents who have BTDT).