Yahoo Finance Stressed-out mum vents over necessary $150 a day expense ‘in order to survive’
Carissa McHole revealed her experience of sending her son to daycare has been fraught with issues.
An Aussie mum has vented about the tough reality plaguing many parents across Australia. When a newborn reaches a certain age, they'll likely be placed in daycare and the caregiver who was on parental leave will return to work - and many parents are struggling with the transition amid the cost-of-living crisis.
Carissa McHolme said she was "very lucky" to spend a year with her son before putting him into daycare and going back to work. But she explained to Yahoo Finance that decision had some unexpected consequences.
"We were getting to the stage where we're spending more than what we're earning," she said. "So me going back to work just had to happen otherwise there was gonna be a bit of debt coming in or we might not be able to eat the foods we've been happily eating."
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'It just doesn't feel natural'
The 33-year-old, who is based on the Gold Coast with her husband, said it's been difficult sending her son to daycare. He hasn't taken to the new surroundings well and won't eat or drink while he's there.
One time, she was asked to come in to give him some milk because he wouldn't drink it unless she specifically fed it to him.
When she left, he was incredibly upset and McHolme said it was like a punch to the guts having to say goodbye to him.
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"It just doesn't feel natural when you have to choose between having a roof over your head or being there for your child," she told Yahoo Finance.
She runs her own business selling bath and body products while her husband is a nuclear medicine scientist. While she said they earn enough to get by, they have to be careful with their finances to afford daycare on top of their other expenses.
Daycare in her area costs nearly $150 a day and the mum sends her son three times a week. While the government's Child Care Subsidy takes a decent chunk off that bill, she said it's still a huge dent in their finances.
"It's so expensive," she said. "We looked at the cost and it's cheaper to send your child to a private school than it is to send them to daycare, which blows my mind."
Dealing with 'mum guilt'
McHolme posted a video on TikTok raging about the situation she and many other parents face.
"Sending your kid to daycare in order to be able to survive should not be a normal thing," she said. "It's so effed that to continue being able to live our life, we have to send our child to a centre for someone else to look after them, so we can go to work and then afford to pay for their daycare as well as our food, our rent, bills, everything else.
"It doesn't make sense. I hate this feeling. This mum guilt is so real right now."
She was quickly met with loads of comments from other people saying they were in the same situation.
"I feel this so so so deeply in my soul. I had to work in order to have PPL with my second bubba, and daycare just destroyed my heart," said one person.
"The government really needs to increase the cut-off for family tax benefits so mums who want to stay home and raise their own children can. My husband is a plumber and on a good wage but we struggle," wrote another.
McHolme was overwhelmed by all the messages and she said it helped to know she wasn't alone.
She and her husband said they will likely only have one more child because any more and they won't be able to get by.
Child care could soon cost just $10 a day
An initiative was launched earlier this year that could dramatically reduce the cost of child care.
Early childhood advocates launched a bill for consultation to parliament back in March alongside independent MP Zoe Daniel.
Under the proposal, three days per week of early learning would be guaranteed for all children aged five and under, capped at $10 per day, and free for low-income families.
Daniel said the new policy could be “transformative” to lift rates of women’s workforce participation and reduce cost-of-living pressures facing Australian households.
“It’s the bold, visionary reform that we so seldom see in Australia and in that sense it’s an enormous opportunity. The exciting and transformative benefits far outweigh the costs,” she told NCA NewsWire.
According to recent data from the Productivity Commission, out-of-pocket child care costs have risen substantially for families living in every state and territory in Australia.
Victorians currently pay the highest daycare bill in the country, with the average cost of 50 hours of centre-based care at $626 a week.
The government increased its childcare subsidy for families earning under $530,000 last July, however, according to a report from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission last year, fees rose by nearly double the rate of wages and inflation between 2018 to 2022.
- with NCA Newswire
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