As my children plead with me not to bring them to creche, my heart is stretched thin

It’s just gone 8am and I have decided I can no longer go to the job I am ready and dressed for.

I must give it all up and attend full time to the needs of my two young children. I am in the hallway of our house, then the kitchen. My eldest trails behind me, groaning. My daughter follows closer, weaving in between my legs so that I can no longer walk without picking her up.

It began with one of them, then the other, every emotion between them contagious in their population of two. They are pleading with me not to bring them to creche.

I am repeating the words my partner and I have been soothing them with all morning. I name the people they will see, the games they will play, how we will collect them as early as we can. I remind them that they love it there – and it’s true, they do. And we love it too; their teachers are caring and kind. They teach and entertain them in ways we never could. Our children have friends the same size as themselves, and they play all day with them in a safe and loving environment.

And still, I am grounded by the immediacy of this moment, my heart stretched thin across my chest as my body withstands the impact of their protestations.

It’s impossible to leave. I cannot stay.

[ The motherhood penalty: ‘Once they’re in bed, you log back on at 9pm or 10pm and work’Opens in new window ]

My partner and I both work full time, out of financial necessity and also because our careers are something that we have worked hard to build. They have been forged, over many years, by the brute force of our labour, the sweat of our efforts. I worked in politics all through my twenties and early thirties. It was a job that demanded the complete subjugation of self. At any given moment, at any time of day or night – weekend, holidays or otherwise – there was never any greater priority than whomever was on the other end of the phone.

I loved it. It was unsustainable.

It’s one thing to wilfully disregard your own wellbeing for an extended period of time, but once becoming a mother, such reckless behaviour is no longer feasible. The opportunity cost of overwork is staring me in the face: it is asking me for a drink; it wants me to sit down and play with it. When I was pregnant with my son, I worried constantly about how I would maintain momentum around my career once he arrived. My ambition was a barely leashed animal that I was already struggling to hold on to. Role models for content, successful mothers in the workforce were few and far between. This, among the obvious concerns around the health of the baby, preoccupied me entirely.

[ Loneliness in early motherhood: ‘I can’t keep calling my mum up here every day’Opens in new window ]

I knew better than to confide these worries in friends, many of whom were struggling in one way or another with fertility or career progression. I felt ashamed of myself for thinking this way, for feeling unable to reconcile the trade-offs necessary in a life of such abundance.

Even now, several years on, it is still something I struggle with. Since becoming a mother, I am completely transformed and yet, I am exactly the same person. I have not yet reconciled the two, arguably inconsistent identities. Instead I attempt to hold both at the same time. I am checking emails and reading newspapers before the children wake in the morning. My partner and I are on our laptops at the kitchen table when they are asleep, the two of us, fitting our old selves into the margins of our new ones.

It’s time for me to leave the house.

[ The case for flexible working: ‘We lose one-third of women in their child-rearing years’Opens in new window ]

I squat down to face my son. My partner is putting socks on his feet, then his shoes. He is a child; a baby really. This I forget sometimes. My daughter is still attached to my body like a front-facing backpack. I straighten up and she tightens her floppy noodle arms around my neck. Her tears are hot on my hand as I wipe them away.

I am at my desk, in the calm of an office environment when I receive a message from my partner informing me they went in okay. I have seen it myself, how quickly they move on, leaving behind the wreckage of their parents.

When I finish work and travel to collect them, they do not want to leave. My son is standing in front of a better collection of Lego than we have at home, avoiding eye contact with me. His teacher is telling me he had a great day. My daughter is in my arms and there is sweat prickling the back of my neck as I hold her. It is staining the silk material of my blouse, which will now need to be dry-cleaned.

My son is whispering to his friend; he is suggesting to her that they play hide and seek.