excited to be here! but financial worries

[Patsy7]

Hello lovelies,

extremely excited to be here!!! I have recently been through a difficult time- unplanned ectopic pregnancy which resulted in emergency surgery (12+ hours of internal bleeding and I almost died).

I have been unimaginably broody since it all happened (understandably) and my OH has been insisting on waiting a couple of years... until tonight!!!!! We have decided (once it has been 3 cycles since the ectopic) to NTNP!

Only thing that has been previously preventing us from making this decision is financial circumstances. Any advice on this topic would be greatly appreciated!! We don't make a lot of money- mine being the greater income and am worried how difficult it will be financially with a child, especially on maternity leave. I live in the UK and am not too sure about the support we can get. I know child benefit is around £20 a week, but is there any other support we can look in to?

anyone who is in a similar position or who has a child on a smaller income, if you could give me any tips/advice that would be great, it is the only thing that worries me.

thank you in advance

 

[purplecupcake]

I think both of you should look for better paying jobs instead of relying on assistance.

 

[Patsy7]

I can't believe I actually feel the need to justify myself to you but here goes.

I love my job. I am a holistic therapist which doesn't pay extremely well but I make a lot of my money with commission and tips which is why I think we will struggle while on maternity leave. my boyfriend is an aspiring artist, who works in a bar to get by. we both love what we do and are not willing to change our careers, which have the potential to make a lot of money in years to come (I would like to have my own business one day). We live in central London which is a very expensive area to live in so moving would be on the cards but not a career change.

we are not looking to 'rely on assistance', I just wondered if there is any help we are entitled to as parents in the UK. I notice you are from Texas, so you wouldn't know anyway but thanks for your input. I am not going to feel bad about our decision to NTNP, I have endometriosis and now only one tube so having a child a little sooner than we feel financially ready has to be an option for us as my chances of conceiving are low and a baby would be a blessing at any point in my life.

Now if there is anyone who actually has any proper advice without judging me I would really appreciate it.. not just on support in the UK but on realistically how much does it cost monthly with a baby, or how much would you advise saving before the baby? Or am I the only one with financial worries :/

 

[AnnieM85]

My advice would be make a budget and save money up for when the baby does come and if possible move to a cheaper place

 

[HoneyBee144]

I'm not sure on how much you can claim etc but have you looked at child tax credits and working tax credits? I think there is a calculator online but it can be difficult to work through. We went to our local CAB (Citizen Advice Bureau) and they helped us.

I don't think you're relying on assistance at all, you both work and the system is there to support couples like you who want to have children and work.

I'm sorry about everything you've been through, must have been tough x

 

[Bun87]

I'm not sure what benefits there are but sure you could find out what is available online. Also agree on saving a little each month so that you have back up funds in place good luck on your ntnp journey! Having a baby is amazing x

 

[Patsy7]

thanks ladies

i will look into things.. i tried to call my local CAB once but apparently they stopped taking phone calls in my area so not sure how to go about it!

deffo will start saving though

 

[Sarah Lou 80]

Sorry to hear what a rough time you've had. What an exciting time you've got ahead though! Don't worry about negative comments. The child and working tax credits are a great help. Unfortunately we don't get ours anymore and are starting to feel the pinch a bit.i think financial worries are always an issue (unless you are loaded!). It's important to be happy in your work. I was in a job that I was miserable in and now am a sahm so am happy happy happy and that's good for baby too!

To get tax credits you have to earn less than £26000 a year between you. That's for one child. I believe it's £32000 if you have 2 children. The tax calculator thingy is a good way to work out roughly what you'd get but obviously, you'd need to apply properly to know the exact amount. Say you had a baby now, they would ask you for your earnings from April last year and this year (I think). The calculator will give you a rough idea though. I think you can claim within a month of babies birth and they backdate payments to the date the baby was born. If you claim after a month, they backdate it by a month if that makes sense. So say if you forgot to do it and your baby was 4 month old, you can still claim but they will only backdate the payments by a month rather than 4 months!

Hope I've not confused you! The tax credit business always gets my head in a spin!

Good luck with everything

 

[Rcx]

Hello lovelies,

extremely excited to be here!!! I have recently been through a difficult time- unplanned ectopic pregnancy which resulted in emergency surgery (12+ hours of internal bleeding and I almost died).

I have been unimaginably broody since it all happened (understandably) and my OH has been insisting on waiting a couple of years... until tonight!!!!! We have decided (once it has been 3 cycles since the ectopic) to NTNP!

Only thing that has been previously preventing us from making this decision is financial circumstances. Any advice on this topic would be greatly appreciated!! We don't make a lot of money- mine being the greater income and am worried how difficult it will be financially with a child, especially on maternity leave. I live in the UK and am not too sure about the support we can get. I know child benefit is around £20 a week, but is there any other support we can look in to?

anyone who is in a similar position or who has a child on a smaller income, if you could give me any tips/advice that would be great, it is the only thing that worries me.

thank you in advance

Hi there,

good luck on NTNP!

I work in benefits for local gov and my advice is to do an online benefits calculation with your local council. You could be entitled to child tax credit, working tax credit, housing benefit and council tax reduction. I don't know if you are renting or mortgaged but you would get council tax reduction if mortgaged. They will help with a mortgage in only extreme cases. Are u self employed?

I hope it all works out for you and try not to worry about money, there is no shame in taking benefits, especially if you are working and contributing to the said benefit budgets

take care x

 

[Patsy7]

thank you for the advice!

i will do this online calculator, i didn't know about that, thanks!

no i'm not self employed but hope to be in the coming years, and we rent at the moment, but we would like to move closer to family when we have the baby so not sure yet. i have never really thought about getting a mortgage seriously before (we have moved around a bit and enjoy living in different places) but obviously we will need stability with the LO. it's another thing i will have to get some info on as neither of us have ever felt the need to use credit cards so don't know how we would get a credit rating?!

i don't feel shame in it at all, i have never claimed anything in my life (which is why i know so little about it), i have always worked and supported myself and that's what the system is there for i suppose. who knows we may be ok it's just the unknown isnt it!

anyway, we have time to sort these things out and hopefully everything will work out okay in the end. i'm starting to think does anyone ever feel financially ready for a baby! lol

xx