My heart goes out to you reading your post. I can imagine the distress you're suffering. I could never have left my son at that age, no, that is not accurate, I would not have made the choice to leave him because I believe that this time is too precious to spend away from him, and that the care I give him is worth much more than the money I could make away from him. I fully appreciate that you are saying you will be falling short of the money you need if you don't work, but have you considered working part time and/or what you can do to cut expenses out of your budget? For instance, if you have a mortgage, can you go interest only? Or consider selling and renting until you feel ready to go back to work? Can you refinance other debts to make them manageable? Can you re-consider what is really necessary in life? Please don't take offence, I just see so often people following what is done without thinking about what they really want and what is really important to them. It may be that you are happy working, but if you're not, some things to think about?

I often have to calm my anxiety about our level of debt with the thought that when my son is in school and I begin working for money again we will quickly be in a much better financial position...meanwhile, it's so nice being a SAHM, and I wouldn't trade it for anything.