Two women have shared their stories of childcare cost struggles with Belfast Live as they call for greater government help for families and for women wanting to return to work after having children.
Emma Smith is an obstetrics and gynaecology doctor in the Ulster Hospital and has two young children.
She said years of dedication to her job were just barely enough for her to keep her head above water in terms of the childcare bills she faces each month.
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"I've done five years at university doing my medical degree, two years working as an F1/F2 doctor and then five years of training within my speciality after that," she said.
"So it's quite a bit of training to get to the stage I'm at now, I'm basically at registrar level in obstetrics and gynaecology.
"It's a job that I absolutely love doing, it's an excellent team of colleagues in all of the Trusts in Northern Ireland that are working in obstetrics and gynaecology.
"It's a speciality that can have some real highs and lows, everybody has to really pull together to look after patients, keep everybody safe and bring lots of amazing new babies into the world and help people through gynae problems and issues as well."
Emma and Ricky recently welcomed their daughter Ren into the world and she is now ten weeks old, a sister to their two-year-old boy Finn.
She said that they were looking at a hefty chunk of their earnings disappearing each month within the next year or two.
"Obviously, I'm really happy to have the family that I have, I'm so blessed to have both of them, they're both amazing wee people and even our 10-week-old, we're starting to see her personality come out already," Emma added.
"But we're obviously thinking about the fact we have one child already in nursery and when I go back to work, our second child will also have to go to nursery.
"There's been a recent big hike we've seen in the nursery fees in the last month and I think our nursery team are amazing, it's a really hard job that they do, looking after a big crowd of children all day long."
Emma said that she felt lucky to have the job that she did and the salary that comes with it, but that even with as much expertise as she has, it was still a strain to meet the rising costs.
"It's a difficult position to be in, with all the changes in the economy, prices going up across the board for food, energy, all the expenses around the house and then to also know that you have to put out this huge amount of money to look after your children.
"It's just such a big chunk of work now that basically when I go back to work that it will negate my entire salary.
"At the moment, our childcare bill is at least double what our mortgage is and when I go back to work and our second child goes to nursery care as well, it'll be three to four times and that's just a huge amount of money."
The Belfast woman said revealed that she knows of colleagues who have made their career decisions based around the childcare costs implications, meaning patients could be losing out on healthcare professionals with years of experience.
"It's sad again that there are people who are getting to my stage where they have had years of training within the NHS here, working within trusts and being brought up to a level of expertise as well and then maybe deciding to leave and taking all that expertise with them," she said.
"That's happening in all different specialities in Northern Ireland at the moment, which is really sad to see because we are losing a big breadth of knowledge which could be contributing to keeping the health service in better stead here."
Emma said it would help if the government were to follow the lead of England in helping with childcare costs.
"If there was a system similar to what they're talking about bringing in in the rest of the UK, if there was subsidised healthcare, even the amount they're talking about would be a huge, huge help to everyone in NI at the moment," she said.
"To know you're being helped out a bit with those bills, it would just make it a much less bitter pill to swallow, knowing going back to work that you're taking time away from your family and you're paying for your kids while you're away for that time, to know that there is a bit of subsidised help from the government as well.
"I think that if that was something that was brought up by any of the parties, all of the parties, it's something that everybody would get really engaged with.
"It would just be really nice if they could get their heads together and get back in the room now."
Less than 10 miles from Emma, Ashleigh Averell is running her own business in Newtownabbey, Ibrand, but her own frustrations with the childcare system here led to her posting on Facebook asking for change.
The level of response proved eye-opening for the entrepreneur.
"I think the reason why it got quite a lot of traction was because I was discussing something as women that we are quite ashamed to admit, that we can't afford it and whenever there was floods of women coming forward, it was actually quite overwhelming and emotional for me," she said.
Ashleigh is mum to Patrick, as well as being a small-business owner and said finding balance between those two roles was exhausting.
"My business is in quite an extreme phase of growth which means we have to constantly reinvest money and any money that I can physically get goes straight on childcare," she admitted.
"I have thought of stages where I might have to scale back the business, take employees off etc but at the end of the day, they also have children, they also have childcare costs.
"Do I scale down the business and give up my dreams for a period of years or do I try and grow to make the bill for the childcare?".
In her heartfelt post on Facebook last month, Ashleigh said she felt Northern Ireland was falling behind other regions in the UK when it came to supporting parents.
"The system is currently designed to fail, forcing parents out of work due to financial circumstances," she wrote.
"Daycare facilities are also on their knees with rising costs & regulations to adhere to.
"Please, look in the eyes of a women who has had to reduce her hours, or give up her career (without choice) due to the cost of childcare."
Ashleigh told Belfast Live that last point was of particular importance where many women feel railroaded into giving up something they have spent years working at or building.
"There's one girl in particular, she messaged me and I think she was doing four days a week of childcare and she was like 'at the end of this I literally eat beans on toast, because there's nothing left for me to even eat properly'," Ashleigh said.
"That really hit home with me but it also hit home about how her career is so important to her and for her to give that up, her mental health would probably dip as well.
"I know whenever I was on maternity leave from my business, I actually found that incredibly difficult from an identity point.
"So whenever a woman might have to give up work, what happens with that and how do they work through their mental health off that because again, those facilities are maybe little to none as well."
The Newtownabbey businesswoman said she hoped to see the same system brought in in Northern Ireland as was recently announced in England.
Working parents in England will be able to access 30 hours of free childcare per week, for 38 weeks of the year, from when their child is 9 months old to when they start school under new changes.
"Anything at all that would help, I understand it does have flaws and holes in it and that's being discussed, but it does need to be emulated in some form over here," Ashleigh added.
Both mums have had their stories boosted through the parents' group Melted Parents NI
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