Staying home with children for several years...?

My husband and I have decided for me to to stay home until the children start school. The youngest starts K in 3 years.
I have been working very little already as a travel nurse for the last year.
I have been a RN for 7 years mostly charge M/S and staff ICU .
It is kind of long but child care is not happening around here. And we are financially ok wo me working.
So, my question-- is that ok? Can I just not work?
What happens in three years when I try to get a part time home health position?
Or any position, although to be honest I do not forsee acute care in my future any longer.
Do I notify the BON?
I'm not sure of the specifics of maintaining your license, but I can tell you that after years of not working, it will be difficult for you to reenter the workforce in any setting. There are several threads active right now about parents who stayed home with the kids who now can't find jobs because they've been out of the workforce for too long.Can you take a per diem job? Perhaps work a few shifts a month? That at least keeps a toe in the door...As a personal aside, kudos to you for deciding to raise your own kids. That cannot be an easy job. I hope to be able to do what you're doing someday!
You don't have to notify the BON . In my state, when it is time to renew your license, there is an "inactive" option. If you plan to go back in the future, keep your license active, even if you are not working. I stay at home the majority of the time for my kids. The per diem option has allowed me to continue in nursing on the days and hours I can work. Even very few hours in a pay period will bring in some income while keeping your skills, contacts and resume current.Consider a prn job if you can make it work.It is hard to predict what will happen in 3 years. Do you have any home health experience? I ask because if you are taking up a new speciality and especially after a lot of time off, starting full time will give you the skills you will need.
We travel with him several times out of the year, so it makes a PRN job difficult coupled with the babysitter quandary. But I will look at different options, and many more will arise next fall when my son can go to PreK two days a week. By September I would have been off a year and a half. No one wants a nurse who cannot be there until after 8 and must leave by 2 (school option + office option) or a nurse that cannot be there after 530 pm because day care closes (by state regulation) at 6. And all of this hinges on being available all year, and really, we miss my husband and those few trips when we get to travel with him really hold us together as a family.Except perhaps agency... although the patient nurse ratios have scared me so badly on agency gigs, I think I have an equal shot of loosing my license on one of those as I do not getting work in three years. Oh and my car!! Its so old, much time and it would need some major work. We are limping, lol. I can afford one but do not want to since not working. But and this is HUGE--- it is a safety net if I need to reenter the work force in a hurry.So here are my options in my brain:- Chance it.- Agency per diem: take kids to inlaws 1.5 hrs away, drive 2 hrs other way, and hope I do not get cancelled.- School. I am a year away (if I continue at snail pace) from my BSN. Finish that and get into Informatics program. I design ads, manage two websites, podcasts, compile quarterly reporting, etc (1 co, 2 sites- for my husbands co) now from home, so I could possibly build on that. Which is where I want to be in nursing eventually: PR, business, informatics...- Look into office PRN work, I think they would be more flexible with travel etc. and only near my in-laws. And its a hometown small town crowd with folks I grew up with now being the office managers, NPs, and MDs... Could be a bad thing, too - PRN local, next year with hours of 9 to 230... Yea right. What am I missing? --------------------------So on BON I shouldn't mark inactive?
We hire parent shifters that work when they are available - usually during school hours. Is that available near you?
If I might need my job as a "safety net" or insurance I would try to make it work. Since it sounds like you would be responsible for getting the kids to and from daycare yourself ask single RN mothers how they manage. Some daycare centers open early and if you did standard 8 hour shifts that might work. I'd still look for PRN if you want to travel at times with your husband.
I have never heard of it. I live in a very rural area, but my entire nursing career I have made the commute to the city, an hour and 40 minute drive.I will be asking around.
Here is the thing, I really want to just stay home with my children. I am trying to figure out the best steps to work minimally (if at all) the next few years while maximizing my chances of reentry into the work-force in 3-4 years, and protecting my license. I didn't go to school and etc, to loose my license. I don't mind starting over as a new grad in 4 years, I don't expect not to have a penalty, but I would like to know I can count on at least a new grad position.I think everyone needs a back up plan. But we have made financial decisions/sacrifices just for me to stay home. That is what I meant by safety net. Like spouse injury, etc. I would have a good 3-4 months before I had to go to work- if his income ceased.
A lot of "new grad" positions will not allow you to have any paid RN experience so don't count on that as being an option. I think you can work but minimally. A couple days a month and you'd still pretty much be a stay at home mom. Initially you might have to work a couple days a week for orientation as you've been out of work for a year but it can be doable. What about home care since you live in a rural area?
Home care may be an option. I have never done home care, though.Maybe I should find a way to make agency PRN work two days a month. I can only do Sundays...Its like being a single mom wo being able to move to a better child care area.
I stayed home for 10 yrs with my kids and did not work as a nurse at all during that time. Quite frankly after 6 yrs of it I was burned out and tired because I had two babies so I quit. I do not regret staying home with my kids at all. I was able to re-enter the nursing field quite easily around here. However, (and this is a BIG however), it wasn't easy confidence wise. I hadn't worked for so long as a nurse (and I've heard this from nurses who have only been out a year or two), that I felt like a new grad all over again and let's face it-it's miserable enough the first time let alone a second! They pretty much treat you like a new grad as well. I did know what to expect which made that part easier but the whole time I kept thinking if I'd just kept my foot in the door I could've been in the area I wanted (instead of med-surg which I don't like) and not felt so darn scared all the time! I know some nurses who work prn and only work 2 shifts a month so I'm sure if you really wanted to you could make that work. It sounds like you're just coming up with excuses not to work which is fine but no one on here is going to tell you it's good for your career or it will be easy to find work after you go back from being off. Sure I found work but being at the bottom of the totem pole I had no seniority or recent experiences so not only were my choices limited, I had no flexibility (or time off built up) so I had to work whenever they wanted me to and after being home for so long my kids had a hard time with me always being gone and not able to choose when I worked. If you go prn you can pretty much choose when you work and several home health agencies around here have prn jobs too. Another thing is I only wanted part-time after being off for so long but with all the orientation I had to go through and the extra classes and things I was working more full-time than part. If you really feel it's best in your heart to quit then do so but at the very least work on your education so you can show you were doing something while you were off and most hospitals around here are wanting their nurses to have a BSN anyway. Just know most informatics jobs want you to have recent experience so just be aware of that. Also check with your board of nursing and see what's entailed for making your license active again after it being inactive. Some are so much work and money it's just easier to keep them active even if you aren't working and it's nice to not have that wait time of making it active if you have a good job opportunity waiting esp if you only plan on being out 3 yrs but it's certainly an option if you don't want to pay for it when you aren't using it. You just wait until it's time for renewal and check inactive and submit it. Very simple.I wish you luck! Your kids are only little once and it goes fast so enjoy them! Everything will work out no matter what you do-just know it just might not work out like you want if you quit but if you're ok and aware of that then follow your heart!
Many colleges do offer nurse refresher courses as a stepping stone for getting back into the workforce. This may be the way to reenter nursing in a few years for you.
My advice is to find some job with minimal requirements... perhaps prn doing private duty. I know with my private duty job, I am not required to work any shift I don't want to work, and it's no big deal to take off for vacations, etc.I took 2 years off to be home with my kids, and I had a very difficult time finding a job afterward, even with many years of prior experience. If I had it to do over again, I wouldn't have quit entirely.