I felt exactly the same when I got back- everyone said what a great job he did. Which I’m obviously happy about because it meant my team were happy and things carried on smoothly, but when I actually got back people were just as happy to have me back (mostly haha) so had to put it to the back of my mind. It is super hard!
I could have written this myself! My mat cover is a single Pringle who lives near my office and appears to be much better at my job than me! But they can’t discriminate just because you have kids or different working hours. I’m going to care less when I go back and stop doing free over time!
It made it worse that my ‘temporary replacement’ was a man who spent every handover meeting prior to me leaving telling me how shit the next few months were going to be covering my role. Thanks mate!
You’re not crazy. I feel exactly the same about returning to work.