So I'm (done) interviewing for residency. I have a couple second looks coming up, and haven't completely finalized my rank list yet, but my top three choices are going to be either in Big City where I grew up (in the burbs), or nearby Small City (where I lived for a research year during med school). Because Small City is, well, small, and because I know people there with young kids who have done the whole preschool search thing, I went ahead and applied for several different schools for DD, who will be turning 3 in July. First of all, I was amazed at how different the "preschool" process is! I am used to submitting an application, getting on a wait list, and waiting for a spot. These places mostly have yearly application cycles, where you apply the winter prior to starting in September, and if you don't get a spot, you reapply the next year - no mid-year spots (or at least, very rare). This is probably old news to most of you but I wasn't prepared for it!

So our chances with a number of those schools are really low because of how late we applied and the fact that we aren't in the area for visits/"interviews", but we are also on waiting lists at some more typical "daycare" type places affiliated with the hospital, so I feel fairly confident that we're in a good situation to find childcare there should I match to Small City.

The question, however, is Big City. Depending on which program in Big City, and myriad other factors, we could end up living in any number of suburbs, each of which is quite large. Despite having grown up in the area, I don't have any friends in the area with kids. I have NO IDEA how to go about identifying places to apply to without getting COMPLETELY overwhelmed (I did a google search for just one possible town the other day and came up with a gazillion hits). Part of me is tempted to wait until after Match Day, as a) I will know for sure where we are going, and b) I will have more time on my hands at that point than I do now (currently enrolled in full-time graduate coursework in biostats and clinical research methods). I am trying to convince myself that because it is such a large city, and because we have family support there, and because it will probably be a while before DH lines up a job there, that we will be okay and should be able to find something.

Am I being stupid? Do I need to get over the fact that this process is overwhelming and just start calling places? Or is it reasonable to hold off? Any suggestions on how to go about it? (I suppose one thing I can do is contact the HR departments about getting on the employee childcare wait lists, of which there seem to be quite a few, though I'd rather DD be in preschool closer to where we live then where I work, and I'm not sure one can get on those lists without being an employee).

Thanks ladies!!!

You could consider just hedging your bets - picking one place near your work, and one place in one or two likely suburbs, just to have *something* in place now in case it turns out to be harder than you think once you match... but give yourself permission not to stress about it being perfect or put too much time into it, since it's just a "backup" plan...?

I think if it were me, I'd hold off on anything in Big City since it does sound completely overwhelming and it sounds like you have some backup childcare available. Once you match it will be so much easier to narrow your search. When we were applying for residency I remember being in the same situation and thinking "should I apply for daycares or nannies in boston/philly/etc??" But then what part of the city would we be in? What are the areas really like? I couldn't handle doing that much research for things that *might* happen. But, then again - I'm sure there are people who are on the other side of the argument and can handle looking at a million possibilities... There's probably no "right" answer!

Thanks ladies! Since no one has refuted your responses, I'm assuming that no one strongly disagrees. AmmaMD, that was a great idea. I emailed 4 hospital-affiliated daycares today. Two got back to me - one with a free application (I submitted), one with an application requiring a $40 nonrefundable deposit (I'm thinking about it, might wait until after my second look at that program). Hopefully will hear back from the others next week. Next step if I get to it (not pressuring myself) is to consider applying to a couple in some potential suburbs, as you suggested. Of course my contact in Small City recently gave me a few more suggestions so I feel like I should be on the ball about those as well, but I'm putting those at the bottom of the list since I already applied to 5 places there. Trying to be well prepared but also go easy on myself is hard, but I think I'm doing okay! So thanks!