For the last few weeks 23-year-Aoife McGrath has had to split her life. From Monday morning to Wednesday evening she's a final-year journalism student in the DIT School of Journalism in Aungier Street, Dublin. The second half of her week revolves around her eight-and-a-half month old daughter Zoe in Clonmel, Co Tipperary. Her mum minds Zoe from Monday to Wednesday but teaches the piano on a Thursday and Friday, so Aoife has to be at home to mind Zoe.

Having deferred her final year to have Zoe, Aoife's return to college was only made possible when her mother offered to mind Zoe from Monday to Wednesday. "I wasn't even planning to go back to college at all," she says, adding that her parents were very keen for her to finish. "I was never that motivated before having Zoe, so it's really given me a push. I'm getting stuck in. I'm much more focused and I know exactly what I have to do and I'm getting on with it."

The first week back at college Aoife went to Bray, Co Wicklow (where her parents have a house), on a Sunday night, so as not to be travelling so far on Monday morning. But, she explains: "It was too much. Three nights away is too much so I normally go up on Monday morning and then really it is just all day Monday, Tuesday Wednesday and I'm home on Wednesday night. But I don't really associate Dublin with her. It's like I don't miss her being there. I just miss her."

For the foreseeable future Aoife will get the 5.40 a.m. bus on a Monday morning from Clonmel arriving in Dublin at 9 a.m. in time for her 10 a.m. lecture, returning to Clonmel on the 6 p.m. bus on a Wednesday.

Aoife foresees that her current arrangement will be difficult when she has to do her thesis: Zoe has been crawling for a month and is at the adventurous stage. "I don't get much work done down here, because I have to mind Zoe and it's very hard to juggle the two and get things done. She's very active and you've to keep an eye on her."

She explains that Zoe is up at least once a night for a bottle, maybe twice, because she's teething at the moment and she's a bit off form. They get up at 7 a.m., she has her breakfast at eight and goes to Mass with Aoife's mum at 10. "She goes back down at 11 so I get an hour free and I do things during that hour, then she's up again. The whole day is basically just entertaining her. The whole day revolves around her."

Because she has her familiar surroundings and routine, Aoife believes Zoe doesn't miss her. It is only for three days "and it is for her that I am doing it. That's the way I justify it." She says it is the ideal time to be away because if Zoe was a toddler she'd know her mother was away.

Bringing Zoe to Bray is not an option at the moment, as Zoe is just a bit too young and needs the stimulation she wouldn't get in a creche. "When she's at toddler age, it's easier, because creches are more facilitating towards smaller children rather than babies."

Aoife would like to do a postgrad, ideally in Cork, and then she would bring Zoe with her. She is very glad she had Zoe in Clonmel because "being a single mum is hard enough. But somewhere like Bray or Dublin, there are so many single mothers that you get lumped into this category and I hate that. I hate people looking down on you because you are a single mum and you're pushing your pram."

She can't imagine her life without Zoe. "Before I was just plodding along, doing what I had to do, going to college, getting my degree. I wasn't really sure what I wanted to do in life. I think she's really given me a drive to better myself."

It's not such a long way to Tipperary when Zoe's there!