If you google "working mom" or "working from home" or "stay at home mom," a myriad of posts will pop up. It seems like every mommy or daddy blogger out there writes about this topic - probably because there is an incredible amount of pain/guilt/ambivalence/relief/joy/name-your-emotion-here about going to work, working at home, and leaving your career to stay home with your kid(s).
I haven't updated this blog in a few months - I do apologize! Though one thing I had resolved not to do a long time ago was to apologize for not writing. I used to apologize in my own personal journals that no one else was reading (as if the journal cared!) and it would keep me from getting back to writing; I would feel like too much time had passed and there was no way to catch my writing up. Well, with that attitude, I would never grow as a writer. I just have to pick back up and get going again as if the large gap never happened.
Back to the topic at hand, the first time I left M with the babysitter to go to work, I felt this knot start to tighten in my chest. I wanted to turn right around, let the babysitter go, and stay with my M forever. The knot slowly loosened as I started my first day at work. I became involved in teaching my classes and getting through my first day.
By the time I picked M up (we bring her to a shared babysitter), I was in a much better mood and so excited to see her. She, being only five months old at the time, barely reciprocated, batting at the hanging toys on the play mat instead. I could not wait until she was a few months older and would greet me with a gummy smile and gleeful squeal.
Well, now we are a few months later--M is nine and half months old and it is even harder to leave her! She suddenly started noticing the people in her life and watches me leave with this blank expression on her face that I take to mean, "There you go, leaving me--again." Is the reward of her happiness to see me later worth the sadness and guilt of leaving her in the first place?
So many parents ask this question and there doesn't seem to be a simple answer. Some quit their jobs and rave about all the time they can spend with their kids. Others warn not to become a stay at home parent because you will go crazy with the kids all day and have a hard time getting back into the working world later. Some lament having to go to work. Others feel guilty about admitting that they enjoy those hours with other adults and without having to take care of a screaming baby. Yet others complain about working from home and ignoring their kids.
I am lucky enough to work a ten minute walk from where we live. I spend the mornings with M, then drop her off at the babysitter and teach in the afternoons. It is still hard to leave M every day. I don't necessarily feel that freedom from kids when I leave her, as I then go and spend my afternoon with 90-something students. But at least they're not babies, right? Still, I miss M when I'm not with her. In between classes, I turn on my phone just so I can see her picture on my lock screen background.
Like I said in my very first post on this blog, I am not here to provide answers. If you're looking for solutions to parenting issues, you will not find them here. I am only sharing my experience in the hopes that you will be able to relate and feel you are not alone. I hope this post does that for you.
