The Balancing Act

I admit, I cried when I returned to work. Before having my daughter, I would have put in 10+ hour days and worked from home on top of that without a second thought. Being away from my 3 month old for more than 12 hours a day  thanks to a hellish commute. It was hell for both of us and contrary to reassurances from other working moms, the routine did not get better. The Little Empress began to reverse cycle, ie. taking the majority of her feedings as nursing sessions during the time I was home.

Meanwhile, I was a complete wreck at work. My heart just was not in the job any more. The breaking point came when The Little Empress was barely four months old and went on a bottle strike. Despite several tries with different bottles and even sippy cups, The Little Empress refused to drink anything that was not breast. My husband spent two warm days, waiting with my daughter in our truck, bringing her to me every three hours to nurse because she simply refused to eat any other way.

That was when I knew I had to find a way to stay home, for my daughter’s sake (as well as my husband’s sanity!) God blessed us as my husband found his dream job. While it paid far less than I made at the time, we decided to take the plunge: my husband would become our main source of income while I took care of our daughter and pursued a long held dream of mine to become a freelance writer.

I grew up in a comfortable, middle class environment but like many other families in our community, both of my parents worked hard to make ends meet. I honestly don’t believe any of my close friends while I grew up had a stay at home parent. And as I grew up, whenever I thought about having children, the idea of being at home never entered my mind as being an option.

Even when I got pregnant in 2007, I took for granted that I would be a working mother like many of my peers. Financially speaking, it made most sense for me to remain employed and for my husband to be the stay at home parent. I had worked so hard over the years gain the recognition and respect of my colleagues and believed that I would never willingly give that up. I planned to take my generous 3 month maternity leave and then return to my career as an IT infrastructure analyst in the financial software industry.

Before I became a parent, I thought I would be bored doing “nothing” other than taking care of the baby. (Yeah, you may smack me now.) I quickly discovered that “taking care of the baby” meant that there was never nothing to do! And, as tough as taking care of my daughter was, I also realized that I enjoyed being home with her. Being home with her meant that I missed nothing of her new baby moments. Every day, my daughter grew and changed, learning something new every day.  I realized that I did not want to miss even a moment of her life and began to seriously dread my return to the working world.