For the longest time I was a stay-at-home mother and I loved it! I loved everything about it. The arts and crafts I created with my kids, the day trips anywhere we wanted, and the snuggles, oh the snuggles. After twelve years home, and four kids, I have returned to working full-time (plus a part-time job and school).
There are days that I am so physically drained that I drop as soon as I hit the couch. My body begging for a time out. Then there are days where I feel on top of the world, that I can do anything. Where the more I did that day the more successful I felt. It’s kind of like a mental checklist.
According to Family & Hope Network “The percentage of married women who hold a job and whose youngest child is between ages six and eighteen rose from 49.2% in 1970 to 74.7% in 1990. For mothers of younger children (under six years old), the increase was even more dramatic, rising from 30.3% in 1970 to 58.4% in 1990.” (2013)
Working is hard! I feel like I am missing everything! I need a clone!
Don’t get me wrong, I think being a stay at home parent is extremely hard. But the feeling of being torn in a multitude of directions, disappointment, frustration, and despair, are all too much to bare as a working Mom sometimes.
I have been told on more than one occasion that I am super Mom, asked “How do you do it?” My answer is “I do not know!” Better yet, I don’t! I don’t feel like I do it all. I try to balance school, working both full-time and part-time, house work, and my kids crazy activity schedules. MY LIFE IS CRAZY!
I pray every waking moment that my kids are not suffering and that they realize if not now, but someday that I did all of this for them. As I write now my eyes are welting up. The guilt is crushing my chest-almost suffocating me.
[…] by default, in a perpetual state of seeking balance in her life. Whether she is married, single, working or not. Finding and maintaining balance is not easy. Another tendency (many, not all), modern mommies face […]