When your baby is crying because he has a 103 fever, aching, and saying "Momma", you sort want to stay home.
I knew the day would come where it wasn't all rainbows and sunshine. I knew the Mom guilt would come one day, but not so soon. I couldn't stay home when I had so much going on at work, and have only been there for a month.
I cried all the way to work. I felt like a failure as a Mom. A sell out. The poor kid wanted him Momma-not any other family member.
I made it through the important stuff that luckily transpired in the morning. Lucky for me I work with a lot of Moms that understood why I was so heart broken. After calling home to check in and learn that he was still upset, I couldn't sit in my office any longer. My first unexpected 1/2 day was about to happen.
I went home and put on the yoga pants, and cozied on the sofa with him. I know three hours of his life that he didn't have me while sick wouldn't be memorable to him, but it would be to me. You see for the other two kids there hasn't been a moment of sickness they didn't get to have Mom. This poor child now has to fight for me with my job.
Everything comes with balance. I am sure it will get easier with time. It is hard to want it all on your own terms. Life just doesn't seem to work that way.
It has been an incredibly challenging week this week. As the baby got better, I started to get sick. I pressed on, while trying to muster up the energy to do my job accurately. I stayed positive as much as I could. I poured every ounce of me out in our to make it to this day. FRIDAY!
The hard part I will struggle with this weekend is wanting to do fun things with my kids, while trying to recuperate for Monday. I am beyond exhausted not only from sickness, but emotionally. I have poured, and poured, and left literally on empty. I'm hoping that a little bit of sleeping in and some warm cozy clothes will be enough to fix it.
In the past, when I was a working women minus the family, I was able to recuperate by having every night, and every evening free to do as I please. Now that time is filled with putting on the Mom hat, and figuring out how to be great at BOTH! The trick is to figure out how to be both without guilt.
Friday, September 27, 2013
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
9/11
I can remember that day clearly.
My innocence was peeled back. It is funny when you are talking about innocence when you are in your mid-twenties being lost. Up until this point certain things in life I was no longer naive about, but never in am million years did I think as a grown adult I would learn I was limited to my thinking in a grander more evil way.
I know I am not alone in this feeling, on this day, as I am pretty sure even the elderly felt ripped of the innocence they had assumed they would exit this world with in tact.
9/11 changed everything.
Our American soil. Our thousands of people. Our city. Our hero's. Our planes. Our buildings. Our skylines. Our families. Our hearts. All cost by deliberate, well calculated evil.
It was hard for me to grasp as a social worker at that time who was on the front line trying to make a difference in the world, how in fact people would be so malicious towards a bunch of innocent people. I kept thinking of the young lives that had started their career that ended that day. The parents with young kids at home, some unborn, that didn't make it home. How, on this loving earth, could anyone dream of 2 American commercial jetliners crashing directly into two massive buildings. A place I had lived for years, and loved on with all of my heart. Two buildings I had weeks before stood in front of admiring their beauty and moved to take photos that would last in my dining room forever not for their beauty but for their legacy.
A few months ago I was blessed to go down to the memorial alone. I stood in the same spot that once held the large globe signifying its grounds. Instead of the beautiful buildings that once stood there, huge massive, beautiful crafted holes now are there. Holes that are filled to the brim with names. Names of people that were loved and cherished, and didn't deserve that day to be their last.
It is an honor to always be able to say I lived in New York City. My heart will hold it until the day comes that it is my last. My prayers today, while standing in the halls of my new social work job during a moment of silence, is may those grieving be lifted. May this day never be forgotten. May we see more love than evil.
I want to grow that innocence back for our country.
My innocence was peeled back. It is funny when you are talking about innocence when you are in your mid-twenties being lost. Up until this point certain things in life I was no longer naive about, but never in am million years did I think as a grown adult I would learn I was limited to my thinking in a grander more evil way.
I know I am not alone in this feeling, on this day, as I am pretty sure even the elderly felt ripped of the innocence they had assumed they would exit this world with in tact.
9/11 changed everything.
Our American soil. Our thousands of people. Our city. Our hero's. Our planes. Our buildings. Our skylines. Our families. Our hearts. All cost by deliberate, well calculated evil.
It was hard for me to grasp as a social worker at that time who was on the front line trying to make a difference in the world, how in fact people would be so malicious towards a bunch of innocent people. I kept thinking of the young lives that had started their career that ended that day. The parents with young kids at home, some unborn, that didn't make it home. How, on this loving earth, could anyone dream of 2 American commercial jetliners crashing directly into two massive buildings. A place I had lived for years, and loved on with all of my heart. Two buildings I had weeks before stood in front of admiring their beauty and moved to take photos that would last in my dining room forever not for their beauty but for their legacy.
A few months ago I was blessed to go down to the memorial alone. I stood in the same spot that once held the large globe signifying its grounds. Instead of the beautiful buildings that once stood there, huge massive, beautiful crafted holes now are there. Holes that are filled to the brim with names. Names of people that were loved and cherished, and didn't deserve that day to be their last.
It is an honor to always be able to say I lived in New York City. My heart will hold it until the day comes that it is my last. My prayers today, while standing in the halls of my new social work job during a moment of silence, is may those grieving be lifted. May this day never be forgotten. May we see more love than evil.
I want to grow that innocence back for our country.
Sunday, September 8, 2013
Feeling Blessed
Being a stay at home Mom is extremely challenging. It is hard to be Mom 24/7. It is hard to pour all of who you are into little people that have high needs of change me, feed me, hug me. It is hard to seek out who you truly are while being Mom all day everyday. Especially when you had a well defined self image prior to motherhood.
Two weeks in of being a working Mom I have already learned an abundance about who exactly I am. Many things I had forgotten about, and some I never knew.
What I didn't realize while being a stay at home Mom was that although I loved the time spent with my children, I was depressed. When I woke up to every day being the same, wearing the same yoga pants, listening to the same gossip, and filling up my time by the minute with things and people that sometimes didn't exactly matter much. I adore shedding the ability to be sucked in to high school momma drama (and MAN is there so much when you are home everyday being social). I love having limited time for things/people that matter. I love dressing up while missing my yoga pants for the weekend. I am spending a significantly less amount of money. And....yes! I have lost 5 pounds since working! Why? because I have no time to eat my day away or spend money on random bored trips to Target or the grocery store.
Obviously I get this is not what ALL stay at home Mom's do or feel, but for me it was a black hole I got stuck in for way, way to long. Ideally, looking back, I should've spent the first year with each child, and the time between worked. Seven years was just way to long when I had defined myself as a life learner, and career women for years and years prior. I truly forgot I could talk in a professional manner that had nothing to do with the color of baby poop. I forgot that people actually cared where I went for my graduate degrees, or worked, or lived. As Mom's we tend to only focus on that. Our conversations never wander to what makes us who we are other then our kids or our spouse. Hallelujah I am much much more then that. AND I FORGOT!
There will be days I will absolutely loathe going to work I am sure. Times I envy those sweet days of seeing friends with an open calendar. It is life. Although the grass is usually always greener on the other side--I got to say this field I am standing on is the best color green right now with just the right amount of light.
I have learned volumes--book worthy of information from being home for so long. I am so very grateful to my husband that let me take the time to love on our children. I am equally grateful for this new opportunity with a commute I could walk to, a job I actually am good at, a baby sitter that is AMAZING and an end of the day time of 2:45 so I am still able to enjoy my kids. I never ever miss my oldest getting off the bus! On so many levels this was the best decision we have made in a long long time.
It is a true blessing when you feel like all the stars are alined and you are exactly where you are meant to be. It is also a blessing when the entire family has adjusted without any major challenges, and all seem equally as happy.
We are blessed.
Two weeks in of being a working Mom I have already learned an abundance about who exactly I am. Many things I had forgotten about, and some I never knew.
What I didn't realize while being a stay at home Mom was that although I loved the time spent with my children, I was depressed. When I woke up to every day being the same, wearing the same yoga pants, listening to the same gossip, and filling up my time by the minute with things and people that sometimes didn't exactly matter much. I adore shedding the ability to be sucked in to high school momma drama (and MAN is there so much when you are home everyday being social). I love having limited time for things/people that matter. I love dressing up while missing my yoga pants for the weekend. I am spending a significantly less amount of money. And....yes! I have lost 5 pounds since working! Why? because I have no time to eat my day away or spend money on random bored trips to Target or the grocery store.
Obviously I get this is not what ALL stay at home Mom's do or feel, but for me it was a black hole I got stuck in for way, way to long. Ideally, looking back, I should've spent the first year with each child, and the time between worked. Seven years was just way to long when I had defined myself as a life learner, and career women for years and years prior. I truly forgot I could talk in a professional manner that had nothing to do with the color of baby poop. I forgot that people actually cared where I went for my graduate degrees, or worked, or lived. As Mom's we tend to only focus on that. Our conversations never wander to what makes us who we are other then our kids or our spouse. Hallelujah I am much much more then that. AND I FORGOT!
There will be days I will absolutely loathe going to work I am sure. Times I envy those sweet days of seeing friends with an open calendar. It is life. Although the grass is usually always greener on the other side--I got to say this field I am standing on is the best color green right now with just the right amount of light.
I have learned volumes--book worthy of information from being home for so long. I am so very grateful to my husband that let me take the time to love on our children. I am equally grateful for this new opportunity with a commute I could walk to, a job I actually am good at, a baby sitter that is AMAZING and an end of the day time of 2:45 so I am still able to enjoy my kids. I never ever miss my oldest getting off the bus! On so many levels this was the best decision we have made in a long long time.
It is a true blessing when you feel like all the stars are alined and you are exactly where you are meant to be. It is also a blessing when the entire family has adjusted without any major challenges, and all seem equally as happy.
We are blessed.
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