Life as a working mom

Every morning you drag yourself out of bed, generally at least 30 minutes earlier than you need to be up so you can take care of any kid related emergencies or just get in some extra cuddle time. You make your kids breakfast while brushing your hair, taking care to give your daughter a swipe of lipstick from the makeup bag to keep her happy, and keeping your son’s milk glass full. If a miracle occurs and you actually are able to walk out the door with just enough time to make it to work on time, you peel your crying daughter off of you because she doesn’t want you to leave. You choke back a few tears, tell her you love her and that Nanny will have a great day with her, and you’ll be home soon, even though you know it’s never soon enough.

You fight the morning rush and barely make it to work on time, only to stare at pictures of your kids and wish you were home. You use your lunch hour to run and buy diapers, wipes, medicine, whatever you may be out of, while slamming down a frozen dinner because when do you have time to actually make a lunch? You struggle through a work day, trying to get enough done to prevent you from having to work that evening, and race home through numerous traffic jams. You’re greeted by smiling faces, the bright spot of the day, as you struggle in with bags, mail, etc. The kids “help” you change clothes so you can begin your second job of the day. You make an attempt to fix dinner with 2 kids wanting your attention or at least to both be held at the same time or to “help” with dinner and decide to scrap it til bath time in lieu of some play time. Your short hour of playtime is up, kids are stuck into the tub, you are running between the bathroom and the stove as you create something edible out of a frozen concoction from the fridge. Take kids out of the bath, put them into pajamas, get milk cups, lovies, binkies, etc. Off to snuggle on the couch. You then remember you haven’t eaten dinner but if you do it now you set bedtime back ½ an hour. Decide on cold dinner (again) and put the kids to sleep, sad because you didn’t have enough time with them. Eat dinner, and attempt to at least do the dishes, fold some laundry, run the vacuum, etc. Promise yourself that tomorrow night you’ll exercise. Make a grocery list for the weekend, check the calendar for this weekend’s activities, pray that somehow there will be an additional 10 hours in every day. Write out some bills. Do some work that of course didn’t get done. Promise that this weekend in between church, grocery store, shopping for birthday gifts, and general errands you will find time to work on the kids’ scrapbook. Figure out how you’re going to pay off your credit cards and how you can get out of paying your student loans back. If you’re lucky, watch some television and probably see yet another story on how mothers working is damaging children’s little psyches. Begin guilt cycle over again.

Fall into bed exhausted, ignoring the piles of clothes all over the bedroom. Pray that you can get at least 6 hours of uninterrupted sleep before starting it all over again. Promise that on the weekend you’ll go to bed at 8 to make up for the lost sleep time. Know that will never actually happen. Remember that you have a load of laundry in the washer that needs put in the dryer. Decide that you don’t care and leave it there, probably to be forgotten the next morning and needing to be rewashed. Make a mental list of the 10,000 things that need to be done around the house and promise that it will all get done the next weekend. Know that the list will never actually be completed in the next 25 years. Promise that next week you will be more organized. Laugh out loud at this proposition. Fall asleep, wake up to daughter screaming for pacifier at 1 am. Wake up again at 5 am when the alarm goes off and it seems you’ve been asleep for 5 minutes. Repeat ad nauseum.

But ain’t this worth it??