Should I Stay or Should I Go?

Being on maternity leave means I get the chance to see what it'd be like to be a SAHM. I'm not even going to go there on which option is better or worse -- staying at home or going to work. I think we're all enlightened enough to realize that both have their unique challenges and rewards, but here's my take on the pros and cons...at least in my small microcosm.

5 Joys of Working Outside the Home

1. You are more likely to shower regularly: It's amazing how not having a routine schedule can place showering on the back burner of your day. Back when I was working, my day began every morning at 7 am with a cup of coffee and a shower. I took exactly 1 hour to groom myself, check the Blackberry for any overnight fires, find the desired Backyardigans episode on TiVO for the Jackal, slurp down cereal, throw the dirty laundry down into the basement for later attention, find my sunglasses, grab last night's leftovers to take for lunch and head out the door. These days my mornings go something like this:

5:30 AM - feed baby
6:30 AM - wake up, realize I have passed out, put baby back in crib, tuck boob back in nursing bra, crawl into bed
7:00 AM - hear baby whimpering, bring baby into my bed, pull out boob, pray for a few more minutes of sleep
7:30 AM - after 18th time 3-year-old has screamed "Mom!" at top of lungs, get out of bed, pull on robe, gently place baby in crib, go downstairs in search of coffee
8:30 AM - realize I've been watching (I mean, really watching. Watching to the point where you find yourself wondering why Jerry Falwell singled out Tinky Winky.) Teletubbies for an hour when you hear baby waking up; feed baby (has it really been 3 hours already?)
9:00 AM - change poopy diaper, fight to keep 3-year-old from physically harming baby
10:00 AM - spend hour trying to burp baby and settle down to nap
11:00 AM - remember I'm breast feeding and should probably put something besides Seattle's Best in my stomach
11:30 AM - consider taking a shower, hear baby whimpering, feed baby (repeat from above)

Needless to say, at noon when I found myself unshowered and still enrobed, I felt myself questioning my very existence because I obviously had no purpose in life.

2. Your Outlook calendar makes you feel productive: On the contrary, if I had an Outlook calendar that had each 30-minute segment tightly scheduled I'd be more likely to view myself as contributing member of society. There were many, many times at work when I'd have a day full of meetings -- all anal-retentively documented with 5-minute reminders -- and even thought I didn't do a damn thing all day long other than sit in meetings (some were even meetings about meetings) and at the end of day I felt that, by gosh, I had done something that day. Perhaps I should start scheduling the feedings and diaper changes...

3. Other adults may notice your contribution: Hubby has blogged about how our 3-year-old graciously, constantly and repeatedly tells us 'good job, daddy' or 'good job, mommy' for the accomplishment of any task ranging from drinking our coffee to blowing our nose. While it's nice to have his cheap praise, there's no one to appreciate the fact that yesterday I managed to clean the entire house, do 6 loads of laundry, buy groceries, pick up the dry cleaning, pay bills, get in 30 minutes of cardio, make a fabulous dinner from scratch (people, I roasted an entire chicken and de-boned it by hand to yield the meat for the chili) and recycle 2 rotten bananas into a moist banana bread that left the entire house smelling heavenly. And did anyone notice? Yeah, hubby complimented the dinner and banana bread, but it wasn't like my stellar accomplishments were going to make a client happy, or be discussed during my annual review, or noticed by an impressed co-worker who'd nominate me for employee of the month.



Made chicken chili on Monday night. This would have NEVER happened when I was at my job.

4. You have something to discuss with your spouse besides poop: My husband and I frequently call each other during the day for no reason in particular. The conversations go something like this:

Hey, what's up?

Oh nothing, just at work.

Yeah, so what's happening.

Oh nothing, just working on this proposal. It's so annoying because so-and-so expects me to do such-and-such by COB today....[launch into venting session about how life, work and people suck]

Now that I'm home, we still call each other but the conversations go something like this:

Hey, what's up?

Oh nothing, just feeding the baby.

Yeah, so anything going on?

No, not really. I just fed him and he spit up all over himself and me. And, oh my god, you should have seen the poop he just took....

[silence]

Hello?

[sound of typing]

You're emailing aren't you?

Um....[more sound of typing]...what?

Nevermind, I'll just see you later.

And at that point I realize I've become one of those people who only talks about their kids. Or maybe it's just that your state of mind is in a different place when you're faced with office stress versus being faced with a day of poop-slinging. What seems important to one just isn't all that hot to the other. I've been at work on days where my husband is having a less busy day. I'm in the middle of some crisis (e.g. $5M proposal is due in 20 minutes and I can't get the fucking formulas in Excel to work) when my husband calls asking what room we should take in the beach house we're renting with friends ...in 7 months! I can't deal and practically hang up on him.

5. You can afford to pay someone to watch your kids: This is the best and worst thing about working outside of the home. You get to leave the rug rats with someone else who will wipe their butts and referee their temper tantrums while you're typing at your computer and sitting in conference rooms. The stress is different but I often question which vocation requires the greatest amount of patience and restraint. I spend all day missing the kids and race home to spend a few hours with them before bedtime. Cooking their mac & cheese and giving them their baths takes on a sweet and memorable flavor and it's not until right before you read Goodnight Moon for the 7th time that you're getting sick of them. On the other hand, spend all day with your kids and you find yourself obsessively watching that clock for 6 when your spouse will be home to take care of at least one of them. Which leads to the the next blog topic: 5 Joys of Being a SAHM.