2018 was a life changing year for me. That’s when we found out we were unexpectedly pregnant with our third child. After crunching some numbers, I realized that with my teacher salary and paying for daycare for three kids, I would be bringing home a meager $500 a month. “Surely,” I thought, “There must be something I can do from home to earn $500 a month.” Thus began the next phase of my mom journey. I found an online job, waking up in the early hours of the morning to teach English to Chinese students.
I want to first applaud stay-at-home moms.
Before working from home, I’d had summers off, so I thought I knew what I was getting into. You have a thankless, often monotonous job pulling you through the repetitive motions of dishes and laundry and what feels like pointless cleaning. You follow tiny tornados from room to room, trying to rein in their chaos, all while you attempt to speak to them with soft, soothing tones and ensure that they feel loved and are developing early academic and social skills. It’s exhausting — oftentimes, mentally and emotionally more so than physically.
None of that detracts from the good. The past five years, I’ve been here for it all: first smiles, first steps, first words. With eyes wide open, I got to watch in wonder as my littles explored the world, trying to make sense of it all. I’ve been here for their sweet hugs and slobbery kisses.
To working moms, I also applaud you.
I’ve been there, and I don’t hesitate to say that I loved my job. I loved my students and watching them grow as I prodded them to think deeply about the personal and cultural significance of our choices as we analyzed Red Scarf Girl and The Hiding Place. I made it a point to be good at my job, and I often felt accomplished with my academic endeavors. But my heart ached each morning when my three-year-old came down the stairs and asked, “Mom, do you get to stay home all day with us?” “No,” I would shake my head sadly, “I’ve got to go to school.” I wanted to be with my babies, and even though I loved what I did, I knew I was missing some of the milestones along the way.
And to my fellow work-from-home moms, we have the best and worst of both worlds.
I don’t miss my babies during the day anymore. When my two-year-old wakes up and wants to snuggle and read books, we can spend an extra ten minutes doing that. There’s much less rushing to get out the door. I get all of the hugs and kisses, and I no longer stress about what we’re going to do when someone is sick.
I also get the benefits of working. Yesterday, in a conversation with my husband, I mentioned that continuing to work is really what has saved my mental health. At work, people praise me for a job well done. I am loved and respected. There are techniques and a format for being a good teacher, and I can easily learn and follow that. It feels good to be acknowledged.
The clincher is that I also get the worst of both.
First and foremost is the guilt. A stay-at-home mom may feel guilty for not contributing monetarily to her family. A working mom’s guilt comes from not spending as much time with her children. As a work-from-home mom, yes, I earn an income, but my contribution is very small, and I often feel that I could and should be doing more. I feel guilty, and possibly a little envious of the financial situation we could be in were I to choose to work full-time.
I feel guilty about not spending enough with my children. Yes, I get the milestones and the extra hugs and kisses. Yes, we adore each other. But I also teach online during the day. My schedule is fairly flexible, so much of my work happens while my children are napping, but there’s still a section of each day when I turn on the TV, so they’ll stay occupied during my class. Since I work during nap time, much of my time with my children is spent trying to maintain some semblance of order with the rest of the house. I don’t have hours upon end to take them to the park or organize a creative STEM activity. I need to do the dishes that have been sitting in the sink since Sunday night.
My friends, you’ll understand well when I talk about the chaos of being a work-from-home mom.
My attention is split between the responsibilities I have with work and those at home. Things are often half done on both sides. My kitchen hasn’t been cleaned in four days and laundry is a sordid tale of feast or famine. Though I’m here with my babies, too many moments of my day are spent running from one task to the other. So I settle with keeping things equally ignored, focusing on the next big priority of my ever expanding to-do list.
I don’t write this as a complaint, but as an offering of solidarity. Motherhood is everything glorious and hard, no matter how it looks for you. Whatever your financial situation or working status, there are a lot of us experiencing the same chaos.
