Suburban (in)Sanity

Broken

I'm working too much, and my daughter, the emotional antenna, knows. And it's not like at age seven she can say, "Mom, you're working so much and your head is elsewhere and that scares me and I wish you would focus on me more and I don't like having to go to school early some days or having you pick me up late other days and I just want our normal life back."

As if that were even possible.

But it's little things. She doesn't want to do the after school class anymore. Easily frustrated at home. Feels like everyone's "always" against her or making her do things or pulling her this way or that. She's emotionally peaking and valleying at varying times during the day, often one immediately after the next. Need I even say that it's never at a convenient time for me?

And on the inside, I'm so conflicted. For the first time since *before my oldest was born* (clock it - that was more than 9 years ago) I'm immersed in a work project that occupies my brain before, during, and after "work" (having a flexible schedule is both a blessing and an extremely bad curse.) My brain wants to solve my work issues 24/7 - yes even in the middle of the night. And my body is ready to give up on me. Woke up with a migraine this morning, which is my body's last salvo, last fire across the bow. "Yo, bitch. More rest. Less crazy."

And my little girl, how do I fix this? How do I help her know that changes are okay? That everything is temporary anyway (while simultaneously not freaking out about the fact that summer is 5 short weeks away and my project is due June 1. If it slips even a few days, I'm toast with no childcare.)? That mom working isn't stealing me away from her. Because in a way, that's a lie. It's true, my brain is tied up elsewhere much of the time. But is that really wrong? She's seven! She can cope. Can't she? Should she?

Why are all issues of working and balancing mothering such Solomon's choices? Why can't I figure out how to compartmentalize? Or the right things to say to my baby, who isn't actually saying, "I don't like it when you work"? (most of the time. She has actually said that. Rip my beating heart out and serve it on a platter, shall we?)

And am I upset because she's shining her white-hot light on the exact heart of the issue? The place where a big part of me *wants* this. Wants the full immersion. Misses the way solving work-related problems feeds a very malnourished part of my soul.

I never realized that having babies would cause this kind of existential discomfort. I don't want to have to face up to the reality that is cut back - do less - pull back. I want the damn cake, I want to eat it, too. But it turns out, I have to share.

 

Things that make my head burst into flames

I've been working in my chosen career since I was nineteen years old. I started as a part-time college intern. Three, four, five days a week I would drop my books and notebooks off in my dorm room, change into something that vaguely resembled business attire (back in the days when women did *not* wear pantsuits. And I'm not even making that up. I remember when the first woman in the area started wearing pantsuits to work - not pants/tops as separates, but like a men's business suit but cut for a woman. No, it wasn't the 1980s. It was the 1990s for chrissake! Oh, right, I'm old. Erp.) and hop the train into the city to go to work. There were days when I had to make sure to work at least two hours, because if I only worked one, I didn't quite make the train fare to/from work (at my starting rate of about $6.37/hr.)

I've worked more years than I haven't. And I took time off to raise my kids. Because it's something that was important to me, but it was also something that was the right timing for us - my career had reached a lull, I had lost one job and a new job wasn't quite the right fit for me, so we reconsidered priorities, wrote a budget, and...I've blogged about this before.

But the thing that has always made my head burst into flames is the fact that I work hard, damn hard, and just as hard as anybody else (harder than some, too.) And I'm quick. And productive. And my time is worth it. This is even more important in the post-baby-working-years because I have these heart-stoppingly painful conversations with my 7 year old, who tonight at bedtime when I was reviewing the week's schedule and mentioning when I would be in the office, told me "we're not going to have to have a babysitter again?" Because last week once I had to have a sitter take care of the kids after school for a few hours so I could do a video shoot at work. And she noticed. And while the sitter does a nice job, and the daughter benefits from other people in the world caring about her and interacting with her, she just doesn't like it. So rip my heart out and serve it on a platter, shall we? Ugh. This part about working is not the best part, but I console myself with the idea that I'm working and contributing and setting a good example, and I've got a pretty great part-time gig that flexes around my family's commitments and lets me be the mom most of the time and...then I read this sort of shit and it makes my head burst into flames. (that article references this one which is where the actual combustion occurs)

Because HOW CAN IT BE 2011 and this is still happening?!?!?

And how can a writer write this passage and not have her own head explode into flames?

Simply put, many women—not all, but enough to have a big impact on the statistics—are willing to trade higher pay for other desirable job characteristics.

Because I just don't get it.

Meanwhile, the original poster (the one who I agree with) says the following:

I would also love to know why, if pay is so equal, women with kids are paid less than men with kids. I'm sure that some will explain it by saying that women decided to take time off to raise up the young'ins, and therefore lose market share. I can see how that would affect lifetime earnings. However, I am confused as to why, then, a woman who is employed at a job with the same experience as a man still earns less than he does.

Exactly!

I heard this from a company I worked with when first returning to the my field after a 5 year gap to raise my babies. "Oh, the industry has changed, technology is different, therefore we'll pay you this lower rate because honestly you're 5 years behind but aren't you lucky to get to work with us?"

I went on to do development on a project when I was only assigned to do design (tech friends will know these pay at VERY different pay scales - and my background is tracked more toward design, though I'm learning now how to spin things so that this isn't as much of a factor) and discovered that while I was off for 5 years, what the industry did was build authoring tools to automate much of what we used to have to code by hand. The industry just basically caught up with me, and gave me additional tools to work with. I wasn't behind in the slightest. I still get mad thinking about this experience. Bah!

As my friend Veronica (a nuclear engineer from Argentina, and someone else who has chosen to do the kind of sequencing I've done, taking time off to raise children, planning to come back again to the workforce in the future) says, "Infuriating. It is a double discrimination: one that considers that the work of raising a child (a human being!!!) is useless and another one that sentences a woman to a lower wage because she was "wasting her time" while everybody else was doing more productive things. It makes me furious. I think that before this pay discrimination disappears, society must recognize - and include in the economy - child rearing work. Until these activities are not seen for what they are (an indispensable contribution to the development of the human race) we will be punished for raising our kids."

Is that what it is? A punishment? Why aren't we all marching on our various government offices *now*? Oh, that's right, because there are school lunches to make, diapers to change, babies to nurse, field trips to chaperone, teenagers to equip with the skills to survive their adolescence. And work to be done.

The tabbed browser...OF DOOM!

I have so many tabs open in my browser at the moment that I literally can't see what any of them say. I wish people would stop linking to such interesting articles!

Here's what it looks like:

Crazy, eh? (It's Rockmelt, a new browser that integrates social media sites into the sidebars of the browser, built on Chrome. I like it pretty much, have been using it for a few months. Still not sure how much I love it.)

But there are some amazing and important gems in my tabs...of DOOM, so let me share a few of the articles that have struck me in the last week or two:

First, this is the most important thing I've read in ages. It's an online presentation about art, creativity, being who you are, becoming who you are by virtue of what you create. It's fantastic, and every person who cares about being authentically you should read this. The rest of you imposters should keep moving along.

Which reminds me about this set of links on the Impostor Syndrome I read this week. You should read it, too.You are not an impostor.

And then there's this stuff about being a stay at home mom that I open in my browser and desperately want to reply to but don't really have the time. This is *important* work, being the at-home parent. Very important work. It's very often and very easily marginalized, though, in part by well-meaning hard-working parents who work outside of the home. Please understand I know each role has significant value, having played each role at many different times in the last 10 years. But being at home is *important.* It is *valuable.* It is *worthwhile work.* Those who choose, or by circumstances or life situations get forced into, this path need support, encouragement, and respect.

A friend linked to this awesome bit about Harry Potter, and honestly I can't get enough. HP Deathly Hallows Part 1 comes out on DVD soon!

Have I linked to this one before? Doing silly public art? I'm dying to do this with my children, maybe now that the weather is starting to improve. Or at least suck less. I love people who treat art with whimsy and view making others smile as an important way to spend their time. I do, too.

I'm sure you've seen some of the awesome articles about iPads and children with developmental delays, disabilities, and other limitations. I'm amazed at this tool that DIDN'T EXIST JUST 14 MONTHS AGO. Ponder that for a second. I already couldn't live without mine and I've only had it since Christmas.

We introverts are getting props so much more in the Age of the Internet. It's about damn time. Hey - I'm not socially awkward (except when I am) or antisocial (except when I've spent all day with PEOPLE) -- I'm just an introvert. I need some downtime. Computer time = downtime for me, even though it's also become one of my primary social interaction methods (asynchronous = ideal for people w/busy lives. Which I have. Which explains my extremely sporadic blog posting schedule.)

The posts I'm reading from teachers responding to the various crises in state legislatures that are bringing their profession into light are heartbreaking. My teacher friends are among my most important, most inteligent, most treasured for the way they see my children as people, whether they've ever "officially" taught my children or not.

This site is almost as good as Mila's Daydreams, (book next Jan, sign up for her mailing list!) In the first linked site, a Korean artist takes children's drawings and recreates them in scenes. The prince/princess on the stairs are absolutely magical.

An online author friend is trying out the epublishing thing. Like the rest of us. ;)

This site makes a great point about what carrying a baby does for them (hint: gives them things to look at/experience/interact with in the world. More people wanted to talk to me and my baby when I carried them than at any other time!)

My friend Melanie mentions a Once Upon a Time challenge in her blog that sounds really interesting...

One of my other imaginary friends (funny that so far each "friend" I've mentioned here is someone I know from online interactions only. Isn't that interesting? Remember that bit about introverts!? speaking of which - another article...) linked to a fascinating grant-giving organization called Saving Lives at Birth: The Grand Challenge for Development. My friends in the birthing and mother advocacy worlds might be interested.

Another imaginary friend (who I have actually met in person) has posted about the difference between delegating and abdicating control. This is something that is really familiar to me from the business world, but it's surprising to me in the recent discussions I have been watching on the state of the publishing industry how quick some authors are willing to abdicate complete control over their intellectual property - the words they bled and sweated over for ages. Scary. She doesn't do comments on her posts due to other commitments, but I love comments on my blog posts, so feel free to read and debate away, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Closing, you really need to listen to Sarah Kay talk about If I Should Have a Daughter. It's important.