Tag: Work-life-balance

Balance, Health, Hopes, Toddlers, Travel, Work, Yoga

Failing at Mommy Blogging

olivia

Motherhood is definitely a game of priorities. Unfortunately, mommy blogging hasn’t been one of mine in recent months. Now, I know what you’re thinking, maybe the world doesn’t need another mommy blogger, but this mommy does miss blogging!

The trick, I suppose, is weaving the blogging into my other priorities. Like making money for my family. That’s been a big shift for me in recent months. With E getting bigger and more independent, the worker bee part of my personality has been back in full swing. And, it seems I’ve returned a bit more scattered in muliple directions than ever before.

I finished (and refinished and then finished again…) my middle grade novel. I started teaching games at a Waldorf school. I ramped up my real estate efforts for my husband’s business. I started a home business selling travel items for kids. I…

You get the picture.

I guess the opportunity to reinvent myself has been just too tempting. Why pick one thing? There are so many options! And finally the chance to try IT ALL, or almost all… I’d also like to teach yoga and…

I think that’s going to be in my focus in 2016. Not yoga, but filtering through all the sampling I did in the second half of 2015 to hone in on fewer sources of work so I can accomplish more with my time.

But, while I’m still at it all–

Do you want to publish my middle grade manuscript?

Do you want to buy or sell a house in the Sacramento area?

Do you need any busy bags or cute t-shirts to help you survive your next outing with kids?

See, it is possible to blog and chase all my other goals simultaneously… Or, maybe not. I miss my old blog posts, about things like, you know, getting your stubborn toddler to FINALLY sleep through the night. That will just have to be the topic of my next post. Now that I’ve promised it, I’ll have to deliver, which I guess makes me less of a mom blog failure after all…

Happy holidays from my busy family to yours!

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Balance, Hopes, Work

Deciding to Jump: To Go Back to Work, Or Not?

olivia
It's the sweet, quiet moments like these I hate to give up.
It’s the sweet, quiet moments like these I hate to give up.

I am standing on the edge of one of the biggest jumps of my life. Either I go back to work part-time as an intervention teacher and attempt to juggle my dream of writing into the mix of afterwork motherhood, or I take a deep breath, and jump straight into life as a stay-at-home mom and writer.

For many, the answer seems easy. JUMP. But the decision is much more layered than I expected. I love my school, my students, my coworkers. Some days I feel on the verge of going stir crazy at home. I have a part-time job waiting that may never be there again. The predictability of a work schedule, a paycheck, and good health insurance speaks to my cautious nature. Returning to work is somehow the less frightening choice.

With a face like this, it is hard to leave home.
With a face like this, it is hard to leave home.

Then, there is my daughter. Our biological strings are still firmly attached. When I am away, she is constantly on my mind, pulling at my body for milk. Every day she does something new, something I do not want to miss. While part-time work may give me the chance to catch many of these moments, it does not leave as much space for writing. As it is, I have to sneak my words in a few at a time, while she is sleeping or while I do not have to use my precious childcare hours for some other endeavor, like getting my teeth cleaned or running to the grocery store. And then, of course, there are other family circumstances that must go unmentioned.

A friend and I talked this week about how mothers feel pressured to be supermom and do everything, but the truth is, I don’t feel pressured, I just wish I could do everything. If only I could be in three places at once, mothering, writing, and working.  Obviously mothering wins on that list, but between writing and working, I do not have it figured out and the battle is agonizing.

Returning to work is the known. Taking the leap of faith is the unknown, but so far motherhood has been one huge leap of faith, from our decision to see if it happens, to hoping every moment of every day she would be born healthy, to the daily trial and error of new parenting. In order to make this jump work, we will need to restructure everything, to change the way we live.

Even as I write this, I feel aware of how lucky I am to be able to make this choice– but I also think the choice is within reach for many more women than they realize, it just requires a possibly uncomfortable amount of change.

If you have been in my shoes before, how did you come to a decision? Did you jump impulsively or was it clear one option outweighed the other? For me, it has been much harder to decide than I ever expected.