TOTW: Working outside the home

[Csara]

Although this does not apply to many of us here, it was suggested as a topic of the week and I would like to honor all of the requests. So, here we go!

For those of you who work outside the home - What made you decide to work outside the home? Did you have a choice? Do you like working? Tell us some stuff you love about working outside the home? Do you feel guilty? How do you deal with that guilt?

Sorry for all the questions. I meant to just get you started. Add as many as you wish!

[RedBedHead]

I work outside of the home part time. I am a preschool teacher and love it! I only work for 9 months out of the year, 3 hours per day. I hadn't really intended on working after Cameron was born but I missed it horribly. I'm fortunate enough to have my mom about 5 miles away from me so she keeps Cameron while I'm working. This year C will go with me 2 days each week so that will only mean 9 hours away from her per week.
I have never felt guilty about my choice but I think that has to do with where she is while I am working.

[michellemomx3]

Cool question! I worked outside the home until my older daughter was almost four. The baby was 1½ at the time I stopped working outside the home.

I worked outside the home because I had had that job for over 10 years when I had my first baby. I didn't really want to quit and we needed the money, but we weren't willing to have someone else care for our children. The management (a married couple) knew of my plans to have children and offered to allow me to bring the children to work with me.

So that's what I did for nearly four years, and there was always someone employed there who helped me entertain the children when I was really busy. I had an office to myself and the kids played in there while I worked. I fed them, changed them, and did most of the care. The person who helped me with them would take them and play with them when I got really busy or when they (the employee) got bored!

This arrangement worked out wonderfully until the management had their own child and of course brought him to work. I'll spare you the details but to make a long story short my job ended and I began working from home!

Anyway, I loved that job and didn't have the chance to feel guilty since the kids were always with me. I love working from home even more but now that I have another baby there is a BIG drawback — there isn't anyone to take him and entertain him for me anymore! The girls are okay but there's only so much an eight-year-old and a five-year-old can do with a screaming spoiled baby!

[pink_elephant]

I love my job. I was actually finishign up school when i got pregnant, and my company put me thru school, so I owed them time (contractually and morally) anyhow. I didn't really have a choice about going back, but I made it pretty clear from the start that I wasn't interested in being a SAHM or a WAHM. Financially we might could have done it but not real comfortably. I was on bedrest for 5 weeks prior to havign Andy and then home for 8 weeks. I got 50% pay for the entire 13 weeks, becuase it was considered short term disability versus maternity (which would have been unpaid since I hadn't been "permanent" witht he company long enough). I love being able to be me and not mom or wife for time during the day. I feel like I lose myself with my husband, son and household. My schedule sucks sometimes but it is getting better. Plus, I am pretty good at my job and recently got a bonus for doing such a good job I NEED the adult interaction, and hoenstly, I NEED time from my son. I'd go crazy just me and him all the time. I want to be able to miss him, ya know? I work FT right now, and then some most weeks. DH takes him to and from daycare usually, but occassionally i pick him up and once in a blue moon I drop him off. My original babysitter was my cousin and when that stopped workign out with my demanding schedule at work, it was my SIL. Then, she became a tad unreliable because her boys and mine kept passing germs and I went like 10 days withotu a sitter and then she went on (planned) vacation! At that point I was out of back up options and we decided (it almost broke myheart) to go with a daycare. I did tons of research and visited a few times, at different times of the day. DH did the same thing. We finally decided on it and enrolled him. I am really happy we did, it has been great for him. One good thing about my job is the flexibility of my hours. A lot of times I can kinda come and go as I need to, meaning when he does get in school I won't have to miss stuff for him. I definitely think i am a better, more patient mama because I work outside the home (not better than SAHMs, just me personally.. I'm better as a WOHM than a SAHM.. make sense?) Also, should anythign happen to my husband, I have a career to fall back on. THAT makes me feel more secure honestly. I love the variety of my job, from office work to ship work. I do feel the guilt when I leave before he wakes up (most every mroning) and there are nights where he's in bed when I get home (not too often, but sometimes). Part of the issue is my hour+ commute, which will probably not get better because DH drive 35-40 minutes the other direction. As far as dealing with the guilt, I simply remind myself that my schedule won't always be that way and that my son loves me no matter what and I am doing what is best for us. Plus, it helps that he gets to talk on the phone with me at least once during the days that are crazy like that. (Although at one point he stopped calling me mama and only called the phone mama... that nearly killed me.. but he's over it now) more or less, I am happy to work

[CC21]

I work outside the home and for us there isn't any other option. We need both paychecks to survive. But, I can't imagine being a SAHM. Maybe if we weren't in such a rural area and I could go to playdates and stuff like that. But, it's 45 min to an hour to even get to a decent size town and over 2 hours to get to a city. I would just be too bored being at home every day. I think I would become a sloth. And that's not good for me or the kids.

I try not to focus on the fact that my kids see the babysitter for more hours during the week days than they do me and dh. We do take them to a SAHM who babysits rather than a typical daycare and that helps. I feel like they are getting more attention and care than they would at a daycare with 40 other kids.

[pink_elephant]

BTW, thanks for using this topic... it was one of my suggesstions

[jessica]

What made you decide to work outside the home? Did you have a choice?

I guess the easiest way to answer this is because I didn't decide to not work outside the home. I never viewed staying home as an option for myself. Both of my grandmothers worked and my own mother worked and so growing up it was never something I ever thought of for myself. Out of all the close friends I had growing up, I can really only think of 2 who had moms that stayed home ... so I guess I was just exposed more to families with working moms. Although for my particular situation I wouldn't consider that I have a choice anyway unless I made some drastic lifestyle changes that I don't see as viable options (and I'm not talking about cut the cell phone and cable types of changes).

Do you like working?

I do! I am extremely proud of my career and educational success. I love the type of job that I have where, like Missy, I can come and go. I don't clock in/out, I have no set schedule. I can work from home here and there. I get tons of vacation time, sick leave and family leave. I didn't go back to work until my daughter was 5 months old which I am extremely thankful for.

Tell us some stuff you love about working outside the home?

I love being Career Jessica. I love making my parents and my husband proud. I love the money (I wouldn't do what I do for free lol so I'd better love the money). I love the interaction with people that speak my language. I love learning and growing in my field month after month.

Do you feel guilty? How do you deal with that guilt?

I don't carry a constant feeling of guilt around with me. I do have days where I feel guilty depending on if I've had longer days than normal or I feel like Josilyn is having developmental leaps that I'm missing. The number one way I deal with the guilt is I whip out the calendar and plan some time off. In May I had a 5 day weekend ... in July I took off from the 4th through that Sunday and then again on the 18th I was off for 5 days to travel to see family. I definitely take advantage of my vacation time and primarily use it to be with Josilyn. Another way I dealt with my guilt when I first went back to work was to pump my breastmilk like a madwoman. I was hooked up to the pump in my company's lactation room pounding away on my laptop half the day. I also kept pumping past her 1st birthday because I could and viewed it as a wonderful gift to myself and to her. I read a fabulous book called "Hirkani's Daughters" that is filled with stories of working/pumping moms - that book constantly reenergized me. Us pumpers at work passed that book around in the lactation room, it was like our pumping mom bible lol.

[Csara]

Jessica, that's cool that there were other women at work that were also pumping....and there was actually a lactation room? Wow. You must work for a big company. What do you do?

[jessica]

Yeah there are usually 4 or 5 women at work using the room. Sometimes there'd be 2 or 3 of us in there at the same time. We had our own locked room - The Lactation Room. It has 4 private cubes within the room and each has drawers, books, magazines, outlets for laptops, etc. Then there's a fridge for everyone to put their milk in. One of the biggest inspirations for me was a lady who was pumping for the milk bank as her toddler had weaned but she kept pumping for the milk bank. I met her when I first came back to work and thought oh wow that's awesome. When the nurse finds out you are pg, it is assumed that you will need a key to the room because you will be breastfeeding/pumping. My company has won awards for a pro-nursing workplace (from LLL I think actually). They even had 2 hospital grade pumps there too so you could just bring your own hook ups (the Medela Lactinas). Although I got more suction out of my PIS so after a few months I started just bringing my own pump with me.

It is definitely a big company ... I work for a Fortune 100 corporation here in Austin ... I'm a senior business analyst. It is definitely an incredible place to work for a breastfeeding mom. My boss was very understanding and knew why it was hard for me to do lunch meetings or travel and I haven't traveled yet since I returned to work although there have been times where I almost had/should have for one reason or another. Having a room with a fridge is really pretty basic (the pumps went above & beyond) but its a shame so many companies don't even have a room for moms.

[B'sgirl]

Wow, that's awesome that your company is so accommodating. Is your CEO female, by chance? (:

I often miss working. I taught school until B was born. I keep having dreams about teaching, and whenever I go out I am sorely tempted to buy classroom supplies. I know I could get a job, even part time anytime I wanted.

But then I see B and watch him grow and I know I couldn't bear to leave him with someone else while I went to work. But I always keep my teaching license current so I have that to fall back on if I need it.