How Becoming a Mom Changed my Relationship with Work
Recently I’ve come to realize how pivotal becoming a parent has been in my journey toward equilibrium and my relationship to work.
Before I had my son, Walter, I could keep this really strict barrier up between my work life and personal life. I didn’t hang out with work friends outside of office hours, I rigidly stuck to regular work hours, I tracked all my PTO or sick time diligently. While I wouldn’t have described it this way at the time, looking back on it I see how constricting it was. I’d built this box for myself by controlling everything I possibly could in my home and work environments.to be sure I never had to get outside that comfortable box. But, sometimes it was inevitable. For instance, when I learned that my mom had breast cancer and I was living on the opposite coast from her. The next day I cried at work (something extraordinarily out of character for me – in fact I wish I could cry more!) after a somewhat typical, albeit gruff interaction with a client. I know now that was because I hadn’t yet processed the sadness, fear, and grief of my mom’s diagnosis and all those feelings were coming out at any possible chance – definitely outside of the box! (I should note that my mom is fine and cancer free!)
I lived this way, with my work life and personal life packed up neatly in their respective boxes for as long as I could. I made some baby steps toward integrating the two – which mostly meant trying to bring more of my whole self to work. I started taking advantage of the flexible schedule my boss supported. I would go to an appointment during the day and rather than log the sick time I would do any work I later. I would leave a little early for no other reason than I needed a break from work.
At home with snuggling my sick baby who had his first stomach bug - during a particularly busy week…
But, it was when my maternity leave ended was officially became a working mom that I was pushed into the deep end of making progress toward deconstructing the boxes. When you’re a parent, especially of an infant, there are so many things that can derail your day. Is your child care sick? Is your child sick? Did they have a terrible night of sleep? Have they been cranky for a week and sapped your energy? Are they spitting up more than normal leaving you to spend all your brain space wondering if they’re okay and if you should make a doctor’s appointment? If you do make one will the doctor think you’re overreacting? Maybe your parents have advice. Oh you could read that book you got about the first year. Any parents out there know this feeling well. And I’d guess that any non-parents do to, just swap child with something else. In this blog post I won’t go into the ways that society and work places prioritize nuclear families and children over other forms of family (chosen family, closest friends, etc.), but I do want to note that I believe all those versions should be important and prioritized.
Because of the aforementioned list of any possible ways your day can change on a dime when you become a working parent there was no longer any way to keep the boxes separate. They both came crashing down and crumpled together into a pile where I couldn’t tell which was which anymore. I was lucky that I had spent time (unintentionally) preparing for this. I had been in regular therapy for several years that gave me tools to work through the uncomfortable feelings that came with being a whole person at work. I did some self-development work in the form enneagram and Myers Brigs to understand my strengths, weaknesses, and preferences and how they play out. I participated in Tara Mohr’s Playing Big course, which gave me confidence in my talents in the work place. I had been reading books like: Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle that helped me learn to recognize the signs of impending burnout and what to do about it. I had been practicing setting and maintaining boundaries in my personal life. Don’t get me wrong it was, and still is a challenge that I contend with regularly, but the foundation I’d laid made it easier.
If you don’t have a foundation, that’s okay! Honestly, that’s why we started this business. Amanda and I both have a preternatural interest in self-development and I find it fun, really fun, to go deep and learn more about what makes me tick. But I know that most people don’t feel that way and this type of self-preservation work is not taught to us. Our society values production and agreeability (especially in women) so it can be hard push back on demands or set boundaries with your time. I’m going to say it again, because it’s important, if you don’t have a foundation, of course you don’t! You weren’t set-up to have one. So when something major happens like, for me, becoming a parent, and it becomes impossible not to bring some of your personal life to work and vice versa it can feel bad.
If work is feeling bad for you or if you feel like you can’t bring your whole self to work you’re in the right place. We have a number of tools to help you, leave a comment or send us a message and tell us about what you’re going through at work. We’d love to help!
