I thought this article and the thoughtful chat were worth a read. So honest and interesting. Props to Amy Beckett for supporting her family in so many different ways and working hard to get back into the legal field when the time was right for her. I particularly love Arlington, VA’s comments about how vital “off-the-books flexibility” is to be a successful working parent.
Category Archives: YouBetterWork
No joke
So to celebrate the mommy track’s birthday (check it!), I talked with my boss about needing to reduce my hours. Plenty of my co-workers (female, natch) work reduced schedules, and my boss is extremely understanding, but this was still a conversation I was totally dreading. Not because it felt like a failing or because of the salary cut (although that SUCKS), but because if he said no I wasn’t really sure how I was going to maintain my sanity.
I’ve been REALLY lucky during my time in big law firm world. After my son was born I came back full-time, fully expecting to reduce my hours at some point, but I got staffed on a huge case with some good responsibility and a safety net to support me. So I stayed on full-time, got preggers again, and had another lovely maternity leave. Returning to work full-time with two, though, has been a whole different ball game. (Parents of 2+ kids, you hear me!) There just are not enough hours in the day to be the mom I want to be and the laywer I should be to justify my rates (and, um, employment). And on top of the normal day-to-day craziness, we’re moving in 2 weeks (MOVING), every family member we’ve ever heard of is coming to visit, and I’m lucky if my husband and I can have a 10 minute conversation that’s not interrupted by a crazy kid or by me falling asleep.
And once again, I got lucky. My boss said cool. Just like that. He expressed some totally valid concerns (that billing less makes me less valuable on paper, and maybe a better target for layoffs, and that I’ll need to have some flexibility in my schedule to really make it work) but also said he’d support whatever I decided on.
So I guess I’m jumping on the mommy track now. Is that what this means? Who freaking knows. But I do know that I’m super tired of every conversation about motherhood being so loaded. Can moms do anything without being judged? I’ve heard it all (and sadly bought in to some of it before I knew better): that full-time working moms value their career over their kids, that they’re cold and distant, that they think a big paycheck is more important than spending time with their kids; that SAHMs are dull and baby-obsessed, that they wasted time and money going to school, that they’re putting themselves at financial risk, that they don’t set a good example for their kids. And apparently part-time working moms are “mommy tracked,” just kind of pretend-working, bringing home a dinky paycheck, and being semi-involved in their kids’ lives. It’s like there is no path a mom can take that doesn’t involve some judgment by society.
But I guess that’s just how it goes being a parent. A mom and dad scolded me at a park a few weeks ago for letting my daughter crawl around while kids were running near her. Really? It’s bad to let a baby crawl in a park with her mom two feet away? Sigh.
Anyways. I am determined to really give this part-time thing a shot, and to cut out the mommy guilt that plagues me every once in a while, and to enjoy all the SAHMs and working moms and whatever moms in my life with no judgment, and hope that they can do the same with me.
And that is not an April Fool’s joke. Speaking of: I apologize to my son’s preschool teachers for his “OH NO I pooped my pants!” joke. It was all his dad.
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It is you
So I am BEYOND stressed today, BEYOND! Just beyond. I’m totally obsessed with selling our house, or more accurately, with not selling our house. I woke up in the middle of the night and had to fight the urge to mop the kitchen floors, because what if someone comes in our house and loves it and just has to have it, and then they see dirt all over the kitchen floor and decide they hate the whole thing and then tell everyone it’s a crappy house? Which it is NOT, mind you, it’s awesome and if you are looking to live somewhere in DC please for the love of God let me know.
Adding to the stress is some office politics, which I used to be REALLY good at, but now it all just freaks me out. I’m also remembering the days early on at the firm when I used to be so overly eager for new work, and would literally call people I didn’t know and ask them if I could please oh please have an assignment from them. Now every time I’m offered some new work, I have to do this bizarre calculus in my head and weigh my current work and my husband’s travel schedule and my kids’ upcoming doctor’s appointments and field trips and birthday parties… Actually, now that I write this out, I think my current calculus is much more simple than it used to be. Used to be: how much can I take on to really impress everyone? Now: how much can I take on without completely screwing something up? Sigh.
Anywho, do you know what I listen to when I am stressed? Of course you do not. So I will share it with you. I defy you to listen to this song and not chill a bit. There are random pictures of naked women and weed in the video, which I tell you not as a warning, but as an incentive to watch.
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Sigh and double ugh
So two interesting things happened at work yesterday. One, my boss “popped by” my office to introduce me to the general counsel of one of our biggest clients. Right as I was wrapping up my research into a remote control fart machine (www.thefartmachine.com – GO THERE NOW). Luckily, I had just finished playing the sample fart noises and had mostly calmed myself down when they came in. But I was reclined in my chair with my shoes off. Sigh. And two, I heard through the grapevine that a co-blabbermouth told someone that I hadn’t been working enough lately. My first reaction wasn’t to get mad at him for gossiping or talking shit about me; it was to feel really bad. It’s bad enough to feel guilty that I slack at work when home needs me a little more (or when I need home a little more), but to have someone else notice? Ugh. And not just notice, but feel the need to call me on it. Ugh ugh.
This person is junior to me, so in bizarro law firm world, his opinion doesn’t really count for much. My very understanding boss knows I work hard, keep strange hours, and occassionally come into work with mis-matched shoes and breast pump parts hanging out of my bag. But hearing about the gossip did make me get in a little earlier today, and hold off on the fart machine research for a little while.
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Someone call the wahhhmbulance
So for the past 6 nights, my daughter has decided to wake up hollering and shaking the rails of her crib in the middle of the night and will not stop screaming until my husband or I go in and rock her. As cute as she is, I would really prefer not to see her at 3 am, particularly when she is yelling for no apparent reason. I took her to the doctor to follow up on her most recent ear infection (sigh) and she’s healthy, so I think she’s yelling just because she can. And maybe because she’s finally getting her top two teeth.
Anywho, I don’t think I can fully explain how freaking mean and grumpy and generally psychotic lack of sleep makes me. For example, I could not find a matching sock for my son this morning (laundry tends to reproduce like the Duggars in my house when mama’s tired), and I seriously considered punching the laundry basket. Because it really had it coming.
Functioning at work while sleep deprived is always a bit of a performance. It requires a little extra make-up, a lot more working with the door closed, and massive amounts of coffee, combined with telling a few select blabbermouths about my lack of sleep so the word slowly makes its way to the people who need to know that, really, don’t mess with Sarah today. On a conference call yesterday, someone I’ve never met actually said, “Oh, did you finally get some sleep last night?” Well done, my co-blabbermouths.
And tonight is my first Girls Night Out in, oh, like a year and a half. Although it probably doesn’t qualify as a real girls night out because (1) I am wearing frumpy flats and my hair is a wreck; (2) there will be no drunken dancing unless something goes terribly wrong; and (3) we are going to a book signing. At a synagogue. Somewhere in the middle of pregnancy #2 I officially became lame. Whatevs. The point is that I’m exhausted, feeling sad that I won’t be putting my kids to bed tonight, and not able to appreciate the good things I have going on today.
Some day I’ll make a Costanza-style napping nest under my desk. If only I had the energy.
Mama, Esq. 