Things are happening – life update

It’s always a nice feeling when working hard starts to pay off. 

Firstly, the diet. It’s going well, not super well but we’re heading in the right direction. I have rekindled my love of vegetables and have been scoffing more than my 5 a day. I tried asparagus again… Still don’t like it. But I once was not a fan of cabbage but now I’m loving it. It’s going in everything – much to my partner’s delight 😉

The boys sleep habits continue but are improving. His mood is also seeing a more rosy turn. I’ve been spending more time with him too, ensuring its just Mummy and baby time on a Saturday with no interruptions. It may seem a little selfish but I think we both need it.

My brother has booked his wedding for September next year so it’s been bridesmaid natter and colour schemes on the agenda this week. We’re all very excited and I’m glad he’s getting it done before I do. It buys us some time as Mum and Dad will need to rebuild the finances once my brother has cleaned them out.

My job is moving along at a pace too. We had a workshop all last week to talk acquisition and retention strategy. I came in on the Thursday morning with the idea that I wanted to build a CRM program for customers. After two solid days we had the framework sorted ready to load it with the data. My boss is seriously impressed and now I’m being looked at for promotion to Head of CRM… Excellent!

Lastly, my August Birchbox arrived this morning so an update on that will follow shortly. 

All in all, it’s looking up.

Thanks for reading, C x

The reality of being a working Mum

Today my boy moved from the baby room at nursery into the toddler room and I’m not sure how I feel about it?

In the UK when your child turns two they move from a baby room (3:1 adult care) to a toddler room (5:1 adult care). My boy has been in his room for 18 months of his 24 month lifespan. He’s had the same key worker since he got there too. So technically she’s spent more time with my son than I have. That hasn’t ever really crossed my mind until now. 

I work because I have to not necessarily because I want to. My partner is in a job he doesn’t like because we need him to have a flexible shift pattern so I can stay on full time. We work hard to apparently give the kids a better life. But it simply isn’t true. We work, pay our bills, don’t see the kids and still have nothing to show for it. Oh yes, we did buy a house on the cheap but can’t afford to do any of the modernisation it requires. 

I didn’t have a baby just to pay someone else to raise him. And it’s at this point that I feel like a shitty mother but also hugely conflicted for feeling this way. 

Our society seems to have two opposing views on stay at home mums. On one side we have the families that can afford for one parent to stay home. And we applaud these women for haulting their careers, bringing up their children, being a perfect wife with an almost expectation that these women should be at home raising their children.

On the other side we have mothers that it just doesn’t cost in for them to work, the childcare is too high and the pay too low. The benefits system is holding these women back from going to work. Yet we berate these women for not contributing to the public purse. Scrounging to pay for their kids from hard working tax payers. How is this ok?

On the flip side of this we also have some mothers (I’m not quite in either camp) who could afford to stay home but choose not to and choose to further their career. These mothers are accused of being selfish of putting career before child. It seems as a woman, you just can’t get it right. 

For me, I’d love to go part time but it’s just not financially viable. We’d lose too much by me dropping a day. Plus, we’d still earn too much to get any help from the government – not that I want the state to pay me to have children.

I genuinely worry for the future of our children raised by nurseries. Surely, children that don’t see their parents that often become detached from their parents. Could this lead to social issues later on? Would your child be resentful for the lack of time spent with them? I don’t know what the answer is. I was fortunate to always have my mum around – we were in the  “it doesn’t cost in” group. 

So I suppose what I’m saying is, I miss my son and there is nothing I can do to change that. I can’t get the 18 months we spent apart back. I can’t shift this feeling that his key worker has been more of a parent to him than I have. But what I do know is that my son needs me as his mother and I need to find a way to be with him more often before it’s too late and he starts to question why I’m not around.

Thanks for reading, C x