Is being a stay at home mum easy?

Its a forever open can of worms, with working mums, stay at home mums and mum’s all over the world wanting to profess that what they do is hard work and everyone else has it easy. Having never experienced being a working mum first hand it is a little hard for me to compare, however, one of my very close friends, Ruby, shares with me on a daily basis the turmoils she suffers from working part time and looking after her 8 month old daughter. We met up for lunch recently and she was in a terrible state, the worst I have ever seen her in. Her mother-in-law looks after her little girl while she goes to work 3 days a week. In the begining the situation was ideal.  Ruby was so happy to have a bit of her life back if only for 3 days a week. The pay was decent enough to allow her to continue with the lifestyle she had become accustommed to and not feel guilty about spending the moolar! So when we met up for lunch it came as a supprise to find her not so comfortable with the chilcare arrangement anymore. She said that after spending christmas with her in-laws, she had been driven crazy with the way her mother-in-law always thought she knew what her baby wanted. Everything she did with her own child was criticised and it was ” Oooooh, no, she doesn’t need that, she needs this..etc”. She lost the plot one day at the dining table and blew her top, storming out of the room, leaving everyone in shock 🙂 Ruby is now contemplating giving up her job to look after her baby girl full time. I did’nt really know what to say. Of course, I consoled her and said that her in-laws were being insensitive but deep down I think she knew that this is the path she had chosen to go down when she decided to return to work. Although it is not a choice but a necessitiy for some who need the money in order to pay the bills, those that go back to work  for whatever reason, have to accept that whoever is looking after their child is going to get to know them well and in effect, is temporarily taking over the role of mother.

So, being a stay at home mum is definately emotionally easier. I would say having to switch between employee and mother every day is pretty tough on your sense of “self”! On a daily basis as far as stress and workload goes, I would have to admit that staying at home is slightly easier in my opinion. Its not a case of intellect but of being able to choose when you do your hours that makes a huge difference on your everyday level of happiness. Alright, so I know you need huge amounts of patience and a strong will to spend all day, every day with your kids while doing the mundane household chores, but you can’t argue with the fact that if you have had a restless night with your little one, at least you get the opportunity to catch up on sleep when they go down for a nap. You can do the washing up whenever youwant to that day, there is no strict order in which these things must be done and the flexibility you get with staying at home really reduces the pressure on you in comparrision to someone who has to be there for a meeting at 9am sharp, or needs to hand in a project by the end of that week.

So my sympathy does go out to all the working mums out there, especially those that don’t have a choice…everything comes at a price and I’d rather give up my career any day than give up the precious moments spent with my babies.

Mother Vs. Lover; How do we balance the act?

Since becoming a mum the one thing I have found hard to accomplish is the daily transition from mother to lover. I’m not talking just about sex but about the whole process of shutting off once your sproglets are in bed and having time with your partner. It is not something that comes easy to me at all.  The more I think about it, change on the whole is quite uncomfortable for me. Despite always having the urge to be moving forward in life, once something does change (ie. moving house, new job, new baby, etc) it takes quite a while until I feel comfortable with it. So when the babies are in bed and the evening begins, how do you cope with letting go of the mummy feeling and participating in couple time? For instance, if I have just come downstairs after doing the bedtime routine and my partner instantly comes over to me for a cuddle, I just can’t handle it. The conflicting emotions in me between mother and lover are just too different and I really need a good half an hour to settle myself into the new role. Once I am ready though its fine, I just have to have that little bit of time to adjust after a whole day of nappy changing, food throwing, picking up off the floor etc. Am I the only one that finds it hard? I really hope not!

So the begining… urm…begins!

Sat here with my last bottle of wine for at least the next 2 years, I am thinking is this such a good idea? I mean I still have New Years eve to get through..surely that is a good enough excuse, if any, to get plastered. The mother in me says “No can do Jen, it won’t be good for your baby to be. Continue to drink if you want to rot in hell and feel guilty for the rest of your pregnancy. If you would prefer to do it right this time then pack it in!”.

So I have my Sanatogen pre-natal’s at the ready and take my first lot tomorrow morning. We had originally agreed to ttc on the 1st  January but unfortunately, it being my last chance to gorge this crimbo, I have put on a whole stone in the space of a month. To be fair, I have been trying to consume all of the crap food in the house so that it is gone and I won’t be tempted. Now I’m going to have to get this stone off before we ttc, I couldn’t bare it if I got preggers before I was back to my normal 9 stone. With Harry we only got to try twice and that was it. I had only just stoped taking my pill too. I put on a wopping 3 stone and it took me a whole year to shed so I’d like to give myself a fighting chance this time round. I plan on interval running on our treadmill every day for at least 40 minutes while Harry has his nap. Healthy eating too…a maximum of 1,200 calories should do it don’t you think? I’m not really sure what is a healthy amount? I’m guessing if I start running before we ttc then I should be able to keep it up throughout the pregnancy. Hmmm, not really sure if it would be safe to do that though, you know, in the first 3 months….I would really love to hear what you think or what you did to prepare your body for pregnancy.