I have a few rules for this blog. 

I don’t write about my family, outside of telling stories or showing my appreciation for them.  I know that as good as it would feel to open up this editor and pound out a post about a fight or an annoyance (like when Craig says he’s going to get up at 5:30AM and I spend an hour that I could be sleeping trying to wake him up… Oh, wait.  That doesn’t happen much anymore now that we have a baby alarm clock.)  I would inevitably regret posting it. 

I don’t use my child’s name.  I’m not sure where this started or if it will always continue this way.  I just sort of started using her initial.   

And, I don’t blog about work. Because?  Well, I’m not stupid. 

Except sometimes these rules get in the way of me sharing “me” with you.  Sometimes for months on end, you get sappy stories and funny pictures written at arms length because I can’t write about what’s going on in my 9-5 life.  I can’t write about upheavals that are happening at work.  Changes that have me wondering whether it’s time to make a career move.  Wondering if I have the stamina to undergo a second organizational change in 20-some months.  Wondering what I want to be when I grow up. 

I feel like I’m here, in this job, for a while yet.  And while the changes that have occurred have put me in a place where I’m far more uncertain about my job than I was three months ago, I still have a job.  I have a boss who is supportive and flexible and who constantly reminds me that my family comes first.  I still get to pay the mortgage, keep Pampers on C’s butt and wear cute shoes almost every day. 

If I’m honest, I feel a little lost at work.  But at the same time, I’m trying to embrace this new reality and enjoy the down time.  I’m thinking about working on my PR accreditation.  I’m grateful to get my nights and weekends back and not feel guilty for napping on weekends instead of working while the baby naps.  I’m beyond thrilled that I turned off work email on my phone and no longer feel like I have to check email at 8:00 at night. 

It’s still a work in  progress.  I still have moments where I search Monster and browse the newspapers.  (Anyone looking for a reasonably decent writer/marketer/PR professional with an affection for social media?  Anyone?) But I’m working on it. 

So, wish me luck.  I’m gonna need it. 

And if you work with me and you read this?  Well, you understand.

My poor family.  Because of my chosen career path they often get strong armed, guilted, persuaded into attending events that I’m planning.  In fact, Craig and I met at one of these very events just over eight years ago.  Remind me to tell you how he brought a girl to what I thought might have been our first date, mmkay? 

But that’s beside the point.

Over the years, my friends, parents, husband and in-laws have attended and been volunteered for all star football games, dances, craft fairs, golf tournaments and silent auctions. When I left my last job, they probably all did a happy dance thinking that their days of showing up for events they had no interest in were behind them.  But not so.  Turns out, I sort of missed event planning.  So I used my corporate marketing hat last year to pitch an employee-based 5K that would raise money for charity. 

And, once again, my parents and in-laws found themselves volunteering, Craig signed up his football players for service hours and I ran around like a chicken with my head cut off the morning of the run.  There’s something about that excitement the day of the event.  There’s a nervous feeling hoping that the weather holds out.  My mind spins, running through my lists of things to do, wondering what I missed.  And I hear “ka-ching, ka-ching” every time a car pulls in the driveway.  I love it. 

This year, the best part was not the couple thousand dollars we raised or the more than 150 people that showed up.  ::Fist bump to all the people that helped me pull this off::  No.  Instead it was looking out into the crowd and seeing this: 

Because with my mom and dad, my husband and my mother-in-law was my little girl. Smiling, giggling and acting shy when friends and coworkers tried to talk to her.   And it was the happiest I’ve ever been to see familiar faces in the audience.  I’ma working mom.  It’s who I am.  But seeing the face that I’m working for, having her be a (small) part of my “work day” made it so much better.  I know she won’t remember this, but I will.

Today this working mother thing is not working out.  I have IMs flashing at me from coworkers who want to know why their projects aren’t complete and missed phone calls from other staff members who have questions or problems to be addressed.  I chose to ask for forgiveness not permission this morning and forgiveness did not come easy.  But, I am picking my battles today.

My vow to not work on weekends has led to deadlines that are so far passed they’re wearing high tops and scrunchies.  I feel overwhelmed looking at my to do list. There is not enough of me to go around.  I am treading water today.

Or I was until someone scheduled a meeting that will put me home after C should have been fed and halfway to bed.  I don’t want to go to the meeting and miss half of the two hours I get with her a night.  And instead of handling it like a grown up or sucking it up and doing it anyway, I fight back tears and pray that no one walks in my office. Thus becoming the working mother I never wanted to be. 

So, someone tell me.  Drinking at lunch?  Surely it has saved someone’s sanity, right?

You know those times when you imagine what your life will look like in 2, 5 or 10 years?  It’s the picture you saw before you were married and before you had kids.  As the pieces start to fall into place and you come up on those milestones of your wedding day, or seeing the two pink lines on the pregnancy test, the picture starts to get a little clearer.  You hear the voices of the people who tell you that your life is about to change and you see this picture in your head and you sigh, start to smile and think, “yes, yes it is going to change.” 

Because this picture?  It is good.  There is sunshine and happiness, hugs and slobbery kisses.  There is a weekend that ends as quickly as it started because it’s full of laughter and time with family and friends.  This was my weekend.  And it came not a moment too soon. 

Before I had a baby I knew that being a working mom would be tough Monday through Friday.  I understood that my quality time with my child would be limited on work days and that she would spend more time with her grandmother than with me.  I expected that my weekends would be all about my baby and my family.  Instead I’ve found myself frustrated over napping and schedules and being cooped up in the house.  I’ve spent hours trying to get her to sleep, then the half hour that she sleeps analyzing spreadsheets, proofreading and catching up on email. 

Pre-baby I pictured my weekends as a time to relax and get ready for another week.  Maybe I would even cook something or clean my house.  Instead, Saturdays and Sundays fly by with no meals for the week being prepared and my house still a mess. 

But not this weekend.  This weekend I shut off the laptop and ignored email.  (Not that I was getting any, it was a holiday weekend.)  For two days, 48 hours, I stepped away.  I didn’t worry about naps – good thing, since they were boycotted on Saturday.  My daughter and I went for a walk, met a friend for brunch and shopped.  Our families threw parties to celebrate birthdays and an anniversary and, of course, Easter dinner.  It was exactly what I imagined a weekend with my family would look like. 

On Monday, I went back to work with a messy house, nothing cooked and slightly exhausted.  But with the memories of a little girl in her pink dress dancing to the music in church, reaching for Easter eggs and squealing with her daddy.

Today was a bad day.  If I had to guess it was the combination of an overwhelming workload and PMS.  PMS on a Saturday I can handle.  An overwhelming workload on a day that my hormones aren’t all out whack from recently growing a human I can handle.  PMS on a Tuesday at 10 AM when I realize I’ve missed another deadline and look at the next three months of planning where enough work exists for four of me?  Not so good. 

It was a day that 18 months ago would have been rewarded with a cold beer and fried cheese.  And for a moment, just a moment, I found myself missing the ease of having a bad day and wallowing in it.  Coming home and soaking in a hot bath with a glass of wine and a good cry. Or bitching to a co-worker at happy hour.  Or running to the mall and buying new shoes. 

Then, I came home to this face. 

Bundled up in the car seat for the 100-yard ride from Nauni's house to ours. What? It was cold out.

And we giggled.  I clapped while she practiced rolling.  I put her down on one side of the floor and picked her up when she rolled to the other.  She ate carrots and yelled when I didn’t get them in her mouth fast enough.  We gave her a bath and I laughed as she splashed me.  I took pictures, calling her name and making funny noises to try to capture her smile. 

And when I rocked her to sleep and felt her head heavy on my shoulder and the rhythm of her breath on my neck, I found myself wondering why my day was so bad.

Finding balance has been the hardest part of the four months I’ve been back to work.  Wanting to be as productive and on my game as I was pre-baby but not sacrificing my baby for my job.  I know I’m not the only mother to face this.  I’m not special or any worse off than anyone else. 

Most days I’m pretty good at recognizing that this is the life I chose.  I knew before I got pregnant that I would be a working mom.  Because I like to work.  I like getting up, getting out of the house, having adult conversation.  Don’t get me wrong, not working is not an option.  We are a two income family.  But, knowing that staying at home is not an option helps me to put things in perspective.  I am able to remind myself that part of my job as C’s mother is providing for her.  Because I work, she has a house with a yard she can run and play in (you know, after she learns to walk), she has Pampers on her butt and food on her table. 

I don’t feel like a part-time mom.  But it’s hard to know that my kid spends more time with her grandmother than me.  It’s hard to realize at 10AM on a Tuesday that I’m already so far behind that I have two hours of work awaiting me after I put C to bed.  It makes my gut twist when I see my husband look at me out of the corner of his eye when I answer an email while I’m feeding her.  I feel guilty calling my mom three weekends in a row to ask her to babysit while I try to catch up.  I hate that I probably missed the first time she rolled over and I recognize that may be one of many firsts that I miss. 

The place I question myself the most as a mother is letting my job take up so much of my time and my attention.  I’ve promised myself that when she needs me I’ll be there for her.  I’ve sworn that I will be there for her doctor appointments.  I will leave work early for sporting events.  Hell, maybe I’ll even coach her softball team (eh.. maybe not.  I’ll be the mom that brings the snacks.)  These are easy promises to make when your kid is five months old.  I’ve never had to put them into practice. 

Until last week.  When I took a few days off work.  In the middle of tight deadlines and deadlines that I had already missed by a mile (at this point are any of you wondering why I’m still employed?).  I put a request into my boss, said my kid needs to be on a better daytime schedule and I would be out for a few days doing it.  And out I was.   Now, the scheduling thing didn’t really work out because she got sick.  But I was with her father when we took her to the doctor (twice).  I comforted her when she cried, walked the hall with her at night and didn’ t think about what was happening at the office.  Even when the little red light was flashing on my phone indicating that I had emails. I ignored them when my daughter needed me.  Granted Nap War 2010 was an epic fail, but I feel a little better in knowing that I can turn off the career driven voice in my head and focus on my baby.

I used to spend a lot of time imagining what my life would be like when I finally had a job that I liked and was good at.  Or when I could convince Craig to marry me.  Or when I did what I always thought I was put on this earth to do and had a baby.  In these early twenty-some fantasies I was ambitious and successful, I was a hot wife that made her husband weak in the knees, or I was the soccer mom in a gas guzzling SUV with 2.5 kids in the back seat laughing and getting their sticky hands on the windows.  I was easily breezing through life complete with great friends, happy hours, traveling and shopping.  Of course there would be shopping. 

It never occurred to me that to be really good at one might mean sacrificing at least one of the other two.  At work today we had our annual awards lunch and this year, I got an award for my dedication and commitment to developing our strategic plan and new brand identity.  Part of the nomination talked about how I spent time during maternity leave writing copy, participating in conference calls and working with our agency.  As I got up to accept the award, all I could think was “Well, this won’t be part of Munchkin’s baby book.” 

I like my job, I really do.  I finally feel like I have my shit together between 8 and 5.  I see a future.  I know my resume looks good.  I know that I’m good at what I do.  I worked hard for this and I feel damn proud to have gotten here.  But…. 

You see, there’s a but.  I never wanted to be that mom that checks email on her Blackberry while she feeds the baby.  Or the wife that can’t take a day off without taking the laptop home. I can’t blame the office or the boss.  It’s not a pressure that they’ve applied.  It’s a fear that if I stop working as hard as I have for the last 18 months or so, that I will lose the momentum that I’ve gained.  It’s a fear that behind closed doors or under his or her breath a person will mutter, “well, before she had the baby…” It’s not wanting to ever be bored and unnoticed at work again. 

It’s hard squeezing everything into a 24 hour day.  It’s hard finding a way to be the successful chick at work, the wonderful wife and the patient mother.  The only thing hot about me is the hot mess that I am when I come home, a half an hour later than I wanted to with no plans for dinner.  I drip with envy over those women that have it all figured out and I beg them to send me their secrets.  Please.

Does it make me a bad mom if for the THIRD weekend in row, I call my mom and ask her to watch my baby while I go to work on Saturday?

Folks, working is kicking my ass. Like it’s the fourth grade bully that looks at me cross eyed as I walk by with my head down hoping to avoid having my hair pulled. There are deadlines looming, there are deadlines that are passed and every time I think I’m getting close to being caught up. Yeah, I’m not.

::Head desk:: I’m whipped. And I miss my child. And I miss my husband. There needs to be two of me.  Only that wouldn’t work because one of me would need to have the time to explain the work to the other of me.  One of these days I will write a post gushing about the parts of my job I really like.  But right now, I have work that I really should be doing.

To the state of Constant Conflict. Where a new mother, hell any mother, is pulled between wanting to be the same energetic and focused person she was before she birthed a child and the distracted and tired person she became after she had to leave that child to go earn a paycheck.

Again, I KNOW I am not the first mom to go through this and I KNOW everyone says it will get easier. My daughter is in good hands. That is not the point. The point is before I held my little girl and spent just about every moment of her first six weeks of life with her, I always rolled my eyes at the person who left meetings early to get home to their kids, or the person who never went for drinks after, or the ones who complained under their breath about having to travel out of town for work. I was NEVER going to be like that. I wouldn’t let having a child at home keep me from doing what I needed to do to advance at work. (Side note, my ambition is more about wanting to keep a roof over our heads and Nine West shoes on my feet than wanting to rule the world).

Well, I am now that person. Yesterday was my first ‘real’ day back from maternity leave and after a long day of presentation rehearsals and discussions that ended at 7:45, the rest of the marketing department, including my boss and our agency contacts, were headed to dinner. It was my weary voice that asked if dinner was required and skipped out to come home to kiss my kid before putting her to bed. I know I should have taken put in the extra time, especially after being gone for six weeks. I should have been at the table when ideas for today’s presentation were being discussed.  But every single fiber of my being told me to go home. So I did.

And I cried the whole way, because I feel guilty for leaving and guilty for feeling conflicted.  But conflicted is what I feel.  As much as I know leaving was the right decision, I couldn’t help but wonder if my boss is thinking that I’ve changed or if other members of the department feel like I’m not pulling my weight or if I was missing something.  If the next time there’s a new position in our department, will I be judged as not being serious about or dedicated to my job and will it go to someone with less responsibility at home.  And then I think that worrying about those things when my baby is six weeks old makes me a terrible mother who doesn’t understand her priorities. 

See….constant state of conflict. 

Forget writing thank you notes (its been a month, what’s another few days), going through clothes (that’s depressing anyway) or cleaning my house (like I need an excuse to avoid that)… today I am doing nothing but holding my baby, because tomorrow I am leaving her ALL DAY to go to a meeting for work.  ::sigh:: 

Yes I know my maternity leave doesn’t end until next week and I made the choice to be involved with 2010 planning while I was off and I offered to attend the non-mandatory meeting tomorrow.  Do not remind me that all along I’ve talked about how I could not be a stay at home mom, how I needed to get out of the house for ‘adult conversation’ and to feel productive and how I was pretty sure I could rock as a working mom.  Seriously, do not go there, because right now the words to the “You’re Gonna Miss This” song are running through my head and all I can think about is how much I’m going to miss tomorrow and every other day that I’m at work while she is home.  The way we cuddle in bed early in the mornings, and the way she smiles and gurgles after being fed and changed mid-morning, or the way she curls up on my chest to take an afternoon nap. 

So, tomorrow, I will go to the meeting, stop at Dunkin Donuts for a hot chocolate and put on my happy face about how it feels good to be back; but today, I am holding my baby and trying not to cry.  And seriously, the first person to say I told you so, loses blog reading rights.