Our Little Baby Blog

Back to Work

As of this evening at 5:20 p.m., I have completed my second week of work. I'm happy to report that no major catastrophes have occurred yet. Our caregiver, Cindy, has been amazing with Anna and we feel so good about leaving her there. That's by far the most important part of this. Cindy lives about 4 blocks away and has a baby of her own. Mike walks Anna down there each morning and I pick her up after work. Cindy is sweet, reliable, highly educated (a PhD, if you can believe it), and really a joy to be around. Regardless of how I feel about leaving her each day, Anna is safe and sound and happy and that's really what matters.

For those of you who don't know, I am now working 4 days a week and theoretically arrive at work at 8:00 a.m. and leaving by 5:00 p.m. I say theoretically because it's been VERY difficult for me to leave at 5:00 p.m. and I am not even particularly busy right now. After just two weeks back at work, I cannot tell you how much respect I have for working mothers. Talk about having my eyes opened in a way I never imagined... I had no idea how much energy and organization it takes to do all this.

Going back to work is challenging on a lot of levels. Obviously, I miss Anna oodles and gobs. Each morning before I leave, I shower her with kisses and hope that she'll be as excited to see me at the end of the day as I am just thinking about how I get to see her. This is the kind of emotional pull that makes it hard to walk out the door. But then there's another level of logistical challenges added to this. From 5:30 a.m. when I wake up to 8:00 pm when Anna goes down, I feel like it's a race. And then in the "free time" we have between 8 - 10 p.m., we have to do all those extra things like eat or finish work or unload the dishwasher before heading to bed. Mike has always been able to function on little sleep, but I'm not so lucky. I need my 8 hours or I have trouble making complete sentences. So there's just very little time in the day to do anything that isn't a necessity. I'm not complaining, mind you, after all this appears to be how America operates every day and I'm actually a bit proud of myself for making it through the last two weeks without a major mistake (i.e. forgot to pick up my child or slept through the alarm). I'm just shocked at how oblivious I was to it all. And, we're the lucky ones. Mike and I are a good team and we take turns with various household tasks, plus we have certain amenities that a lot of people don't have like a dishwasher and a car, and a cleaning lady that comes every 3 weeks. We're certainly fortunate.

On top of this, I'm still breastfeeding and that means pumping at work. I am lucky in that I have an office where I can shut my door, but there's no lock. So I sit at my desk and pump and pray that no one views the "do not disturb" sign as just a suggestion. The logistics of my pumping and cleaning of the pump parts operation have been refined several times already, but I can't seem to get it down to less that 40 minutes. And I have to do this three times a day while at work. Again, I had no idea women all across the country were doing this... it's a little nuts if you ask me. Worth it and important, but a little nuts.

So now it's Thursday and, unfortunately, I am going to have to work from home tomorrow. But, I knew that would probably happen. At least I'll get to hang with Anna and stay in my pajamas til noon. All in all, I'd give myself a B+ for the last two weeks. I am hoping to bring it up to an A- but I can live with the current grade for now.