Right At Home

I recently apologized to a friend for not returning her email, explaining that we had six birthdays in our family in one week and hosted three parties.  She paused, looked at me as if I had silly string shooting out of my ears, and clarified, "three parties....at your house?!"  I nodded.  She then asked, "Do you just love being at home?"

I went on to explain that I have always run at this speed, but now I can do it without falling apart; so yes, I do love being at home.  Almost daily I get asked by friends how our "new life" is.  It has been almost five months since I quit my job of eleven years, got a new job working 1-2 shifts a month at a residential hospice, and most importantly, decided to stay at home and take in two other kiddos during the day.  Michael got an evening position at his job, allowing him to be home until 1:30 each day, which has re-routed family time to a new schedule and dimension. 

So the verdict on our new life?  Pretty awesome.  We have so much more time together as a family.  I get to watch my kids grow at a slower pace.  My "after hours" workload has transformed from charting and on-call shifts to meal planning and Pinterest perusing.  I went from driving 100 miles a day with the windows open on nicer days to lounging on the grass and running through sprinklers every day.  When I'm having a reflective moment of taking in the joy of being with the kids, it's not overshadowed by feelings of "hurry up and enjoy this, you have work to do after they're in bed."  It's unbelievable freedom to enjoy.  When they get sick, I get to be here to take care of them. When it's Sunday, there's no fear of Monday morning.  I can blog, bake, plan parties, read, and swim.  I can sit in my backyard inflatable pool in the middle of the day.  I can see friends. I can celebrate my kids' birthdays on the day, all day long.

Lest I paint a picture of a serene life, staying home is hard work, which was no surprise to me.  It's just a different kind of hard.  The intensity of my former job has translated into messier intensities at home.  I had to scrub the table for 10 minutes before I could find a spot clean enough to put my laptop down to write this blog.  In a period of only a few hours today, I facilitated six full outfit changes, eight if you include the ones they started with; one kid peed on our rug, another spilled two full cups of lemonade on the table and chair and his entire outfit, another massaged noodles into his hair and created sensory water fun in the toilet.  Yesterday I attempted to vacuum only to end up kneeling on the carpet pulling up crystals of Tootsie Pop debris that had glued themselves down to the fibers.  Charlie climbs on top the table a minimum of ten times a day, and pulls chairs up to the fridge to dispense water onto the floor.  He is also our child who sticks small toys into outlets.  I have been foraging through a chronic back pain flare that put me in urgent care this weekend.  I have managed to do a load of laundry each day, but haven't folded or put away a single item of clothing in days.  But I'd rather have this kind of hard than some of the hard I experienced when balancing work and home life a few months ago.

There is a certain expertise and specialized experience in my nursing profession that is not being used right now, and at times I'm tempted to feel sad that everything I put into my career is now "wasted." But I always come around to the assurance that I was meant to be on that path during that time in my life, and now I'm meant to be on this one.  I don't regret not leaving my job sooner, and I don't feel I've missed out on my kids.  I also don't regret doing the full-time mom thing instead now.  I'm right at home, right now. 

I have been supported by a tremendous community of family, friends, and coworkers who have validated my decisions.  They've told me how different I look.  My conversations, attitude, and energy are all changed. But I want to take a moment to emphasize how very much I support parents who choose to work, and parents who choose to be at home.  And how much I empathize with those who would love to be home but can't afford to.  The decision to be at home versus work full time can be so painful.  Amidst the support I've gotten throughout my difficult decisions, I've also come across some interesting attitudes and advice.  Countless colleagues in the working community have said "you can always go back," or  "you won't loose your skills," or "you know, this is good, until your kids are in school."  And this is all well-meaning, but if I've learned anything it's that I don't have a 5-year-plan, only God does.  Maybe I'll go back, maybe not.  I'm happy where I am, and that is more than enough.  I've also had some feedback from the stay-at-home-mom communities; knowing looks and comments like, "you just don't get this time back," or "I bet you are so glad you're at home now." One couple even said, "we just get so excited when we hear of mothers who quit their jobs to be at home with their kids."  I get this underlying sense of "so glad you made the right decision," as if I chose work over my kids.

So to all communities I say...working is hard.  Staying at home is hard.  Both are wonderful. Both have blessings and incredible challenges. Choosing one over the other does not mean you love your children more or less than someone else on another path.  I understand both worlds intimately, and I so wish that there wasn't this separation in parental communities.  So madres and padres, whether you're in-house or out in the workforce, know that we're all working supah dupah hard to love and provide our kids.  We're all pulling off miracles every day.  You're all important, you're all valuable, and you're doing a great job, whatever that may be.