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“Having It All” Is a Big Ugly Lie

I know, I know, I’m probably the one millionth person to make this groundbreaking statement.

Still...it’s true. It’s a lie to say that women can have it all. But it’s a lie that goes deeper than just the very obvious fact that it’s impossible.

It’s a lie that hides in plain sight. In the very language we use to describe the thing that so many working mothers have been exhausting ourselves in the never-ending pursuit to achieve.

I don’t pretend to speak for every working mother, but when I’m busy “having it all,” it doesn’t usually feel I’m “having” anything.

While I’m in the middle of answering emails, playing dress-up, making dinner, and prepping for client presentations, I feel like I’m doing and giving and being a lot, but “having”? Not so much.

Maybe that’s because, too often, I’ve defined “having it all” as “having responsibility for it all.” As “having to deal with it all.” Or, sometimes, “having to pretend that I don’t feel like saying ‘fuck it all.’”

From the conversations I’ve had over a-few-too-many glasses of wine with other working moms, in those precious moments when we try to jam in some communal “self care” after the kids are asleep, I get the feeling I’m not the only one.

We’re all so busy doing, giving, and being it all, that we don’t stop for a moment to ask ourselves what we’re getting out of the deal. But, every once in a while, in rare moments, a little voice inside us pipes up and asks, “Is this really what you wanted?”

And we laugh, commiserate with our friends, perhaps make a joking toast to “having it all!” Then we pour another glass of wine and we tell that little voice to shut the fuck up and leave us alone because we are doing the best we can.

But...I’ve started listening to that little voice. And it has some pretty damn interesting things to say.

Here’s what I’m beginning to believe (intellectually if not always instinctively): Having it all is possible. Except we’ve spent our entire lives being taught that having isn’t something we’re allowed to do. Not if we’ve got two x chromosomes and several generations of martyrdom showing us the ropes.

What we call “having,” that’s not what having means.

Having doesn’t mean doing. It doesn’t mean giving.

Having it all doesn’t mean being performing at home AND at work. It doesn’t mean being an excellent mother AND a strong, sexy wife. Having means taking. It means receiving. It means accepting. It means owning. Having isn’t about what you do for your company or your children or your spouse. It’s about determining who you are to yourself. It’s about knowing what matters to you. It’s about knowing what you want, what you need. And it’s about expecting that you will get it.

Having it all doesn’t mean going on vacation and finding yourself on a conference call while simultaneously doing dishes in the kitchen and angrily wondering why you are the only one on the planet capable of making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. It means going on vacation and GOING ON VACATION. It means saying “I’m not available this week” and for the love of god it means doing that and NOT SAYING SORRY. Having means knowing that your time off isn’t a gift. It’s something you’ve earned. And you have a right to take that time without apologizing to anyone for doing so. Even if things are busy. Even if it feels like the company will fall apart without you. It probably won’t. But even if it does, “having it all” means knowing that IT. IS. NOT. YOUR. PROBLEM. But you know what? “Having it all” also means having the right to say, “I really want to take this conference call. It’s important to me and you all are going to have to figure out what to do with yourselves until I’m done.” And sometimes “having it all” means putting down the phone, putting down the peanut butter-covered knife, leaving everyone to their own devices and going down to the beach and reading a fucking novel without having to look up every three sentences to make sure someone isn’t drowning or to say “OHH WOW WHAT A PRETTY SEASHELL.” And “having it all” means that, NO, YOU ARE NOT SORRY.

We say we are sorry because we’ve all been taught that sorry is what we’re supposed to be all of the time, but what the fuck do we have to be sorry for?

Why do so many of us feel like we need to ask forgiveness for wanting things?

Why do so many of us we feel like we have to ask permission from our employers, from our spouses, from our freaking toddlers, to have our own needs and desires? I know this is reductive. I know our husbands do so much more than our mothers’ husbands ever did. I know that even being able to consider exercising my right to have is a reflection of privilege that too many mothers don’t have the money or support to enjoy. I know it’s a complicated issue and it’s something that affects every working parent, not just mothers. But I also know that most of the fathers I know aren’t saddled with the guilt I hear in the voices of my mother friends. I don’t hear the fathers I know worrying that no matter how much they do or give, it’s never going to be enough. And, if they do express those things, I don’t hear them turning that reality into self-hatred. I don’t see them drawing a conclusion that there’s something deeply wrong with them because they can’t do or give or be it all. And just because things are better for some of us than for others doesn’t mean that we’re not working in a bullshit, broken system. And it doesn’t mean that we can’t stand up and call it out for what it is. Bullshit. I don’t know know why or how or when we got the idea that we weren’t allowed to take as much as we give. And, frankly, I’m not super interested in digging into the whys or hows or whens. All I know is that, all this time, when we thought we were having it all, we somehow ended up, once again, giving ourselves away.

So, ladies, I’d like to propose a toast: HERE’S. TO. HAVING. IT. ALL. FOR REAL.

(Image credit: Yaskii for WorkingMother.com. Also, the lady in the illustration cracks me up. Is that zen motherhood? Or is she just a worn-out zombie, who’s like “Fuck it, kid. Have your binkie. Mama’s on the phone with a client”?)

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Everything is ruined and I’m terrible forever.

S and I were in the living room one Saturday morning a few weeks ago. She was coloring. I was reading. It was one of those quiet moments that are so precious because they are so rare.

Then suddenly, she was screaming.

Her marker had slipped outside the line. And that pink scribble that went where it wasn’t supposed to sent her right into a DefCon5 meltdown.

"IT'S RUINED!" she howled. "I RUINED IT! I'M BAD AT COLORING! I'M THE WORST!"

I picked her up off the ground and held her. I told her that coloring isn't about right or wrong. That it's about expression, not perfection. And that, with time and practice, she'll get better.

But she wasn't having it. "I'M ALWAYS GOING TO BE BAD AT COLORING. IT'LL NEVER EVER EVER EVER GET BETTER."

Eventually she calmed down and seemed to forget her trauma. (In fact, she turned it into a strategic play for hot cocoa.)

But I haven't forgotten it. Weeks later and that moment is still banging around inside my head.

It ripped my heart out to hear my kid beat herself up like that. Because to me, she's perfect. Even if she's the shittiest colorer in the world, she is exactly who she should be. And it hurts to hear her doubt that for even a moment.

But what’s messing with my head is how familiar her words felt.

I've spent my entire life battling those same cognitive distortions. The black-and-white thinking. The obsession with perfection. The sense that when something goes wrong, it's because you are, in some fundamental way, "the worst."

Since that Saturday, I've been hyper-focused on everything I say in front of her, trying to catch myself in those self-defeating patterns.

But I also keep wondering (because I do love stoking the hot fires of self-recrimination): What if my thought habits aren't the issue?

What if that shit is encoded in my chromosomes?

Am I modeling this kind of thinking in ways so subtle I can't even tell when it's happening? Or am I - and now her - just built to be anxious and self-critical and perhaps a teensy bit dramatic?

But, really, it doesn't matter either way. Because all the agonizing is nothing but me pushing away the truth that I can't protect her from pain.

We all become parents for partly selfish reasons. Mine was the fantasy that I could help my child become a healthier, more whole person than I am.

But she’s teaching me every day that I can’t make her into anything. She is of me, but also beyond me, in all the best and hardest ways.

So I'm trying to focus less on what I'm doing wrong and instead, keep teaching her what I know to be true.

I'm going to keep reminding her that failure is how we learn. That perfection is neither possible nor expected. And, at the heart of it, that she has a right to be here. No matter what.

I believe those things for her, to my core.

And as I keep holding her in the light that only a mother can generate, maybe I'll learn to believe those things for me too.

[mamaneedsabigidea]

Three Years, Four Months, Minus One Day

Twenty steps.

That’s as far as I can carry you now.

We look like a circus act, your feet dangling halfway between my knees and ankles.

I stagger from the house toward the mailbox, enacting a ritual we’ve observed since the first day you came home.

I’m paying attention, as closely as I know how. To your laughter echoing in the trees. Your breath hot against my neck. Your hair, overlong golden tangles obscuring your eyes as you tell me faster mommy, faster, there’s a bear, it’s going to get us.

I have to set you down.

You’re too big for this body that carried you. These arms that rocked you. This heart that yearns to keep you close, as you explode toward a world that pulls you away from me.

You are too big and I am too small and I have to set you down.

Knowing that one day, one day far too soon, I’ll never pick you up again.

[mamaneedsabigidea]

Things that Help #1

There are a lot of words on this blog about the emotional, psychological and metaphysical experience of being a mother and a creative at the same time. But I just realized I haven’t really shared much of the down-and-dirty details of how the hell you make this work.

The good news is that it’s only taken me 3.25 years to pull together a few pieces of concrete practical advice that might help you. I hope. (An obligatory disclaimer: This is what works for my family and my family is not your family and I am not you and this might be stupid advice you’ve already heard and really what do these dumb little life hacks matter in the face of the fact that, in the scheme of all things, we are all just insignificant flashes of light in a vast swath of interstellar darkness...ahem.) Money

I hope this does not come off as the most obvious and obnoxious thing to say. But I’m not being flippant, I swear. One of the advantages of being a working parent is you have more money than you would if you didn’t work. A friend once told me, “Don’t be afraid to throw money at the problem.” And she’s absolutely right. Childcare is expensive. Prepared food is expensive. But they are way less expensive than the long-term costs of leaving the workforce. Your time has value, too. And, since having Seraphina, I realize that time is really the one thing there’s never enough of. So yeah, if you can buy yourself a few more moments in the day, do it.

Help

You cannot do this alone. If you try, you will hate your life and you will fail. If I have one regret about the first year of Seraphina’s life, it’s that I rarely accepted the help people offered me.

Whenever someone offered to watch the baby or do something for me, this little voice would start jabbering in my head, whispering things like “They don’t really mean it, they’re just being nice, you don’t want to burden them, what if she poops, what if she poops on them while they are holding her, what if she simultaneously poops and pukes all over them and they hate you and your child and will never talk to you again.” If you have a voice like that, tell it to shut up. People like babies. They want to help. They love feeling useful.

Don’t be like me. Accept the help people offer you. Ask for help when you need it. People love you.

(And if the baby pukes and poops on them at the same time, you will all laugh about it someday and when your kid is an adult, your friend will be all like ‘haha, you puked and pooped on me once when you are a baby.’ It’s going to be great. Seraphina once peed all over my friend’s upholstered chaise lounge and we are still friends. I think. (Hi, Ellen, I love you.))

Of course, you’re going to need more significant help than friends holding your kid or bringing you dinners. You are going to need HELP. Like help that you pay for. (Unless you have a local family member who is dying to care for your child full-time, in which case I envy you with the fire of a thousand burning suns.)

The good news is that you have lots of options. You can hire a nanny. You can find a great daycare. I ended up doing both.

Seraphina goes to daycare for most of the day, but a loving, wonderful, magical woman named Maggie picks her up at 4:15 and stays with her until I get home from work. They play, they do art, they read books in Polish -- and I don’t have to stress about racing a clock while my kid is sitting all alone, the last one on the playground.

It’s really the most awesome setup. But I never would have thought of it myself. One day when I was pregnant, I was bitching to a co-worker about how neither a nanny or a daycare felt totally right. She said “Why don’t you do both?” I looked at her and actually said out loud, “WAIT ARE YOU ALLOWED TO DO THAT?” Turns out, you are. You’re allowed to do whatever the hell you need to do to make it work.

In the last three years, to make it work, I have had to:

Bring a co-worker to babysit my 11-month-old while I was in a pitch

Leave my husband to solo parent for almost two weeks

Sit my kid in the pitch room with an iPad for most of a Saturday

Post a cry for help on FB for last-minute help

Fly my sister in from Arizona to babysit for three hours

But it has always, always worked out. And, as I drove S to school this morning, she was singing and happy and seems to be not terribly broken. (Though when I went to kiss her goodbye, she did sneeze directly into my mouth because children are disgusting.) This YouTube Video

Yes, it’s cheesy. Yes, the outfits capture pretty much every crime of the ‘80s. Yes the boy in the last scene looks entirely too old to be sitting on his grandmother’s lap. But, when I had to travel for work, I would watch it with Seraphina before I left. And she would watch it almost every day while I was gone. And yes, to tell the truth, sometimes I would watch it in my hotel room while I was gone and cry and cry, but I’m maudlin like that. Now that she’s three, she needs to watch it less, because, yep, she’s realized that mommy comes back. And probably she’s also realized that when mommy is gone daddy lets her watch all the Bubble Guppies she can handle and that’s pretty awesome too.

Clothing Subscription Boxes

I really, truly would be naked without Stitch Fix. I was never a big fan of shopping, but now that I’m a mom, an uninterrupted hour to stand alone in a dressing room is an unimaginable luxury. If you’re a stylish person who enjoys shopping, that’s what the Internet is for. But if, like me, you don’t love it, why not outsource the job to someone who is better at it than you? When you sign up, you tell them what size and shape and colors you are, you tell them what you like and don’t like, you tell them how much money you’re willing to spend. And then, like magic, a box of five things shows up on your doorstep. Try it on at home after the kid is already asleep, package up everything you don’t want, and drop it in the mailroom on your way into work the next day. It has made my life so much easier. And sometimes, when I am feeling very very fancy, I will get a shipment from Trunk Club. Which is just like Stitch Fix, except all of the clothes come from Nordstrom, which means they are very nice but expensive, so I only do it a few times a year and feel very fancy when I do.

Bringing Your Kid to Work Sometimes

There are times you might have to, because your nanny is sick or because daycare is closed for a teacher workday. But you should also bring the kid by sometimes just because it’s fun to show off the little creature you made. And they will LOVE coming to your office. They will love being treated like a tiny little superstar and they will love it when your co-workers talk to them in that weird voice we all reserve for cute kids. They will love touching all the crap on your desk and playing with the random toy you got from some production company and they will marvel at all the snacks you are surrounded by and they will get jacked up on sugar and have the time of their life. And I think it really does help them to know where you are when you are not with them.

To Be Continued...

This post is a novella at least, so I’m going to stop before it becomes the War and Peace of personal blogging. But I don’t want to wait until S is 6 before I share anything useful, so from now on, I’ll pop up a thing that helps whenever I think of it. And, if you have things that help, please tell me. Please. I’ll take all the help I can get.

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Things I Unsuccessfully Attempted Before Finally Manhandling Clothes onto My 3-Year-Old as She Screamed Like I Was Killing Her

Saying, in my best robot voice, “INITIATING CLOTHING SEQUENCE.”

Bribing her with an episode of Caillou, commonly known as the world’s most annoying cartoon

Counting to three. Really slowly. Twice.

Flapping the pants open and closed like a puppet mouth while pleading, “All I want in life is to be on a little girl.”

Pointing at the stars on her pants and screaming “LOOK! THERE ARE STARS ON THESE PANTS! YOU LOVE STARS!” (Her response: “I want MOONS!!! ****tears and screaming****”)

Glaring at my husband as though he were somehow telepathically instructing her to be a huge pain in my ass

Yelling “YOU ARE MAKING ME LATE!” (because of course a three-year-old gives half a crap about my meeting schedule)

Very casually saying to her father “WOW DADDY, OUR BABY IS SUCH A BIG GIRL. DO YOU THINK SHE IS BIG ENOUGH TO PUT ON HER OWN CLOTHES? NAHHH.”

Threats. Ex: “Do you want to go to school naked?” (The answer: “YES!”)

“MAMA IS DRESSED. DADDY IS DRESSED. WHY ARE YOU NOT DRESSED?” 

Walking away in hopes that she would magically do it herself. (Spoiler alert: She didn’t.)

Repeating multiple times, “I know you keep saying it, but I swear, your panties are not in your butt.”

Mentally booking a one-way bus ticket to some quiet Midwestern town where I could get a job at Target and start all over again

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12 ways in which my toddler is like a drunk sorority girl.

- Falls down while wearing pretty dresses

- Obsessed with other women’s boobs

- Really sloppy kisser

- Laughing one second, sobbing the next

- Loves to dance, especially while standing on tables

- Demands pizza over and over again in a loud, annoying voice

- Passes out in inconvenient places

- Won’t let me go to the bathroom alone

- Tells long stories that are totally incoherent

- Enjoys taking her shirt off in public

- Spills every drink you hand her

- Throws up without warning, then just keeps right on partying

[mamaneedsabigidea]

Big Ears

I always knew that, at some point, I’d have to start watching what I say around the kid.

I just didn’t know that point would happen so soon.

S has been adding about a word a day to her vocabulary. But she’s yet to string more than one together.

Until now.

The other day, I was bumbling around the house and I put the milk in the pantry or the trash in the fridge or I tripped over my own shoelace or I said “car seat” when I meant “stroller” or something similarly bone-headed.

I looked at S and said, “Baby, your mama is a dodo.”

S looked back at me, cracked a devilish smile, then said her first two-word phrase: “Mama. Dodo.”

Oops.

Really, I should know better.

I don’t want to teach my daughter that relentless self-deprecation is a winning strategy in life. I’ve learned that lesson the hard way. Inside my head lives an abusive tyrant that constantly reminds me that I’m a failure at life, love, work and cooking anything more complicated than a bowl of cereal.

I don’t want that for her.

But on an even deeper level, I should know better because my entire career and self-concept revolve around harnessing the power of words. That’s what I do. That’s what I preach to anyone who will listen. So when I use words in such a careless manner, without regard to what they are teaching my daughter about how her mother sees herself in the world, I’m denying the very truth I beg people to understand.

Does that mean I’ve managed to refrain from wielding a single self-harming word since my realization?

Nope.

But it does mean that, whenever I notice myself doing it, I stop and I tell S what I really meant to say: “Mama’s not really a dodo. Mama is just frustrated because sometimes her body doesn’t do what she wants it to/brain can’t hold everything at one time/words don’t always come out right.”

And maybe, in some ways, that’s even better than not saying anything at all. Because I’m teaching her to notice the words that, especially for women, seem to slip out so easily. I’m teaching her to stop herself. To recognize what she really meant to say. I’m teaching her to label her feelings. And most of all, I’m teaching her to stand up against the person who will probably always be her harshest critic: herself.

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Holy shit, I think I might be this person. My shame is overwhelming.

It’s Showtime!

When someone comes on the subway with a bright-eyed baby in a good mood, it’s like a magic act.  People are engaged, they’re making googie faces, they’re trying to see what this baby is up to:  “OH, he’s smiling!  Hiiiii!  Peek-a-BOO!”  It’s great.

Toddlers on the other hand, aren’t magical, necessarily. But some parents still think they’ve got a Magical Baby!  They enter the subway with their toddlers like those subway dancers: “It’s Showtime!” and suddenly the subway ride is all about the toddler’s crazy antics:  

“Oh, look Jackson is going around on the pole!” “Oh, now Jackson!  Watch out for the nice lady!” “Jackson, please sit on your butt, you can’t stand on the seat!”  

It’s like “The Jackson Show” all of a sudden.  There’s a tone of voice that these parents use with their kids that is presentational, like the greater public is involved.  They’re announcing things to the kid and everyone within a 20 foot radius.  It feels like this scolding Jackson is getting is for my benefit somehow, instead of getting Jackson to chill.

Now I’m watching a show called “The Very Good Parent of Jackson” that i didn’t know I bought a ticket for.  Hey, I’m trying to do a crossword puzzle here.  I want my money back.

Hey, maybe I’m turning into Andy Rooney in my old age.  But people gotta chill with their kids!  

[mamaneedsabigidea]

I am the problem.

(This is from my drafts folder. I wrote it a couple months ago, then must have decided not to post it. These days, I may not be feeling any more on top of life but I’m certainly feeling a lot less crazy. I only wish I’d been able to talk more about it at the time. But post-partum anxiety is real.) 

I've been struggling lately.  I won't lie. More and more, I've had these elaborate fantasies about quitting my job in favor of some imagined career that would take away all of my anxiety about holding together a full-time job and a baby whose real grown-up have-it-together parents don't seem to be showing up anytime soon.

Each night, I go to sleep terrified of what the next day will bring: what meeting request I'll have to decline, what new project I'll have to fit in, what unexpected illness will keep the baby home from school and throw a wrench into my carefully constructed plans.

I do this every single night.

And every single day, things work out. They are never as unmanageable as I feared. The statistics prove it.

The number of days where things didn't work out: 0

The number of hours I've spent worrying that things might not work out: dear god, it hurts me to even imagine.

I've spent so many moments of Seraphina's life lashing myself to a ship of anxiety, creating my own stormy waters of dark imaginings.

The other night, I found myself awake at 2am, unable to fall asleep because I was busy worrying about how to make the childcare situation work once Seraphina is out of daycare and onto preschool. You know. 2.25 YEARS from now.

That's not "mommy stress."

It's not "a lot going on."

It's not "hormones."

It's an anxiety problem that's turning all my joy into dread.

And it's not okay.

But the wonder of it all, is that none of this is real. I've created it all. Which means I can create it differently.

If I can't? Well, there are things to help with that too. And I'm not too proud to get help if I need it.

Being a working mom is totally doable. Being a working mom with raging anxiety, not so much.

[mamaneedsabigidea]

What not to call your pumping room

Our pumping room at work is called the Lactation Station, because we are a creative ad agency and clever as hell.

Today I entertained myself while pumping by thinking of some really bad alternatives. I’ve catalogued some of the worst ones below:

The Milk Jug

The Prolactin Depot

The Mammary Pocket (evokes the warm comfort a kangaroo offers her joey)

The Pump Dumpster

The Boob Refuge

The Splash Zone

The Bosom Barn

And my favorite...

The Squirt Locker (would also make an awesome porn movie)

Got any bad/good ones to add?

[mamaneedsabigidea]

My baby, the sociopath.

At just a few weeks shy of a year, Seraphina is breathtakingly cute. She's all big, toothy grins, enthusiastic waves and sweet dance moves to the tinny music of her activity table.

She’s also terrifyingly brutal.

Kitty, sweet, asthmatic, 17-year-old Kitty, is the primary target of her abuse.

Each day, when we arrive home from the storage facility I euphemistically call “baby school,” Seraphina immediately squirms to be set down. Once obliged, she crawls, hands and feet all slapslapslap, right to Kitty.

As she approaches, she lets loose a bloodcurdling shriek, kind of like the bully version of Mel Gibson’s “FREEEEEEEDOMMMMMMM!”

If allowed to reach Kitty unchecked, she will jam both hands into Kitty’s side, curl them into fistfuls of hair and loose skin and PULL, yanking Kitty several inches to either side.

Despite this same scenario playing out at least a dozen times since Seraphina has been mobile, Kitty never takes evasive action. She just sits there, watching, as her tormenter approaches, with sort of a weary air about her.

I’m not one for violence on either side and I have no desire to take my cat-scratched baby to urgent care. But honestly? I feel like Kitty would be well within her rights to defend herself. A gentle swat, a warning hiss – something.

But no. Poor, stoic Kitty just lies there and takes it. Even worse, she PURRS through the whole thing. Perhaps she has some kind of feline Stockholm Syndrome. Or maybe she’s just happy that someone is finally giving her a little attention.

We’ve been trying to get Seraphina to understand how to engage with a pet. In our house, this involves saying, over and over, in a loud, enthusiastic and rather dopey voice, “GENTLE!!! GENTLE!!!!!" while at the same time, making exaggerated petting motions. Frankly, we look like idiots. But it’s an idiocy I’m willing to assume, if it means she’ll give the cat a break.

Every time we repeat this lesson, Seraphina looks up at us with careful attention for a moment, then resumes yanking Kitty off the ground by the skin of her side.

But yesterday, something different happened.

Seraphina approached Kitty and all happened as per our usual routine: We intercepted her approach, hollered "GENTLE!!! GENTLE!!!!," demonstrated the appropriate patting motion, Seraphina watched carefully.

But then! Then!

She extended one chubby hand and, ever so gently, she patted Kitty.

Once, twice...

Then pulled her by the tail two feet across the floor.

I picked her up and said “NO we don’t hurt Kitty.”

She smiled hugely, then attempted to claw off my right eyebrow.

“NO! WE DON’T HURT MAMA!” I said with as much force as I could muster.

She looked at me. Laughed right in my face. Tried to pull out my nose stud.

Frustrated, I set her down in the containment area we euphemistically call “baby playground.”

She immediately started sobbing.

So, that’s a...win?

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Vacation All I Ever Wanted

Before we became parents, my husband and I took at least one vacation a year. In fact, just months before I got pregnant, we spent a fabulous week in Paris.

Even on maternity leave, I snuck in a family week at the beach.

But now that I’m a full-time working mom, vacations look a little bit different.

The baby wakes up every morning at 2am and 5am, then is up for good at 7am. This includes the weekend. Each morning, we bring her into bed with us at 5am, then both desperately try to will her back to sleep when she starts kicking and talking and rolling around at 7am.

Eventually, we give up and groggily start playing with her. Until, at some point, I announce “I’m taking a vacation.”

At which point I roll over and turn my back on the two of them for about five minutes.

From a week in Paris to five minutes in bed while my baby claws at my back the whole time.

Pretty much sums it up.

[mamaneedsabigidea]

Don't Wake the Baby!

Last month, I got on a plane for the first time in almost a year. It was a short business trip, just for a day, but it was also the first time I had to leave before S woke up, knowing I wouldn't arrive home until long after she'd gone to sleep.

The night before the trip, as I was getting ready for bed, my husband laid down the law for me.

"Don't wake up the baby," he said.

I tried to affect my most innocent look. As if I would ever put my own selfish desire for sleepy snuggles and baby aroma sniffing above my child's need for restful sleep.

"I would never," I said. "Unless, you know, she's already awake because she's hungry."

Which was a definitely possibility. My flight was scheduled for 6:05am, which meant I needed to be out of the house by 4:47am, if I pushed it to the absolute limit.

(Proof that it really happened: This grainy photo taken at sunrise on my iPad, like a true gangster.)

The baby had been waking up for a solid week, right on schedule at about 4:20am.

So I had it all figured out. The baby would wake up, I'd get my early-morning snoogle on and nurse her at the same time, which would also conveniently spare me the indignity of pumping in the airport bathroom.

I bet you already see where this is going.

I'm in the bathroom, slooowlly getting ready while keeping one eye on the monitor. At 4:18am, not a twitch.

4:20am, still fast asleep.

4:24am, absolutely no sign of waking.

Now, being a responsible, caring mother who is the picture of absolute selflessness, I would NEVER go in the room to wake up my baby.

But, at 4:28am, with S still dead to the world and me facing the very real possibility that I was going to miss her, I might have done something a bit, shall we say, untoward.

See, the baby monitor has four buttons on it, one of which says TALK. This button turns the unit in the baby's room into a little speaker, so parents can say stuff like "IT'S OKAY, BABY!" and "GO BACK TO SLEEP!" when their sweet precious kidlets wake up at some ungodly hour. 

Now, this was indeed an ungodly hour, but for the first time, I actually wanted my baby to be awake.

So, it's possible, hypothetically possible, very vaguely sort of inconclusively possible, that I may have pushed the TALK button.

I may have, in fact, held down the TALK button with one hand. And, though you'll never prove it, there is a slight outside chance that I might have used the other hand to bang some stuff around the counter a wee bit more loudly than necessarily, in hopes that the resulting racket might stir the baby from her dead sleep.

And yes, had you been in my bathroom at 4:32am, you might have seen my holding down the TALK button with one hand while using my electric toothbrush with the other, so that the buzzing of the toothbrush, held directly next to the TALK speaker, might have more success than a clanking deodorant container.

But we will never know if these things happened. Because the baby never woke up. And I did indeed find myself pumping in an airport bathroom.

Fortunately, while it was sort of gross, I did not perish. And while the day was long, I managed to pull myself together into some semblance of a working professional. And, thanks to a very quick-thinking colleague, I was able to get on an earlier flight home and come banging through the door a good five minutes before bedtime.

At which point, I may possibly have gathered my baby into my arms and burst into tears, as though I were welcoming her home from a three-year deployment.

[mamaneedsabigidea]

Mama's Good Luck Charm

From pretty much the moment I got pregnant, I started trying to figure out how to make this working mom business work out. And I'd set it up pretty well. Except for one word that probably strikes fear into the heart of everyone who's crazy enough to be both an ad creative and a parent. Pitch. Generally, I can manage my days into a rough kind of routine. Not perfect, but manageable. But in a pitch situation, all that structure goes out the window. There are late nights, early mornings and, if you end up on the presentation team, traveling to the pitch meeting itself. I knew I wasn't going to get out of pitching forever. And I was right. Last month, I got put on my first pitch. A fast and furious one. When our creative manager came to give me the assignment, I think she saw the fear in my eyes. "Don't worry," she said. "You're not REALLY on this," she said. "Just tip in a few ideas here and there, whatever you've got." Fast forward a week and I'm up at 2:00am, making last-minute TV script revisions and trying to figure out what to do with the baby while we are at the pitch. That's right, we. Because my husband was in the pitch meeting too. "'Don't worry,' she said. 'You're not REALLY on this,' she said," I bitched aloud to the dark living room as I frantically typed revisions with one hand, while also texting my partner who was still at the office, all while keeping one eye on the baby monitor. It is also theoretically possible that I might have, once or twice, said, "I quit. I just, I quit." But I didn't quit. I asked Seraphina's babysitter to work late. I felt extremely sorry for myself at times. I thanked the heavens for the awesomeness of my partner, who was missing out on time with his own kids to be in the office for the late-night meetings I couldn't make. We drove to the pitch with the baby in the backseat. During the rehearsal and the pitch meeting itself, a fabulous, wonderful saint of a co-worker watched Seraphina in our hotel room. (An act of love that was certainly not in her job description!) I stood up in the pitch meeting, I presented with at least a modicum of coherence, then we continued on to our first family Thanksgiving. A pitch was the thing I'd been most dreading since the day I came back from maternity leave. I was terrified I couldn't pull it off. And I couldn't. Not by myself. Not without asking for help. Which, if you know me, you know isn't something that comes easily to me. But apparently, it takes a village to win a pitch. Which we did :)

[mamaneedsabigidea]

I seem to have misplaced my safety net.

Over the last month or two, I feel like I've gotten into a pretty good rhythm. In fact, there was even a moment here and there where I thought, "This isn't so bad. I can totally do this."

And I can.

Provided the winds blow right and everything lines up just so and the entire world stays perfectly on track.

Which is totally how advertising (and life) works, right?

This week has forced me to realize just how precarious my situation really is.

I've been balancing two different accounts. Which has been manageable.

My husband has been out of town for over a week, with the rest of the week still to go.

I'm making it work.

Today, I was briefed on a pitch.

Okay. My chest is getting a little tight at the thought of it. But I can do this. I can.

The first creative check-in is on Friday afternoon. And the second is on Sunday.

Shit.

So now I'm trying to figure out how to balance a client presentation for one client, a planning meeting for another client, concepting for the pitch and lining up weekend childcare for the baby.

(And yes, maybe crying a little bit about the thought of missing the precious hours with my baby girl that normally get me through the whole week. Tiny violins, play for me!)

Oh and did I mention I am sick?

Because i am.

I've got a cold, the kind that comes with a sore throat, sinus pressure and sweet body aches.

I can't afford to be sick right now. So I'm just kind of ignoring it, except every couple of hours thinking, "Man, I don't feel good" then getting back to it.

So yeah, I'm holding it together.

But the cracks are starting to show.

I snapped at people in two different meetings today.

I ate a candy bar before lunch. And a candy bar after lunch. Neither of which I could even taste because of my plugged-up face, but I still angrily chomped through both of them. (The good/bad news is that I have eaten all the candy bars in my possession. So at least I won't be able to make myself sick to my stomach again.)

I'm tired. I'm stressed. And I'm feeling incredibly, incredibly guilty. Guilty that I'm going to miss a weekend with my baby. And guilty that I'm too overwhelmed to be gung-ho excited about what could be a real creative opportunity.

And dear god, I am so, so, so terrified the baby is going to get sick. I want to kiss her little head so badly. Every fiber of me screams out to smooch all over her. But I'm fighting it. Because if the baby gets sick and daycare sends her home, I am really, truly, totally fucked.

In some ways, being a working mom reminds me a lot of growing up poor.

In both situations, you cobble together a decent setup for the day-to-day. But, in both cases, one tiny thing goes wrong and you're screwed. Because you've got no safety net. And it doesn't take much to bring the whole ticky tacky operation crashing down.

The only difference is that I used to not have enough money.

These days, I just don't have enough me.

[mamaneedsabigidea]

At Least I Tried

I took a little extra time this morning to spiff up a bit.

Pretty dress.

Tall shoes.

An extra coat of mascara.

At 10am, the top button of my dress breaks off. Doesn't fall off. BREAKS OFF. Safety pins are a great invention.

At noon, I notice there is a splash of spitup on my right shoulder. I consider trying to daub at it with a wet paper towel. Decide to leave it there.

During my last trip to the restroom, I take a quick peek over my shoulder to make sure the rear view is okay. Only to discover that my entire back is absolutely covered with hundreds of the hairs that I am still, 5.5 months post-birth, shedding at an alarming rate.

Oh well. At least I have some chocolate.

[mamaneedsabigidea]

Can we just slow it down a little?

I cried over an autumn leaf the other day.

It was a gorgeous late fall afternoon and Seraphina and I were taking a spin around the neighborhood.

She was kicking away in her stroller and burbling in her strange little baby language. As I pushed her down the quiet suburban street, a single crimson leaf sashayed its way to the asphalt.

My heart seized up at the sight of it and I cried right there in the street.

Something about the very freshness of my new baby is making me aware of time in a way I never was before.

Aware of how quickly it passes. Aware of how easy it is to waste. And, most of all, aware that there will never, ever, ever be enough.

Isn't this butterfly bush gorgeous? Yep, and in a few months, it will be dead.

On the way to baby school the other day, the Flaming Lips' "Do You Realize?" came on.

Do you realize That everyone you know Someday, will die.

Suddenly, I was sobbing.

Seraphina is changing so fast. And her super-speed transformation is making make me aware of how time affects us all in a way I'm usually better able to ignore.

In my mind, my stepdaughter is still the little eight-year-old girl she was when I met her. Except I looked up the other day (literally up, as she is now well over 5'7" tall) and I realized she's closer to being a woman than a child. In five years, she'll be out on her own and our family-of-four Sunday trips to Bruegger's will become an odd group of three. (Until, of course, Seraphina leaves too.)

And one late night as I was lying in bed torturing myself with these existential concerns, it struck me -- really struck me, for the first time -- that my husband is older than my mother was when she died. Which made me realize how very, very, very young my mom was when she died. And, at the same time, made me feel desperately afraid of losing him too.

Don't even get me started on what happens when I catch my own reflection and realize that, while I may be 17 in my mind, I am definitely almost 36 on the outside.

Basically, over the last couple of weeks, I've been stumbling around with all of my emotional nerves exposed.

I'm tender all over because it's all so very beautiful and I'm trying so hard to hold on to each and every moment. But I can't. And that kills me.

It's exciting to watch Seraphina develop into her own little person. But nobody warned me that it would also make me so sad.