On Motherhood: Working full time with one kid

On Motherhood

Working full time with one kid

I spent the first part of my life as a mother working. I was blessed with two boys in the span of four years. Then, while pregnant with my third I was downsized and began life as a stay at home mom. This is my experience written in a three part series. See Part 2 Working full time with two kids and Part 3 Life with three kids.

Life before kids

I was working as a Research Assistant by day and moonlighting as a Front End web developer by night. This was back when the repetitive nature of my work during the day drove me to express my creativity in other ways. I enjoyed binge watching shows such as Doctor Who or Scrubs. My husband and I traveled. We bought furniture and adopted a dog.

Two years earlier, I had suffered a miscarriage. This experience left me with an obsession to be a mother. The nature of the loss also served to re-prioritize my life: Family First, Career Second. I suspect that it is this early experience that taught me to cherish my kids having known what it is like to lose a child. For that reason no matter the struggle, I will always find the time for a cuddle.

Enter One Child

Fast forward to being pregnant in a laboratory environment, a story for another day, I survived my first pregnancy and my healthy son was born 10 lbs and many many hours of labor later.

At the time we lived in Boston and my primary stress soon after childbirth was the inevitable return to work. I was working for a company where I had been able to negotiate an extended unpaid leave. I was granted six months.

In my inexperience as a new mother, in our two bed tiny apartment, I would wash all of his toys once a week and mop the floors in case the germs from the dog were too much. I would sterilize everything and anything that touched his lips. I would lovingly make soft baby food and research and order only the best of the best for him. He spent his first year wearing reusable diapers that I diligently collected and washed.

I was determined to breastfeed for a whole year. With great difficulty I managed 4 months before realizing between my commute and having no success with a pump that I would need to resort to formula. My husband being French and of more prejudiced taste, found the most organic, tested, and tastiest formula money could buy.

In those early days of motherhood, the monotony of caring for my one child grew on me and from four months I was looking forward to my return to work. I wanted my independence back. I wanted the freedom my husband had. My husband took a hand at looking after our son when he was home but I felt the increasing pressure and need for some help. I was overwhelmed with the expectations of being both a perfect mother and perfect wife. I needed a mother’s helper.

To be a working mom means letting go of the expectation that you will be the first person to witness all of the joyful things in a toddler’s life.

You anxiously interview 4 to 6 or more nanny candidates in the hope that someone will have the right vibe for the type of experience you expect your child to have. Many of the candidates I interviewed were fresh out of university, early childhood educators, who told me they knew the best for my child to help him developmentally. All I saw was the green of inexperience. This was my son and I was not putting him in an institution. I wanted him to feel loved and cared for as if it was me, just not me.

Some would ask here why I did not just put him in a daycare. I wanted a replacement for me. I did not want him to be one of many who had to take his turn waiting for attention. This was after all my first born child. I also had an issue with trusting him in a group home. My husband and I had visited at least one daycare where the sight of a child left crying in the corner was enough to convince me. I found it easier to trust someone who would be minding him one to one.

This was what I wanted and I could not be convinced otherwise.

I finally had the luck to interview an older Tibetan lady who was already mother to a 5 and 10 year old. She took on the role of older aunt and I learned that having a care person for my child also meant having a care person for me. She would have our laundry done and our house spotless by the time the work week was out. I still insisted in doing all the cooking and providing food. She enjoyed taking my little boy on outdoor walks in all types of weather with his little face slathered with petroleum jelly to protect from both cold and wind.

This is how I returned to work with the reassurance that there was someone like ‘Me’ mothering my son.

When he turned 1.5 years old, we helped our nanny find her next placement and enrolled my son in a family run daycare that boasted a loving environment, ready made and healthy meals, and a Spanish bilingual experience. Our ever friendly son was ready to make friends and play to burn off his excessive energy and sleep through the night.

From a young age we had adhered to the school of having a ready bedtime and putting him to bed by 7 PM every night. There were many nights of sleep training as he moved from infant to toddler but the tactic paid off and even as an 8 year old today he will go to bed when it is time without complaint. He had the luck of two parents, numerous songs, and stories. We benefited from the freedom of an evening to ourselves.

All parents of one kid are crazy

As a parent of one child, you figure out what works and stick by it. This becomes routine. If that means sitting in the back seat with your child to keep them company (something I never did on account of knowing people who did), this is your crazy. You might be a super helicopter parent watching and playing with your child in absence of all others. You may be obsessed with cooking everything that your child eats as I was. You may sanitize and sterilize everything your child is exposed to for fear of them getting sick. You may put foam rollers on all the hard corners to keep them from hitting their head. You buy all the books and toys that you never had when you were a child. You let your child make all the decisions because you were not allowed to when you were a child. You keep your child from ever tasting ‘kid’ food because you know that one day they will be eating pizza and fries on a daily basis. You give in to your picky eater and tell everyone that little Marshall does not like carrots and won’t eat them so don’t even try.

Lessons from the working mom with one kid

• Get help when you need it
• Set a bedtime and stick to it
• Nobody is perfect
• You will miss out a few firsts, take joy in ‘Your Firsts’
• Especially if you plan to have more than one child, enjoy the silence, enjoy the freedom to choose, and most of all, enjoy the controls you have in place

Advice from the more experienced mom of three

• Own your kid, don’t let them own you: Set boundaries and establish that the parent sets the rules
• All kids are different and you can still cherish and respect your child’s individuality while expecting them to finish their food, put away their toys, and be kind to others
• Let your kid play by themselves from time to time so they learn to entertain themselves
• Let your child get hurt so they learn to recover, let your child fall so they will learn to pick themselves up
• Let your kid know what it is to be bored, hungry, and scared (for obvious reasons not all at the same time!)

Part 2 Working full time with two kids
Part 3 Life with three kids