A very bad start to the working day
Being a working parent is a constant juggle. Suzie Thoraval, a lawyer and mother of two young children, wants to believe that work and family can coexist.
I come home from my five thirty am workout expecting a quiet slumbering family, but instead have a very bad start to the working day. All the lights are on, and my daughter is on the couch under a blanket looking pale and miserable. My husband emerges from the shower with a tale about how the kids woke up at 5.50am and my daughter then vomited all over him, the bed and the room.
So now she has to stay home from school while my son goes to childcare. We begin the negotiation of who will do the pick up and who will look after her – we both know it’s a bad start to the working day. Naturally this is all happening on a really busy day at work. I have to produce a report by close of business today and have numerous important meetings. My husband will need me home to help with the night-time routine. Just how much pressure can be heaped onto one day?
I rush to get ready, try not to get too affected by guilt as my little son clings on to my neck telling me he does not want to go to childcare and kiss my feverish daughter on the head and run out the door to grab my train.
On this morning and many like it I can’t help feeling the life we are leading is all wrong. Sitting on the train to work contemplating this question, the same old dilemmas and contradictions present themselves: We need the money; I like working; our kids are resilient and confident; childcare is good for them socially; I’m lucky to have a husband who is involved and willing to take the load on a day like today.
But I feel I’m missing out on parts of being a mum. Today, I won’t be there to provide the cuddles, comforting and love that my daughter needs to get better.
I keep saying to myself that after this current crisis at work I’ll think laterally about how to restructure things so that they are saner. So far I haven’t had the headspace. Perhaps an epiphany will come to me. Perhaps the answer is right in front of me. But I’m too busy and hurried to notice.
This blog was first published on the Professional Mums.net website and is reproduced with the kind permission of the author.
Suzie Thoraval has been a lawyer for 14 years and has worked in a top tier global law firm, as in-house counsel for a multinational corporation and currently works for the Victorian State Government. She has two children, aged 3 and 5, as well as a supportive husband. Her experience has taught her that businesses can better harness the skills and talents of working parents. She believes that work and life can coexist.
josephgray
July 12, 2013 at 8:53 am
It is this time we realize
It is this time we realize how entangled our lives have become. On our way to our careers and married lives both together, sometimes we feel like loosing out the grip over them.