So when does working mom guilt go away?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Here’s the thing - I do have to work, but even if I didn’t have to, I think I’d work at least part-time. I’m not cut out to be a full-time SAHM, and I know that. I’ve been back to work for about a month now (my son is three months old), and it’s ONLY started hitting me this week. I’d been doing great before this week.

I think it has to do with the fact that Baby B has pretty much outgrown that floppy newborn phase and he’s pretty darn entertaining now when he’s awake. I had an absolute blast with him on Sunday afternoon, and last night, we just played for over an hour. And all of a sudden, leaving him has gotten harder.

I have a fantastic baby-sitter. She adores him. I trust her completely with him. I have a great job that I very much enjoy. I like coming to work every day. Baby B is loved at home and at daycare. He is doted on and adored by me and his dad, as well as his grandparents. He’s a happy, healthy little boy, and whether I work or not, that’s not going to change.

So why am I all of a sudden feeling guilty when I wasn’t feeling guilty before? And when I KNOW I would be miserable staying home after awhile?

Most of all, how do I make it go away? I hate feeling like this.

E.

2

The way I look at it is that there isn’t one ideal model for a happy, healthy family. Historically speaking, moms have always had to work, one way or another, and there’s nothing bad about a baby learning that other people besides mom and dad can love and care for him sometimes. In the past it was aunts or siblings or grandma or other extended family. Now it’s a trusted babysitter (not a ‘stranger’–it really burns me up with people talk about having your child raised by a ‘stranger’ as if you just leave him on the bus every morning.) Your life is enriched by your work, his life is enriched by time with the sitter. Everybody gets what they need.

My kids are past that age, but they still think of their babysitter as another grandma.

3

It doesn’t.

My daughter is going to be four in January and I tried the work from home thing. I went back to work in August because I got an offer I couldn’t refuse. That said, I miss being at home with her even though I know she LOVES her daycare program.

If I stop working full-time before she starts school I will need to keep her in part-time just because she really loves being around the other kids.

Sigh.

Remembersing how much she loves it didn’t help me when I was sobbing in the tub about missing her.

I read an interview with Elizabeth Vargas in Marie Clare this month and they asked her, after doing a story on Working Moms for 20/20 if moms could “have it all” if they had money, prestige and fame.
Her response was a simple, “No.”

I find it encouraging to know that all moms struggle with this decision. I personally think each mom needs to do what is best for her and her family. Happy mom is usually best mom.

4

Oh man. There’s working mom guilt? Shit.

I’m so buying my mom (a working mom all her life who provided for her family even during their hardest times, and with an alcoholic and drug-addicted husband) something nice this week. SO buying her something nice. She deserves it.

You working moms out there get my thumbs up. And hopefully, in 18 years, your kids’ll appreciate it too. :slight_smile: Ya’ll rock.

~Tasha

5

I’m probably going to get flamed for this, but…

YOU are not replaceable as Mum. You are replaceable at work, but your baby only has one Mum, and that’s YOU.

Since you have to work, that’s the reality. But if there’s anyway you and the Mister can swing it so you can work part time, or if he can work more and you can be a full SAHM, or the grandparents can take over instead of some stranger, it would be great.

I say this as someone who had kidlets in daycare, and looking back, I wish there had been another way.

I know you’re a good mom. I know you’re doing the best you can. But DO NOT underestimate the importance of you to your son.

6

I never had it.

I’m really not sure why, but I just knew that sending my son to daycare while I worked was the right thing for him and for me. Maybe it’s because he had kids to play with at daycare and I’m not a very playful person. Maybe because I knew that his whole day revolved around him his friends, as opposed to him, the house, errands, TV, the phone, bill-paying, etc, etc, etc.

Before daycare I had my sister, who is now a daycare teacher, care for him. IMO, she sucked.

My little pet theory is that kids are meant to be cared for collectively and that it’s nature’s way to have some women who take care of kids and some women who do other things and, yet, kids still love their mama’s best.

7

After you last little one makes parole, the guilt lightenes a tiny bit.

Tris

8

[QUOTE=ivylass]
I’m probably going to get flamed for this, but…

YOU are not replaceable as Mum. You are replaceable at work, but your baby only has one Mum, and that’s YOU.

Since you have to work, that’s the reality. But if there’s anyway you and the Mister can swing it so you can work part time, or if he can work more and you can be a full SAHM, or the grandparents can take over instead of some stranger, it would be great.

I say this as someone who had kidlets in daycare, and looking back, I wish there had been another way.

I know you’re a good mom. I know you’re doing the best you can. But DO NOT underestimate the importance of you to your son.
[/QUOTE]

I’m not going to flame you, but I am just going to point out that the phrase “some stranger” really grates on me. It is a pet peeve of mine that people refer to day care providers as “strangers.” I work part time, my son is at my mom’s one day and a private home day care for 2 days. Honestly, he loves my mom, but in some ways he is better off during the day care days and I say that knowing she is a loving and doting grandma. The day care provider balances his days better with activities, she is a former nanny and preschool teacher, she gives him healthful balanced meals, and he has great friends there. He loves her and loves going there, as soon as I set him down he runs to her arms just like with grandma. If he didn’t like going there or if I thought he wasn’t happy or safe there I would pull him out in a heartbeat. My mom is a normal grandma and spoils him, if he was there every day she would have to be much more of a disciplinarian with him and neither of us wants that.

I did not look for the first ad in the phone book and drop him off there. Just because someone is related to you or your friend does not automatically make them a better child care provider, but so often I hear people assume that. We actually have the chance to reduce his day care stays by a few hours now that my husband is working a different shift, but we talked and are choosing to let him go the 2 full days since he likes it so much and to let him keep his normal schedule.

My guess is that most people research their day care providers more carefully than their kid’s teachers. But no one criticizes people for sending that same 3 or 4 year old to preschool to be taught by strangers.

You are right that no one can replace me as mom, and no one does. That doesn’t mean my child should only be exposed to me or only raised by me. Part of my duty as his mom is to expose him to other loving people, whether that is a play group or a preschool or a day care.

9

I found it difficult when they were babies, but when they got old enough to play with other kids at daycare, it didn’t bother me as much. They have fun every day (more fun than I’m having) and that makes it easier. But when they were babies, and I knew someone else was holding them and feeding them, it was pretty hard.

10

[QUOTE=Ceejaytee]
I found it difficult when they were babies, but when they got old enough to play with other kids at daycare, it didn’t bother me as much. They have fun every day (more fun than I’m having) and that makes it easier. But when they were babies, and I knew someone else was holding them and feeding them, it was pretty hard.
[/QUOTE]

I completely agree. Every mom needs to find what works for her, but I found that my little one loved me best when she was little. Now that she plays with (and not just around) other kids she enjoys that more.

11

Sorry to add on to my last post, but I also would not have my husband work an extra job or tons of overtime so that I could stay home full time. Kids need their dads too.

12

Please count me among those who hate the term “some stranger” when it comes to child care providers. Maybe there are parents who are forced to take their children to daycare situations where they haven’t spent much time but that’s not always, or I dare say, often the case. I was on the waiting list at my place, which is why I had a relative care for my son for awhile, but we visited quite a few times beforehand. It was the kind of daycare where the kids moved up like they do in school, but he had and we had ample opportunity to get to know the new teachers too. There were days when he tried to make us stay with him as did most of the kids, but he really felt comfortable there and loved his strangers very much.

13

[QUOTE=ivylass]

I know you’re a good mom. I know you’re doing the best you can. But DO NOT underestimate the importance of you to your son.
[/QUOTE]

Oh, I’m not at all. I know that I’m the center of his world, and that’s the way I love it - he lights up when I pick him up, he lights up when I get him up in the mornings, he lights up when I smile at him. I’m just happier knowing that he’s in a place during the day where he’s happy and they take excellent care of him.

Working part-time isn’t an option right now. Maybe in a few years. We’re still trying to recover from ElzaHub’s layoff, and while things are slowly improving, it’s not that good. Not working is simply not an option. Working part-time isn’t an option.

Actually, Velma’s said it all for me. My sitter is definitely not a stranger - I researched the hell out of many providers, and she’s by far the one I feel the most comfortable with.

I was in daycare from the time I was very little. I couldn’t tell you the names of the majority of my daycare providers (aside from my neighbors who watched us), but I can tell you everything my parents did for me as a kid, including coaching and attending all of my softball games, taking me to cheerleading, taking us out on the boat, etc. I’m closer to my parents now than several of my friends, who were raised by SAHMs. And I want to be that kind of parent to my son - so it can be done, I just need to strike a good balance.

E.

14

But, to reassure the OP, he loves me more than anyone in the world, including The World’s Coolest Dad.

15

If you’re anything like me (and you might not be), self-doubts will always be there. Yes, kids should learn to trust all kinds of people, including daycare folks. Except for a brief time in some sectors of middle-class America and Europe, for most of history children worked, too. In those sectors of middle-class America and Europe, not all of those SAHMs were happy and fulfilled. Not all of them were even especially good mothers. A miserable, bored, resentful person is not necessarily a good caregiver. Circumstances often mean that a mother working outside the home can make the difference between, say, her children being able to have good health care, or access to good education.

OTOH – The whole latchkey child scene is distressing to many of us. We are not “there” as often as we’d like for special moments. We have trouble getting to in-school or business hours events. We miss the soccer matches and the basketball games. We also miss time from work for kids’ illnesses. When they are older, we worry that they’ll skip school or get into trouble when we’re not there for them. In my neighborhood, there were almost no adults around at all after school – a few retired folks maybe – everyone else was working. IMHO it’s less of a problem for the very young; you can get “day care.” For middle school and up, that doesn’t work well. So every difficulty, from then on into adulthood, some of us feel horribly guilty that had we only been there more, perhaps things would have been better.

16

[QUOTE=Caricci]
But, to reassure the OP, he loves me more than anyone in the world, including The World’s Coolest Dad.
[/QUOTE]

Yeah, that’s the thing - I know I’m his favorite person, and it’s not just because I supply some of his food :D. ElzaHub was actually feeling kind of left out for the first couple of months because Baby B wanted MOM and ONLY MOM most of the time - he couldn’t be rocked to sleep by Dad. Now he’s starting to respond to Daddy a LOT, and is giving him a bunch of those same sly little grins. It’s really nice. But it’s still nice to know that I’m his favorite :smiley: .

I figured out why I’m feeling like this NOW - one, it’s slow here right now, so I have too much time to think ;). Two, I re-read a book that I read BEFORE getting pregnant about a workaholic mom, and haven’t read since having Baby B - my emotions are still all out of whack, thanks to hormones, so I think I’m just reading between the lines (and it doesn’t help that one of the character’s kids has the same name as my kid). I’m putting the book away and not reading it again.

My sitter’s only about 10 minutes away, so on the days I just can’t go another second without seeing him, I just pop over for lunch and we hang out.

E.

17

[QUOTE=Elza B]

Two, I re-read a book that I read BEFORE getting pregnant about a workaholic mom, and haven’t read since having Baby B - my emotions are still all out of whack, thanks to hormones, so I think I’m just reading between the lines (and it doesn’t help that one of the character’s kids has the same name as my kid). I’m putting the book away and not reading it again.

E.
[/QUOTE]

Good idea! :slight_smile:

I think you’re going to be just fine.

18

You get your guilt now, or you get it later, whether or not you’re a housewife or a working mom.

My own kids are grown now, but I was a housewife all the years of their growing up. And I sometimes felt guilty because I wasn’t bringing in an income.

::shrugs:: It’s always something, my friend. Do what you need to do for your family not what society, or books, or people on this message board (or any message board), tell you you need to do. It’s sounds like you and your husband have decided that it’s best, right now, for you to hold a job and put your little guy in daycare. So you choose the best daycare you can (which you have), and deal with it. Let go of the guilt – it’s not fruitful, and it’s not necessary. By the time your baby is grown you’ll have made tons of mistakes and there will be things you regret doing or not having done. Just remember, you’re doing the best you can do and that’s all any of us can do.

19

What about working dad guilt, huh? When my son was born I was working a 3 to midnight shift while my wife worked a regular schedule. I took him to the park, went to “Mommy and Me” classes (they really need to change the name) where I was usually the only man there and would get lots of strange looks from the mothers, sang to him, read to him, took him to the zoo and so on. When he napped I would clean and do laundry. My SIL would cover the couple hours between me leaving for work and my wife coming home.
I hated it when my schedule changed and I was put on a day shift. I would look at the clock and think, “It’s time for his nap.” I swore that I could smell dirty diapers at work. One time I reached into my pocket to get some change and found his pacifier. I almost cried.
When my daughter came along I couldn’t make the schedule change and felt guilty that I wasn’t there. Intellectually, I knew she was fine at the daycare center. Emotionally, I was a mess about someone besides me or my wife being with her 24/7.
My wife has been on medical disability for the past 4 years so she has been SAHM after being an aggressive, balls-to-the-walls salesperson. At first she loved the art projects, stories and games. I would come home and find them at the table cutting and pasting and my daughter’s face covered with marker.
Now that my daughter is in kindergarten and my wife is almost ready to be released from medical disability, I can see that my wife is getting a little antsy. She wants to get back in the business world but is scared about our little girl being in an after school program and not with her.
Being a parent sucks, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

20

My opinion only:

If you *have * to work, then you have to work. Just deal with the guilt.

If you do *not * have to work, but you choose to work anyway, then you *should * feel guilty.