What is Too Much to Sacrifice to SAH?

Ok so its that horrible day at work.  You walk in late because you spent your morning dealing with on crisis after another only to look down and notice you have two different shoes on and baby spit up on your shoulder.  You go to the bathroom try to clean off the spit up with those awesome brown paper towels (you all know what I mean) and hope no one notices the mismatched shoes as you sneak into that meeting you are late for.  Hope you can get done your work quickly so you can leave on time to pick up you're older child from school before picking up the younger one from daycare.   How much easier would it be to just stay home and take care of your children?  Internally, you start running the numbers ok without childcare and if we cancel cable, get rid of one car, cut our food bill, stop going out to dinner it totally do able.

Maybe its just the parenting groups/message boards that I am apart of but more and more I'm seeing a trend where working mothers are trying to make the jump to staying at home.  While if you can responsibly stay at home, I say go for it not judgement here, however the advice being given to those women is downright irresponsible!!

Some of the advice I've seen recently is, to drain your savings and retirement accounts you can always save money later in life and you're kids will only be small once.  More advice is to sell your house or break a lease and move into a cheaper area (worse school districts and higher crime) because you being with your kids will balance it out.  Borrow money from family and friends, they'll understand and want to help.  Declare bankruptcy, move in with family, cancel cable internet ect. and sell a car.  Another poster said to re-enroll in school online to defer student loan payments and borrow a little "extra" for living expenses.

What are we teaching out children if these are the decisions we are making and advising others to make?  The message I'm receiving is to look to others to take care of you're responsibilities for you so you can do what you WANT.  Is it really responsible to put your child into an environment that you were not comfortable with to start with just because you want to stay at home.  I also want to raise the question what happens if there is an emergency and you have no savings?

What is the plan if something happens to the family to the remaining breadwinner?  With all that being said, if you can be a stay at home parent without negatively impacting your family go for it.  There is no right answer when it comes to raising your children other than teaching them to do the right thing and be a good person.  I'm afraid, however, for my children's generation, my generation is already notorious for huge amounts of credit card debt and people living beyond their means.  Education is being valued less and less.  My hope is that my children learn from these mistakes and don't make same mistakes of my generation.

The Day My Son Wanted Nothing to Do With Me

While on vacation with my entire family I had one of the most heart breaking things happen... my son wanted nothing to do with me only my mother (his grandmother).  My mom watches him everyday while I am working so they have a strong bond, but this was completely heart breaking.  If I would take my son into another room for a even a simple task of changing his diaper he would scream bloody murder for my mother.  He wouldn't eat any meals at the table with the rest of the family he wanted to sit on the couch with "Mimi" and eat (despite Mimi sitting at the table with the rest of the family).  We took him to the beach and Mimi had to be the one in the ocean, Mimi had to play in the sand.  When we got back Mimi had to cook his lunch and put him down for his nap.  At bedtime, Mimi had to give him his bath and put him to bed (a task usually reserved for only mommy and daddy).  At one point my husband attempted to help my mother and my son pushed him away and told him no.

There my husband and I were, standing in the kitchen of our rented beach condo, heartbroken wondering what to do next.  My two month old was happily sleeping in the bedroom, surely he still loved us but what did we do to make our toddler favor his grandmother; I didn't want my youngest to favor her too.  I began sobbing into the kitchen counter feeling like a failure as a mother.  I love my kids, they are my everything.  All of my time is devoted to caring for them and being with them.  Yes I do work 40+ hours a week but I wake them up and make their breakfast in the morning, I am getting home when they are waking up from their afternoon naps (thanks to my 10 minute commute) and spend every weekend doing activities with them.  So why did my son want to be with his grandmother over his mother?  What seemed like an eternity later, my mom emerged from the bedroom, my son had fallen asleep and she apologized to me.  She felt bad that my son was favoring her, it was no fault of hers no fault of my son; it was just the fact in that moment.  I went to bed that night feeling very defeated and very heartbroken.

I woke up the next morning to my son snuggled in bed next to me (his bed was in the same room as mine for vacation).  He had woken up in the middle of the night and saw mommy and daddy were in the room and climbed into our bed for comfort.  Obviously, the topic of conversation at the breakfast table was the big elephant in the room.  With the prodding of my brother and sister (thanks again!), we discovered that Mimi had "altered" my son's routine after my second was born.  As my second son likes to eat leisurely, Mimi has started allowing my toddler to eat meals in the family room with his toys so she can focus on feeding the baby.  Since Mommy and Daddy have only left my son to be put to bed by his Mimi (or anybody else) less than 5 nights, Mimi has snuggled with him and watched Sesame Street with him until he fell asleep.  The answer wasn't that he loved his Mimi more than Mommy and Daddy the answer was he liked the way Mimi did things.  As Mimi put it, Mommy and Daddy have more rules.

I was very worried that this was going to continue throughout the entire vacation and extend into our "normal lives" once we got home but thankfully it didn't.  When Mimi became aware of what was happening she enforced mommy and daddy's rules and the Mimi fascination seemed to dwindle.  He still loved his Mimi and wanted to do things with her but he also wanted to interact with all his other family members as well.

Our first night home my son got right into bed and fell right asleep just like he was doing before we went for vacation.  He fell right back into his normal routine in stride as though it had not been interrupted for the week prior.  He was content when Mimi left when Mommy got home from work (even if he wasn't content to stay inside since it was raining and his brother is 2 months old).  He's the exact same kid as he was before we left for vacation except with more words and requesting ice cream every night (Thanks Uncle B).

This was a definite learning experience for me!  Sometimes being a Mommy is a thankless job and sometimes that means not being the "fun one" or the popular one with your kids,  I need to focus on my relationships with my kids and not focus on being the most liked person in their lives.  That doesn't mean however that I don't want to be the most liked in their lives and that it doesn't hurt when they favor someone else.  What am I going to do when they want to go away on a trip without me or want to get married?  I think those things are going to break my heart, but I can't cry in the kitchen forever or can I?

Making "Mommy Friends"

As a young professional, my social circle is kind of evolving daily.  After having my son I found myself if a very unique place.  NONE of my high school and college friends were even married (most not even dating) and kids were the last thing on their mind.  Our siblings do not have any kids either.  We had two couple friends that had babies as well and I had one co-worker friend who had just gotten pregnant so my pool of “mommy friends” was pretty light.   I made the choice for my kids to be cared for at home, so there were no parents to meet from the day care class.  Where was I going to meet “mommy friends”?

The truth is I still don’t know.  My oldest son is 21 months old and I still have the same number of mommy friends.  As a working mother I find it hard to make mommy friends.  I have spent countless hours looking into activities that I could do with my kids and other parents.  Most mommy and me activities I have found occur late morning on weekdays which essentially cuts out the whole working parent population.  I did enroll my oldest in swimming lessons, it was a mommy and me type course.  I would chat with the other parents while we were waiting for the class to start.  Most were SAH moms and the majority of their play dates occur during the day Monday through Friday.  Another social circle that I was unable to break into. L

My other concern with my lack of “mommy friends” was socialization for my son (my youngest is too young to need socialization).  Thankfully, this has resolved itself slightly with a combination of my neighbor and “grandmommy friends.”  My next door neighbor babysits her grandson who is slightly older than my oldest and the two have quickly become great friends and the close proximity makes it possible for them to play together almost every day. 

My question remains how do I make “mommy friends” or do I continue to keep my life very separate.  To be fair I must say that I have a collection of friends that are more than happy to have my little guys in tow when we hang out.  Hopefully some of my non-mommy friends become “mommy friends” themselves until then I guess the hunt continues.