Not Cut Out For Stay-At-Home Parenting

I love my kids. I love spending time with them. I am truly grateful for the opportunity to have these 13 weeks off from work to get to know them. But I am learning a valuable lesson- one which I was pretty sure I knew before, but I definitely know now.

I am not cut out for stay at home parenting. Even if we could afford for me to not go back to work, I wouldn't want to be a stay at home mom. Kudos to those of you who can do it and not go insane. I am in awe of you. I am completely serious about this. You are godlike beings.

For one thing, the work is 24-7. When I did my "real job," or let's call it "paying job" from now on... at my paying job, I was required to show up at 8:00 a.m. But let's say I woke up with a pounding headache and didn't really have any important meetings in the morning, well, I could shoot a quick e-mail to my boss and let her know I needed an extra hour or two of sleep. Once I arrived at work, I was dealing with reasonable adults. I didn't always agree with them on every point, but not one of them ever said to me, "NO MOMMY! No wipe my dirty butt!" During the day, let's say I was feeling tired or perhaps restless after a long session of cleaning up e-mail. Well, I could take a BREAK. I could go to the bathroom. No one would follow me there and watch me pee, or go into my office and break things while I was gone. I could walk over to a co-worker's desk for a brief chat. I could make a phone call with no interruptions. I don't care what anyone ever tells you, there is no paying job out there that is more difficult than being a mom to toddlers 24-7. And I am tired. Yes, the work is rewarding, but it is also relentless.

I despise cleaning my house. I have always harbored a deep-seated hatred of cleaning, but in the past I was able to get by with simply ignoring the problem. As long as I had clean underwear, I really didn't need to do laundry. Dishes? Every two to three days was fine. Preparing meals and the subsequent clean-up? We ate at least a third of all our meals at restaurants- probably more. These days, I find myself compelled to stay ahead of the mess. If I don't do dishes at least 2 or 3 times per day, the sink will be overflowing. Same with laundry. I may have 30 pairs of underwear, but my little boy has only 15, and since he uses two to four pairs per day (the record is eight for one day) he runs out pretty quick. I feel that when I go back to work, the need for endless cleaning will be greatly reduced.

But really the biggest thing that I have realized about myself is that I crave adult interactions. I need to talk to people who are rational thinkers. Can you imagine if the people I worked with interacted on Tino and Victoria's level? It would go something like this:

Me: Andy, why don't we meet at 3:00 to discuss your upcoming sales presentation?

Andy: Want to watch a movie.

Me: Well, I can appreciate that, but I really do think we should iron out some of the fine points of your presentation. This is a pretty large deal we're working on here.

Andy: Want to watch a movie.

Me: Okay, that's fine, you can watch a movie, but after we have our 3:00 meeting.

Andy : (crying) NOOOOOO.... Watch movie! Want to watch movie! Want to watch movie!

Me: Andy, I can see you're very upset right now. Why don't we discuss this a bit later, after you've had a chance to calm down? I'm going to go to my office now and you can come see me after you compose yourself.

Andy: (Throws himself on floor) NO!!! Come back! Come back! I want my DADDY! (sobbing uncontrollably) My Daddy! My Daddy!

So as of May 10, I will definitely be going back to work. I'm going to soak up every minute of this leave of absence and maximize the time I have with my children. And then I'm going to get my life back. Or at least some semblance of it.