Time in Tahoe good, bad

Okay, I love being away from the hustle of our regular lives and having Father in Chief around to help with Toddler in Chief round the clock, but this dial-up Internet connection is maddening.

I know, I know. I really shouldn't be connecting to the Internet while we away from the hustle in an attempt to soak up couple/family-time before FIC starts his new job on Monday. But this Internet-thing is so much a part of our daily lives that it is *really* hard to truly disconnect, to not check email numerous times a day, to not dial in just to see where the best Mexican restaurant is, to not connect just for a minute to see if anyone has commented on my most recent blog posting.

Here's a confession: I don't even remember how to use the telephone book. And if your restaurant doesn't have its menu posted online, it might as well not even exist. To steal the Yellow Pages' tag line: If it's not online, it doesn't exist.

There is no part of my life that doesn't have a direct link to the Internet. My address book, my main source of communication with friends (who calls anyone anymore??), maps, driving directions, photos (and there are so many with a kid around looking so darn cute all of the time), menus, my livelihood/sanity depends on it through blogs, instant messaging with FIC while he's at work, finding a plumber/repair person/electrician/dog walker, finding the closest Wi-Fi hotspots. The only thing I haven't transitioned online is my calendar. I still love my little check-book-sized version where I use an actual pen with actual ink to sort out my appointments and to chronicle TIC's weight at his well-baby check-ups.

So sad as it is, we couldn't leave home without it. So we take turns sitting at the kitchen table tapping away on the tiny keyboard in the un-ergonomicly correct chair to check a hundred unimportant things (with each taking ten times as long due to dial-up) while the snow-covered Sierra mountains serve as the backdrop. At least we're all together and someone else is changing a larger percentage of poopy diapers.

Wombs everywhere buzzing into action

Portfolio Manager Mom has confirmed her departure from our weekly group with an email. She wrote: "As all of you know, I am going back to work full time, which means we won't be able to come to playgroup anymore...The transition to preschool for (PM Toddler) has been much faster than expected. (PM Toddler)'s adjusting to preschool was one of my biggest worry, so I'm glad that things turn out better than expected."

Better than expected for PM Toddler. And I can only hope that PMM's transition back to the workforce is a nicer than the madness Bethany over at Writing Mommy is experiencing.

So that leaves me flying solo as the one mom in the group who is not trying to double the number of kids in the house. Being outnumbered is a strange feeling. No one has asked me outright when I'm having another. But I find that I keep bringing it up with the women in the group. So in addition toddlerhood, I'm talking about babies and labor and pregnancy and feeling the baby move and contractions and labor and meconium and placentas and crowning and labor and pushing and epidurals and c-sections and bleeding and labor and breastfeeding and not sleeping and lions and tigers and bears.

Oh my.

Why am I doing this to myself? I'm just starting to really enjoy Toddler in Chief's independent playtime and my subsequent enjoyment in a little bit of personal time. But what is really interesting is that I keep bringing it up with Father in Chief:

"So when do you think we should have another?"
"Three years is a good age gap, don't you think?"
"Don't want to have them too far apart."
"I don't want to have a baby in the fall or winter."
"That means we need to get pregnant during X time of year."

I was not talking about this stuff a month ago when the non-pregnant women outnumbered the pregnant women. I'm sure there is some hormonal/biological happenings here. The pregnant women are seeping with hormones. Being around them makes the non-pregnant women interested in being pregnant. Seems like some kind of Jedi Mind Trick. And I think it's working.

Over 25 and planning a baby? It's too late

If the only path to career/home balance utopia is to start planning in your mid-20s, we're all screwed. Or at least my generation of women who is already in their early 30s with a baby, is screwed.

This is the advice of the Boston Globe's Penelope Trunk last week in an article entitled, "New generation puts the focus on family." She wrote: "Good planning starts in one's mid-20s. And then you need to have a very substantial conversation about it with your partner."

Well that's all find and dandy, but that guidance is teetering upon some pretty enormous assumptions. First, it assumes that you have a partner when you're in your mid-20s. I was fortunate to have landed Father in Chief early in life. But the plethora of matchmaking web sites indicates that not only is finding a mate big business, it isn't easy nor does it come with any guarantee that it will happen by a certain point in our lives, i.e.: in our mid-20s. Trunk's guidance also assumes that you know early on that you want to have a family. I can wholeheartedly say that when I was in my mid-20s, the idea of having kids was about as appealing as scraping off my knuckles with a cheese grater.

Trunk starts her article with the story of a couple who is about to get married and who have a life-long game plan. "It's cake-tasting time for Carin Rosenberg and Erik Lawrence. They're getting married on July 2, and like many engaged couples, they're excited to start life as a team...They have a plan for a baby (lots of hands-on parenting) and careers (no out-of-control hours), and while they will each have advanced degrees, there are no plans for high-powered jobs."

Okay, she doesn't mention how old this couple is, but they sound rather idealistic. I'm not bashing idealism, but deciding that high-powered jobs are out, could make building a realistic career-path very difficult. And how exactly do they define "high powered?" I think it's pretty fair to say--and Trunk even points out--that most career-worthy jobs are unfortunately 40-hour (or more) work weeks. That is why so many of my super-talented mom friends are no longer working in their respective fields. We are all underemployed because our former employers could not merge parent and paycheck.

So I think it's great that this couple is going to try and avoid long hours, etc. Hell, I think no company should expect people to work more than 40 hours a week. But let's be honest here: people make job choices based on how much it pays, what kind of health insurance it offers, how long does it take to get there. Period. Yes there are other things we consider, like do we like the people, do we like the business, is there good potential for growth, etc., but fundamentally, we need the basics first.

Trunk offered three guidelines to follow to achieve the work/parenting balance you want: 1) Build expertise to gain flexibility; 2) Live below your means and forget the big house; 3) Marry someone whose career aspirations are consistent with yours.

Sure we can forego the fancy house and the expensive cars for more modest lifestyles to aim for the right parenting/career balance, but most people want to put food on the table and save for their kids' college educations.

And that third item is absurd. Trunk wrote: "If one person makes four times as much as the other person, the discussion will not be among equals when there's a snow day and someone has to stay home from work with no notice." I'm not really sure what this sentence is even saying. Make sure you don't marry someone who makes more money than you do because you're going to get screwed if you had hoped to share the sick-child responsibility.

Don't get me wrong. I'm all for planning. But sometimes life gets in the way of the plans that we set out for ourselves. Going into a job knowing that you eventually hope to get a flexible schedule is great. Trying to avoid jobs that you know force you to work more hours that you want is great. But fundamentally this is like feeding the wrong end of the dog. We should be focusing on the corporate end of the equation, examining company policies and rewarding those that allow family-friendly policies, like job-shares, better maternity leaves, and flexible schedules.

Not the whole story...

Network Administrator Friend sent me an email in response to yesterday's post about her amazingly independent kids, which allow her some freedom and make her life as an at-home parent less stressful.

She said I really saw a skewed view of her kids during our stay with her family, mostly because Younger Brother was never with us without Older Brother or Toddler in Chief. She said that when Older Brother is in pre-school, Younger Brother doesn't know what to do with himself because he is so used to having someone to play with. So when he should be off making his own fun, he can't handle the alone time and gets a bit overwhelming.

So here's her attempt to set the record straight:

You didn't get to see this, since either (Older Brother) or (TIC) was around at all times, so (Younger Brother) wasn't that bad during your trip. On normal days, when (Older Brother) is in school, (Younger Brother) will not leave me alone. He follows me from room to room, just chants "Mama Mama Mama" and interrupts everything I try to do. So, I find that I use the time I have alone with him to grocery shop, run errands, etc, just so were not just hanging around the house, because then he wants to be entertained.

And he always wants to wrestle, which is annoying to me, but (Older Brother) loves it. (Younger Brother) also will get into "destructo" mode when I don't pay attention to him (when Older Brother is at school), and if I try to read email, the paper, make a phone call, etc, he goes off and finds something really naughty and makes a huge mess. Just for the attention. Even at 18 months, bad attention is better than none, I guess. :-)

We've been trying "time out" for Younger Brother when he bites, throws or hits, but it doesn't seem to be working. I set up the Pack n Play in living room, in a corner, with no toys, no view of the TV, nothing to do. Anyway, he was in it yesterday (he dumped out all the cat food and water while I was trying to do the laundry - Older Brother was at school), but he entertained himself enough that he didn't mind it. I think it works better when Older Brother is home, since then he is reminded that he can't have the toy Older Brother is playing with, but by himself, he just jumped around and laughed. Oh well.

Still, if the only times that are rough for Network Admin Friend are when Older Brother is at daycare, it still sounds like she has a pretty good situation.

Although from the comments from Kristen, Geeky Mom, and Bethany seem to suggest that it gets easier the older they get, regardless of how clingy or needy they are now.

I'm not that kind of mom

Network Administrator Friend has some of the most independent kids I've ever met. Toddler in Chief and I stayed with her while we were on the east coast in February.

Her four-year-old son wandered from project to project, toy to toy, room to room entertaining himself. He'd play with Thomas the train. Then he'd dance along with the super energetic Discovery Kids television show, Hi-5. Then he'd move to a stickers project, then to markers, and so on. Her one-year-old son was nearly as independent. He'd crawl up the stairs to read some books. He'd jump on the bed, and then head back downstairs to see what the big kids were doing. Once in a while, he would try to tackle Older Brother. If that didn't have the desired results, he would go for Toddler in Chief, which TIC hated.

It was amazing how much Network Administrator Friend could do without distraction while her kids kept themselves busy. The dishes, the laundry, email, telephone calls. Her only distraction was when the kids wanted to switch to a new project...from stickers to markers, for example. Put one box away and get out a different box of activities. I had a hard time eating an entire bowl of Cheerios without distraction. And I could see NAF cringe when TIC would get upset and holler for "help" yet again.

It was so interesting to see how well her kids did on their own. How did that happen? She's happy to set up the tracks so that they can play. She's happy to get them started on a project. She's didn't sit on the floor and read books all day. She didn't get down and play with blocks or letters or Thomas. "I'm not that kind of mom," she said.

There it is. There was no guilt. There was no apology. That's just the way it is. And her kids are great. Loving. Gentle (except for the occasionally tackle). Creative. Independent.

This trip happened right after Judith Warner's piece appeared in Newsweek (still can't seem to get away from that). Her life, her parenting was just so opposite everything that article talked about. Everyone was content. No one was stressed out. Not NAF, not the kids, except for TIC, that is. TIC was stressed out. They weren't his toys, it wasn't his house. He was whiny, clingy, and over all an unpleasant kid to be around--very unusual for my mild-mannered toddler.

She wasn't aching for child care or a break from the kids. She wasn't missing work or anxious to head back. She was at ease, happy, harmonious. Maybe she wasn't stressed out because her kids' independence allowed her time to herself to read, to do email, to make phone calls, to work on household projects, to be herself. She gets to be with them, they get to be with her, but neither overshadows the other.

I didn't see that

Many of the topics I write about are inspired by comments that I received on previous posts. This is a round up of some of the insightful and thought-provoking comments posted here recently.

Pregnancy

Kateri on getting pregnant with No. 2, after not wanting to get pregnant: "I went through a period, right after Naomi started to sleep well, of *not* wanting to get pregnant again for a *long time*. But here I am, barely pregnant, and looking forward very much to another baby. Who knew?"

Angry Pregnant Lawyer on the pressure to get pregnant: "Friends of ours who already have one had recently confided that they had just stopped trying to have no. 2. They said trying to get pregnant again was really stressing them out, and they realized that they were really only trying because they felt pressure from everyone else (friends, family, physicians) to have a second. They came to the conclusion that they liked being a family of two parents, one kid, and they are much less stressed right now. Which is not to say they won't change their minds later on and decide to try again, but I think they'll only do so when they know they really want to have another."

Working

Manababies on going back to work, NOT: "When I was still a mom-of-one, I often went back and forth... should I go back to work? If so, when? My husband used to ask me that question constantly. After my son came along he stopped asking because it really is too much to think about, especially with all the little things we Mommies have going on in our heads. And the only time I can stop and think is when the kids are in bed. At that point I can't even begin to raise that 'going back to work' issue. Ugh, such a tough thing!"

Kristen on the balance between working and being at home: "Three days a week, I'm at the office being a WOHM. Four days a week, I'm home playing with the children being a SAHM...I kinda like being in the middle...But one day a few weeks ago, I had these two things said to me on the very same day:

1) I don't know how you can let other people raise your kids.
2) How could you waste your career potential by staying at your part time job so long? Don't you want promotions and advancement?

So, you really can't win!"

The BIG debate

Rosemary on at-home mome versus working moms: "Neither working nor staying home are easy -- they both have their advantages and disadvantages, and everyone has to make the decision that works best or is most financially feasible for them...Why can't women acknowledge that what works for one may not work for another? If you work, terrific. If you stay home, well, thats terrific too...Staying home with kids just is not easy nor particularly comfortable, particularly for someone used to the working world. And working when you have very young children isn't easy either -- juggling day care, illness, jobs, stress -- ugh. It can be a nightmare. But both sides also have their rewards. And whether one stays home or goes to work is a personal decision that the rest of us shouldn't be so quick to judge. What happened to women supporting one another? Is that just a myth? Whatever I choose to do, it will be the decision that I feel is best for me, and for my family. I would hope that other women would understand that, and not jump so quickly to judge."

Anonymous wrote that we should celebrate and not debate: "In the DC area, there is a "DC Urban Moms" list. There was a "mommy war" debate about a month or so ago. It became very ugly and personal. I think each side is very defensive and insecure about their choices that they feel the need to validate their choices by criticizing the other side. We should "celebrate" the fact that we have a choice...We should focus our attention to the bigger issues like having a national maternity leave program and quality childcare."

Timing

Anonymous wrote that a two-year gap too small: "I truly don't understand the rush to have another child... Unless someone is pushing the fertility clock...I think the 2 year spacing that is sooo ingrained in our culture is too close in age. Esp. now that research shows how important the first three years are."

The simple life

Bethany on life before kids: "Hang in there sister... hang in there. Every mom (admit it girls!) has the same feelings of wanting the *simplier life* back...Just remember one thing--those *simplier* times are glorified as all happy and stress free (remember college? I thought it was tough... ROTFL, boy, did *I* have it wrong). We have selectively forgotten the stress and trauma."

Can't do it all

Chip on fostering independence: "I've never understood the parenting philosophy that kids need 100% undivided attention 24-7, it doesn't seem healthy for parents or kids (and sets us up for feelings of failure because it's also not possible!)...That said, I do think there's value in just being in the same room or nearby as the kids develop their self-play capacities, while we're doing other things, and not concentrating our attention on the kids but just puttering around, washing dishes, opening mail, whatever."

Where we go from here

Mission accomplished. Well done. Bravo. I'm reaching over my shoulder to pat myself on the back. I pitched a story, interviewed people, constructed neatly organized prose, filed it to my editor on time. Now I anxiously await its debut at local newsstands, libraries, and bookstores.

I conquered freelancing writing and there is more if I want it. My editor is interested in hearing more about another one of my story pitches. I just need to suck up and do the research. So why am I still talking about a story that I filed six weeks ago? More importantly, why haven't I already started researching that next piece?

Was this an exercise in rubbing my under-stimulated ego? Did I desperately need to publish something so that I had some recent accomplishment to point to? So that I could say: Look at me hubby, I'm not wasting all of my talents at home. I still know how to form complex sentences. Look everyone: Just because I'm home raising a child, don't write me off. I'm still here. Look at me world: There's my name in print to prove it.

But instead of plowing fist-first into research while still soaring from the joy of accomplishment from the last piece, I've been dragging my fingers in other directions. Maybe I feel like I've proven that I'm still worthy, that someone would hire me if need be. So I sit in my computer chair surrounded by the red walls in my home office and blog. There is no research, pitching, or pining for my next byline going on now.

I'm sure it is an ego thing. So much of the time, at-home parents feel invisible. There isn't a whole lot to show for at the end of the day. If we're lucky, everyone is wearing relatively clean clothing and our bellies are full of something, hopefully something nutritious. It's not glamorous work. It's thankless work. It's invisible work.

The longer I'm out of work, the more I worry about how hard it will be to jump back in, if I needed to, or if I wanted to. I think of Portfolio Manager Mom. Doesn't seem like she had to look to hard to find a fabulous job. Are my writing skills as desirable? As hirable?

I feel the way I felt when I first graduated from college and moved across the country: why would anyone hire me? There are hundreds, thousands of other people out there with better skills, who are smarter, who have more experience, who are more driven, who will work for less money, who exercise more, who drive nicer cars, who wear more fashionable clothing, who know how to solve world peace. Okay, I'm exaggerating, but being away from work compounds the feeling of worthlessness.

I know these are unjustified feelings, but they are real to me, none the less.

"While some stay at home moms are thinking longingly of the independence of the office and the camaraderie of colleagues, I spend my days wishing I could be home," wrote Mandy over at Fosterfest, in a recent post called Jumping Fences. "I long to tell those stay at home moms -- quit trying so hard. So what if you spent all day running errands and only played peekaboo once -- you were there."

Perhaps part of this struggle to be seen comes is a result of being a writer in the first place. When I was a scribe at a technology news site, everyday the world could see that I had been productive. Everyday there were two, three, four, five items that I could point to that were directly related to my productivity for the day. I could see them, my boss could see them, our readers could see them. It was out there and it was visible.

And now that I'm home and mostly invisible, not having that recognition and visibility is hard to adjust to. So knowing that I'm still capable of getting published will hopefully lessen the performance pressure so that I can enjoy my full time job as parent.

Who do you trust?

I completely love the women I'm friends with today. I feel hugely grateful and fortunate to know them. But they probably aren't people I would have been friends with in high school. They have different tastes in music. They don't live on my block. They come from different socioeconomic backgrounds. It's not that I would have necessarily disliked them, but we probably would have had different circles of friends if we had gone to high school together.

And when you're an at-home parent without a long-time circle of friends and family, where do you make your friends? In high school, it was pretty clear-cut. We all took the bus together. We all wandered from class to class together. We glanced inside other kids' lockers to see if they have the same New Order or The Smiths stickers we had.

But now that we aren't taking the bus to school or sitting in class with other kids all day, how do we find our friends? We don't live with our parents. We don't live in the same town or state we grew up in.

Miriam over at Playground Revolution recently posted about a weekend in North Carolina talking with other women about parenting and grown-up friendships. She wrote: "(F)riendship in adult life is not really about finding kindred spirits and soulmates, as we used to think, but rather, about being there, about going to the Y three times a week and talking to the same people, or, for many parents, going to the playground, or the schoolyard, and suddenly, those people become your friends even if they're not who you thought you'd be best friends with."

It's true, we find the grown-up equivalent to going to school and meeting kids that have similar interests. Only instead of looking for people who like photography, or are vegetarians, or who also work for the high school newspaper, we bond through seeing each other at the park or the mothers' club playgroup. The common thread is our kids and the fact that we show up, not our background or what street we live on. We see each other at the park, we can look at their kids and watch how they interact with them.

We all talked about this for a while, and agreed, but the conversation held a bemused tone, as if to say that we didn't quite believe that being there is enough to build friendship on. And then Vivian made a comment that being there is an expression of trust. That when five mothers or fathers see each other five times a week at the playground, there's a level of trust that builds up. They are showing each other that they are present, that they can indeed be counted on. It doesn't have to be spoken, but that's why playground friendships build so strongly, even among people who have little else in common. She took something that seemed trivial--making friendship on something so silly as being in the same place at the same time, repeatedly--and linked it with one of the most fundamental of human desires and qualities: trust

Another reason that these friendships and bonds become so strong is because in addition to just physically being in the same place at the same time, these people meeting at the playground time and again are also emotionally, mentally, psychologically in the same place at the same time. They are all raising little kids who like to go to the playground. And having that bond off the bat helps people feel connected as well, which also leads to trust.

Emotional ride speeds downhill

This is a follow up to my previous post, about how life before kids was easier emotionally. Life always has challenges and no matter how much we plan. We can't control everything and things will not always go as we would like them to. I try to remind myself of my bell-shaped stress management theory.

Basically the theory is: all of the anxiety and stress in our lives falls somewhere on a bell-shaped curve. No matter how great and on track life is, there will always be something out there on the far end of that curve pushing our buttons and making us crazy. Most everything else will fall into the fat middle section of the curve, and then there will be a couple of things that really don't give us much grief at the other end.

I think that this theory holds true for the most part. But I find that the more I delve into my personal struggle with finding a balance between parenting and career and marriage and family and chores and pets, the more I slip down the spiral slide towards more struggle. Part of this spouting I think it very useful because it forces me to fess up to my inner struggle and makes me confront those inner-most, private places of my life.

However, kneading this internal conflict also has a down side. The more I examine, stew, and swish those bits around in my thoughts, the more I'm surrounding myself with them. Then they swell, becoming more prevalent because I'm trying to think about them, understand them, and find new ways to write about them. So while this struggle should be mostly manageable in the bulky part of the stress curve, it's getting unnaturally pushed out into that far end of the curve, making me crazy sometimes.

"(I)t's funny these feelings. they're just feelings. and you have them sometimes. and you have other types of feelings other times," wrote Swamps into response to my emotional confession. "(S)ometimes you are just feeling like life is shit, and then suddenly something happens -- a friend calls out of the blue, or some stranger pays you a random compliment, or you help an old lady thru a tricky situation -- and that feeling just disappears. gone."

She's right. Something distracts me from the constant internal magnification and poof, there is life going on around me. Good life. Good experiences. Good relationships.

It's official: We're outnumbered

My playgroup has officially tipped the scales towards the pregnant members. There are nine moms/nine kids, and now five of the nine moms are pregnant with their second baby.

But that's not all. Of the four non-pregnant members: one mom is getting ready to sign a contract with a organization that connects infertile couples with surrogate mothers, one mom recently miscarried and is hoping to get pregnant again soon, another non-pregnant mom just accepted a new job--and she was grinning ear to ear about it today. That leaves me. I recently decided to put off having another baby for a while; you really can't go out dancing when you've got a balloon belly knocking you off balance.

So there are two issues here: first, I'll be the only mom left in this group who isn't pregnant or actively trying to expand my family; and second, my thoughts about Portfolio Manager Mom heading back to work are mixed. (For full disclosure purposes, I'm in two playgroups with Toddler in Chief. In the other playgroup, two moms have had second babies and the rest are decidely not pregnant).

But first things first, I found out about two of the pregnancies today and the other two, just 14 days ago. That is a lot to digest during a short amount of time. Why is everyone ready to do it again? Our kids are just turning two, and I suppose it's the standard 2 1/2- to 3-year spread in age. So what am I really upset about? Me, of course! I'm not ready, but I already feel the pressure, even though no one has said, "When are you going to have another?"

I really like going out again. My kid just weaned in January, so my body is my own. I can drink and abuse it as much as I like without affecting another person. My kid sleeps 12 hours at night, so I also sleep all night. I like my clothes. I was one of those moms who didn't want to spend hundreds of dollars on clothes that I would only wear for a couple of months. That is, until I felt hideously frumpy and hormones were seeping from the walls. I broke down and bought one pair of cute jeans, a sexy Michael Starrs low cut, snug sparkly blue shirt, one oatmeal-colored turtle neck sweater, and two white fitted T-shirts. Someone did give me a frilly blue flowered shirt as well, but my belly always hung out the bottom.

But perhaps what is eating at me more than feeling silently pressured to get pregnant again, maybe all my stress is over Portfolio Manager Mom's onramp back into the workforce. While she was all smiles, we really didn't talk about how this means she's departing from our weekly gatherings. My feelings about her success are mixed. Part of me is a tiny bit jealous that she had the courage to do it. Another part of me says, you go girl. Another part of me feels like she is a traitor, leaving us at-home moms to struggle with ourselves.

But as I looked around, no one really seemed like they were struggling. Perhaps because every other woman there is gearing up for morning sickness, frumpy clothing, and more sleepless nights, they've come to terms with their current parenting status. Their new-found pregnancies or infant via surrogate has shifted their to focus to what it will be like to have two babies demanding their attentions instead of just one toddler. With a sly smile, Stanford Staffer Mom said, "I'm glad I'm not going back to work."

For me, I'm not so sure.