Full time mom or part time mom?
by Lilian ~ July 9th, 2007. Filed under: Family.
This is a meme I can easily do. Here’s how it is done. The choice is mine - to be a full-time mom or part time mom, i.e working.
Now, you will not believe this but I will choose both. If you put a woman, alone at home, with no one but a small baby or kid, she will go mad. I know I will. Being a full-time mother is a very, very boring task if one doesn’t have adult interactions. Soon, the self-esteem will slowly goes down the drain like the baby’s poo. We humans cannot live alone because we need others to boost our ego a bit, challenge our mind sometimes and make us feel normal. To those who never deal with babies, they may think it is all rosy and sweet being a mommy with a cute baby. But in real life, babies are not cute and sweet all the time. They are a lot of work, a mighty boring work.
I don’t know how other moms did it but I couldn’t possibly jump into being a fulltime mom. So, #1 came along and I got my mom and sis to take care of him. #2 came along, and mom and sis who are more expert than me, took care of them while I work. #3 came along and no more mom, so he had to be sent to a babysitter.
We couldn’t manage three kids, in three different drop-off points in the morning so sometimes, #3 stayed at the babysitter day and night. We only brought him home to play during the evenings and returned him at night.
Then, only I finally found the courage to drop everything and be a stay-at-home mom when he was about 15 months old. Then with #4, I have discovered a part of me that I never know. I am such a gutsy woman! With him, I can almost go without sleep for 24 hours on end because he was oxygen dependant and I had to keep an eye that his tubes were not detached from his nose. I would put my palm on his chest while sleeping. So, that pretty sums up how one can be totally focused as a fulltime mom when the situation calls for it.
By #5 kid, I treated him differently. He is one big bundle of joy and nothing else. It was all beautiful.
So, if I am given a choice to start from #1, will I choose to be a stay-at-home mom? No. I think I need that few more years of being a working woman to discover myself. I need that interactions with my colleagues, the achievements I made and what I can do or cannot do.
I will only become a stay-at-home mom if there is really no other options or if I couldn’t find any reliable help. And if I stay home, I still need to make myself useful to others than my kids. That’s why I have MyMomsBest parenting site and MyMomsBest forum. I got that established and now I have my dozen of blogs to play with.
So, yeah, never be a total fulltime mom, it will sucks out every inch of your esteem and make you a lousy mom. Find something to do. Community works, church works, online communities, hobbies, interests, moms and kids groups, some direct sales, blogging whatever.
And don’t be too focussed on your career as well. Priority is the family and nothing else matters.
In conclusion - One cannot make a choice. It has to come with the circumstances and one has to go with the flow.
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July 9th, 2007 at 1:25 am
I like this tag
I’ll share with you how i deal with being a mom Samm’s way
July 9th, 2007 at 1:58 am
Lilian,
I share your thoughts. My hubby is so eager to have a baby. When he asks me, it’s not that I don’t like baby, but I’m afraid of the fact that I will be stuck with a baby at home all the time and that will reduce my chance to ever get a job in this foreign country. Eventually I might get mad from only interacting with baby and the dad.
July 9th, 2007 at 8:29 am
OK… will think and write about it.
July 9th, 2007 at 9:21 am
Woww, you’re fast!
Yes, go with the flow is what happens most of the time. I guess it depends very much upon the circumstances we’re in and what our priorities are.
That part about you having a palm on #4’s chest… reminds me of our ambulance trips ferrying very ill intubated babies to SCN 2 hours away. There were no better monitoring except our senses. And we relied on the sense of vision and touch the most. Chest rising and falling, heart rate and skin colour.
The difference was it was just till we got to the referral centre and handed them over to hook up to the monitors. You did it the whole day.
July 9th, 2007 at 3:45 pm
So, wanna know more about me…hehe, of course I’ll share. This is a good tag, btw.
July 9th, 2007 at 5:20 pm
i read your post about #4 before and i thought it was such a beautiful story. I sobbed when i read that.
But anyhow, i agree with Bernard, its always best to go with the circumstance
July 9th, 2007 at 6:13 pm
I love this post. I think I cannot stay at home like you and just jaga anak. I will become siau poh by then. Not that I don’t like baby or kids but somehow I feel we adults need to do some adult stuff too. My son is 4 and my girl is 2 and I am slightly easier now. At least I can do more things that I want. That make me come back to work again last year. Since I cannot leave my kids with someone else - don’t have the heart to do that so, Lawrence had given me the best gift that I ever had - Cooking Island. So now, I can work and take care of the kids at the same time.
July 10th, 2007 at 12:45 am
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July 10th, 2007 at 1:01 am
Children are suppossed to be loved and taught to learn the proper way by parents.
I alternately take up both roles when my work schedule permits.
July 10th, 2007 at 9:41 pm
love being a stay home mum and will go to work if have to contribute financially or have lots of maids to do all housework so no need to do so when i get home from work. stay home mom have more time to socialise, go gym etc etc happy stay home mom
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