When Chaco was born, I was happily employed in my chosen profession. Most of the other women I worked with that had babies came back to work after maternity leave. I took an extended leave and came back with my hours cut in half.
I did the part-time thing for 3 years. In the meantime, Wolfgang had come along. In the meantime, I met some ladies who turned me over to their way of thinking.
Actually, I already knew I wasn't happy dropping the kids off with the babysitter 3 days a week. Even though she was great with kids, even though she lived and ran her daycare from her house that was very near mine, even though she and I would become good friends - all those even thoughs.
So yeah, I ended up meeting this fun group of moms. Remember the days when the internet was brand new? The happy chirp of the dial-up modem? The way we could practically drink a whole cup of tea while a page loaded? I met these women on a discussion forum for moms. Ironically, I found them while surfing from work.
They did "whatever it takes" to stay home and raise the kids. Recall that I said we did cotton diapers? To save money? Well, some of these women not only used cotton diapers, they made their own. They made practically everything! They schooled me in frugality. I retired. My only regret is that it took me 3 years.
I would love to know what happened to most of those women. But as these things often go, we simply lost touch. This was pre-facebook, pre-give-any-personal-information-to-anyone-on-the-internet.
Today, I was doing my weekly purge of my school e-mail. I ran across a short message from a teacher who took this year off to spend the first year home with her daughter who was born nearly a year ago. She was letting us know that her plan to take a year off turned into "I'm not coming back".
That made me happy.
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8 comments:
For a woman (or a man, for that matter) to make a decision based on a family need; to make sacrifices; to deal with and handle "opinions"... well, that makes me happy, too.
Are you old enough to remember the Virginia Slims cigarette commercial (song) "You've come a long way baby, to get where you got to today..." ?
I think they were refering to women who made other kinds of decisions, but nevertheless, it fits you, too. :)
I'm sure the ride has been good and that baby is still saying, Yipeeeee!
Having Travis was certainly life-altering here. He was born in August, and I was a middle school teacher. I took my year-long FMLA leave and never went back to full time public school teaching.
He'll be 13 in a few months.
I'm applying for my first public school teaching gig since before he was born.
Good for her!
Bravo for her! It's a matter of personal choice. Some feel that they can deal with the career and family, while others choose to focus upon raising the family. I respect those who forgo the rat race for the family. It ain't an easy decision. My wife did the same with our son and I feel it made all the difference.
I always imagine how I will be living and doing things when I have kids. I know i'm going to have to make a ton of sacrifices and for this, its probably one of the reasons why I wont be having any for a while. Once I do, I hope I meet a supportive group of moms too :3.
I worked for the first year after my oldest was born and I HATED it! He had a great daycare provider, but she got the best of his days and I was jealous. That's why I opened my own home daycare and stuck with it for 11 years until all of my kids were in school. And then I went to work at their school. I have never regretted having more time with my kids.
I made the choice to stay home as well after teaching for 3 years. I wasn't happy with my child care providers, however. I just felt like none of them were good enough... not that I was that much better, but at least I knew I loved them. :)I stayed home for 8 years with them, and then when child #4 started school, I began working at that same school. I never regretted it either, but I must say that I'm very happy that I work with adults now!
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