Tag: parenting

The Glamorous Life of this Stay at Home mom.

The Glamorous Life of this Stay at Home mom.

Before everyone gets all upset with me, I realize how grateful I am to even have the option to be a stay at home mom. I realize how many single parents are out there working more than one job I also realize the number of families with both parents working and still those ends are barely coming together.

This however is MY story. Everyone has his or her own story.

I never wanted to be a stay at home mom. When my daughter came along, I cut my hours back. I was fortunate to have a boss who was understanding and a job that was flexible to allow a new schedule. When I had my second child, my boss again understood and allowed me to cut my hours back even more. (When my boss quit, my new boss was not as understanding and actually wasn’t open to women playing any management part in the company.)

Needless to say, I have been blessed with so many great bosses. So many bosses who understood about work/life balance. Sometimes we don’t realize what we have until it’s too late.

A few years ago, I decided to stay at home full time. It wasn’t my boss. My schedule was great. I was tired of the ACTUAL job and some of the people I had to encounter on a daily basis.

So I left and my boss understood and his parting words to me were this “You aren’t going to be happy staying at home.” I laughed and thought to myself “What a crazy thing to say.”

It’s been 3 years and I am starting to think he might have been right.

Here’s what I love about being a stay at home mom.
1) Being able to wear yoga pants all day.
2) Not having to get in the car if it’s cold outside.
3) Having my dogs with me all day
4) Not having to worry about back up plans for sick kids or snow days.
5) Going to the gym late morning
6) Being able to lunch with my girlfriends
7) Being able to run errands without those weekend crowds

Here’s what I don’t like about being a stay at home mom.
1) It’s super lonely. More lonely than you could imagine.
2) Some days you feel worthless
3) Lack of your own spending money
4) Guilt when you do spend money on non-necessities
5) Miss feeling like I am making an actual contribution
My husband is great and supportive. However, some days I feel like he looks at me and wonders what I do all day.

Some days the loneliness is overwhelming. (Today is one of those days.) I look around the house all the things I want to get done. My “to do” list is so long. It has things I want to accomplish and things I need to accomplish.

I’ve been looking into ways to make some side cash or doing job outside of the house. Sometimes I dream of having this hugely successful side business. Sometimes I dream of opening a gym, just to give me a place to go where I am the boss.

I have looked into MLM companies but I am not great a selling. I don’t like to pressure my friends or family. Trust me, I get so tired of seeing the same things on Facebook. Not to mention all the people on instragram who only want to follow me so they can sell me their products.

If I am home all the time, my house should be the cleanest house should be spotless. Laundry done every day. A yummy home cooked meal on the table at 6 pm every night. (If only)

Some days I am on top of everything – I get so many things done. Other days (most days) I am so consumed by the shear feeling of loneliness and feeling worthless. I’m 44 and I think, “This is it”. I start to wallow in my own self-pity that before I know it, it’s time to pick the kids up from school. Then I get mad at myself for another wasted day. (It’s 10 am right now and I have gotten 2 loads of laundry done, wiped down the counters. I’ve also thought about dusting my downstairs, cleaning out the basement, and cleaning the closets. The last 3 did not happen.)

Staying at home has way more positives over negatives. But some days being a stay at home mom is so the opposite of glamorous. If you are a stay at home mom or dad, I hope you find it rewarding.

What you don’t see coming with parenting

When we think about becoming parents, we think about babies, toddlers. We think about them growing up and giving us grandbabies.

When they are babies, we run on lack of sleep. We never knew we would care and talk about pooping and eating habits. We never knew we could love another human being so fiercely.   Everyone says the years go by so fast.   We are so tired we think they are crazy.

Here comes the toddler stage. We are now chasing them around, keeping them out of things. They make us laugh by incorrectly pronouncing words.   They even make us laugh when they do bad things. We shake our heads and laugh under our breath when they yell out a curse word.

They move on to school and we worry about them making friends. We worry about their grades.   We just want make sure they are invited to play dates and birthday parties.

I look back on those days and they now seem so far away. I think about tired I was back then. Little did I know what was coming up in my future.

The stage no one prepared me for was the “tween” stage.   Sure, I can think back to myself at that age. I can tell my kids my stories so they know they aren’t alone when a friend hurts them. I can tell them the things I did wrong so they can learn from my mistakes (or at least hope).

I wasn’t really prepared the AMOUNT of attitude I would be getting from the kids. I wasn’t planning on my life depending on their friendships. I wasn’t prepared for checking texts and social media. I was in no way prepared for reading things in those texts I didn’t want to read.   A kid offering my 13 year old a vape pen. A friend sending less than pleasant things via texts.   I wasn’t prepared to feel like I am going through all of it all over again. Those hurt feelings.   The feelings of being left out. Only this time I think it hurts more because I can’t fix it for them. I can’t make them see it will get better.   I can’t make them realize that everyone is trying to find out who they are and where they stand with other peers.

When you are parent, you set your rules for your children. Rules they break. Rules you bend. The flip side to those rules is when other parents don’t have those same rules.   Parents who have way less rules than you have set down. There is always a parent more “cool” than you. Things you don’t really feel comfortable with but you do trust those parents.

I’m not in denial about what lies ahead of me – sex, drugs, drinking. I know they are on the horizon. They will be here sooner than I know it.   It actually terrifies me if I am being 100% honest.   I like to be honest with my kids and keep the lines of communication open.   Like I said, I read the texts and I see the things that are kept from me. Nothing horrible – YET.   I think back to my childhood and how things have changed. My mom didn’t have to worry about social media. In ways, it might have been better if she didn’t know things. I wasn’t a horrible kid. I stayed a virgin, stayed away from drugs though I did drink.

I also don’t think parents got so involved in everything with us. My parents knew my friends parents. My parents knew where I was spending my time.   They didn’t have conversations with other parents about what we were doing – they let us figure it out.   I know if they had to step in, they would have. I know that my friend’s parents would have been the same way.

To me, the dark side of parenting is these years – tween/teenager.  Sex trafficking is a major concern. Kids want to see how many “followers” and “streaks” they can rack up. They don’t always look at who their friends on social media. They don’t know about the people who scout out other kids. (Think about Peter in the movie Taken.”

I feel very unprepared and very ill equipped in these years.   Am I the only one?