The pressure is there to be a stay-at-home-mom (SAHM as the lingo goes). Blogs, articles, chat rooms, friends, relatives all offer up the advantages to being a SAHM. But I don’t think there is enough shared and said on why it is okay to be a working mom. Maybe it is because all the moms that are working and balancing the life balance of it all are too busy to write about it. Maybe it is mommy guilt that working moms don’t think they are worthy to share that they actually enjoy their job or career. It doesn’t make them less of a mother. It probably makes them more of a mother.
The most profound and simple advice that my crazy hours working attorney mom friend shared with me years ago was “A happy mom makes a happy family.”
There are 6 reasons that I love being a working mom as I travel on business this week.
6. The food is fantastic. I get to travel, attend meetings, go out for late dinners and eat fabulous food which being a lover of food, is a delight.
5. I see and learn business. Above is Joe Lange of Lange Twins Winery. This week along with colleagues while en route to a meeting we toured Lange Twins, learning about a family business, risk and putting it all on the line for family business growth and success. As my husband works as a 2nd generation in a family owned business and my family is a 5th generation farming family, I love seeing and expanding my thinking of how other families grow and expand their businesses.
4. One of a kind experiences are a part of my working life, like yesterday as I toured JS West’s farm and facilities where they produce and package 1.2 million eggs a day. It’s an amazing family farming story that I will share more about on the AdFarm blog and tomorrow here for a Farm Girl Friday post.
3. Learning, understanding and developing a strong connection to where and how our food is grown and the story behind it is a favorite reason I love my working mom career.
2. Social media. I love social media for professional development. I love social media for personal growth. Social media has changed how I view my working life as well as my personal life. My working mom life is mash between personal and professional. Sitting yesterday at an AdFarm Sacramento event with Jay Baer, social media blogger and strategist and my colleague, Libby made me think more about the power of social media and how it connects my passions for food, farming, motherhood, family and more.
1. People. Every reason I am a working mom is really about people. The people I love the most are my family. They are always my top priority. The people that expand and connect me through my professional work grows my personal relationships also. I have talked about Wife of a Dairyman, Nancy Grossi before. She was my blogging buddy before I ever traveled to California for work purposes. Yesterday she came to attend the Sacramento event and we got to chit chat a bit too. Together we both are a part of Real Farmwives of America. The people connection has trickled down to our kids who are now pen pals.
My 3 year old daughter, Miss E, has never met Nancy or the Grossi family but she talks about her friends “in California on the dairy farm” often. The Grossi children’s photos and handmade artwork are hung on our kitchen fridge on the prairie. It is a reminder to me that our family has broader experiences, outlooks and views from my work.
My working mom life makes me happy and in turn my family is happier.
Being a working mom is full of challenges, balances and trade offs. But in the midst of a week like this, I wouldn’t change a moment of it. My kids spend a few nights from me but are spending more one-on-one time with their Dad and grandparents during those nights. When I am home, I am more hands on and attentive as a mom. My awareness of being an engaged and loving mom every day is a deliberate act I think about more as a working mom than if I was a stay-at-home-mom daily. I consciously know this about myself and it makes me a better mom.
Embrace life’s circumstances, know who you are and know who aren’t and be happy with your role with who you are now. If it’s a working mom, stay-at-home mom or not a mom, there are reasons to love it and live it.
What do you find to be the toughest challenges as a mom? Or if you don’t have children what are challenges you face in your working life balance?
(I can always use advice and tips…)
I worked full time until I had the twins. Now I have 2 part time jobs (a marketing job which is primarily online and a teaching job at a local college). I work 10-15 hours a week. It’s good for me, because I want to feel connected and interact and be out there. But I also get to enjoy being home w/ my kids for most of the time. Best of both worlds 🙂
My experiences with motherhood and work have pretty much run the gamut. I’ve gone from being a judgmental stay-at-home mom, to working part time, to bringing the kids along while I work, to putting them in daycare just so I can have a break, and back again, sometimes all at the same time. I’ve come to the same realization as you…it’s all about doing what is best for you and your family and forgetting about the guilt. And the guilt cuts both ways, working moms feel bad because they’re not at home, at home moms feel it because they don’t love every minute of it. It’s that guilt that really hurts the family. Do what’s best for you, your kids, and your family. What’s best for my family may not be what’s best for yours and that is ok!! And sometimes it takes a little experimentation to figure that out. Oh, and that picture of the prime rib….my stomach is growling!!
I think the toughest challenge is keeping your own priority list in order when it doesn’t match your employer’s. I’m blessed to work with a team that allows me to balance what I need to and I constantly strive to tend to my top priority (family) while not letting it lessen my contribution to my employer. It can be done and makes for a happy mom and happy family – just like you said!
good article, its great to see another person’s perspective!
Huh, I never realized there was pressure to be a SAHM. Actually, I feel like I get looked down upon a lot of times because I am one, despite having a degree in business administration. I’m kinda of an odd-ball in my area because I chose to stay home instead of going on to grad-school or into a career. I have even started my own at-home business out of the need to feel like I’m “doing something”. I dunno how working moms do it! You guys deserve an A in my book for everything you do at work and then at home!
I never planned on being a SAHM…it just happened. I agree, sometimes I feel looked down upon because I have those college degrees but aren’t “using” them. My husband asked me the other day if I missed working. Yes and no. There are ups and downs to being both kinds of moms and I hope I can return to work someday. But I agree Katie, a happy mom makes a happy family. Wonderful post!
Thanks for sharing Katie. I think whether you are a stay-at-home mom or a working mom, you are still a mom either way!! I don’t think there is a “best” way to do it. We all do what is best for ourselves and our families. In our situation it is best for me to stay home being my hubby is a pilot. Each family, each mom has to choose what is best for her and her family and then do the best they can!! I love being a stay at home mom and I am happy doing it so then our household is happy. I agree a happy mom makes a happy household, regardless of if you are a stay at home mom or a working mom!! Great post!! Take care and blessings to you!!
Katie, you are such an expert at balancing your home life priorities and your career. Your daughters {and son too} have a fantastic role model to look up to. One of the things I admire about a working mom such as yourself is the time you spend with your family is definitely HIGH quality time:)
Oh, and I’m certain at one point in the future, our kids will meet ‘in real life’ also:)
~safe travels to you, nancy
This is so good Katie! I think by working we are giving our kids a different opportunity by working. Not better, not worse but different than our counterpart SAHMs. A happy mom does make a happy family.
And those dinners are nice, especially when you aren’t policing the etiquette of the kids.
Thanks for being a continued inspiration!
The work dinners can be really nice even if they aren’t too kind to the waist line.
Great post!!
What a great post Katie. You always seem to be able to put into words the things that I think about (okay, sometimes struggle with). Thanks for that!
I love, love this post. Even though I’m in the “not a mom” category, I fully expect to have to balance work and family down the road. You seem to have it together so well and it makes me feel a little less afraid of the whole thing. Thanks for the perspective!
Great post, Katie! I don’t know you really well. But I think you can often learn a lot about someone by reading their blog. And from what I’ve read on your blog, you sound like a wonderful mom. And you’re obviously really good at your job and enjoy it. You seem to be doing well balancing work and family.
Katie, nicely done! I saw this blog title while I was at a monastery on a working retreat. I wanted to read it then but had given up reading blogs for that week with limited Internet, so I’m glad I came back. You did a nice job with this! It can be a touchy subject, and there are good reasons for that, but I agree with you. Having met you, you seem very balanced and happy in your life so I think you’ve hit on something good. I think having a supportive and loving husband probably helps too, right? You are very blessed! 🙂
Still dreaming of the social networking aspect and how our lives may merge again someday because of it…I hope!
I agree that a happy mom makes a happy family…Its funny though because I am a SAHM with a BA in child development and amongst the people I know it is VERY looked down on to be a stay at home mom…I wonder if it depends on your community?
As a single mom, I never had to decide if I was going to be a working mom or not. My decision was made for me. I think the best advice I ever got was that I was the only one that say my daughter’s firsts. I was lucky that my Mom watched her the first 3 years and she never mentioned that my daughter did anything until I said. Did you know she walked this weekend, she had her first belly laugh and said her first word.
Visiting from Kelly’s blog. Thank you for posting. There is so many SAHM in my hometown and I do feel guilty working so much sometimes, even though I know it’s right for me and my family. The only tips I have is that I am OCD in planning/preparing stuff. And it still doesn’t all get done. But, that’s the 2nd thing, who cares? As long as everyone is happy and healthy, it doesn’t matter!
Sorry ….I totally disagree. They way I look at it.. stay home with the kids and work full time when they are grown. You are missing so much and you have no idea. 🙁
Thanks for sharing!
I found your post through Kelly’s Korner. The hardest part about being a working mom is that the free time I have to be with my child is the same time everyone else wants to be with her (weekends and evenings). Its a challenge to get just mommy and baby time in.