Member Articles

I look around my house. My daughter is coloring with magic markers. My son, just a couple of months old, is in his bouncy seat, his chin glistening with drool. They both look content. I have recently returned to work after my second maternity leave.

“It’ll get easier,” I say.

I know it doesn’t make her feel better. I just don’t know how to explain what will happen—how each day, she will feel more comfortable with her decision to work and with her son’s childcare situation; how she still will miss him but will start to feel less guilty; how it always will be difficult; but, well, it will get easier.

I have to get off the phone before we can talk it all out. My daughter is no longer coloring on paper; she is trying to decorate the kitchen with her markers. My son is screaming his head off for no apparent reason. The dog is barking at the UPS delivery guy.

A little addition tells me it has been nearly 1,000 mornings since that bathroom scene. The insanity in my household has increased exponentially. That’s what happens when a family grows. But the gut-wrenching heartbreak my friend across town feels as she cradles her infant, well, that is almost gone.

It has gotten easier.