As of today, my daughter is away with my parents for 10 whole days, splashing at the beach, watching too many cartoons and eating endless “mommy doesn’t let me eat this at home” treats. Heaven for her and, dare I say this, a bit of heaven for me and my husband.

You see, I have tons of working mom guilt. I’ve tried to battle it, fight it, ignore it, rationalize it, but it’s sill there, especially when my work takes me away from my daughter overnight, say on business trips (I know I am not alone in this). When my parents took her for two weeks last year, I felt incredibly guilty, the entire time. And as we were getting ready for her trip to the beach this year, I kept waiting for the guilt to kick in.

But it didn’t. Read the rest of this entry »

I recently spoke at a great conference for women entrepreneurs and there met up with a few of my friends who don’t have kids. One of them runs her own successful business and two are plugging away in the corporate/financial world. All three are in their mid-30s and I guess the clock is ticking because all three asked me the same question at some point during the day:

I am petrified about having kids and balancing my demanding career with being a mom — can you tell me the truth about what it’s like?

Talk about pressure. Read the rest of this entry »

My daughter is turning four in a few weeks (OMG!) and while the stubbornness of this age I could do without, I’m loving this time in her life. She says the funniest things, asks the cutest questions, and wants to do stuff together which is, for the most part, kind of fun. A member recently asked how many of us actually get on the floor and actively play with our kids and I proudly answered that yes, this is something I do as much as possible.

But as every working mom I know, I find myself under constant pressure to spend more quality time with my daughter and with ever-present guilt that I am not spending enough of it with her. Read the rest of this entry »

This past weekend my daughter went to a birthday party where the activity was to make a mask out of clay. My daughter is almost four, while the party was for a bunch of seven year-olds (we’re friends with the family so she was invited), and she couldn’t do this on her own, so I had to help out. (It turned out that many of the seven year-olds also couldn’t soften the clay/shape it/cut it/attached parts to it on their own, but that’s not the point.)

After I helped my daughter get her huge chunk of clay into a mask that did actually look like a cat, it was time to paint it. My daughter jumped to it and as you can imagine, the colors were all over the place, the red from the mouth was running into the face, the brown from the nose was running into the mouth, and when she took a huge brush of yellow (to do the eyes, mommy!) it splattered all over the blue background color.

As I was watching her do this, I was having an internal debate. I can summarize it like this: Read the rest of this entry »

I had coffee the other day with a friend of a friend. Since we moved my friends have been really kind introducing me to their friends in the area and I always jump at the opportunity. We had a really nice talk and after I got home there was an email from the friend who introduced us, saying how much this woman liked me and how together she said I seemed.

I literally almost spit up the water I was drinking when I read that because I was having one of those days you really want to forget. My daughter was sick and I’d spent the morning attempting, without much success, to get a bit of work done while taking care of her. I’d forgotten a really important call. My mom and I managed to get in a fight on the phone. I’d spilled the soup I was making all over the stove that was cleaned the day before and I was consuming every bad-for-me sugary carbohydrate I could get my hands on to try and eat some of the stress away. (Verdict — that definitely doesn’t work,) Read the rest of this entry »

Many times when I mention to someone my guilt about not spending enough time with my daughter they say to focus on the quality of time I spend with her vs. quantity. I always nod not just to be polite but because I believe that quality does matter and kids don’t sit there with clocks keeping track of how many hours a day we spend with them.

I also think back to my childhood, when my mom worked nights and we’d see each other for just a few minutes at night during the work week. What I remember is my excitement of jumping around and recounting my day to her (as she tried to grab something to eat and take off her heels), the way her face was glowing when she listened to me, the sweetness of her kiss when she and my dad tucked me in. I also remember the weekends which the three of us would usually spend together and I cringe with guilt thinking back to becoming a teenager and telling my parents that I don’t want to hang out with them so much any more. My mom worked and worked a lot, but I never felt a lack of closeness between us from that. Read the rest of this entry »

I’ll just come out and say it:

Our daughter goes to sleep at 7pm and I really like having a few hours after she is asleep to do work, talk to my husband, or watch some silly TV. (OK, let’s be honest, mostly I spend the time working but the hour my husband and I spend together, eating dinner or catching up on a show is essential to my sanity.)

Don’t think that was selfish enough of a confession? I got more: Read the rest of this entry »