I was at an event earlier today where the main speaker, an uber-successful mom CEO and entrepreneur with two kids, gave the intro speech and talked about what she has learned about being a working mom who has a demanding career. When it came time for questions a woman in the audience asked her if she ever worried that her working so much negatively affected her kids and their relationship with her.

I couldn’t figure out if the question was a bit passive-aggressive or genuinely from someone who wanted to know how this woman managed to be a mom and high-powered career woman, but it struck me nonetheless. Her response was very honest — she talked about issues her older son is having at school and how she felt that her and her husband not being around as much when he was younger probably had something to do with his current lack of motivation. She said that they learned their lessons and she doesn’t feel like their youngest is getting the short end of the parenting stick.

Driving home I was thinking about this question as it applies to my own life. Read the rest of this entry »

I was at a restaurant for lunch yesterday and there were two women sitting at a table next to ours. While I was waiting for my lunch date to arrive I overheard them talking. I can’t make this stuff up:

Woman #1: “Did you hear that Jill got a new job?”

Woman #2: ” Yes, I ran into her husband at the school and he told me. It sounds amazing actually, but it’s full-time.”

Woman #1: “I know! She told me last time I saw her. It’s pretty intense and probably involves some travel. I just don’t get how she is going to pull it off and still find time for her kids. I don’t mean to judge, but I don’t think I could be a great mom if I worked full-time.” Read the rest of this entry »

One of the most common and I think, quite good, pieces of advice I’ve heard about being a working mom is to look at my life in terms of phases or chapters. We all know that it’s almost impossible to “balance” work, family, and personal time/interests at the same time — there just isn’t enough time in each day and not enough mental and physical energy to give each the same level of attention. But if we look at life as a series of chapters — with some more focused on career, some more focused on kids and family, some on ourselves — perhaps the trade-offs we make all the time can be a bit less conflicting.

Like I said, I like this advice. Many times when I feel guilty about not spending enough time with my daughter because of work, I use it to make myself feel less horrible. “This phase of my life is work-heavy,” I think, “but it won’t be like this forever.”

But I’ll be honest with you — I only half buy this argument. Read the rest of this entry »

I recently came to a realization that for the first two or so years of my daughter’s life I basically denied that my life had changed in any significant way.

Yes, I loved her tremendously and yes, I got a lot less sleep and was a lot more tired, but after my three-month long maternity leave was over I went back to work and continued to live pretty much my old life. I went off to my job at the office, worked until 5:30, and then rushed home to see my daughter for an hour before she went to bed. (Leaving at 5:30 is an unheard-of situation in the industry where I worked but I was the only senior woman at the office and while I got dirty looks, I made it clear that that was the deal. Period.) I worked from home at night to get things done, but I’d done that before as well.

We had a wonderful nanny and my daughter was really happy and well taken care of by her. The nanny also cooked and I’d often come home to a fully-cooked meal plus some. I juggled, it was harder than before we were parents, but I was out of the house and away from my daughter a lot more than I was there and the juggle was concentrated to the few hours at night and on weekends.

Around the time my daughter turned two I had a moment that I’d never expected myself to have — I realized that I could not continue to be away from her for most of the day during the week, to have someone else know her teachers, her friends, her words and funny habits better than me. I’d never thought of myself as a typical maternal type but there they were, my maternal instincts, kicking in and STRONG. And so, as I’ve written about here, I decided to quit my fast-paced, secure, and too-highly paid job and change careers so I could have more flexibility. A year later we’d moved to a different city, I’d started Work It, Mom! from my home office, and my daughter went to daycare. No nanny, no full-time office job, no dinner help, no someone else to stay home with her when she is sick.

I’m now six months into this new phase of my life and I’ve learned something: Read the rest of this entry »

Today’s guest blog post is by Wendy, the rockin’ founder of emomsathome.com. Following up on my post yesterday about overcoming fears of failure as an entrepreneur, this is Wendy’s perspective on the topic. It’s no secret that I am a huge fan of hers–read this, it will give you a fresh perspective whether or not you’re an entrepreneur.

Is it Fear of Failure or Fear of Success That Is Holding You Back?

My second home based business was a great freelance graphic design business. I ran it for 4 years from home, never took on any debt, and made money every year (until the end… but that’s another story). There were several times in which I tried to figure out how to grow the company without taking on more clients - and the obvious solution was to subcontract some of my work out to other freelancers.

This worked for a while, but I found that I was a little lot outside of my comfort zone to delegate work - especially work that had “my name on it”. I wanted to run the show - wanted to maintain control. At the time, I knew I was dealing with an internal struggle - and deducted that I was just afraid of failing :: that if I didn’t control all of the pieces of the puzzle, something would go terribly wrong.

So I eventually stopped trying.

It wasn’t until few years later that I realized that perhaps it wasn’t fear of failure at all. In fact, I was damn good at failing :: I failed to follow up on a ton of leads, failed to grow my business to the level I wanted, failed to manage my time efficiently, and in the end the burnout got to me and I ended up closing my doors (which may or may not be considered a failure - for me, it truly was the right time to move on).

It was a dear friend who helped me to see that failing was indeed comfortable for me. What I was actually afraid of was becoming a success. Megan over at eBay Selling for eParents wrote a heartfelt post about this yesterday. And instead of buttoning up her article, she left it open ended and asked for some input from others.

So here’s what I have found. Becoming successful has a whole slew of perceived baggage that comes with it: I feared that if I became hugely successful…

• Friendships and relationships would change because I would become more successful than the people I loved
• That success would go to my head and I would become a raving bi*ch (hahaha) Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve had a few tough weeks. I was really sick, then my daughter had croup, then my doctor told me that the reason I get sick and tired more than I used to is because my body is apparently rebelling against how much I work and stress, things aren’t moving as fast on the work front as I’d like, my husband and I have had a few too many unnecessary “why didn’t you get chicken at the store when it’s on the list?” bickerings, my mom wants to know why I can’t just be normal and get my high-paying job back, and a mom in my daughter’s preschool class greeted me the other day by saying “Hi! Good to see you–I just spent an hour with the kids making zucchini bread!” (Yes, she had THAT tone in her voice and THAT look on her face.) So generally not feeling super about my work-life juggling abilities.

And then I read this and at least for a short while, it made me feel like the most balanced and most awesome work-life juggler. It’s an article about Dolly Lenz, a super-duper-top-notch-celebrity real estate broker in New York City, who last year sold more than $700,000,000 in real estate. (No, there aren’t extra zeros in there.) When I saw that number I said wow, amazing–you go girl! And then I read this quote:

“Each week, how much time do you actually spend with your two teenage kids?”

“I would say I spend an hour with my daughter, and I would say I speak to my son 10 minutes a week.” Read the rest of this entry »

I just came back from seeing a new doctor. We moved recently, so I am making the doctor rounds (fun, I know.) This time it was a new OBGYN and I really liked her, which is a HUGE relief, since I loved my OB back in NYC and have been dreading switching to someone new. But something happened at the appointment that has compelled me to intrude on our Guest Blogger Tuesday here at the Work It, Mom! Blog:

In the pile of the paperwork that the doctor’s office gave me to fill out there was a basic “tell us about yourself” questionnaire. I was on autopilot while filling it out until I got to this question:

Do you work outside the home?

First I just tried to figure out what to write as an answer. Since I work from a home office, the obvious choice was, of course, to write “No”. But what I think the question was asking is whether I have a job and the answer to that is “Yes”. What I really wanted to write in that field is a long and somewhat annoyed essay about the millions of moms who work from home, make a living for their families, and don’t see themselves as not working simply because they don’t go to an office every day. But I got a hold of myself just in time to just write “Run a company from home” and move on to the next set of questions. Read the rest of this entry »