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 »

Last night I was exhausted by 8pm, which was annoying, since that’s when the second half of my working day begins. It was a more stressful Monday than usual because my grandmother had surgery in the morning — all is OK for now, fingers crossed — and I’d spent a lot of time on the phone talking with various members of my family, calming them down and pretending to be calm myself. Pretending takes a lot of energy.

I had a bunch of work to get done but he first thing I did was to make dinner for the next two days. Read the rest of this entry »