On this blog I often share the struggles and challenges I face as a working mom. It’s not easy, we all know that. But today I had one of those amazing days when everything seemed to work and as I sit here and type these words, I am experiencing an extremely rare emotion:

I feel like I rocked this day, as a mom, as a professional, as a daughter, and even as a wife.

Feeling like this is rare for me because I get through most days with this nagging feeling of not being adequate in any of the many roles that I play. You know the drill, I am sure: Not feeling like you did enough at work, or spent enough time with your kids, or managed to have a real conversation with your husband. Read any member article or blog or comment on Work It, Mom! and it seems many of us feel this way. And that’s why I wanted to share my small little victory of having one day when I don’t feel like that. It’s totally cheesy, but life is so full of difficult stuff that I feel we need to play up the good parts more.

So, about my day. I am sure you don’t want to hear all of the details, but here’s the gist:
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I’ve never watched Dr. Phil and to be honest, the small bits of the show that I’ve caught here and there, while flipping through channels at the gym, didn’t exactly draw me in. I find him blunt, but in a bad way, intrusive, but in less-than-helpful way, and just overall not a kind of guy whose opinion will sway me. So when I read about the show he did recently about stay-at-home moms vs. working moms, I didn’t rush to YouTube to check it out.

It turns out it was a very good thing. According to the many, many blog posts about it — most filled with the kind of sharp emotion only the mommy wars can bring on — the show would have made my blood boil. One of the guests was Jessica Gottlieb, who is a stay-at-home mom and who often blogs about the wonderfullness of moms who stay at home and the terribleness of moms who choose to work. Apparently she said things like working moms who choose to work (vs those who have to work) are selfish and “I wouldn’t outsource loving my husband, why would I outsource loving my kids?”
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I was completely blown away when I read recently about a ruling by an Ohio court that the state’s law that protects pregnant women from workplace discrimination does not protect them from being punished for breastfeeding at work during unauthorized times. At the center of the case was a woman who was fired by her company for pumping at work during an unauthorized break. Her son was 5-month old at the time.

(Many other moms and bloggers are reacting to this — check out Leah’s awesome post over at Working (on) Motherhood.)

I am not a lawyer and won’t go into dissecting the actual case. I am sure the core of the case revolved around the fact that this woman took an unauthorized break and what she did during it has nothing to do with it — she broke the rules and there were implications. But I can’t help but think that in this case, the employer should have shown some more flexibility. After all, it’s not like she went shopping during the break.

The issue that this raises in my mind is the fact that while the government strongly promotes the benefits of breastfeeding and advocates for women to breastfeed as long as possible, we don’t have federal regulation that sets standards that companies have to follow when it comes to new moms. For example, new moms could be allotted more regular breaks during the day, so that if they are choosing to pump at work they have plenty of opportunities to do it. Or perhaps new moms can be allowed to take several unplanned breaks during the day so they could pump. Whatever it is, I am fairly certain that the government can do more to actually help moms who want to pump at work do it and the fact that it’s not the case makes me really angry.
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Image from LA Times

I’m a fan of Diane Sawyer — she is smart, seems to treat her show guests with respect and just stunningly gorgeous — so I was happy to learn that she is taking over the nightly news anchor spot at ABC. Not all, but part of my happiness had to do with the fact that yes, here goes another woman into a highly visible position not often occupied by women. Katie Couric paved the way as the nightly news anchor for CBS and to have another woman in a coveted position is just cool. (If you want to have an “I can’t believe this moment”, consider this: Women occupy only 3% of the “clout” positions in media.)

But then I started to wonder whether we (read, we = women) should be celebrating Diane Sawyer’s new gig, as some women’s organizations are doing.
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After my daughter was born I took a 12-week maternity leave. I didn’t fully appreciate at the time how lucky I was to have a fully-paid three-month leave, but it felt nothing but too short and not enough the day I went back to work.

Going back was brutal. I did a bit of work while I was at home but from the first moment I was back at the office I was expected to be on and at 100%. If you’ve had kids, you know it’s entirely impossible to do that so soon after having your life change completely. Eventually I managed to get back into a work routine, but it took a while.

Which is why I was sitting there with my jaw wide open when I read about Rachita Dati, the justice minister of France, who returned to work five days after giving birth. No, not a type, five as in 5 days after giving birth.
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Another title for this post could be: What the f* is wrong with us, women!

I read in an article over the weekend that according to the Workplace Bullying Institute (is there an institute for everything?) when women bully others at work they target other women 70% of the time, while men tend to target women and men equally. Workplace bully-like behavior is an ugly thing on its own, but the fact that women undermine each other and are nasty to each other more often just plain sucks. (I was going to write something more eloquent, but this topic doesn’t deserve it.)

This isn’t the first article written about how terrible women can be to each other in the workplace and it’s not the first time I write about it here — my post about being tired of dealing with bitchy women at work is one of the most popular on this blog. Every time I think about this topic I go through the list of reasons/theories for why women have such a hard time supporting each other in the workplace: (the author of the article I mentioned has a similar list):
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According to this article I just read in the New York Times more companies are allowing moms to bring their babies to work.

My reaction, as I read it, was why would anyone want to bring their child to work? Granted, I’ve never worked for a company that allowed this, but I don’t see the appeal. As things stand I struggle constantly to give 100% of my attention to my daughter when I am with her and to my work when I am working — I think this would be nearly impossible to do if my daughter were, in fact, right there where I work. I’m also fairly certain that having a baby running around an office is at least somewhat distracting to other people who work there, even if they absolutely positively adore babies and have lots of their own.
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The Duggars have 18 children. They had 17 at the time I was reading this interview with them over at ParentDish, but their newest baby was just born. 18. I am just going to type that again so you know it’s not a typo.

But back to the interview. As I was reading it I started to think about how families make the decision about how many kids to have. Because I think it’s one of those, you know, LIFE DECISIONS, which might come easy to some but is likely emotionally and otherwise charged for others.
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According to a new study, if you’re an ambitious and competent woman your next job interview might not go so well. According to a new study in Psychology of Women Quarterly:

Women who present themselves as confident and ambitious in job interviews are viewed as highly competent but also lacking social skills. Women who present themselves as modest and cooperative, while well liked, are perceived as low on competence. By contrast, confident and ambitious male candidates are viewed as both competent and likable and therefore are more likely to be hired as a manager than either confident or modest women.
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Between the redesign of Work It, Mom! (Did you check it out? Do you like it? If you don’t, i don’t want to hear from you for at least a week.) and the Thanksgiving holiday I’ve missed reading several articles about the momification of Michelle Obama. But now I’m caught up and I have a few things to say on the topic, not surprisingly.

As background, what upsets some working women, and what has been termed the momification of Michelle Obama, is her decision to put her career on hold and her announcement that once Barak Obama becomes our next President she will assume the role of mom-in-chief. As a working woman whose career is very important to me I don’t get what the fuss is all about.
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