Promotion

I got a promotion this week. After my disappointment about not getting the job I thought I had and the fact my substitute teaching license may not be approved before my orientation later this month, hubby and I talked about things and he gave me a promotion. I have been promoted to full-time stay-at-home mom.

My job duties include not only childcare, getting kids ready and out the door for school each day, homework help, driving back and forth to all their activities, cleaning, cooking, grocery shopping, meal planning, laundry, dishes, my job also now includes keeping us on a strict budget and saving us money.

I haven't been working since mid-June but having the burden of looking for a job off my shoulders is huge. It takes a lot of emotional energy to be constantly searching for a job. Not that I won't take any part-time work I can find until the baby is born but it is just the weight has been lifted. I am still pursuing substitute teaching though I just have to wait and see if my license will ever get approved. I also think I found a few hours per week childcare job at a local church, similar to what I've done in the past. Also since we made this decision Tuesday, three leads on occasional child care/nanny work have came up. If they pan out great, I'll work, enjoy it, and take the extra money. If they don't work out that is ok too.

Being a full-time stay-at-home mom has been on my heart for awhile though before paying off both our cars and all our credit card debt it was never really an option for me. Being a stay-at-home mom is completely different than the career driven me of years past when I had aspirations of law school and being a full-time career woman. Things change though and the demands of raising three children and managing a household are a lot. Add a newborn to the mix and you definitely have your hands full. I can't even imagine trying to balance a full-time career, 4 children, including a newborn, and keeping my household running. Not that it can't be done, lots of women do it and do it well, I just know it is not for me. I strongly feel that these years with my kids are years I cannot get back. That being available to them and making them my number one priority is important to me. I can have a career later but for now being a mom is more than enough for me and a job I do with pride.

Things won't look very different at my house at first but I am taking this job seriously, especially the part about sticking to a strict budget and saving us money. This has been somewhat of a gradual change for our family from full-time career outside the home to watching children inside our home, to nannying, to now being a full-time mom. I know I am a better and more patient mom when I can devote the time and attention to my kids they need instead of worrying about calling in sick to work or missing their school play because work has an important meeting. It is easy to say as a career woman that your family is your number one priority but I made sacrifices, missing countless activities of my kids that I simply cannot get back. It is also an amazing feeling that if your children are sick they can simply stay home, no guilt or pressure for calling in sick to work. I am not saying what I am doing is right or wrong but it is right for my family at this time and that is what is important.