Making The Choice

Some say today's women can have it all: thriving kids, successful career, healthy marriage, clean house, a close circle of friends and still manage to get a pedicure every once in a while.   I'm only 5 months into this thing called motherhood, but I have to say, I call bullshit.   There are only 24 hours in the day, and even though 8 hours of sleep is a long-lost memory, I don't know how these superwomen do it all.  

If you can, (some of my best friends seem to be doing a hell of a good job at it) I give you props and then some.  But I am throwing in the towel on being able to "have it all" and with my stomach in knots, am saying goodbye to what once looked like a very promising career.  Today is my last day on the job.

For the past 3 months I've only worked part time, which I felt like I could balance well and still maintain my sanity.  What I didn't account for was having to pay a sitter more than I would end up making and being stuck in a position that did nothing to satisfy my aspirations but was all that made sense for the "part-time person."  I guess I'm young enough and naïve enough to not be ok with mediocre.  I only want great.    And I think my full time career could have been that. It could have been great.   But what I have now in Forrest is amazing, and if I can't do both, I wholeheartedly choose him.   It's just, well... I feel like a little part of me is dying today and if I start crying right here at my desk on my last day of my "career," I hope the world understands.  I've worked on my profession for over a decade, and I only worked on creating Forrest for 9 months.

I bet some people think I'm an awful woman right now...

There's a song out there with the lyrics, "In the blink of an eye; Seems like minutes as the years fly by... Afraid to stop because you can't stop time."   I know that Forrest will grow up so fast, and when it's all said and done, I don't think I will ever regret leaving a promising full time career behind to be present with him every day.  I am trading in business development meetings for play dates, pencil skirts for spit-up soaked t-shirts, and challenging DoD solicitations for Mother Goose and Curious George.  I am trading in a comfortable income and some nice discretionary spending for a real tightening of the proverbial belt. But I really feel like I'm doing the right thing. I want to be with him -- to be wholly present and to be... his.     It's just . . . I feel like I'm going through an identity crisis.

Today is my last day on the job.   And tomorrow I may cry a little for what is past, but then I will scoop my beautiful little boy up and cuddle him as if my life depends on it.  Because it might.