I Can Bring Home the Cheese Sticks and Fry Them Up In a Pan

I went back to work a few weeks ago, which put me at the center of a cultural phenomenon. Much like that time I was sitting in traffic on the 101/405 interchange in Los Angeles at the very moment that the radio was announcing that it was at the top of the list of the country’s worst interchanges, I am now right in the thick of things again. Except this time I am not praying for traffic to move because I have to pee so badly. This time I just want everything to SLOW DOWN.

In the last month I have had one foot planted on either side of the great Mommy Wars of the new millennium: one second I was a Stay at Home Mom, and then at 9:30 on a Tuesday, in my new Land’s End No-Iron shirt, I walked through a door and became a Working Mom. I joined the other side!

I still don’t get what the big deal is with the Mommy Wars. It seems like the only people who are arguing for the merits of either side are the people who actually have a choice in the matter of going back to work or not. Everyone else simply must work to pull in enough money to make ends meet, and they are not at war with anyone besides The Man, which is a whole different fight. The moms who do have a choice and decide to go back to work are maligned by the ones who stay home, which I must say is a dirty way to kick a sister when she’s down. Aren’t we all in this together? Isn’t this what feminism was all about? The choice to choose it all? Enough, I say. SHUT UP ABOUT THE MOMMY WARS, already, and JUST DO WHAT’S RIGHT FOR YOU! Then at least we might be spared those ridiculous “news stories” on the Today Show or another Caitlin Flanagan book.

For me, the war is in my heart. I didn’t want to go back to work. I know the right choice for me and my family is for me to be a SAHM (because you get to watch Oprah every day but our bank account wouldn’t support that lifestyle for longer than a year. So here I am. Having taken a whole year off to care for my son, Kyle, I got pretty used to spending my time with him, and I never missed all the baggage that came with having a career. I also just loved sleeping in, taking long showers, walks around the park, and getting my hair and nails done whenever I wanted. And if you think that’s really what I did with my “time off,” then you haven’t had a baby yet.

I thought I would hate working again. I assumed that my potty mouth would return with commuting, bad office coffee, and annoying coworkers. But I must confess, when I am at work I am NOT responsible for a child. Anything in comparison is so much less “actual work” that it feels easy. (Not to mention that my job is to write a television show about babies, a topic I know well. I actually conceived and gave birth to Kyle as research for this job. A bit extreme, I know, but I am dedicated to my work. I’m not running around after a toddler while simultaneously grocery shopping, paying bills, doing laundry, feeding the pets, vacuuming, or unwrapping cheese sticks for dinner. At work my only job is to write. It’s that simple.

The one major downside of this shift in my responsibilities is that my husband and I have had to place Kyle in full time daycare. Stewart left the search for a suitable caregiver up to me since I am pretty particular about who cares for my child in my stead. At first it was a daunting task — not every daycare has an open spot for a child under 2 at any given time. And there’s no manual or comprehensive list of daycare locations in our area. It took a lot of research and many phone calls for me to even gather a list of places to visit. In the end I met with 8 different daycare providers, including 6 home-based daycares (basically licensed babysitters, one daycare facility, and a nanny.

From my research, I have crafted a few tips for those of you who might be considering a career in the childcare industry:

• Clean your house before I come over. Really. It doesn’t have to be immaculate, but at least hide the dead bugs and dog hair.
• Farm animals are charming, but they and the three-legged German shepherd scared me away in an instant.
• It would help if you spoke the language I speak, which is English. I’m just sayin’.
• I’m a new mother. I am honestly turned off by the fact that you feed Froot Loops to your charges as a snack. Haven’t you seen those public service announcements about childhood-onset diabetes?
• This is Los Angeles. Nobody works 9-5, and even if they did, traffic prohibits them from making it to your daycare on time every day. When I am late, I simply cannot pay your penalty that is as much as my monthly mortgage payment.

I finally found a woman who met all of my requirements, and Kyle has been going to her house for two weeks. At first it was awful, mostly because I was so emotional and so guilt-ridden about leaving him behind. When I dropped him off the first day I burst into tears. Bad move. The babysitter instantly burst into tears as well. But somehow we got through that first day and every day since then has been a tiny bit better. Kyle and I still say goodbye like lovers parting, but as I walk away sometimes I even hear him laugh.

That little voice, the one that tells me I should have sacrificed my TiVo and Real Simple subscriptions and my weekly runs to Target so I could stay home with my baby even longer, is still there in the back of my head. And I realized that I have outsourced yet another of my household duties. After all, I really suck at things like cleaning my house, pruning roses, and pedicures, so I pay people to do that stuff. I can’t care for my child while I work at a job I am good at, so I hired a pro to watch him. The babysitter plays with Kyle all day long, which is something I could never do as a homemaker. She prepares homemade food for every meal, while I have no problem serving up fish sticks, cheese sticks, pretty much anything in stick form. She engages in educational activities, crafts, and games. In contrast, I have little to no experience other than the fact that I grew Kyle in my womb and got him this far.

At the end of the day, what I am left with is this simple reality: I am happy, Kyle is happy, Stewart is happy, and we now have enough money to buy things like $800 digital cameras to take pictures of Kyle so we can remember him during the 45 hours a week that he’s at the babysitter’s house. I work in the company of like-minded, smart people, who make me smarter just being around them. And I get to come home to a delightful child who is learning more than I can teach him. Would I have it any other way? Absolutely, but this is the right way for us right now.

It’s hard enough to be a mother, period. Add on the challenges and social pressures that go with at-home mothering or work outside the home, and you have a great big pile of women with their dukes up. It’s no wonder the news media exploits us like they do. But now that I’ve made up my mind about my own life, I swear if I hear one more pundit telling me what to do I am going to throw my Blackberry at the television, and then I’m going to email Elizabeth Vargas and say “good for you, quitting your news anchor job so you can have a second baby!” Then I’ll turn on my TiVo and watch today’s Oprah. Who says you can’t have it all?

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kim@themommytimes.com