It is 6:30 am and she straps her 3-month old into his car seat. Today she traded in her slippers and go-to robe for her nursing friendly professional attire.
She’s heading back to work but this time he isn’t going with her. For nine glorious months she toted him along in her belly as she met with colleagues, attended meetings and wowed clients.
But today, he won’t be allowed in. Her baby is going to be with strangers, and, even though she checked all the credentials, got referrals and even toured the center in-person, her heart still breaks. Daycare is not the place she wants him to be but their lifestyle requires a dual income and there is no other option.
The past three months were filled with sleepless nights, unknowns and learning curves but she would go back and do it all over again, because working was not in her plans. As a child she played house, cared for her dolls and dreamed of becoming a mom. Now she is leaving her “day job” to go to work.
She unlocks the doors and enters the empty office, the one she refused to think about the past three months. The emptiness mimics the hollowness in her heart.
Sitting at her computer, she stares at the endless list of emails she ignored during her leave. She knows she has to get to them but her heart wants to race back and pick him up. The clock ticks and it is already time to pump so she locks herself away in the small space, listening to the rhythmic pulsing of her machine. She thinks of the afternoons she nursed him, sitting outside, in the sun, on her porch. Now she is living on coffee and whatever lunch she was able to throw together.
Day by day it does get a little more manageable. She figures out how to pump during her short breaks or even in the car while she is driving. She learns to keep an extra set of pump parts at work just in case her already jumbled mind forgets them at home. She allows herself to switch to formula because it’s about his health and not her need to bond. She finds the best dry shampoo so that she can devote an extra five minutes in the mornings to snuggle him.
She will get through this. She will survive. She might even begin to appreciate the adult conversations she gets to have at work.
When you see her in the office though, know that she might have been up three times last night with a teething baby. She might be thinking of the nursing session she is missing while strapped to her pump. She might be wondering if he says his first word off her watch or if the daycare center will keep him on his sleep schedule, the one she worked so hard to get him on.
Be gentle on her because secretly she could be breaking inside.
