WAHM: New Year's Revolutions

Shortly after I launched my freelance writing business I announced to my husband and the mirror that my work day ends at 5:00 p.m. I would happily handle dinner preparations, mail sorting, personal errands, gardening, and calls to my mother-in-law after the close of my business day.

That worked really well until our daughter was born and I fell clutching and screaming from the highwire of my perfect work/life balance and slammed into the unyielding reality of WAHM-hood.

For a long time all I did was wipe... her chin, her butt, her fingers, the counter, the floor, the rug, my lap, my shirt, Daddy's shoulder, strangers' hands...

After about six weeks I managed to eat breakfast and get dressed on the same day. She celebrated by screaming from 5:30 to 9:00 that night and every night thereafter for the next month.

Somehow, in the blur of wiping and screaming and 45-minute sleeping I loved her more every day and actually completed some work for my clients. It was the closest I've come to developing psychosis.

We've all learned a lot since then, and I've regained a fair portion of the work/life balance I had pre-WAHM, but not as much or as consistently as I'd like. Therefore, I'm making three New Year's resolutions - which I call revolutions, because although they seem simple enough, my mastery of them will revolutionize my daily life:

1. I will eat breakfast before leaving the house.
2. I will not have any caffeine after 2:00 p.m.
3. I will spend 30 minutes every day doing something just for me. I can kickbox, do yoga, read, play my flute, listen to music, look at old photo albums, journal, sit by the lake... anything that is truly for me. (No cheating by cleaning out a closet or making a grocery list "because I feel better when things are organized.")

I realize now that there's no way for my writer work day to end at 5:00. Some days it doesn't begin until after 7:00 p.m.! But even if I never return to the highwire, with good balance I can climb higher up the ladder. And that's a good day's work.

Sally Bacchetta - Freelance Writer
Freelance Writer
Parenting
Motherhood