I'm not sure if that's even the correct title for this post, but I just like saying it. Have you seen the movie Baby Mama? It was totally underrated and in my opinion, parts of it were pretty realistic. A single woman who works 24/7 to prove to her boss that she can stand up there with the best of them while her maternal instincts are screaming at her from the insides. She hires a surrogate to carry her baby for her since she finds herself to be infertile. What am I getting at here? Well, basically my question is...How does a single working mom do it?
I can barely take care of myself and my dog while working full time. I can't imagine having a baby, full time job, and doing it all alone. Whether you're a single working mom, a married working mom, or just a working girl who is one day hoping to be a baby mama, here is a list of the top 10 companies for Working Mothers, according to Working Mother Magazine:
- Abbott Laboratories, IL
- American Express, NY
- Bank of America, NC
- Booz Allen Hamilton, VA
- Bristol-Myers Squibb, NY
- Colgate-Palmolive, NY
- Computer Associates, NY
- Fannie Mae, DC
- General Mills, MN
- IBM, NY
One of my best friends is currently 6 months pregnant. She is so excited for the baby yet so stressed out about maternity leave and who is going to watch the baby while she's at her job. I work in a day care/preschool so mommies be aware, there ARE educated and responsible people out there who would love to take care of your children while you are at work. Personally I would LOVE to be a stay at home mom. I really enjoy my job, and am lucky to be in a profession that has great hours for children (my mom was a teacher and could easily pick us up and drop us off at school without us even knowing she had a job) but I know it is different for most of you Working Girls.
For those of you who do not have children yet, do you think you'll become a Working Mommy? Continue providing for your family and being a great success? Are there any readers who are already mommies? We'd love to hear your take on it!
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12 comments:
I'm not a mom yet, nor am I even in a relationship, though I would love to be a mom someday. Being a graphic designer and an independent consultant for Arbonne International, it will definitely be possible to balance work and motherhood. I just don't know how long I would take time away from working to focus on being a mom.
I will probably be a working mommy and that terrifies and exhilarates me with anticipation.
I would love to be a working mom someday, but as a single lady the logistics of it are totally beyond me. I have a friend who's expecting now, and she just had to quit the job she looked for for over six months because day care would have eaten up almost ALL her take-home pay. She hated to quit, but it wouldn't have made sense to stay. So it was with my own mom.
In a larger sense, I think public policy here in the US should better reflect the reality that many women work after they have kids (most because they have to) and that those moms shouldn't have to completely 'go it alone' in terms of finding great affordable day care, high quality health care and protection at work so that they can't be fired for fricking procreating.
We don't have kids yet, but I would like to stay at home for the first year of their life. We try to live on just one income, so that when that time comes it won't be as big of a transition. I don't think that's for everyone, but it's something that I want to do. I have so much respect for all of the working moms at my job - honestly, I don't know how they do it!
My mom is a single mom. She says,"You'll be surprised at what you can do when you have to."
She raised 5 girls, 2 jobs, and full time school up to a Master's degree by herself.
I'm 8 1/2 months pregnant currently and i'm so lucky i have a flexible job where i can work from home and my husband just got cleared to work from home a few days a week. so between the two of us home we'll be able to take care of our girl rather than put her in day care. i'm sure it will still be hard though...
I'm a single working girl now, but yes, I would love to be a working mom, but I am terrified of the "mommy track"... the logistics are scary - my colleagues beg, borrow, and steal any time off they have to cover carpools, spring and winter breaks, summer vacation, and while they're married, the weight seems to all be on the women. The worst part is, I suspect our bosses' (who are men) wives carried the bulk of the weight of raising their children, because they lack any sympathy or flexibility with the women with children who need to come in later and stay later or vice versa, or have emergencies - I'm sure their children also had strep throat or had to stay home sick, but they had wives to stay home with the kids. We are the wives/future wives... We're all we've got, so how do we make it work?
I feel blessed to have been on both sides of the fence (working mom and staying home). I think teaching is an awesome career when you want to be working mom. Even if you don't have a background in teaching, you can always apply for alternate routes to becoming a teacher like the Phoenix Teaching Fellows program @ www.phoenixteachingfellows.org
I'm still a newlywed, so not ready for kids just yet, but eventually I will be. For me, my "ideal world" would be working full time with our first kid for a year or two, then go down to part-time with kid number two. I think we could swing day care for one kid, but two in day care full time is pretty costly.
Then when they both hit school-age I'd want to go back to being full-time.
Personally I think part-time is perfect - you get a couple of days being a mommy at home, but you also get a few days out in the "real world" with adults. I think it's good for your psyche to make sure you're doing things outside the home if you're staying home with kids at all. Just my personal opinion though!
I am a young, married working girl and mommy - and I've always known I would continue to work after having children. Maternity leave reassured me of my decision. For me, the quantity of my parenting became inversely proportionate to my quality of parenting. Some of us are just built to do both.... and need each equally though we will always love our child more than our job (priorities people).
That said, I think its also important to have a job you love or that is a great fit for your mommy-style. On days I am dissatisfied with my career, I second-quess myself more than I should. But this is a healthy set-up for me and my family so I have no regrets! Yeah working mommies!
high quality health care and protection at work so that they can't be fired for fricking procreating.
home based data entry
In the beginning, I was a married working mommy and things went better than I thought. Once I fell into the routine, long stretches of time at home rattled me. The morning dash, days at work, evening parenting cycle works well for me. Now as a single working mommy of two, its still pretty much the same, except there isn't another adult to defer to or rely on or work my nerves. :-)
There was a time when I said, I don't know how that would ever work, and now here I am and it works.
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