Working with kids

It’s 9 AM. It takes me a half an hour to make and eat my scrambled eggs and drink milk tea.

I have an hour left before heading out the door for a meeting at the office. Usually it takes me about an hour to get my 4-year-old and 1-year-old fed, clothed and ready to head out the door. Today I did some of the prep work by staying up late to find their clothes and bags for the morning. It took an hour to drop them off to my babysitter and thn drive 35 minutes to the office.

This would be the second day this week I’d have a long day, getting to work and back from 10 AM to 345 PM.

I used to work four days a week in the office. My schedule adjusted from working 35 hours a week (one kid under 3) to 24 hours a week (two kids under 4) at the office to working 5-10 hours from home (three kids, 7 and under). This schedule gives me flexibility to work at home, take my preschooler back and forth from school, and also be home when my second grader comes home.

By the time I got home, all I had energy to do was load the dishwasher and cook rice for dinner. I warmed the leftovers, fed the kids, ate and headed upstairs to put them to bed. I fell asleep unconsciously for 20 min. as they climbed out of bed and played with their toys.

I can only imagine how this feels for mothers who have to work out of the home every single day, fulltime, overtime to keep their families running. I am grateful that my long haul days are usually just once a week.