"Lucky"

I think the Russian hackers have stopped reading my blog as my stats have dropped down to the level where they should be, reflecting the four people who know about my blog.

Anyhow, here is my complaint du jour...

As I am returning to work in a field similar to the one I had left before I had kids, I am thinking to myself, "Good God, why didn't I do this sooner?" I am learning about databases and how to manage them, which to a regular person might sound boring, but to me it is like an engineering puzzle except instead of with electrical currents and metal, it is with columns and rows and tables. Instead of getting air conditioning or a vehicle that gets you from point A to point B, my results are data. Yay!

The main test for me is when I am in my training classes, I ask myself, "Would I rather be here or at home quilting, doing laundry or helping the kids with their homework?" Haha! This is a trick question. When I am in training, I am not thinking about home at all!

It sounds like I am happy with my new situation, so what is my grand complaint? When I express my relief at going back to work, Jack says, "You were lucky you got to stay at home with the kids."

Why do I want to kick him in the nuts when he says this?

Since Hillary has lost the election, I have a new litmus test for potentially sexist comments. Take any comment, and ask yourself, "Would someone say this to a dude?" If the answer is no and it is a not a gender specific question like a doctor asking when your last menstrual cycle was, then it is probably sexist.

Would you ever tell a guy he was lucky he got to stay at home with kids instead of working? I doubt it. Would you tell Hillary Clinton she was unlucky because she worked when she had a kid? Elizabeth Warren? RBG? I'll throw in a Republican to be fair here: Lisa Murkowski, the Senator from Alaska? Maybe these women did a quick stint as stay-at-home moms, but they got right back on the work horse as soon as possible.

Why didn't I go back sooner? There are so many reasons. Jack works lots of nights and weekends, which meant for the past seventeen years I have been in charge of childcare, much more so than the typical stay-at-home mom whose husband might take the kids camping or mountain biking on the weekends. He doesn't do much yard work or other stuff around the house because he is working.

Let me give you a financial comparison. One of Jack's colleagues is married to a surgeon. They have two nannies and an au pere to take care of their kids. They spend nearly a $100K a year on childcare when three small kids, but they can afford it. Basically, I wars providing Jack $100K of free childcare--including evenings, overnight and weekend coverage--while he worked.

"But I am working," he replies. "I am not laying on the beach drining mimosas." Jack would never lie on the beach and drink mimosas on vacation. He'd be doing some crazy adrenaline junkie activity like white water rafting or mountain biking or the Grouse Grind instead of sitting on a beach, which further proves the point I am going to make: Jack likes to work. He loves to work. This is fine. I am glad I married a smart, ambitious man. But somewhere along the line, he forget he married a smart ambitious woman.

Let's go back to my "Is it sexist?" question and give it a tweak. Let's pretend back in 2000 when Claire-Adele was born, I was making more money than Jack. He had just finished his fellowship and started as an attending physician. At the time, I was earning about 2/3 of what he was making. But let's pretend I was making more. Would he have quit his job as a new physician to stay home and take care of the baby? Would he consider himself "lucky" after his years of training and student debt that he didn't have to work? No. Would he have stayed at home himself? When I asked him the question, he was confused: What you do mean stay at home? his expression read. He didn't get it.

SO WHY SHOULD HE THINK I WAS LUCKY?  ARGH.

It wasn't like I was working in a coal mine or as a servant in a large house. I wasn't picking fruit or doing tedious labor. I have two degrees and was fortunate to work in my field. Sure, any job has its boring moments, its hard moments, its working with irrational people moments. That is part of life. In my volunteer work, I met some of the coolest, nicest people. I've also met some of the biggest loons I've ever encountered in my time on the planet.

So where is this rant heading? I am not sure, but I'll guess. First, I believe the Mommy Wars are really between a husband and a wife, not women against women. I make no judgement on what other women choose to do. I will, however, defend their right to work if they want to. Second, I believe the new theory that estrogen causes women to live in a haze of nurturing hormones. As Sandra Tsing Loh writes in "The Bitch is Back" in the Atlantic, she thinks the "Change" is fertility, not menopause. Maybe I am coming out of my haze, and it ain't pretty.

Some of my anger is directed at our culture and society that forces mothers to choose working or motherhood. Why can't we have both? Why does my husband's workplace have such a demanding schedule that his colleagues need such extravagent childcare arrangements? Coming out of a long stint as a stay-at-home mom, it has been very hard to re-enter the workforce. In my training program, I am learning along side a group of veterans. They are invited to the program because after they served their country, it is hard for them to find good jobs. Their training isn't transferable to a corporate workspace. I feel like I served my country, along with millions of other women who raise their kids. Is there a GI bill for us? Are re-entry programs for women looking to re-enter the work force after having kids? I was incredibly lucky to find one, but there aren't many programs like the one I am in. What about the other millions of moms? Will they be so lucky?

Finally, I beg all fathers on this Father's Day to look at their spouses and wonder how much they achieve as dads comes from moms.