Is it 2022 yet???
Happy New Year! I think we are all happy to leave 2020 behind us, although 2021 does not seem to be off to a great start.
I’m not going to lie, being a working mom to a 6 year old in the middle of a pandemic is a struggle.
I’ve worked for my father in the auction business for over 20 years. I enjoyed the job, and the flexibility allowed me to pursue other interests which made me feel fulfilled. I scheduled things around our busy days and seasons and I was able to take acting classes, go on vacations, and at the age of 30 go to college to earn my BA. Since I was a little girl all I ever wanted to do was work with animals, but I admit, science was not my strong suit so I abandoned the idea of becoming a veterinarian early on. However, while in college, I majored in psychology and took some courses in animal behavior, even writing my senior year thesis on the subject. I thought maybe I could counsel using animal assisted therapies.
At the age of 35, I started graduate school to get my Master’s in Psychological Counseling … and got pregnant, all still while working for the auction company. After my son was born, I put my Master’s Degree on hold and just concentrated on being a working mom and wife. Here is where that flexibility really worked out again. My mom watched my son 3 days a week so I could work, other days I did what I could working from home, I was also able to bring my son to the office with me when needed – it was the perfect job. I was half a stay at home mom / half a working mom.
In 2018-2019 I went back to school to finish my Master’s degree, taking night and online classes. I really enjoyed being in school but it was difficult balancing everything and I worried about paying for school so after one semester with only about 5 classes left to graduate, I quit. Around this time my father decided that at the end of 2019 he would retire and now I worried about what I would do. My husband encouraged me to take over my father’s business – I was hesitant. The main reason was because I did not want to get up on the microphone, my husband said he would go to auction school and do it, so that’s what we planned for. It really made the most sense and was the best option.
So in the spring of 2019 I sat with my father’s business partner and talked with him about me stepping into my father’s role and in the summer my husband went to auction school. All was going as planned. At this time, my son was 5 years old and in Pre-K five half days a week, my father had knee surgery in the summer so my parents were watching him less. I had a fully functioning home office and got as much work done as possible from 8:30am – 11:30am every day and was still able to work after he got home from school. I was also still able to take him to the park, on bike-rides, ice-skating, etc. Again, it was a great work-life balance.
At the end of 2019, beginning of 2020 we all knew my father was not feeling well, despite him telling us he was fine. As my parents got ready for their annual winter in Florida, my father was sent for some tests. They left for Florida before the results were back and they got the call soon afterward. My father was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. My parents left Florida to come back to NJ to meet with doctors and see where we go from here. He was scheduled to have part of his pancreas and his spleen removed on March 13, 2020.
Work was steady, without the help of my parents with my son, and with everything going on with my dad, I had to keep telling myself I just need to make it to September when my son would be in full time kindergarten. The world had other plans.
My dad’s surgery was moved up from March 13th to March 9th, all went well and he is currently cancer free. Several days later, our state shutdown due to the COVID-19 Pandemic. Schools and non-essential businesses were closed. Like many others, I now had a full-time job while parenting simultaneously. At first, it was pretty easy. We had to postpone all auctions so for the next few months there was not much work to do. We stayed in touch with our clients and customers, updated our website and prepared for the changes for when we could get back to business. My days were filled with a little bit of work, bike rides, walks and playing with my son.
Then at the end of June work picked up. Our auctions transitioned from live auctions to online only auctions. Business was steady, then got busier and busier. School in my township offered two options: Option 1. hybrid schedule, certain kids would go Monday and Wednesday, other kids would go Tuesday and Thursday and they would alternate every other Friday, school days would be shortened and kids were required to wear masks. The days they were home they would have virtual school; Option 2. All virtual. Neither seemed to fit our needs, so we unenrolled our son in public school and signed him up with a private homeschool. The homeschool sent us the curriculum and all the materials we would need to teach him at our convenience. We set up a classroom in our house, I was excited to embark on the homeschool journey. The first week or two were great, my son and I were having fun with homeschool and I felt like I was really getting to spend good quality time with him, but it was short lived.
Everything changed. Online auctions require more work, more time and more effort. Work was so busy, we had auctions opening and closing every week and I no longer had time for anything else. I sat at my computer from 8:30am to 6:00pm, eating at my desk – if I ate at all, I’d stop to make dinner and after my son went to sleep get back on the computer to finish work. Some days I never got out of my pajama’s.
My job was no longer as flexible as it once was and I wondered if I was sacrificing more than it’s worth. I cried every single day, sometimes multiple times a day, I yelled, screamed had breakdown after breakdown and just tried to keep pushing forward. I crossed each day off my calendar thinking I made it one more day. If you weren’t in my house, you’d never know it though!
I felt like I was ignoring my child 95% of the day, which made me feel like the worst parent on earth. My family cannot afford for me to not work so I tried telling myself I am providing for my family, but often wondered “at what expense?” My husband would come home and ask, “how was your day?’ my son would respond, “mom cried again”.
In October I decided I had to rent office space again and hired two women to help me, I don’t know if I would have made it the rest of the year without them. Homeschooling wasn’t happening at this point so we re-enrolled our son in public school for the hybrid schedule. Virtual school days were impossible, I couldn’t work and help my kindergartener with his school work at the same time so we signed him up at a tutoring/educational center where he goes on his virtual school days.
Having help and my son going back to school (although it’s not a full schedule) has lifted some of the stress, but not all. I still feel guilt and shame for not spending enough time with my son, time he deserves… I constantly felt like I am putting work before him and that feels really fucking shitty. I can’t help but think that this is why women leave the workforce, because as much as we try, we cannot always do it all. I wonder everyday, if I am making the right decisions and choices and often realize that I’m not even sure what the right choice is.
This is where I’m at.
I know the pandemic flipped many of our world’s upside down, I know I’m not the only one. I also know that my struggles right now are that of privilege, there are many without jobs right now and struggling to figure out how to put food on the table or a roof over their head. You just never know what people are struggling with, we often put on our brave faces and we all are just doing the best we can.
As I am sitting writing this I just got a message that school will be all virtual for the next two weeks … I don’t know what else to say right now except …
I see you, I’m with you, we are all in this together.