Hi Ho, Hi Ho It's off to work we go....

August 2004
Back to work, back to reality....

Hi Ho, Hi Ho, it's back to work I goWHO SAID the modern working mother can't have it all? I'm here to prove those doubters wrong. I'm a mammy. I'm sat here at work and by golly, I have it all.Headache? Yep. Stretchmarks? I have quite a few. Guilt complex at leaving my baby? Oh yes. A deep and satisfying sense of completion at having returned to the world of work? Erm, well.....no comment!I'll admit I'm shocked, very shocked. I always pictured myself as a classic example of a modern career woman. Having followed a rather predictable path through life by forsaking a wild and crazy youth to work my not so wee bum off to get a good degree and appropriate qualifications to become a journalist, I never quite imagined that one day I could feel quite so uncomfortable returning to a career it had been my ambition to follow.Believing myself to be quite a staunch feminist (we're not talking shaved head and dungarees here, but you get the picture), I always scoffed at women who felt bad leaving their offspring with someone else while they returned to the world of work.After all, we woman have fought tooth and nail for some semblance of equality. Why should we have to give up the careers we have fought long and hard for, just because we choose to become mothers? Having umpteen friends with children, I always loved spending time with the little 'uns, but even more than that I loved handing them back at the end of the day after a few hours of goo-ing and gah-ing and making other baby noises. The thought that I could actually tolerate, never mind enjoy, more than a few hours in the company of baby incapable of doing anything for themselves other than spewing was alien to me.Even heavily pregnant and already quite in love with my wee baby, I always thought by the time August came around I would be clawing at the walls to get back to work and kick my brain back into gear.Quality timeYes, a firm believer in quality time. I often scoffed at my dear mammy who said I may just find it hard to leave my child and combine both work with motherhood.This is the noughties. This generation of woman can do anything. We can have it all. We are supposed to thrive on the rush and fuss of getting our wains up and ready, ourselves preened and perfected and out the door before the rush hour begins.We are, it has been alleged, easily able to switch off from family life as soon as we hit the office floor and suddenly transform ourselves from the slattern with baby food in her hair to a professional lady, who never once slips up and says "Ta Ta" to her boss, or gets an urge to phone her childminder once every five minutes.I thought, somewhat foolishly, that I would view my return to work as a blessed relief. Finally I could switch my brain back on. (There really is only so much of Trisha a woman can take). I would get to meet lots of interesting people again, start writing again, spend an entire eight hour period without being puked on or assaulted with the smell of a putrid nappy.But then I never bargained for the fact that there seems to be a significant number of people, dubbed the "super mammies" by me, out there who's life purpose seems to be heaping mountains of guilt on mammies who choose to, or have to, return to work.Stay at home mumsYou know who I'm talking about here. These are the ladies who refuse to give their babies dummies and who breast-feed until junior is two. They are ladies who give up their careers to stay at home, baking home made bread and making organic purees for junior's tea. Generally they also have a bit of money behind them which allows them, unlike us mere mortals, to be in a financial position to give up work, but that does not stop the holier than thou attitude many have.You see, I've got disapproving glances and tuts when I've said I'm going back to work. The news has been filled over the summer months with reports of how leaving a child with a carer will inevitably damage them because all children under the age of three need their mammies.Indeed such super mammies would have us believe that going back to work will inevitably lead our children to start drinking on street corners and cursing at adults before they reach the age of 10.These mammies don't seem to realise that even the most ambitious, career driven woman can't help but have her heart melt a little when she becomes a mother. They don't seem to realise that many of us would love the chance to spend more time with our children, having already realised that babies don't stay wee for long.Consequently, they don't realise that we really don't need them piling their notions of what makes a perfect parent on top of the guilt we are already feeling at not being there for every cough, smile, burp and giggle.I, like countless other working mothers out there, am operating on guilt factor ten, even though I know that the person who is watching my son at the moment (thanks Auntie, I love you!) has 100 times more patience with children than I do, and even though I know that without my income my wain would find himself and his mammy and daddy living in a card board box under the bridge.So I would love, for now, to relax and enjoy the fact I'm back doing the job I love so much. I would love to find the strength in me to tell the super mammies to take a run and jump. I would love for everyone to see how happy and well adjusted my little boy is, even though, (shock, horror) his mammy isn't always there to watch him.In the absence of that, I would just like everyone out there to realise that there is more to being a good mammy than being there 24/7.