Motherhood Vs Career
This is a topic that touches on all of our lives. Whether we begin as these young women so focused on our career or we begin as someone who ultimately wants to settle down and have a family while being slightly independent.
For me I was this girl back home in India who lived a nice, sheltered life. Sheltered not in the sense that I got everything I wanted and had people at the whims of my command but a nice home that was comfortable all I had to do was just study at that point and play with my friends outside because back then there was no iPad so we would go out and play with friends.
That girl grew up in a household where her mother was the homemaker and father was the earner. They had very strict guidelines to follow. The mother never went to work and the father never cooked in the kitchen. And it was a wonderful environment that many of us are going back to.
So when we came to the USA with immigration things were different. Now my Mother was in the workforce, and father was also in the workforce and they were both were cooking. My dad was cooking to support himself, my mom was cooking not only for herself but also for us.
I still believe I had a wonderful time with my mom here in the US when we were usually living by ourselves, as my brother used to venture out to go to colleges, lived in dorm and even travelled across the states for work.
And when marriage happened I was still with my mom but now my brother used to stay with us. That was different. But never did she tell me we have to pay bills or I need help with this, never. To this day I do not understand how she managed to do it all. As you know Mothers have this innate superpower.
So now I understand when she lives peacefully and doesn't call much she is at peace that her kids are married, have kids of their own and are happy in their own world. Yes truly I don't understand her completely but as I am writing I am understanding that what I did in my life after becoming a mother more or less has emulated what I have seen.
You see when you work and you have to take care of your children it gives you a different sense of understanding than when you don't work and take care of children. Each have their own struggles but I saw this first hand in how my Mother in Law and My mother handles kids getting married and how they handled the objections and struggles that come with after kids get married especially after a son gets married.
No matter what anyone says I do admire how she has managed to do it all.
Of course As I mentioned in my previous post it came at a price of pushing me away so that she could focus on her son and daughter in law when they were pregnant and had begun the journey of parenthood. It is something I never got. I was alone in my pregnancy. With my first I used to visit my mother a lot and she would make me food and all, but I never stayed much at her place because it was my brothers place. But still to this date despite what happens that place always feels like home to me.
There have been instances when things have not worked out and might happen again but the fact is this: often as women going through motherhood whether it be conceiving, the time prior to conceiving when you are trying, pregnancy, birth, and the different phases and ages of kids we often end up emulating the best that we see.
For me My journey started as a career woman who was super focused on her career, but not getting anywhere maybe because I didnt have the guidance or maybe because I was not putting enough into it to become an expert, I dont know But for almost 12 years I was working and thinking I am focussed and in those 12 years I got married, had kids and that changed a lot of things.
I was never against daycare as such, I didnt even know I would need one, had never planned for it because when first one was born, I never really though much about what to do once the kid is born because the in laws were going to come and stay with us. So by default It was a given that they would take care of the kid. Because their daughters had also experienced that. Now that I think of it it makes a lot of sense.
Anyway, at 11 months after staying together the in-laws decided to go to India and I know it was for no other reason but to show to me how much they are doing for the child. And I think this is a topic for another day but through whatever happened before and after that time, I ended up facing unemployment, putting both kids through daycare just to work a meager 7 hours or so, I tried to find ways I could work from home at that point even if it was for a few days and I can say I am one of those very very very lucky ones who got to do it.
If I was not able to work even two days from home I would not have survived anything and pandemic and remote working had a big hand in it. So thank you universe.
There were a lot of women who could not continue work during pandemic, because they had their jobs gone, or had no daycare but for me while it worked out at that point it was not until 2023 happened and I was on unemployment I realized wow there is another way to do this. At that point while I was earning unemployment income I got a chance to be kind of a Stay at home mom. And it was okay in the beginning but by the end of it I realized it was not for me.
I love the independence that I get from making my own money spending my own and not asking or begging anyone for money, being able to spend as and what I want on kids and so much more.
It is 2025 now and I am again in unemployment after getting the opportunity of a lifetime to work remotely, my kids will be in school both of them and this time I can really get back to work again, or so I believe honestly.
Writing is also a career for me that I never truly pursued on except college because I didn't know how to. I still don't know how to but it is better to start than wait.
To be Honest I wish I had read something like this when I was in the midst of all this turmoil:
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