In defense of working mothers...

Recently, someone sat down next to me to congratulate me on my new baby. When they asked if I was going back to work, and I said that I was, they remarked, “How can you have worked so hard to have him, only to turn him over to someone else to watch?”

I felt like she slapped me.

I read an article today where Isabella Dutton stated:

“"I cannot understand mothers who insist they want children - especially those who undergo years of fertility treatment - then race back to work at the earliest opportunity after giving birth, leaving the vital job of caring for them to strangers…Why have them at all if you don't want to bring them up, or can't afford to? And why pretend you wanted them if you have no intention of raising them? This hypocrisy is, in my view, far more pernicious and difficult to fathom than my own admission that my life would have been better without children.  And here, perhaps, is the nub of it: I would not take on the job of motherhood and do it half-heartedly."

 I almost spit.

Another friend of mine was distraught after a “sage” made similar comments to her on the almighty Facebook. After a momentary rant, she decided that enough was enough, and unfriended him…I completely understand.

Before I delivered, I hung my head in shame when I said that I would have to go back to work. The day before I came back, I melted down in hysterics in my kitchen, bawling that “he doesn’t belong to someone else!!! He belongs to me!!!!” I got it out of my system, and I am pleased to say that no such dramatic displays occurred the day I came back to the office.

Yes, a huge part of me is ashamed that I am a working mother. I have debts to pay, and student loans to pay off. I have credit cards, and a mortgage; the economy has not been kind to us, though God has always provided. I regret that the credit card debt exists—that is where the shame lies. If not for our debt, I wouldn’t have to work, plain and simple.

But it exists. So I have to work.

Although Satan wants to attack me, and make me think this job is a punishment for bad spending habits (which is not, by the way, the biggest reason we have credit card debt; unemployment means that you buy necessities any way you can), and that I have a punitive field to reap, I believe that my job is actually a blessing. God has provided for us, and He has blessed me with a good job in a solid institution. This job has benefits that help my entire family; for the first time in our marriage, I am the primary on an insurance policy. Since I can’t be privately insured, this is monumental. Our son has incredible health insurance. My husband has incredible health insurance.  There are educational benefits—every day I start to beat myself up, I remind myself that with this job, I am building a future for my family.

My mother was a working mother. Sure, like any child, I questioned whether or not she loved me—but that had NOTHING to do with her work schedule. She somehow made it to every performance. She analyzed every report card. We had chores; we got spankings; we respected our parents. We did our homework. We played outside. Yes, there was daycare, and yes, there were babysitters. They DID NOT raise me.

My mother raised me.

When he married my mom, my stepdad raised me.

To sit there and say that a working mother shills her children off on someone else to be raised, is an insult to my mother, and to the other working moms out there that are working their fingers to the bone, and tearing their hearts in half, to actively raise the children that they know they are responsible for…They work because they love us. They work because they know they have a duty to provide for us. They work because they have to—is it their first choice? Probably not—I know it’s not, for me. But it is a part of life, and you make it work because you have to…You focus on the benefits. You do your job, and you leave it there. When you come home, you are 100% parent. You raise your child.

As a parent (as a mother), you have a responsibility to find care for your child that closely aligns with your personal philosophies. When it doesn’t, you either correct the caregiver or remove your child. Period. They are not responsible for raising your baby—you are.

I am.

And I have not tossed my most precious baby off to some hooligan to get him out of my hair for a few hours—I have vetted my caregiver, I know her family, and I know her theology. So when I leave my baby boy with her, I have peace in my heart that I have made the absolute best of the “situation” of being a working mother.

How dare anyone accuse me, or any other working mom, of callously having children only to dump them off on someone else, so that we can have our career aspirations? Not every working mom wants to climb the corporate ladder; some of us simply want to keep a roof over our family’s head.How dare this Isabella Dutton infer that working mothers are loving their children half-heartedly? That's absurd. I challenge Ms. Dutton to find a child more loved than my boy...To interpret her words, every stay-at-home mom is the best mom in the world. Being an SAHM does NOT mean that you are perfect, that you are the best, or that you are providing the optimal environment for your child. That's a generalization that is unfair. 

I have seen SAHMs that should rethink their options-they're not happy, and it translates to their child. Likewise, I have seen working mothers that do emulate Ms. Sutton's descriptions-they are more corporate than maternal, and that also translates to their child. It's not fair, to divide us as women and mothers into one category or the other. It's not Working Moms vs. SAHMs. One is not better than the other--we're just different, and we all make it work in our way. There's no shame or great pride in one over the other. We do what we do, and we love our babies the best we can.

My mother never made me feel like my needs were secondary to her very-stressful job. I never felt like she preferred her employment over me; I always knew my sister and I were the most important thing in her lives. We still are. If I am as good of a working mom as my mom was, my son is in great shape!

I resent any implication that my skills as a mother are diminished by my need for employment. I resent any implication that I lack maternal instinct, that I am short-changing my child, or that I am shoving my child on someone else to raise. Proverbs 31 talks about a woman who makes things, who buys, who sells, and who provides for her family(verses 15 and 24). How can anyone sit there and say that a woman who is providing for her family, who is doing everything she does with them in mind, is robbing them somehow?

If I were to work all day, then come home, and ignore my family, then yes—that would be grounds for such an accusation. As working mothers, we do have a responsibility to be even more present with the time that we have with our little ones. And for those of us that are? Our children get just as much love as the child who’s mom is home with him for those 8 hours…our kids just get it in a little more concentrated form. 

A working mother and a stay-at-home mom are equals. We love our children just as much. Our situations are different; our sacrifices are different. But we love our kids.

The choices we make, whatever they are, we have made them with their present and future interests in mind. They have our hearts when we are not around; they are never far from our thoughts, no matter the mess in the corporate world. We raise our children with a focus on how God provides, how He loves us, and how we love Him in return. We raise our children with responsibility, and we find caregivers with similar goals and motivation.

I love my son. I have to work. And like my mother before me, my son will always know that he comes first. He may not always understand my methods, but he will always know that he is loved.

Being a wife and a mother is all I’ve ever wanted to be. For now, I am a working wife and a working mother, with a working family. This is where I believe God has us, and it is what I believe He will bless us through. I don’t know if this is how it will always be; regardless, He has put us in this place, at this time. And He has incredible grace…I’ve seen Him pour it out on my mother, and I trust that He will pour it out on me when I seek Him.

Yes, I am a working mother.

I will not hang my head in shame of that title, anymore.

I am proud of the work that I do, and the reason I do it.