Raising my three little ones while working four part-time jobs and freelancing combines to make me feel a hundred different ways on a given day. While there are numerous perks to being a so-called hybrid mom, sometimes the negatives out way the benefits. Often, I feel like I’ve been thrown into the deep end.
1. Tired – As a hybrid mom, I’m always pulled in a thousand different directions. When my children rest, sleep, or disappear for five minutes, I need to be working. If they are awake and in my care, I need to be engaging. It’s exhausting. Not to mention the crazy work hours I often keep and the the unrealistic expectations I consistently place on myself in all areas of my life. Sure, I have tons of work – but shouldn’t I be cooking organic, wholesome meals, have all of the laundry folded, and be doing an activity with the kids I found on Pinterest too?
2. Slighted – No one truly respects my job. Working mom’s who have to “go to” work, take advantage of my flexibility – “Oh, well I have to be at work. Can you do this?” Um… I realize I don’t “go to” work but I am still putting in numerous hours, probably even more than many traditional working moms. I often feel jealous of my husband who actually gets to “go to” work and doesn’t have to try to balance the children with his work. When he is home, he’s home. When he’s at work, he’s at work. Honestly, many days that sounds heavenly.
3. Guilt – Enough with the mocking statements of “I had to decide what was the most important and nothing is more important than my kids.” I honestly believe that no mom chooses to work because she loves her children less… I realize that this is just a way to justify a choice. but this type of platitude isn’t helpful. I always feel guilty when I’m not with my children – even when it’s to work – I don’t need that magnified by someone implying that if I just loved my children more I’d figure out a way to stay home with them full-time (168 hours a week instead of my current 146 hours a week…). And this isn’t a slam against SAHM’s, heck, I am one 90% of the time. We all feel that raising our children is the most important job we’ll ever have — just because a mom works doesn’t mean she doesn’t feel this way! My kids are the most important thing in the world to me – why else would I do this?
4. Frazzled (aka dirty) – I’m the stereotypical frazzled mom in yoga pants who can’t remember the last time she showered. While I attempt to take care of myself by using exercise as my “me” time, I often find that I throw my workout clothes on in the morning and still don’t manage to fit the workout (or the post-workout shower) into my day – mostly because I already have a full-plate. The concept of “Dirty Mom” has been making its way around the blogosphere recently and I have to admit that usually I fit the criteria. Wearing makeup typically falls to the very bottom of the pile when you’re juggling numerous jobs and small children. It isn’t that I don’t care about or respect myself, I’d just rather spend that half hour working for pay (or Heaven-forbid, sleeping myself) when my children are sleeping.
5. Alone – No one really understands my life. I have found no one in real life (and only a few people in the blogosphere) who can relate to my reality. When I’m waking at 3:30 in an attempt to catch a small window of quiet, uninterrupted work time, I feel alone. Yes, I actually am alone – in the way that I need to be to productive – but not that type of alone. Alone as in I’m the only mom on earth who tries to do this much. Alone in my struggle to juggle and balance it all.
I can only imagine how you feel. No matter what working role we have, there are struggles, but honestly…I don’t know how you do it. I believe it shows what a committed employee and mom you are. If I had to work out my own schedule and do as much as you do, I’m not sure I would get it all done (which, of course, means I wouldn’t be employed long or my kid(s) might not like me much). I like to think I’m dedicated, but getting up at 3:30am or working while on vacation just isn’t something I’m willing to sacrifice.
I hadn’t heard the term “hybrid mom” before, but it makes sense. I think that the WAHM lifestyle (I am not going to say “choice”; choices are never made in a vacuum) is hard for most people to figure out. Heck, it’s hard for me to figure out. I was talking about this just yesterday with a former co-worker who also freelances after the kids are in bed. We agreed that the worst part is having to squeeze in work hours around the very long hours of parenting; the second-worst part is not having our evenings to ourselves. I also envy that when D. is home, he’s home; he can count on having downtime, whereas I’m racing the clock to do housework and paid work before my own bedtime.
I do talk to I & N — mostly I., because she complains about it more — about the reasons that I work, as part of my efforts to teach them to respect me and my work (all types of work) as well as money. After 8 pm, they’re infringing on Mom’s Time.
You really have people asking you to pick up THEIR slack? I think that’s terribly dismissive. Once I read an article in Working Mother magazine (which is not very much geared to WAHMs) about how much one can reasonably foist off on a SAHM. I found it pretty offensive.
I feel your pain. Although I am not juggling 4 different jobs teaching, like you do, I gave up teaching in a classroom to be a SAHM. I thought that’s all I’d be doing. Instead, necessity dictated that I do something. I feel blessed that I am able to work at home, as you said, every time my kids are asleep or playing quietly on their own doing transcription. I don’t function well at 3:30 a.m., but I have been known, quite often actually, to still be wake and working at 2 a.m. instead before falling into bed. Add numerous obligations I have self admittedly put on myself of being president of a mom’s group, coordinator and chair of various preschool committees and you have another super tired hybrid mom.
I really enjoy reading your blog because I feel like I can identify with you. This is what happens to the girl who has always been able to do everything and you know what, you are making it work and it gives me hope that I can too. So please feel encouraged, there are others of us out here, we just don’t have the gift of writing that you do, but we feel encouraged to hear it from you too.
Wah, wah, wah. Give me a break. You (and I!) have it better than 99.9% of the human beings who have ever lived and 99.5% of the people alive on this earth today. Your whining (Nobody understands me! I’m so alone! I’m so tiiiiiiiired!) makes you sound small, petty and utterly self-absorbed.
Focus on something other than yourself and your utterly trivial and unoriginal outlook. You’re far from the first mother to balance children and other concerns, and apparently most do it a lot more graciously than you.
Lol. Thanks for the empathy, “Lisa”. I do have it good. I know it. And I work hard for it.
If you don’t like me, don’t read.
Thanks.
You are not alone. Your life is so very similar to my own, but as you know, I now work full-time from home.
I get being jealous of your husband for having his separate spheres, where yours are intertwined, 24/7. That’s my life too. I get waking in the middle of the night to accomplish work in quiet. I do that too. And I get the fact that no one understands how difficult your life really is. I haven’t found that in my own “real life” either. And to those sanctimommies who try to justify their own choices by putting down the choices of other moms who work- they’re the real losers. What’s right for one family is not right for every family. Also? It’s okay to want to work. You’re showing your kids that moms can have careers and be successful and have lives outside of mothering. That’s an important lesson.
Keep up the good fight, Jamie. You’re an awesome woman and an awesome mom.
“Lisa” you are obviously just a blog troll, but this is MY actual, REAL life best friend. She works harder than anyone I have ever met in my life. She also loves more, thinks more, and cares more than anyone in the world. Her husband, children, and colleagues are lucky she is part of their lives. I am lucky that she takes time to be my friend, and you are lucky I am six months pregnant, don’t know you, and feel even minimal amounts of restraint.
Jamie, you are my hero. Please sock some of the millions you are making (haha!) to bail me out of jail if I ever catch someone who doesn’t appreciate you for all the wonderful things you are. LOVE YOU!
Jamie: don’t despair! You always give me hope — I see Howmuch you juggle and still manage to accomplish and I don’t feel so bad about leaving my kids to show houses or document historic buildings or do some volunteer work. Working is a choice for me but I need to work. But finding the right balance is a never-ending struggle. Thanks for sharing and reminding me I am not alone. Some days I so wish I could go to work … Just to rest.
I relate
You are not alone. Though… I haven’t been able to set my alarm for earlier than 4 a.m… unless it’s for an early flight 
People freak when I tell them I get up at 4 to get work in. And I am sitting in workout clothes right now… hoping… hoping… I have a handful of women (online, who do what we do) in my life who truly understand. But at home, IRL… there are few. It can feel lonely. You are not whining. Yes, this is a first world problem, right? We are blessed to have work, etc… doesn’t mean that makes it easy to manage. <3
Lisa – you’re my hero!!!
I don’t know how you do it, I certainly couldn’t. But I wonder – are you enjoying your life? This is your life. YOUR life. Your LIFE. Is that how you want to spend it? When your kids are grown, and you look back on the early years, won’t they look like WORKWORKWORK, always busy, never doing enough? When do you sit back and just watch your children play? When do you sit down with a nice cup of tea and just relax and do nothing for ten minutes? It’s vital, I think. Then again, I live in one of those blessed European countries with mandatory, paid, maternity leave (for 12 months, yes) and state-paid daycare, so who am I to question your way of doing things … I just cannot imagine that it’s good for you, this constant pressure to DO more than fits into 24 hours. And I’m sorry that you feel that you HAVE to do all of this, that you expect so much from yourself.