Working from Home: The Good, the Bad, and the Cheerios

Life changes are inevitable as we get older. But some changes are harder to navigate than others, even when they were our choice. When I found out I was expecting my daughter, I spoke with my supervisor about reducing my hours and doing most of my work from home. I assumed I would crank out all my work during her long naps (please, don’t laugh at my naiveté) and spend the rest of the day playing with her. Well, reality hit me like a ton of bricks when she entered the world a year and a half ago. It turns out, having a baby is a whole lot harder than I imagined, and working from home with a baby presents its own unique challenges. If you are considering moving to a remote situation to spend more time with your baby, here are some things you should consider before making the jump:

The Good:

Time with your baby
This is the most obvious, but still needs to be mentioned. You get the precious gift of not missing a moment with that sweet babe. You get to play with them, see their first smile and steps, and be the one taking them to the park in the middle of the day. It is priceless.

Reduced child care expenses
Child care is not cheap, and having the ability to bypass that expense is certainly not something to toss aside lightly. This is money that could be saved for retirement, Catholic school, a down payment on a house, and countless other things. If you need some help, it’s a lot cheaper to just pay a babysitter for hours as you need them than monthly daycare costs, which brings me to my next point…

Flexibility (depending on your job)
Working from home often means you can work different hours to make up for the time you spend with your baby. It’s a lot easier to wake up at 6:00 am to tackle a few things from your couch in your pajamas before your baby wakes up than to only work during the typical nine to five.

Creative outlet
I love taking care of my baby and cooking for my family, but sometimes it’s refreshing to have a place where I can let my creative side take hold and use the skills that I’ve been cultivating for the past few years. I love that I can stay connected to a world that I really enjoy and love working in, even if it’s in a more limited capacity.

The Bad:

It’s a lot of work
Hey, who would have thought doing TWO jobs is hard? I don’t know why I didn’t think of this before, but taking care of a kid is a full-time job. I need to be attentive to her pretty much all of the time when she is awake, or she will inevitably eat a quarter, stick her finger in an electrical outlet, or climb up on the table and pour all the Cheerios out to simultaneously eat and throw. That doesn’t leave a lot of time for the job I am being paid to do when she is awake. So I squeeze in what I can when she naps. Which then doesn’t leave a whole lot of time for other housework. My house is often a mess when my husband gets home, and dinner is rarely a fancy meal.

TIP: If you are considering taking this on, please make sure you and your spouse are on the same page about cleaning and cooking.

Conflicting pulls on your time are hard on your mental health
No matter how well you manage your time, there will be work emergencies or baby emergencies that pull you away from the other unexpectedly. There have been countless times where I have felt like a terrible mother because I had to deal with something at work while my baby screamed for my attention. It’s heartbreaking. There have been an equal number of times where I have felt like a terrible employee because my baby was going through a nap regression and I didn’t have any time during the day to do the job they were paying me to do. These moments are always crushing to my self esteem. The back and forth can be hard on mental health, and my husband has come home many days to a sobbing (or just really moody) wife.

You’re a part of two worlds, but not really in either
The working world and the stay- at-home world are both great places, but when you work part-time from home with a kid, you rarely feel like you’re fully occupying either. At park dates you are constantly checking email to make sure nothing is coming through that you need to deal with. Work happy hours are generally not a fun option because they don’t want a toddler tagging along, and because they generally talk about the office you aren’t a part of anymore. It’s easy to feel left out of both and a little like a vagabond when you work from home with a baby.

So what’s the verdict? Do I recommend it? Unequivocally yes, it was the right choice for me and our family. Not missing out on time with my daughter, while having a way to be part of an organization I care about and want to support, was the right decision for me. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t challenging. How do I cope with these challenges? That’s coming to you in my next post. Stay tuned!

This post appeared first on Total Whine.