When I was pregnant, I felt that I had something to prove. I could barely sit still and would have these meltdown phases of “having to get this imaginary checklist done.” Okay, so the checklist wasn’t all imaginary. There were, of course, a lot of things to prepare for having a baby, but they were certainly not the end of the world. And yet, here I was, pregnant, in the midst of a pandemic, sans friends, locked-down, no real immediate family around (or being held at bay due to said lock-downs) and having my first baby. Did I mention I had also lost my job on the same day we found out we couldn’t have children naturally and would need to do IVF? It was a whirlwind, but this *need* to *prove* something, was in hindsight, insane.

Now, having had my baby, I look back on it and think, “What was I trying to prove?” and “Who was I trying to prove something to?”. The former is a lot easier to answer. I was trying to show that I could do it all. Sure, isn’t that how the motto goes? “You can have it all?”. Be a career woman, be a dedicated wife or partner, have the babies, be a mother, and keep up the job! In my typical approach, I grabbed the challenge by the horns and didn’t let go. Not once. I obviously had zero idea what was facing me as a parent-to-be, so while I researched the shit out of absolutely everything, I also tried to super “chillax” (is that word still in use? Was it ever?) and lean-into the type of mom I was going to be (slightly granola, but easy-going, with gentle parenting and definitely not needing a ‘village’). I tried to play it cool (HA!) with an attitude of “sure, what’ll be, will be.”

As a university student I had formed this notion that I wanted to ‘have my career’, find the love of my life, work a high-driven career until about 32 years-old, have an Audi-TT convertible, live in a Carrie-like apartment and marry my said soulmate in a beautiful wedding. At which point, I would then do a masters/PhD while on maternity leave, start popping out children, and be a wonderful stay-at-home mom a la Diane Keating in ‘every movie ever’. I would then return to my incredible job where I would work part-time and be creative with the kids, be part of the PTA and a soccer-mom to boot (having upgraded to an beautifully sleek SUV – only problem I could foresee here was that in Ireland they call them mini-vans or people-carriers, but *bats the details vaguely away*). It would all come together beautifully. So, of course, September 2020 and there, I was being fired from my “safety-net” job and my dream of being a mother being flushed down the toilet – all in the space of 2 hours. It really was no wonder I felt I had to * catch up * on something or prove something during pregnancy. The thing is, the only person I was truly battling was myself, and I wasn’t even really aware of it.

Fast-forward two years. My wonderful, intelligent, kind, and beautiful daughter is 21 months old and about to start her first day tomorrow at what the Austrians call ‘Kleinkinderbetreung’ (basically childcare for the little ones). In the province that I live in, the earliest you can send children to public daycare is two-and-a-half years old, so there are only a handful of groups that take children under the age of two. If you are a stay-at-home parent, you’re not entitled to the grant/subsidy that working parents are entitled to. Go figure. The other option is to go for a Tagesmutter (literally a day-mother but means a childminder). In comparison to Ireland, I truly cannot complain about the cost of daycare and to do so would get snorted at back at home, because in Ireland the cost of daycare a month is about the cost of having a mortgage (i.e. €1000+ at least for one child). Here, it is relatively affordable. However, back to my circumstances – I am a stay-at-home mom.

My conundrum, especially my emotional and mental side of my brain, is taking a complete battering. Not unlike the one experienced when I was pregnant. I have somehow accepted that my idea of my life from my university days, was not realistic in any way, shape or form, and that in order to be a stay-at-home mom, it is EXACTLY that. Staying at home and running a household, making a home, cooking meals, planning the family’s lives, and minding a child full time. There is no real “off-the-clock” (I type this as the baby camera is beside me, and she is currently napping. I truly had to fight the urge for a nap myself today and decided that the minor panic attack I had this morning would not get fixed unless I started writing my thoughts out of my head).

Again, I am at a stalemate. I have now been “out of work” since before I was pregnant. My plan had always been to go back and study psychology (not exactly an easy study route). Or should I upskill and become a secondary school teacher here in Austria? Or should I just work in a bar/cafe/restaurant. Since being a mother, any time I considered any sort of work or job, it had to be a “side-hustle” so that I could parent full time as well. And honestly, the thought of where to find the energy just exhausted me. And so I would bench it and focus on the here and now. Any time it would come up again (and it inevitably did), I would consider when I would be able to set aside some time to work (i.e., naptimes and post-bedtime) and I would just magically sprout four new wrinkle lines, and the bags under my eyes would bulge a little more, just at the mere thought of it.

Also in order for it to semi-work, my husband would need to be more involved (he is incredibly hands on, but I mean schedule wise throughout the day), but having also been let go, post-pandemic, and having found a new job, he needs to settle down, prove himself and grow roots – so to speak. Currently, he commutes, and so is working 10 hours plus a 3-hour round trip commute. Was it our choice to move further out of the city to the ‘burbs and have a house? Yes, without a doubt, it was, and we don’t regret that (I feel I have to defend that to my invisible audience), but that does not detract from the reality of the situation. We chose our “shit sandwich” to eat, in the words of Mark Manson, but that doesn’t mean we *always* like the taste of it!

All of which brings me back to the question: What do I do? I may also mention that I carry a little baggage with this question because without wanting to sound “too” cliché and bring my mother into it, but she was a single, stay-at-home mom. She was a super-human, and I wish she was here now because I don’t know how she did it, and I so badly want to ask her that.

Not only when she was single with three children, but also pre-divorce when she was an expat living in Germany through the late 80s and early 90s, starting and running a business, a husband who was diagnosed with two auto-immune illness in quick succession, pregnancy and then children. And then moving to another country after twenty years of living abroad, raising three children alone – it’s mind-blowing. And yet, somehow, the narrative has been “it was SO difficult for her to get her foot back in the door.” As if she didn’t work. She raised three children, all three who attended university, have a hard work ethic, are pretty independent, and bottom line survived her death (eh, sorta).

But I digress. I have a feeling in the pit of my stomach that I am missing something. I am missing the bigger picture or something that other people know that I don’t know. This feeling is coupled with that feeling when I was pregnant, where I had to “prove” something to someone. Looking back to the past, a quick glance over my shoulder, if I could go back and have a coffee with that past-me, I would tell her to stop. Just slow down. First of all, I would tell her that I/we will be more than capable of handling being a mother. It’s an on-the-job learning curve. Secondly, I would tell her to lap up every single second of time, space, and energy. Nap when I want to, read if I want to, go for a coffee or a swim if I want to, watch Netflix if I want to and to emotionally, physically and mentally breathe in and out and let what comes, come. No overthinking or trying to plan “for the worst” or control all possible potential situations and tell her to literally ‘just’ be. And in a world where everyone is constantly running around, scrambling to try and “have it all” and prove something – which is where I feel I am missing out – I think I am just going to take the time for the next few weeks and ‘just be’. I am sure there is a future version of me who will look back and tell me exactly the same thing.

And shout out to that one mom friend who told me to take my time and “just be” – your timing was everything today.