Working Things Out

When I mentioned a few posts ago that my next door neighbor told me that “no one stays home with kids in Silicon Valley”, I left off the last part of her statement. It was, “…because no one can afford it”.

Great googly-moogly was she right!

Two meals’ worth of groceries and a couple of basics for two healthy adults and one preschooler who munches a spoonful of peas, then takes ah bite out of ah chicken nugget before saying, “All done, Mommy” shouldn’t cost $140. And yet it did.

I’ve since stopped feasting on champagne and caviar. I’ve also reverted to my spendthrift ways of shopping from the weekly adverts and clipping coupons so that our weekly grocery bill doesn’t resemble a mortgage payment anymore.

Still… the cost to insure and register the car? Paying for preschool? The house?

“Shocking” doesn’t even begin to describe the little bit of throw up in my mouth every time I think about it… which is A LOT and often.

So even though the timing is all wrong and our life is all kinds of complicated at the moment, I’ve been giving serious consideration to going back to work.

Ideally, I would prefer to do something from home and/or part-time so I could still be home with Scout and the newest littlest one. Just something to bring in a little extra to fund trips to Maui our kids’ college and help rebuild my wardrobe our savings…

Then, on a whim last weekend, I decided to search for my old job in online advertising. (Not my actual old job since that’s back in Texas and last I checked there was someone else there doing it, but something along those same lines.)

As I read over the job descriptions, a knot began forming in my tummy…

“Planning, managing, and executing online advertising campaigns.​”

“Work with agencies and in-house creative in developing media plans, manage budgets, and develop creative.​”

“Report performance on all online media acquisition/​retention efforts including spend, conversion number of customers acquired and ROI.​ Track and report on campaign results, data analysis, and hold weekly campaign status calls with agencies.​”

Umm, c-c-could I do that???

What the hell is wrong with me?! Of course I could… and once DID. Every. Single. Day.

There’s been a lot of talk in the media (and even a Momversation) about a condition called, “Momnesia”.

Does motherhood really make you dumber?

Sure, I’ve done a lot of goofy things since becoming a mom, but I did even goofier things before. (Just ask any my roommates from college and grad school.) So no, I don’t think the onset of motherhood has had anything to do with it.

While living in London, I met a brilliant engineer and mother of three who once told me that it wasn’t intelligence lost with each maternity leave, but rather self-confidence.

Shortly after returning to work, her boss asked if she had any experience with a particular computer program. She paused, told him that she didn’t think so, and he simply went on to assign the project to a colleague.

A bit later, she recalled that DUH, she knew that program. Quite well, in fact. She only spent a year helping to WRITE it, but somehow that tiny detail of her life slipped her mind in her post-motherhood haze.

According to her, it wasn’t the momentary forgetting that irked her, but the pause. Before taking her year or more (!!!) of leave (yes, American moms, let’s all take a moment to hiss and boo in envy), she would never have doubted herself in the first place.

It wasn’t even that long ago that I quit my job… as in barely over two years “not that long” ago.

In grad school, I was team leader on every project and got nothing by As. I used to take on impossible projects (and difficult clients) and I never gave it a second thought. People used to value my professional opinion, not only because of what I said but because of how I said it.

Even if I didn’t quite know how to do something, I used to have the ambition and self assurance to pull it off anyway… or at least, have the good manners to fake it.

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