GOING BACK GRIEVANCES
🌷This week, I have really struggled with the prospect of returning to work in a few short weeks. Evie and I are getting into this amazing groove. She is interacting with me, and we are bonding in a way that did not happen immediately when she was born. Shortly after her birth, with the sleep deprivation, the newness of it all, trying to navigate being new parents, we certainly felt bonded to Evie, but something about these past couple weeks changed me, Phil, and Evie. Our unit is stronger than ever, and the idea of disrupting that to go back to a corporate gig what really did not support me as a new mom, feels like torture.
I have always known I wanted to be a mom. I have also always known I wanted to be a working mom. I wanted my children to look up to me as a badass woman with a stellar career, who was also a loving, amazing mother.
These goals have remained unchanged.
What I am also now keenly aware of, is that I am not ready to go back to work just yet. Unfortunately, because I was not offered a paid leave, nor allowed to extend my personal leave, coupled with the fact that, I will have a career while raising Evie (thus, although I have wanted to, I will not be rage quitting,) my hands are forced to return to my job way sooner than I and Evie are ready.
I find this forceful reentrance frustrating on so many levels. First, my personal leave is not paid, so why not let me extend it for a few more weeks? Can there really be anything more deserving of extending a personal leave, than to take care of and bond with a baby?
Second, despite fighting harder than I ever have, my ability to carry children was stripped from me. Not only was the experience childbirth stolen, but the 40 weeks of pregnancy as well. Forty weeks that most woman get to bond with their baby. I know with certainty the bond between a mother and baby occurs well before birth, as I felt that bond with my son. It feels like a cruel joke to be told I only get a few short months to bond with Evie, and then I must hand her off to daycare. It’s not enough time. There is a reason a large number of developed countries guarantee a year or more of paid maternity leave.
Today, Evie is 11 weeks old. Our amazing, sweet little girl is only 77 days old. It took us nearly 1000 days to get her here. The idea of leaving her side when she’s barely 100 days old is beyond unfair. Can you imagine a more imperative, critical, life-defining time for a new mom AND her baby than those first months? Can there really be a corporate policy or goal that is more important that this time?
I have no recourse. I will have to return before I am ready. I will have to trust those I barely know. But I certainly will never forget the experience and the pain it caused me and continues to do so.🌷
