Just a brain dump, really

I read an excerpt from a book that ashinynewcoin linked to in The Age (that was convoluted, wasn't it?) about the entrenched sexism that nobody sees. Among other things, it described the experiences of two transgender scientists. Both found that their work was taken more seriously during the part of their life when they were men.

It makes excellent points, but I found myself automatically questioning the conclusions because it uses only 2 examples. It really isn't possible to conclude anything from these two people - it may just happen that their work actually was better during the part of their lives lived male (as a coincidence - I'm not suggesting correlation). I stand by that analysis, but for many other reasons, I'm pretty confident that the conclusions are still actually correct, even if they can't be drawn from these two anecdotes alone.

However, what this really led me to consider is how this whole thing has played out in my life. In my current career, I started out working in a company where I never reached a very high position. I was a manager, but I wasn't a regional manager or anything. As a result, I was never really taken very seriously by suppliers or customers. When I left the company, I started my own business, and I was determined to behave like the owner, CEO, Person Of Importance. It didn't work. I figured this was because my business was tiny and it didn't matter to anyone. That was probably true.

Then I was joined by two (male) partners, both of whom had been more senior than me in the company I had worked for. Almost immediately, they became the people everybody talked to. They were the People of Importance. This was for a number of reasons - they were better at it than me, they had a larger reputation in our industry and so on. The situation was as much my doing as theirs.

In any given situation, how can anyone say whether I am taken less seriously because of merit or because I am female? There have been alternative explanations all the way along, and it may well be that they are the right ones in every case, but then that's the whole point about unseen sexism - nobody thinks they are committing it, and not many people think they are suffering as a result of it.

The only way to combat this is to show people the results of studies showing innate bias against women. To make it clear that just because you don't think you're doing it, it doesn't mean you aren't. And just because you are doing it, it doesn't make you a bad person. You're doing it because it's deeply ingrained in our society, not because you believe in sexism. The trick is to take the shame out of it and to make it a point of empowerment. Make a million Facebook quizzes that highlight this ingrained sexism so that we can learn to fight it in ourselves. Treat it as an optical illusion that we can train our brains not to see, rather than a personality defect.

See how that woman's inferior? It's just a trick of society that makes us see her that way, but if you look carefully enough, you can see the truth of it, and if you practice often enough, you find it hard to see how you ever saw the illusion in the first place.

Hong Kong

The problem with working for yourself, is that you pay for your own work travel. That means everything is done as cheaply and quickly as possible. Which in turn means that nearly all work trips are hell on earth. This trip to Hong Kong involved 13 hours on Thursday, 10 hours on Friday and 3 hours Saturday morning. The vast majority of that was in a computer room air conditioned to a cosy 18 degrees and just enough humidity to stop you zapping everything in sight (not enough to avoid dehydration).

However, I did manage a free room upgrade - possibly because I seriously considered the executive upgrade and then decided it wasn't good value. As a result, right now I am looking straight out over Victoria Harbour.

And this is what it looked like the night I got here.

After I gave myself a splitting headache working at the somewhat-less-than-ergonomic hotel desk for 3 hours this morning, I decided some walking might be in order. Also, since this is my third trip to Hong Kong, I figured it was well past time I made the tourist trip to the peak. Here is my proof that I went.

I've finally started to get some feel for the geography of this place, and this is what the other side of the island looks like

I just don't think they're trying hard enough to pave the entire island.

Nice as it was up there, this is where I'd rather have been:

See all those little sails through the smog down there? It was a magnificent sailing day. Why did no-one organise me an invitation onto one of those boats? I consider this a grave failing on the part of the universe.

Tokyo tomorrow, but before then there are many more shopping hours ahead.

Is it 2011 yet?

Monday was ok, I think. I can't actually remember it.

Tuesday at 5:30pm I found out that our child care was ending on Friday, 2 weeks earlier than anticipated. I also discovered that despite months of assurances that they were looking for a new family day care place for Charlie and Elissa, the organisers had not actually started looking until that day. We had missed all the opportunities as new carers had started and kids had moved on to school.

Tuesday night Elissa got croup, so as well as an hour up with her waiting for the steroids to work, she couldn't go to day care the next day. I put off my client and rang around long day care centres. Most of them told me they had 2 year waiting lists. One told me they had places and I went to see them. The only time I could get there was during rest time, so it was hard to gauge much about the kids, but the staff seemed friendly and warm. On the other hand, it smelled more strongly of disinfectant than I would like. It was the only place that was an option unless Family Day Care came up with something plausible, and the woman had not sounded confident.

On Wednesday night, the steroids got Elissa through the night without incident, but Charlie woke with a leg cramp that took quite some time to resolve.

Thursday I got a call from Family Day Care telling me they had only one possibility and it was at the absolute limit of the distance I had originally (2 years ago) specified. That was before I was taking Charlie to preschool as well. Looking at what the drop offs would be like on the 3 mornings that Charlie is at preschool, taking this option was guaranteed to add significant stress to the morning routine. So I now had a choice between two child care options, neither of which I was wild about. And I had 36 hours to resolve it.

Either way, I rushed off to see Ben be the assembly leader at school. After inviting the parents in to the hall with his co-leader, he was looking distressed and then disappeared. Painful moments went by while his co-leader stood in front of everyone wondering what to do. Eventually he reappeared and I was called over. Standing next to the sick bed, his teacher asked him if he was ok, he said "No" and promptly threw up all over the floor.

So I took him home, fobbed off the client again and had an email exchange that resulted in me needing to sack a contractor. By that time I was feeling just about as ill as Ben, and couldn't go to belly dancing. I also needed to make a decision on child care, and decided on the convenient unknown option rather than the inconvenient unknown option. Thankfully my kids are old enough to tell me how things are going at day care, but making such a significant decision with so little time and information is still stomach churning.

Friday morning I finally went to see the much-fobbed client, which didn't go as planned (due to a weird problem whose cause is still only guessed at). This would not have been nearly so bad if Elissa hadn't been sent home from her last day of day care (thereby removing the chance for Charlie and Elissa to say farewell to the carer they've been with for a year) because she was sick again. I needed to call my mother to come from Campbelltown many hours earlier than intended so that Crash didn't need to wake the sick 2 year old to pick up the 4 year old from preschool.

Last night I was going to the Singalonga Sound of Music at the State Theatre (which is why Mum was headed city-ward eventually). To say I wasn't in the mood would be world's greatest understatement. I've never actually seen the movie for starters, so I was already at something of a loss when it came to the audience participation. Add to that the fact that I'd had a splitting headache since 2pm, and the general shittiness and sleeplessness of the previous week, and what I really wanted to do was curl up in a ball. I did ok until someone wanted to know what was wrong with me, at which point I dropped my bundle and went home.

I'd just about got to sleep when Elissa woke very distressed and very feverish, which took another half hour or so to sort out.

So this morning I woke to realise that I had utterly failed to organise baby sitting for tonight.

This week I've pretty much failed at being a parent, a contractor and a friend. Maybe 2011 will be better.

ETA: My fairy godsister waved her magic wand and said "You shall go to the dinner", thus fixing my baby sitting fail. She is a wonderful being.

Work again

I've got myself snowed under in work again, but then this one was always going to happen. We've been relocating a client, which is always an exhilarating, supremely frustrating, inspiring and bad language inducing exercise. Today was pick-it-all-up-and-move day. It went pretty well. I'd be finished, but apparently it is impossible to find a contractor who can locate their own arse with both hands in some disciplines, and I have to go back and babysit the one we've got through finishing the job tomorrow.

Today is a good day to remember that I am grateful. Today I'm grateful to be able to work with clients who can be themselves together, who can let out the tension with humour, and who respect everyone for their contribution - not least because they all know their own.

Hopefully I'll get back to blogging in a day or two. I've got a backlog....

More whinging

But this will be the last for a couple of posts, at least. I promise.

Friday started well. I got up on time, got all the kids where they were going, on time with minimal tantrums and yelling (from me). I went to the hairdresser on the basis that Crash is in Hong Kong, and therefore couldn't need my support until after 12pm. I read a chapter or so of my text book while the colour did its thing. I bought some kids' chopsticks (stuck together at the top with an animal) to resolve the 2 year old problem of one set of chopsticks and two kids.

When I got home, I was a touch overwhelmed by the chaos, so I figured I'd run errands and do some grocery shopping. This is where is started to go to pot.

Some of the drama had its origin on Thursday, when Crash flew out and managed to leave his entire toiletry bag behind, complete with medication. I knew I needed to make a customs declaration to mail them, so I went to the Post Office instead of using Fed Ex. Ha! A customs declaration is not sufficient, you need a specific form, which the Post Office doesn't have. All this to mail about $20 worth of blood pressure and gout medication. This is a law which needs a small quantity cut-off. Just to add insult to injury, since I couldn't send the toiletry bag, and the other thing I needed to send cost less than $10, I couldn't actually pay for the latter because they wouldn't take EFTPOS. What century is this?

And so to Westpac. I needed to deposit some cheques. That worked! I also needed to change the PIN on my brand new, never used debit card. No. It was damaged. It was clearly my fault, just ask the guy on the desk. They had to order me a new card.

Shopping went comparitively smoothly, and I was only 15 minutes behind on my rather tight schedule. I figured if I cooked the spag bol for the kids' dinner really quickly, I'd be back on track. The anxiety levels were high, but manageable. I didn't even make it home before I got a call from Singapore needing support. An hour and a half later, I was still on the phone, whilst chopping onions, cooking and stirring. Somewhere in all the chaos, Fed Ex arrived to deliver 4 ginormous boxes, adding to the despatch atmosphere of my lounge room. I was also juggling calls from two or three other customers. Oh yeah, and I needed to pack the swimming bags for 7:30am the next day, but could not find my swimmers anywhere. Nowhere. Stress was getting really out of hand. And I had done none of the cleaning up I had intended.

By 4:15pm, the spag bol was cooked, but the problems in Hong Kong and Singapore were not resolved. Another customer called and told me he needed me in Bondi Junction. NOW. He was very reasonable, the need was real. But I had to pick the kids up in an hour. I offered to find him someone else who could do the job, which I did. Then the site where the work needed to be done announced that they wouldn't allow said person on site without my being there. Useful. I was really starting to come undone at this stage. Perhaps something about the tone of my voice gave my customer the courage to go back to the site people and explain just how insane this particular policy is, because somewhere in the middle of collecting all the kids, I got a call telling me that my sub would be allowed on site.

Just to add to the "anything that could go wrong..." theme for the day, when I left to pick up the kids, I shut the door after putting the dog out, and a picture fell off the wall. The frame smashed, but I guess I shouldn't complain, the glass didn't. And when I finally got out the door to go to Josh Pyke, we headed to Maccas for a bite. I really only wanted a thick shake. The poor girl on the drive through didn't quite understand the sniggers and "Of course it's not" when she told us the shake machine wasn't working.

All the chaos was to get myself and the kids sufficiently organised for me to go to Josh Pyke Friday night, for everyone to go swimming Saturday morning and for me to go to Sound Relief Saturday lunch time. So much more cheerful posts are to follow. :)

Can't blog, working

My house is a factory. The dining room table is completely covered in electronics, soldering irons and tools. The lounge room is a forest of boxes*. The rest of the house is showing the signs of intense neglect. The children are wondering why they feel like they are missing us, despite us having rarely left the house.

That which is being built must all be shipped within the next few days. Some of it must go tomorrow. Crash follows it all on Thursday. He will be away for just shy of two weeks.

And today I got my period 2 days early. Just in case I wasn't being irrational enough already. I suppose at least that means the (extra) irrational is over.

This should keep food on the table for a while, so it is all worth it. We have a list of things that will be done differently next time. (Don't we always!) But I am actually looking forward to having evenings alone when I can clean this place. It won't happen, and I'll miss him when he's gone, but that's the kind of madness living in a factory induces.

*Wow, I hadn't thought of that book in 20 years.

From DINK to Family of Five

Aztec-rose has asked for "post-birth" stories - stories about how becoming a parent affected you, both personally and with respect to work.

I'm writing it here so that I can spend enough time to make it worth the effort.

When we had our first child, we were both earning substantial incomes. We were making enough money to renovate our house to make it big enough for kids, which we did at the end of the pregnancy. We moved back into our house when Ben was about 8 weeks old.

Like Aztec-rose, I lost all interest in work when I was pregnant. I pretty much lost all interest in anything that didn't involve the couch. It took me quite a while to work out that it was the pregnancy, and not just uncontrolled laziness. Then again, maybe it was both. There was a fair bit of self doubt happening.

Then the kid actually arrived. Nasty but uneventful delivery, but he looked like a purple octopus when he was born, which might have horrified me if I hadn't been so busy thinking he was dead. Fortunately I had the presence of mind to look at the midwife and obs and decided that they wouldn't look so bored if the baby was dead. He needed a bit of oxygen, but not for long and he was fine.

I know this is supposed to be "post-birth" but the fact that it was a less than rosy birth experience just played into my innate dislike of babies. The fact that I find breastfeeding painful and Ben was a grumpy, grumpy baby just piled it on. I wasn't disappointed, just reinforced.

On the plus side, our ridiculous pre-baby devotion to work left us with a lot of leave. Crash took 6 weeks when Ben was born, which made a massive difference to my sanity. I used up all my annual leave at half pay for my 6 months of maternity leave. I was happy to go back to work at 6 months. I went back full time, but I was much less inclined to work indefinite hours. My sister was looking after Ben, so I didn't feel he was abandoned. And I was in a much better state to deal with him when I was home.

At 10 months he walked, and he turned into a whole new baby. It was about then I was actually prepared to consider another child - despite always wanting two kids the whole concept had given me the willies me up until then.

I had a miscarriage when Ben was about 18 months old. Work was fantastic about it - told me to stay at home until I was ready to come back in, and I had about 2 weeks off (time between ultrasound and D&C). However, it did start to change my focus. As work got more stressful, I made the decision that my health and that of the family were more important than the income. When I was pregnant with Charlie, I quit and started my own business. As a result, I had no maternity leave at all with Charlie (did a big install 2 hours away when he was 2 weeks old - he came with me). However, I did get to arrange my time so that I spent time with them.

This day to day balance definitely contributed to my decision to have a 3rd baby. That and the fact that Charlie was an angel baby and gave me hope that I might not have another 6 months like Ben's first. Crash eventually made the same sanity decision as me, and we now work together in our business. Maternity leave was also non-existent with Elissa - I took her to a work site at 7 days, with Crash to look after her between feeds.

Income is much lower, but, most of the time, we can get to the really big events. We can spend time with them all. The trade-off is that we virtually never get a block of time (like a week or more) away from work. Hopefully this will not be forever. Even the work punctuated week we took in January was great therapy for the whole family. I want to be able to take more family holidays, especially as they get older.

Looking at it from the other side, my work life has absolutely had a massive impact on my parenting. I had no idea how to be a parent. I had to ask the midwife to show me how to change a nappy. However, since I had always worked outside my comfort zone, I just naturally approached parenting the same way I had all the other projects I was way out of my depth with.

I read up on the theory, with a healthy amount of skepticism that still wasn't enough to stop me believing some awful rot (exactly the same as at work). I read Up the Duff, Baby Love, Kid Wrangling and Babies!. Then I started the bootstrap process - assume what I know is right, see if it works, if not, ask people who know (friends and family) and look for other expert advice (Tanya Byron was and is a guiding light for me) from people who actually do this stuff in practice. Then try another approach as gleaned from others, always assuming that there will be holes in the conventional wisdom, and that there is always the possibility of another approach that might work better for me. This is a process that has stood me in good stead at work before and after kids. I never assume that I am incapable of anything, I just don't have enough information (or in some cases, inclination). So parenting was much the same. This isn't working? OK, try another approach. I am capable but not psychic. It's been a blessing to have this experience at work, because while I am constantly appraising my techniques, I don't question myself as a parent.

Huh, I actually effectively practise "criticise the action, not the person" on myself as a parent. I hope I do it as well with the kids!

If you are inclined, tell your story to Aztec-rose. She's doing a PhD on this stuff, which I think is an excellent thing.

Thank you

It's not all over yet, but the main testing has been done on that job, and it seems to have passed muster. So I would like to thank Adam, Jeevan and Mark, without whom it would not have been possible. I owe you many beers.

Tired...

Warning: This has "girly" content. Boys, you have been warned.

I knew what a luxury we had, both working part time. Even if our income had halved. But for last few weeks I have been working very nearly full time (with the exception of a half day off during the school holidays). It sucks. It doesn't help that two out of the three projects I have been working on have been stretching my abilities - one of which is decidedly outside them. I haven't slept in anything resembling a sufficient way since Sunday week ago.

The flight home from Hong Kong was nothing short of hideous. The Implanon implant I have had in since Elissa was 6 weeks old is causing me immense grief since I stopped breast feeding. Two periods since, the first one 16 days long, and very heavy. The second one, 19 days and counting, has been worse, and only 3 weeks since the last one. Suffice to say that on the flight I was in pain, and needed to get up from my seat about every hour, resulting in me spending 4 or 5 hours in a flight crew seat. Better air, but very uncomfortable seat.

Wish me luck tomorrow, the job in which I feel way out of my depth on hits crunch time tomorrow. I have scared up some itinerant support for the afternoon, and I am hoping my knight in shining armour will get me through this without complete humiliation.

Ok, vent over. But Mark, where the hell are you when I need you????????

Balance in all things

In answering Aztec-rose's questions about work-life balance, I started on a rant about needing a life apart from kids and work. I think this is an underrated concern.

In the workplace, a culture of obsession is developing. Great professionals are held up as role models, people who are described as "having dedicated their lives" to their jobs. Great success stories involve years of working 90 hour weeks. The problem with this is that it is not what everyone should be aspiring to. Now everyone is required to go the extra mile. For me, the pin-up boy of this view is Einstein. He is held up as an academic hero, and there is no doubt that he was genius. He was also a disaster personally. The world needs the odd Einstein, it does not need an entire generation raised as "Little Einsteins". In fact, his obsession even affected his own work. If a driven, obsessed man can be negatively impacted professionally by a lack of balance and distance, I can only assume it has a greater affect on your average punter.

When I first started working in the corporate world, our workplace had an informal policy of mental health days. People were encouraged not to take sickies, to truly only take sick leave when it was needed. In return, if you just really needed a day off, you could take it as a sick day as long as you let the boss know, so that appropriate staffing could be maintained. I thought it was a bit of a rort when I first worked there (which I was more than happy to make the most of), but when it disappeared in an ocean of NYK head office policy, I realised how productive it had been. People who have the opportunity to de-stress when they need it are much better employees. They handle work stress better, they handle irate customers better, and they are less likely to do a bunk when chaos strikes and you really need all hands on deck. In addition to that, people who have a life outside of work are better at keeping an appropriate perspective. For most of us, no matter how bad the disaster, people won't die, empires won't fall. No doubt everyone has worked with someone who seems committed to the belief that this is the gravity of problems at work. In general, this doesn't make for better handling of the problem.

So you need time off from work for your family. After all, poor bonding with your baby will cause emotional problems for life. 95% of juvenile offenders have emotionally or physically absent fathers. The behaviour of your toddler is the best predictor of their behaviour as a teenager. Best not leave them for a moment, you may regret it for the rest of your life. I take the piss, but I understand why these studies, and the headlines they create, exist. If we don't provide some hard evidence that kids need their parents, caring for them will never be valued. This is a war for the social value of productive adults' time, and no weapon can be spared.

The problem is that this is the order in which most people encounter the battle at the moment. They are already living the obsessive corporate life, then they have kids and have all these statistics thrown at them. It is a major struggle to maintain a career and anything resembling the kind of parenting they want. All the studies designed to legitimise parenting as a use of time just become a source of guilt. Added to the guilt about leaving work on time. Taking regular time out to do something with no corporate or parenting value is largely unthinkable.

For those who stay at home (for whatever reasons), the guilt turns into something along the lines of "if you aren't doing real work, you'd better raise perfect kids". Martyrdom to children is becoming legitimised. We hear that someone "devoted their life to their kids". We are supposed to protect them from bad influences, be there for them always, give them every opportunity.

In contrast, hanging out with friends, adult dinners, even a solitary coffee are described as indulgences and luxuries. Leaving work on time to look after kids might just barely be tolerated, but leaving to go surfing or to the pub with mates (not clients) is definitely poor form. Letting your social life in any way impact on your kids is also a no-no.

The problem here is that as well as having an impact on work performance, a lack of a life can have a negative impact on kids. At worst, parents smother their kids. They don't teach them independence, don't let them learn to critically assess the world. Maybe even end up in all the problems that living vicariously through your kids can cause. At best, it just doesn't teach kids how to live an enjoyable life. It creates an expectation that adults live their lives for work and kids. I suspect it also delays the point where kids realise their parents are real people with faults and quirks. Kids are the centre of the universe, seeing their parents doing stuff for their own edification, with no connection to the kids, helps realign the universe for them. I am not suggesting that this realignment won't happen without parents with lives, just that it is worth considering all the consequences of your self-indulgent behaviour, not just the guilt producing ones.

I would love to see some studies on the long term outcomes, both professional and parental, in people who maintain balance in every aspect of their lives, not just the ones society judges as valuable. I want to see a headline that says "Parents without playtime raise delinquent kids". Lets see some alarmist nonsense in favour of down time for everyone. I really think everyone benefits.

Juggling work and family

Aztec-rose has asked a bunch of questions about how people juggle work and family, so I thought I'd answer them here.

1. What are your main work, life, family balance issues?

Hubby and I work for ourselves, and we don't really work full time, so it is hard to justify (or pay for) full time care. Unfortunately, we don't work to any particular timetable either, so we regularly end up look after kids and working, and that isn't much fun for anyone. Except maybe the baby, who doesn't care much either way.

2. Why is work life family balance such a difficult issue to resolve?

I think because largely we don't know what we want. We know we want cash. We know we want happy kids. Exactly what goes on to achieve those ends is a bit of a mystery. We are told that work is adult and fulfilling and part of our obligation to society. We are also told that kids need to bond and need time with their parents. Pretty much any choice you make is wrong somewhere.

3. Have work life balance issues affected your fertility decisions?

No.

4. Why do women, and mothers still take on the bulk of domestic unpaid work, despite juggle jobs and children?

Because the previous generation did, so we are better at it, and we are terrified that the world will come to an end if the kid forgets their library bag. And lots of other related things. Men still earn more, so it makes financial sense that women take the time off. It's catch 22, and unless we are prepared to make mistakes and leap into the unknown, the next generation will do the same. Mamas don't let your sons grow up to be breadwinners.

5. Why do married women do more housework than women in de facto relationships?

Because married women include the more conservative end of the female spectrum? If you control for general views on feminism, is that still true?

6. Does part-time work give mothers greater flexiblity and balance?

In my case it does. It means I can be involved in the school to the level I choose (somewhat less than the school encourages!), I can move stuff around to accommodate important events. But then I have much greater control over my hours than the average part time employee. And still not enough, since I do have to oblige those pesky customers.

7. Does part-time work free mothers up to do more unpaid work?

Yes. Someone has to do it. Having time to get the unpaid work done can lead to sanity. The real question is does part-time work free fathers up to do more unpaid work? And in our family, the answer is yes, although it has been a slightly rocky road, between his blindness to housework and my control freakery. But we are moving in the right direction.

8. Is part-time work for both co-habiting couples with children a way to more equally share child care and domestic work?

Seems to be. Although sexism in the work place makes this a much more difficult option for men. Also, as a company owner and former manager, I don't know exactly how you handle part time management jobs. There has to be an answer, but until there is a good one, it sets one hell of a ceiling on the careers of part time workers.

9. Do fathers feel they can take up family-friendly options at work?

Not in general. Mostly they have to go elsewhere, although I think "family friendly" is becoming a bit like "green". Companies want to be it. They don't really want to have to change much or spend anything, but if marketplace pressure keeps up, they may have to. More power to the companies that use it as an advertising gimmick. As long as it is backed up at least a little, it creates a market in family friendliness, and that seems to be the only thing that the corporate world recognises.

10. Do fathers still feel the pressure to be primary breadwinners?

My other half does. Definitely. In fact, I think it is still a part of the self definition of many men. See my answer to #4.

11. Are dad’s getting their preferred amount of time with their children?

How long is a piece of string? I think they have even less options. I think that social conditioning makes it even harder for them to know what their preferred amount of time is. And the fact that they are pretty much told incessantly (often by their own partners, something of which I am guilty) that they aren't as good at raising kids as mums makes it even more complicated.

12. Do we value caring work enough?

No, not across the board. Not for kids, or others who need care. We are suspicious of people wanting financial support for it. I don't know what we do about it without making everything just more expensive. Maybe we should go back to only counting one income for mortgage applications (although not requiring that it be the man's!). That was largely what created the requirement for such a greater proportion of the population to work and made caring such a massive issue.

13. What’s the meaning of life? (just kidding) that’s probably enough for now…

42, obviously.

I just have one thing to add. It seems to me that somewhere in this debate, people's lives became looking after children and working. Good mothers (or fathers) dedicate their lives to raising their children. Good employees dedicate their lives to their jobs. Well balanced people juggle the two. Having a life that doesn't involve kids or work doesn't rate a mention, and I think it has serious long term consequences for work and kids. Perhaps that is a subject for another post.

Which way did it go? Which way did it go?

A month since I have even looked at my blog. It's not that I haven't been blogging. I've been composing them almost daily, it's just the sitting down and typing I haven't quite managed. :)

I am currently typing one-handed with an angelic baby daughter just going off to sleep in my other arm. They are truly beautiful at times like this. Of course devil child will magically reappear within seconds should I attempt to put her down! But still, I have enough time just now for half an hour of cuddles, and these times are to be savoured.

Crash is en route home from an overnighter in Melbourne for the second time in a week. First trip coincided with bub's vaccination, and resulted in me getting no sound sleep at all, and aout 4 hours of kinda sorta sleep with a wriggly, unhappy baby next to me. Deep joy. This time was quite different though. I decided to give the boys my full attention at bath and bed time rather than failing to make any of them happy. So other than her actual bath, Elissa was left in her bassinet to scream herself silly during this part of the evening. (I did go in periodically so she knew she wasn't abandoned, but I don't think she was convinced.)

Anyway, when I finally took her downstairs to feed her, I put her down on her tummy for a moment while I went off to get a drink and otherwise prepare for 30 - 45 minutes on the couch, and by the time I got back she was asleep and stayed that way for an hour. When she finally woke up, she fed much better than usual at this time and then ... went to sleep in her bed and didn't wake up until 5am! If only that could be repeated! I can live with half an hour of full on screaming if it avoids 4 hours of squirming, whinging and general unhappiness.

So I was well rested enough today to deal with work. I was in the city and felt in complete control. I managed to resolve multiple issues all on the fly. It felt good. Ginny had bub in the pouch wandering around the city. I am so glad to know my useless, scatter-brained state is really only caused by lack of sleep and will go away once bub is settled.

I just don't *like* babies

The enormity of the task ahead, namely bringing this newborn safely to the other side of babyhood, has just hit me. I knew the pregnancy would suck, and academically I knew I was no fan of baby's first year, but I suppose I had just blocked how much I don't like it.

It's not that I regret having the baby, far from it. I know that by this time next year, this will all be behind me and I'll be looking forward to talking and all the good things about children.

But right now the demands, the pain of feeding, and the guilt about not being able to pull my weight in the business are all hitting hard. I will never understand people who like babies, although I accept that perfectly rational people do. :)

I suspect that at this point in my life, with the business being what it is, losing my independence has been a bigger issue than previously. Certainly being able to have real maternity leave was better. And with Charlie, there wasn't anyone else in the business noticing what I wasn't doing.

Oh well, we'll get there. I am honestly glad to have a baby girl, I am just not convinced that adopting a 12 month old from China wouldn't have been a better plan. :)

Maternity leave is over

Today was quite the adventure. We managed to secure a job with the RTA, which is quite a coup, being well out of our traditional market. Unfortunately, we secured it 3 days before I gave birth. To balance up the luck, one of their suppliers was late and pushed the job back to today rather than last Thursday.

So today I had to be at Yennora at 8am to work in an electrical workshop for an indefinite period of time. Thankfully I have a wonderful husband who came with me and the baby and looked after her between feeds, and added technical advice on occasion. What more can you ask for?

Who says sexism is a huge problem? I was in one of blokiest places I've ever been, and they were more than helpful and understanding with the baby being there, and with the feeding. Not a single snide remark about Dad looking after bub either. I'm not denying there are problems out there, but it seems that in the 10 years I've been in the telco industry, the assumption that I am not technical by virtue of being female has faded, and involved, enlightened fathers are becoming more and more prevalent (dare I say "the norm"?).

Oh, and of course this is much needed income. So all in all, a really good experience, even if I am now mind bogglingly sleep deprived.