When I first found out I was pregnant and started arranging maternity leave the thought of 9 months off work seemed like an eternity. I'd always thought that I would be one of those mums that was itching to return to work and ultimately would end up calling short my maternity leave and probably returning around the 3 month mark. So it's somewhat strange to me to find myself halfway through month 9 with my return to work just 3 weeks away.
I've gone through a lot of emotions in the last couple of months concerning returning to work. Anxiety at first over who would look after Lewis and how would we afford childcare. Sadness at the thought of missing my little boy and perhaps missing out on new milestones and developments. Excitement at the thought of spending a whole day speaking to grown ups about grown up things and more confusing to me, jealousy.
Upon my return to work, my husband, Rob, will be having a lot more one on one time with Lewis than I will. Obviously this is great for Lewis and for us as a family, it means we will have less childcare costs and it means Lewis and his Dad will have some great quality time together. Despite knowing all this I'm still jealous. I'm jealous that Rob will likely get to experience firsts that I will miss and I worry that Lewis will love him more than me. Whereas now it's him returning home from work and me filling him in with our funny stories of the day, the tables will be turned and it will be me getting the updates. I know it's irrational to feel like this, and the likelihood is that I will miss out on very little and Lewis will love me just as much as he always has, but still, it's how I feel sometimes.
I've decided to return to work on a part-time basis, 4 days a week. If we won the lottery tomorrow or somehow came into a ridiculous amount of money I would not be coming back. I enjoy my job, I love the people I work with, the work can be challenging and rewarding and it's definitely the sort of career I always thought I would have. However, since Lewis, since becoming a mum, it all seems so insignificant. The work just doesn't seem important anymore. I loathe to identify myself as solely a mother, I've always imagined that I would be a career woman, regardless whether or not I had children, but at this present moment in time, being a mother to Lewis is the most important thing in my life.
I'm sure that once I get back and fully into the swing of things my mindset will start to shift and being a working mum will become my new normal. I'm very lucky in that I have a wonderful group of mum friends, some of who are returning to work in the near future, some that are not returning until next year and some that will be taking on the challenge of being a stay at home mum. This support network has helped me to explore my feelings surrounding returning and being apart from Lewis for extended periods of time. If you are on maternity leave or coming up to maternity leave definitely invest some time in making mum friends, they'll be your saving grace at times.
So there it is, my feelings about returning to work. I'll be sure to update on how things are going once I'm back into the working groove. How did you cope with returning to work? Are you also returning in the near future, how are you feeling about it? I'd love to hear from you.
