Back to work... (9/21 column)

With Jacob off to daycare, I’m back to being a full-time reporter. But I’m still a full-time mom as well. It was tough dropping my little guy off to be in the care of strangers nine hours of the day. He’s the littlest one there by a few months, and he just seems so tiny next to the older babies who are already crawling and sampling finger foods. At the same time, it’s nice to be able to type again without a sleeping baby restricting my movements.

Sometimes I think it would be wonderful to be a stay-at-home mom. Then I wouldn’t miss a moment of his development. But with today’s rising cost of living, couple with the fact that I’m marrying a dairy farmer, that’s just not possible. Fifty years ago, there probably wouldn’t have been much question. When my grandma got married, she gave up school teaching to be a farm wife and mother to three. That’s just how it was. Even 26 years ago, when my parents were married, my mom stayed home to raise us. Except for a few part-time jobs from time to time, my mom really didn’t have a full-time job off the farm until last year.

My generation is quite different from my grandmother’s. I don’t know any women my age who are strictly housewives. Even the few who do stay home work from home for extra income. I recently heard a statistic that being a full-time mom and housewife is the equivalent of two full-time jobs. After doing it for the past few weeks, I can assure you that is true. Between my two boys (the 25-year old one and the 7-week old one), I had enough laundry and cleaning to keep a maid or two busy. That didn’t include errands, shopping, meals, etc. Not to mention keeping a fussy baby occupied.

If money wasn’t an issue, I would gladly stay home. But there are too many reasons to keep working, enough to justify sending my little boy to daycare. First, the farm economy is too wishy-washing to provide a comfortable living. Though we might be able to make it on one income now, if milk plummets again, I would be searching the classifieds for whatever I could find. Plus, as a young couple, we have a lot of goals that need money. Unless we win the lottery, the down payment on a house isn’t going to just magically appear in our account. Second is the cost of health care. I haven’t done any checking to see what private insurance would cost, but I know what my portion of group insurance costs. We couldn’t afford the whole premium every month. That’s why so many farm families have to rely on BadgerCare.

And finally, I enjoy coming here everyday. I know Nate would give me a job on the farm feeding calves and milking cows, but I wouldn’t enjoy it as much. I love being on the farm, but it’s also nice to have a manure-free work environment. So I hope Jacob enjoys his new caretakers and playmates. I’ll miss being away from him, but it will make my evenings and weekends that much more precious.