This is my fourth week back at work and I never gave a recap of my stay-at-home experience.
Let’s just say that it wasn’t all awful, I avoided being a leading piece on the 6 o’clock news and I just had my last regularly scheduled session on the couch.
I’m glad I experienced it, but I wouldn’t want to do it again. I certainly don’t miss it beyond superficial advantages like not having to wake up at the crack of dawn and not living a life on a regimented schedule.
The advantages to going to work are that I can sip my morning coffee, eat at least one meal slowly while sitting down on a chair, and I don’t have to be constantly afraid of being a 6 o’clock news item.
I say it in slight jest, but there were moments when I absolutely understood how a tragedy might happen. Thank God for having a support system, including a wonderful understanding husband and a strong sense of self-preservation that helped me to recognize danger signs and be proactive about it.
I still have to be somewhat cautious. When D asked me about going to a football game with Soso on Saturday, I couldn’t just say, sure! I had to pause and think about it. I had to mapped out the morning in my head. She has Gymboree and we can stop by a store to kill some time. Lunch and nap or nap and lunch and D will be back soon there after. Okay, sure D, go have fun!
That will be my life for a while. I’m still no where close to being comfortable and loving this life with a child who is extremely emotional and volatile. I love Peanut, but I don’t love her personality. I don’t love her loudness and her tears. And honestly, I never will. I don’t like loud, whiny teary children, period. But I also accept that I could have given birth to this child and I would feel the same. This isn’t an adoption issue so much as personality clashing issue and balancing second child issue.
Put the advantages and disadvantages on a balance scale and the disadvantages still far outweigh the advantages. If I could turn back time, while keeping the memory of this experience, I still would. But life doesn’t work that way and I try really hard to add up all the positives I can. One day, it will all balance out, right? And perhaps even tip on the side of advantages.
