I'm going to be delivering my fourth child in late September. I'm excited to be able to take off 10 weeks from work to stay home with my two youngest. Logan, who is almost 17 months, will stay home from daycare while I'm home with the baby. As of this moment, I'm excited. Yet, come October, I'll probably be ready to pull my hair out while tending to a newborn, trying to breastfeed, take care of the house and chase an almost-2-year-old.
When I went to my first doctor's appointment they asked me a list of questions about my health and the pregnancy. The first question was 'was this pregnancy planned or unplanned?'
I wanted to say, 'do people actually PLAN these things??'
I'm very happy to be pregnant with Jake and mine's fourth baby. We'll celebrate our unofficial ninth anniversary this August. It's an unofficial anniversary because we're not getting married until later this month, but we've been together since 1999. I don't think NOT being married makes us less of a couple, nor does it make our children less legitimate. We love one another and have a good, stable and loving home for our kids and each other.
Back to the big question, I simply answered, 'No, it wasn't planned but we're happy about it.' The nurse/midwife said, 'Girl, I have four of those but I love them to death!' That made me laugh and feel better about having to admit it was unplanned.
I've been at my first real job for about a year and three months and I love what I do. But I also love being a mom. A full-time, hands on mom. I truly admire women who work AND still come home to take care of their families and keep the household running. And I also really admire women who are able to stay home with their kids. Especially those who are taking care of a toddler AND a newborn.
My two oldest children are about to go into the first grade and I love the fact that I was able to stay home with them their first year of life. Of course back then -- a little more than six years ago -- Jake was the only one working and I was a full-time student. Our family income didn't take a big hit because I stayed at home.
Material things are irrelevant, but Jake and I like being able to provide for our family and still have money left over to take them to do stuff and buy them those new pair of shoes they really like. Or buy the newest video game that everyone else is playing.
Jake and I both grew up in families that struggled to make it. We always knew that we wanted something different for our kids. We grew up as happy children and had the basic necessities, but our parents didn't have the extra money nearly 30 years ago to buy the stuff they wanted to buy for their kids.
Despite all that, I actually think I could make it work by freelancing and becoming a professional eBay-er. (That's my new hobby.)
We could downsize our house, get rid of those extra bills (pay off loans and get rid of cable) and learn to be frugal in everything else. We'll save money by not sending Lo to daycare. That will save us about $340/month.
When my baby boy is born this fall, I'm going to dread the time-to-go-back-to-work countdown. I was able to stay home with Logan for eight weeks. Eight wonderful weeks of waking up to his tiny cries, being there to breastfeed him at each feeding, watching him grow each day, remembering the first day he smiled at me and being there the first time he baby babbled.
I'll get ten weeks this time and I'll get paid during my time off (thanks to my work's medical insurance and my annual and sick leave) but I'm not going to want to leave him.
I really like my job and my coworkers, but that's one of the hardest days I'm going to have to deal with. And I'm not looking forward to it.
