Leaning Out

Six short months ago I read Lean In and loved it.  I was completely smitten with the idea of having a kid and still being super involved in my work.  I was totally convinced that I was going to have this child and somehow work things out and stay "on the same level" as the men I was surrounded by at work in administration.  I also was sure that I'd have a natural child birth and breastfeed my child and do all that was best for her.  I'd be supermom and super-admin and keep it all together like the feminist that I am.

Only now do I realize that all of those things don't necessarily go hand in hand.  In fact... I'm going to go out on a limb and say that as long as a woman is breastfeeding her kids there is no way in hell that they can be as dedicated as a man in the workplace.  It just isn't possible.  I have an extreme situation.  My kid is in daycare right down the hall.  This is quite excellent until it isn't.  I get called out of meetings to go feed her on demand.  I get called mid-project and mid-thought and I hear my kid scream in the background and then I proceed to run down the hall, grab her, go sit in a closet and rock her and feed her.  I do want to interject here and also mention that I do love having her nearby and seeing her little face while I feed her makes me feel like I'm not missing out on her completely each day.  But at the same time I know that I'm not the same worker bee that I was a few short months ago.  I'm not working up to my old standards.  I've let go.  And I don't like that... I have pretty high standards for myself.

Even if I didn't have daycare down the hall and I just had to go pump in a bathroom stall every few hours it still wouldn't be the same as before.  I would still constantly be checking the clock to see how many hours had gone by, I would worry about maintaining my supply, and I'd still be more distracted than I was before I became a food source.

Today was crazy.  I had my yearly administrator academy in Des Plaines. I dropped her off at daycare and drove the 20 minutes to the regional office of education.  I got checked in, missed the first 10 minutes of lecture because I had to go pump in the bathroom, and then was totally focused for a good 2 hours.  Then I started worrying about whether or not she'd take the bottle.  I was totally well behaved until our lunch break at 11:30, when I decided to call and check to make sure.  She hadn't eaten.  This little stubborn baby of mine (definitely my child) hadn't eaten for 5 hours since 6:30am.  The daycare told me that it would be nice if I did come back and feed her.  So instead of my lunch break of 30 minutes, I sped like a bat out of hell from Des Plaines to Skokie, snatched up my kid, sat in a closet and then sped back to Des Plaines about 20 minutes late.  As I was driving back and forth I called my husband because I needed someone to understand.  He was at a conference and answered the phone "I'm busy... I can't really talk right now."  

I don't blame him... he does a lot once he gets home and he's the love of my life... but here's the "AHA" moment.  He had that option... and I don't.  As long as I'm my kid's food source I don't get to be off-call.  I'm always on-call.  And that is why Lean In is bullshit.  That woman MUST have formula-fed her kids.  There's nothing wrong with that... and in fact I constantly think to myself that this should be an option... but for some reason I just can't let myself give in.  It's my burden to bear.  Which I guess is what motherhood is all about.