A couple columns I wrote shortly after Jonathan was born. I haven’t written a Jonathan column in awhile because my publisher told me to pick another topic to “mix it up.” Well, I’ve gotten more comments on those columns about motherhood than any other column (except the one on a sailor who died during World War II and the ship that he was on was found 60 years later). Take that bossman (just kidding!)

Walking zombie
Ah, motherhood. Or shall we say “zombiehood”? That is what this mother of an almost 4 month old has come to call it. My son and I have had some issues regarding his sleep pattern. I’d prefer that it mesh with mine and he doesn’t really recognize that. For the most part he sleeps well, but there have been several periods in the night where he thinks he must eat, ignoring the fact that mommy tried to get him to eat before he went to bed and now she would like to sleep. Children, I’ve discovered, don’t have a concept of time like adults do. They don’t understand that one should eat during the day and sleep at night.
I’ve read a number of books and articles about how to encourage your baby to sleep through the night. Many of the “tricks” are working. However, since I work during the day, there is part of me that doesn’t mind that midnight, 2 a.m., 4 a.m. and sometimes 6 a.m. and 7:30 a.m. feeding. He doesn’t actually eat that many often during the night, but some nights it sure feels that way. The time we spend together is precious to me and even if while I am spending it with him I can’t remember my own name, where I am, or who this baby smiling up at me belongs to.
Exhaustion can do some funny things to a person. Of course at the time “those things” are happening they are usually not funny at all. I’ve learned to laugh at some of the weird stuff I have done because of being so tired. Last week I tried to cross the street in Sayre and for several seconds couldn’t figure out why I couldn’t move away from my car. I then realized that I had shut my coat in the door. Instead of getting angry, as exhaustion sometimes makes me do, I laughed out loud, thinking how I must have looked to people driving by — leaning out into the road, my legs moving but the rest of me not going anywhere, and my coat stretched out behind me, trapped in the car door. That same morning I had walked outside of my house to get something from the car and started to slide on some ice. I did one of those “banana peel” slapstick routines for about ten seconds — arms flailing out to my side — but managed to stay up right. Once I was steady again, I tip-toed to my car, laughing again at how silly I must have looked.
There have been times I haven’t laughed in the moment, instead only able to laugh at myself later. This past weekend, after a fairly long day of work the day before and a long night with the baby, I found myself in the middle of my living room floor, early in the morning, sobbing while my son blinked wide-eyed at me from his swing. I hadn’t been able to get a bag open for some containers I had bought and for some reason this seemed like the biggest crisis to me. My husband heard my crying and came down the stairs to find his wife a blubbering, quivering mass of craziness (not an unusual find for him actually). The conversation between us went something like this, with me still in the floor and him kneeling behind me:
Him: “Honey, what’s wrong?”
Me, in a very whiney, pathetic wail: “These stupid things won’t open and I am so tired and waaaaa. . . (unintelligible squeaking and whimpering).”
Him: “Listen, I have some things to do this morning and when I come back I’ll watch the baby and I want you to go to sleep.”
Me: “I am so tired and these stupid things won’t open and I’m a horrible mother and waaaaaa. . .(unintelligible squeaking and whimpering).”
Him: “It’s going to be fine, honey. You’re a wonderful mother. You’re just exhausted. You’re trying to do too much.”
Me: “No, I can do this. I’m fine. It’s just this bag, these things and waaaaa. . . (unintelligible squeaking and whimpering).”
At this point the dog, who thinks he has to lick everything he sees, licks the containers, which have been pre-sterlized for the baby’s health. Dog slobber does not fit into my vocabulary of clean and healthy for my baby.
Me, slapping the dog in the head and flailing like a child throwing a tantrum: “Get away. Get away. Get away. Now, they’re dirty. They’re dirty!!!!! Aaaaargh! Dirty!!! . . . (unintelligible squeaking and whimpering).”
Him: “OK, that’s it. You’re going to bed. Get up. Let’s go. I’ll watch the baby.”
Me: “I can’t. You have things to do. I’ll be fine. All I need is something to eat and I can handle iiiiitttt — waaaaa. . . (unintelligible squeaking and whimpering).”
Him: “Good night, honey. See you later.”
Me, staggering up stairs: “No. I’m fine. I don’t need to go to sleep. I’m fiiine . . .(unintelligible squeaking and whimpering).”
Warren hears a thump as I hit the bed, two loud sobs, and of course, “unintelligible squeaking and whimpering” and then nothing. He and Jonathan sneak upstairs a few moments later and as, Warren likes to describe to others, there I was laying sprawled across the bed, my head back, my mouth hanging open, drool coming out, and a loud snore rattling the walls. Warren tends to exaggerate — a lot.
I’d expound more about how funny exhaustion can make you act, but I am soooo tired, this bag of thingees won’t open, the baby is crying, and I have to change his diaper and waaaaa. . . (unintelligible squeaking and whimpering).

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Learning the real meaning of the term ‘working mother’
I stumbled down the stairs bleary eyed, a squirming three month old in my arms. I fumbled with the buttons of his onesie and the flaps of his diaper while he grinned at me and I attempted a smile. He continued to grin until I worked him into his car seat, pulling his arms through each strap. I pushed a disolvable pill into his mouth to help treat his acid reflux while tucking a blanket around his feet and realized I’d forgotten to put socks on him. I rushed up the stairs, dug through the top drawer of the dresser and found two socks, neither of them matching the other. I put them on him anyhow, casting an anxious eye at the clock.
“Stay there sweety, I’ll be right back,” I told him and rushed out the front door to warm up the car before carrying him out into the cold winter morning.
When I returned his lower lip was pushing out and a cry was beginning to form. By the time I was halfway down the street, the soft cry was a full wail.
I thanked the sitter and gulped back emotion when she slid him from his seat and gave him a reassuring smile. I thanked her and tried to sound cheerful. In the car I dropped my forehead against the steering wheel and took a deep breath. Turning on to Seneca Street to head to the office I noticed a funny feeling in my chest. In the parking lot I dropped my head down again, this time weeping like a mental patient who forgot to take her morning pills. I took another deep breath and wiped away the tears, walked into the office and tried to smile. Another “working mother” asked how my first week back to work was going.
“Oh, OK,” I lied.
She knew I was lying. She asked how I was really doing. I poured my heart out like she was Dr. Phil and I was an abused housewife. I didn’t even notice until much later the frightened expression on her face. She must have felt like a lamb trapped by a rabid wild dog. Only this rabid wild dog was rambling about her puppy and how much she missed him and how she was having an awful hair day and how she’d cried when she left the baby and how she’d forgotten breakfast and . . .
Three hours later I called home, knowing my son would be home with my husband by now and asked how he was. In the background I heard my baby screaming.
“Oh, OK,” my husband lied.
I hung up quickly and locked myself in the bathroom for another good cry. It was developing into a fairly rough introduction for me into the world of a working mother.
Before I became a mother I never thought much about the term “working mother.”
‘All mothers work,’ I thought.
Today most mothers have to work outside of the home, mainly out of necessity. The need to eat and have a roof over my family’s head is why my husband and I both have to work. My mom was a stay at home mom, but growing up I was never naive enough to think all mothers have this luxury. I call it a luxury now that I am a mother because I realize how special it is to be able to stay home and spend all day concentrating on the most important career of all — mothering.
I’ve been leaving Jonathan at home with his daddy, his grandma or taking him to a sitter for about two months now, but each time I slip out of the door, or put his coat on him, I feel a lump in my throat and my chest tighten. I’ve decided that this may never get easier. I’ve had people tell me, while shrugging their shoulders, “Oh well, a lot of mothers have to do it.” I would be dishonest if I didn’t admit that I don’t want to be one of those mothers anymore and sometimes I just want to be rude and scream “Well I don’t want to be ‘a lot of mothers.’”
Through my mom, I’ve discovered that guilt isn’t only reserved for the mother who has to leave her child with a sitter, or in daycare, and go into the office. My mom often told me she felt guilty that she wasn’t helping to support the family financially. I always thought it was silly for her to feel that way, especially because she supported the family in more important ways, including cooking, washing all our clothes, and simply being there to listen to all our complaints and offer us emotional and even spiritual support.
As a kid, I didn’t think much about what I might do about working outside the home when I was a mother. To be honest, I never even pictured myself as a mother, which is probably why I stare in disbelief at Jonathan so often, amazed that this little human is actually my son.
There is a lot of advice out there on how to be a good mother even when you have to work outside the home. Dr. Sears suggests that the success of parenting is not dependent on a mother being “full-time” or “part-time,” but simply being attached to their child.
“Even the artificial divisions ‘full-time’ and ‘part-time’ are misleading,” he writes. “You can be full-time at home, but only part-time interacting with your baby, or part-time at work and full-time interacting with your baby at home.”
My biggest worry about leaving Jonathan with someone else during the day is that he will forget who “mommy” is. I worry that our attachment will be broken, even though I make sure I am with him almost all the time when we are at home in the evenings and on the weekends. My thoughts are silly really. Jonathan heard my voice and lived inside me for nine months straight. I’m pretty sure he has some pleasant associations with me and favors me over anyone else holding him, with exception to his dad.
Sometimes I feel that by being upset over having to leave Jonathan to go to work makes me an immature mother, but then I remind myself that for nine months he was physically part of me, as well as emotionally. I remind myself that if I didn’t become upset at the thought of leaving him then our attachment to each other really would be broken.