10 Reasons Why Working From Home is a Nightmare!
Several years ago, as a single, almost thirty, Sales Manager, I had a web conference with a client who was working from home. I remember how miserable this woman sounded as she juggled her screaming baby and my probably irritating questions about the value she found in my company’s product. At the time, I thought “this woman should be happy, she is able to maintain an amazing career in Marketing and be a mom simultaneously.” I thought this to be a dreamy situation that I aspired to achieve someday.
A few short years later I myself became a mom. The circumstances surrounding my son’s special birth nudged me to put my career on the back-burner for a while. Unwilling to delegate his care to anyone else, I started my own company and began to seek remote work options. I have been fortunate enough to gain opportunities to earn money while working from home, however, it is a far cry from the fantasy that I imagined so many years ago. In fact, I recently completed my first major contract position since becoming a mother of two. With tight deadlines and little help, I definitely learned a thing or two about multi-tasking and “creativity.” I also gained 5 pounds from stress-eating and realized that working from home with two kids is more of a nightmare than a dream. Here are some of the conclusions that I have drawn after my most recent experience.
1) Your potty training toddler will most definitely have to poop at the exact moment that your office is calling you, every.single.time.
2) Offers to help babysit while you work are totally valid… until you actually try to cash them in.
3) It’s unlikely that your paycheck will justify additional childcare and if it does consider yourself one lucky Mama!
4) Your teething baby will not nap during regular times, especially when you schedule phone conferences.
5) Crying, screaming and incessant requests for snacks, drinks or specific episodes of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse are not exactly compatible with concentration.
6) It’s super hard to resist the urge to “dance off” with your toddler or snuggle your cuddlicious baby, while you should be working.
7) Technology breakdowns are much more palatable when there’s “that office tech guy” to come take care of it.
8) Your kids’ needs and your work deadlines will battle for attention causing your stress levels to rise to unprecedented heights.
9) Your husband’s idea of “watching the kids while you work” probably doesn’t mesh with your own and he will probably call you every 5 minutes anyway to find out where this or that is.
10) Your inability to crush work the way you once did when you were single, focused and sitting in an ultra-cool office, will probably drive your “perfectionist self” crazy.
In spite of the difficulties, I am still happy to be able to work from home. Now, as the proud Mama of a preschooler, things should be a little easier in terms of child care. Crazily enough, I’m looking forward to the next nail-biting project and a chance to challenge my brains once again!
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© Nicola Rios Nogales and ispeakmom.com, 2016. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Nicola Rios Nogales and ispeakmom.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
