Since having no choice but to give up university in April due to a complete lack of reliable childcare I have spent the last few months at home with Meadow. This is time that I am of course extremely grateful for, it is however time that I i’m beginning to resent as for the third time in my life I have sacrificed my career to raise a child the very best way I can.
I spend my days at home with Meadow teaching her skills that will help her throughout life, both physically and mentally. I practice gentle parenting, we walk a lot we talk a lot and we do everything together. I love her to pieces as I do my older children.
There is however an undeniable storm brewing within me as this is not the life that envisaged I would have; raising children until I’m too old to care. As a child I dreamt that I would be a successful vet, I would have lots of animals, I would travel all over the world, I would be a good friend and always there for people in need. I would make my own money and never be financially reliant upon anybody.
Over the course of my adult life all I’ve ever really wanted was to be successful at something and I feel like the only thing I’ve really been successful at is raising children. Which is a wonderful thing to have done however is that all I was ever good for?
I’m not at all suggesting that anyone who chooses to stay home is less valuable to the world than someone who doesn’t. However I seem to have lived a life that was never really part of my plan.
Which leads me to wonder is there ever any point in having plans or dreams as a child when actually life pans out how it’s going to pan out and it seems we have little control over that.
I know that my contribution during my lifetime has been to raise three children to be well prepared to live their lives within this world.
I don’t want the cycle to continue though, I want them to live their lives I want them to travel I want them to be free and never feel that they have to have children just to have completed their purpose. That is an old rhetoric, their contribution to the world can be whatever they wish it to be and if that involves having no children but living an absolutely wonderful life I would be so happy for them to do that.
I’ve been looking lately at Open University degree courses that I can do at home. To what avail? I don’t know, I don’t even know the direction I want to travel in as a career anymore, it’s hard to make choices on careers when it feels that everything you’ve ever tried has momentarily felt successful and then fallen flat on its face.
In addition to a complete lack of direction I’m also realistic and realising that I probably won’t actually have any time to complete an open University course at home even though I spend 99% of my time here.
By the time all of the laundry, the cleaning, the cooking, the childcare is completed and I’ve put Meadow to bed I’m absolutely exhausted. By this point my ‘shift’ has been 15 hours long… 7 days of the week. That’s a 105hr working week.
I don’t know if anyone will read this or if this is just an open diary entry, however mum taught me that journal writing is helpful and in some ways this has been cathartic. So if no one reads it that doesn’t matter because somehow it’s helped me feel better to just ramble for awhile.
