for carla

Hi, Carla.

You said you’re considering being a full-time mom, now that you have a small kid and another on the way. Let me tell you a little about the choices working mothers make, for the sake of perspective.

My two-year-old is sick today. Her tonsils are infected, and she’s been running a fever for the third day now. I took a leave from work a day ago so I could take her to the doctor and have antibiotics prescribed.

She hates taking medicine. It’s like a wrestling match every time we have to give her antibiotics and fever medicine, even at two a.m. She ends up looking like she took a shampoo and body wash in sticky, orange-flavored goo, and we use up about three towels, only to repeat the whole thing because she managed to throw up. Then it takes her about an hour to calm down and go back to sleep, then we wake her up again for the next dose.

I lose sleep, but I have to wake up at 5 a.m. to get her older sister ready for school. I go to work and battle paperwork that was pending because I took a leave. And I call home six times to check whether she still has a fever, or if she has eaten, or if she threw up the medicine again.

I feel like I should take another leave, but my supervisor is leaving for Viet Nam on Monday morning, today is Friday, and we don’t have a visa yet. There is a 106-slide Powerpoint presentation to check, three meetings this afternoon, and plane tickets for release. I will worry the whole day about the visa and about my kid, but the only thing to do is to hope that both will be fine.

On one hand, I wish I were home right now taking care of my child. I also wish I could stay home to help my older daughter with her homework, or bring her to school in the morning and chat awhile with her class advisor, or cook my husband’s meals in the evening, or sew curtains in the afternoon while the little one is taking a nap. I long for things like that. I resent it when I come home in the evening and the baby has a new trick to show (like dancing along with Willing Willie), and it’s the yaya who taught her to do it.

On the other hand, I am thankful that I have a job, because my daughter has a health card, and that means I can bring her back to the doctor tomorrow without worrying about the doctor’s fees and the new set of prescription. Because I’m working, my other daughter goes to a private school, has a computer at home, has an iPod (that she lost a week ago), and can collect Barbie dolls. Because I’m working, I can dream about sending both girls to Ateneo for college, or give them cars as graduation gifts.

A child doesn’t care if you plan to send her to Ateneo for college. She cares that you’re there when she’s sick. But you, as an adult, weighs the option of being able to afford medical care when your child needs it.

Working to help provide for the family, or staying home to take care of the kids, should not be how you measure love as a parent. It’s a balancing act, and you tread a fine line for the choices you make. It’s there, every day. Had I been the mistress of a millionaire, and I receive fifty thousand pesos as shopping money every week, I wouldn’t even blink. I’d stay home and raise kids. But then, we don’t know the choices such a woman would make, or whether that makes her a better mother than I am.

So you see, Carla? It’s never an easy call to make. I chose to continue working, and I try to make it light by saying I feel good about putting on eye makeup and wearing heels every morning, but it also makes me look forward to the evenings when I come home to my daughters. And if they’re asleep by the time I get home, I’d still kiss them and tell them how much I love them.