Ramble Ramble

Ok, I know in my last post I said I was going to post today about the practical part of traveling without the kid, but that’s going to have to wait for a few days.

Today, I need to talk about dreams. Fulfillment. Happiness.

I’ve never been one who had some big dream about what I wanted to do with my life, professionally. I kind of fell into my career by way of I was an English major and had to figure out some way to pay the bills. Somehow I ended up in publishing. And from there, I ended up in marketing. I’ve been doing that since my senior year of college, in one form or another. I even moved to New York to further my publishing career (for anyone not aware, all but a very few of the “big” book publishers are based in NYC).

However, after a few years I realized that New York was not for me. And while I enjoyed my job, and the books I worked on, and the celebrities I got to meet, I realized that it wasn’t enough to continue living in that city. I learned about myself that no job satisfaction was worth being miserable in the REST of my life. And so, we picked up and moved across the country.

When we moved, I resigned myself to a career that wasn’t in publishing. There’s not too much in that field in San Diego, so I was prepared to take a job in marketing, and call it a day. But somehow, I ended up in one of the only publishing jobs to be found out here. And while the books I work on now aren’t as glamorous as the ones I worked on in New York, they’re still books. Being a small company, I’ve had my hands in every aspect of marketing and publicity that we do here. I run a small department, where we all do about 4 different jobs, and I run it pretty well. I’m damn good at my job, and I pride myself on that.

But I find myself increasingly dissatisfied with my professional life. I find myself envying, for the first time ever, those people I know who are freelancers or contract workers. Those people who get to set their own goals, and bust their asses for their own dreams. Those people who get to push themselves into whatever new direction their business leads them. Those people who don’t have to play the games that come with working in a big company. Those people who call their own shots.

I’ve tried offering up ways to my boss, however small, that I could get a little closer to professional fulfillment. But I keep getting shot down by the folks higher up the chain (not my boss, she’s awesome. Just restricted like me). I’ve tried creating parts of my job, however small, that make me excited and stoked to come to work in the morning. But they keep getting given to other people once I’ve made them successful. I keep trying and they keep putting up road blocks.

I don’t know what to do anymore. I don’t want to be one of those people who becomes a soulless entity because her job is sucking the life out of her. I want to be passionate about my job again. I want to be excited to sit down and do my work, at least some of the time. If I’m going to deal with the commute, and the people, and the being away from the baby–shouldn’t it occasionally make me fill fulfilled?

I have 3 websites launching this week (like, TOMORROW), and our big trade show next week, and I am FREAKING OUT because I have so much to do and so little time to do it, and I feel like one of those cartoons where the steam inside the character’s head keeps building and building and building until their head explodes, and dear GOD do I want this week to be over, and then, maybe then, I can relax and not feel like this giant ball of OMGOMGOMG!

So um, yeah, posting may be a little sparse until later this week when I might be able to, ya know, breathe or something.

P.S. Your comments on my last two posts have not gone unnoticed–when I have time to intelligently respond to them, I will, but for now, let me just say–You guys are the best, and I know that more every time you leave me such thoughtful comments!

Hey, have you guys heard of the stress diet? It’s a miracle weight loss program! I’ve lost 6 pounds in the last week on this amazing diet–without having to eat well or exercise. Granted, the side effects of the diet may include crying at the littlest thing, lashing out at your loved ones, stress headaches, body aches and general frustration and irritability. But hey, weight loss is weight loss, right?

Seriously, this stress is killing me.  My day right now is get up, check work email while feeding the baby, get ready, go to work, work work work, head home, eat dinner, play with baby for a few minutes, then work work work some more, lately until 11 or 12. I keep telling myself that if I can just make it through Feb. 1, when one of the websites and the ecommerce store that I’m working on launch, things will even out a little. I’ll be able to breathe.

I hate this kind of stress, particularly work related. I haven’t had this kind of pressure at work in a long time, and I know it’s compounded by the guilt I have when I’m working and feel like I should be with the baby (particularly at home). But regardless of the baby, I’m neck deep in projects and deadlines, just barely keeping my head above water. I need more hours in the day or a clone or, and this is a novel idea, a workload for one person rather than the workload of four people.  But since that’s not likely to happen anytime soon, I guess I’m stuck with bitching about it and then sucking it up and doing my job. At least I’m losing weight through it all…right?

I worked from home today. The kid had his 4 month check up, and that includes vaccines. Last time he got his shots, he wanted to spend all day nursing, plus we watch him to make sure he has no adverse effects from the shots, so working from home made the most sense. It was wonderful.

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before, but this would be my ideal work/mom situation, this working from home.  It would be hard (trust me, I’m watching my husband try it, I have other family that has done it, I know it’s not easy), but I think it would make me so much happier. No time lost to the commute, no guilt over missing the kid growing up, and the ability to work at my own pace. Ahhhh, dreamy.

Unfortunately, I think it would only work with an extremely flexible approach to when work got done–there’s no 8-5 regularity when you’ve got the kid too–that my company does not have. They would not be ok with me working 7-9, and then 11-12:30, and then 2-4:30, and then 5-6:15, or whatever random schedule the kid gave me. Plus, my company firmly believes in face time and in appearances of productivity based on hours worked. My company also firmly subscribes to the “other people in the company can’t do that, so you can’t do that” mentality (this applies to everything from telecommuting, to time off, to benefits). So this is a complete and utter pipe dream in my current world.

Someday, I think telecommuting will be more accepted across more industries. Companies will realize that productivity isn’t always tied to the chair in a cubicle.* They’ll realize that people can work just as hard (or harder) if they aren’t in the office. Until then, I can continue to dream of my ideal balance of work and mommyhood, and relish the days like today when I do get to work from home.

*Case in point–I’m always crazy productive when I work at home. I think because I don’t have the distractions of office life around me (people popping in my cube every few minutes, impromptu hallway meetings, someone flagging you down for work because they saw you, etc.). Also, I think I’m always so aware of the perception of slackitude that comes with working from home that I make it a point to be super productive.

Day three of my return to work, and I haven’t cried today–victory!

Ok, only sort of. Monday pretty much sucked. I cried getting ready, I cried pulling out of the drive way, I cried on the freeway, and then I spent the rest of the day trying not to cry every time someone asked me “how are you doing?” or “do you miss him already?” I’d get myself calmed, and focused on something else (like a new computer that needed to be set up, or 3 months of emails, or the urgent thing that needed to be reviewed right away), and then someone would ask how I was doing and I’d have to fight, HARD, not to break down.

Add in the drama of figuring out the hows, and whens, and whatnot of pumping (oh, let me tell you how much I already hate, hate, hate pumping. That’s another post for another day though), which then left me trying to focus on the kid to help things along, and it was an exhausting day. I was never so glad to get home to a screaming baby who needed me (at least for his dinner).

Tuesday didn’t start out much better…I was teary on the drive to work, and at a coworker’s birthday breakfast everyone kept asking the same questions (was it hard? did you miss him? don’t you wish you could be with him? Um, folks seriously, you’re not helping). I was worried it would be another day of emotional beat-down.

But then, something came up. A project that was supposed to be taken care of while I was out on leave didn’t get done and was stalled, and I basically had to come in and save the day. And it felt great.

It felt great to know that I’m still needed here.

It felt great to know that I’m still good at my job.

It felt great to have something to think about besides Jackson.

It felt great to use that part of my brain.

And while it didn’t stop sucking that I’m not able to be with the kid, I was able to give myself a break by doing my job.

Today is…ok. I can’t allow myself to keep thinking about what I’m going to miss with the kid–I’m going to kill myself slowly if I keep that up. I wallowed last week, I wallowed on Monday, but I can’t keep wallowing. There’s no other options for me–I have to work, I have to have the paycheck and the benefits, and I can’t do it at home, so this is what it is. I need to soak that lesson in and make it my own: this is what it is and there is nothing else I can do about it, so I need to figure out how to move forward.

Do I think I’m “over it”? Not a chance. It still hits me at moments, and I’m sure that will continue throughout Jackson’s little life. I’m going to miss things in his life and that’s going to suck. But since I don’t have any other options, I’m trying to find ways to move past the heartache and into a space where I’m ok with this. I’m doing what I have to do for our family, so I’ve got to suck it up and move forward.

And I get to come home to this:

And I’m thankful for that.

P.S. We’re flying today for the first time with the kid. Wish us luck (and non-sicky sick folks in the flying tin can to germ up my baby who can’t get flu shots)!