Week 0 as a stay at home mom:

It’s turning into one of those days today. I’m sitting with my daughter in her room watching her play, all while wondering if I’m doing enough as her mom. Am I playing with her enough? Am I feeding her enough? Am I teaching her enough? She’s not in daycare, so am I socializing her enough? She used to roll over, and now she isn’t very much, so am I giving her enough floor time or tummy time?

I recently went per diem at my job, and my husband got a second job, so I’m, for all intents and purposes, a stay at home mom now. I’ve been spending a lot of time stressing about our finances, especially because we really need to move, but with this shift, we won’t be able to anytime soon. I want to pay off some of my debt so that we can start seriously entertaining the idea of buying a house, but that’s not an option at this point, either, because of our job shift. But everyone was struggling severely during my work shifts, so it makes the most sense for our family right now. And I just have to keep telling myself that we’re doing this for our family, and it WILL get better. It won’t be like this forever, and we will move onto bigger and better things.

I just feel like we always take one step forward and 5 steps back. We were in a good living situation when Ben and I decided to have a baby. Sure, it was only one bedroom, but it was a condo, there was a lot of light, and we were pretty close to work. I really liked it, it’s my favorite place to date that we’ve lived together. It was our own space, we had laundry, there was room to easily walk the dogs, and I was looking forward to turning our dining room into Sloane’s playroom (because let’s be honest, we didn’t use the dining room, anyways, we always ate in the living room). Our currently apartment is definitely a struggle. It’s a converted basement, so the natural light is minimal. I really think that has contributed a lot to my mental health decline since moving in. The living room is TINY, and we barely spend any time in it these days, but the dogs spend all of their time in there, and I feel absolutely horrible about how little I’m able to interact with them because there isn’t really a lot of safe options for having the baby in there right now. It is two bedrooms, so Sloane has her own room, I’ll give it that (even though Sloane doesn’t use her room as a bedroom, that’s still our room). The kitchen can barely be called a kitchen, and it makes it really hard to cook balanced meals for Ben and I, and with Sloane starting solids soon, I’m worried about being able to make regular meals for her. But it’s a roof over our head, and our landlord is very understanding, so while it isn’t optimal, I am thankful we found it in a pinch. We’re making it work, I was just really looking forward to not needing it to work for this long. And it’ll be a bit longer yet. I just need to remind myself it’s a stepping stone to get where we want to be. And we’ll get there, I just need to work on my patience; that’s never been a strong trait of mine, but becoming a mom is helping a little.

So yeah, I’ve spent a better part of this morning wondering if I’m doing the right things for my daughter. I know this is what we needed right now. We needed me to be home more, and it’s not forever. I will go back to work, and we’ll move out eventually, and things will make a little more sense. But that doesn’t change the part of me that feels like I’m just giving up and taking the easy way out because things got hard. I know that’s not the case, because I know being a stay at home mom is going to be a whole new challenge on its own, and I’m going to have to face those in the coming weeks and months. But I’ll have my husband right by my side, like he has been every step of the way thus far, also making decisions and sacrifices for the long term good of our family.

At the end of the day, Sloane is fed and clean and happy. She’s actually a pretty easy going baby, unless you’re trying to get her to take a bottle or sleep on her own, and her doctor said she looks perfect. So I must be doing something right. I just need to get a little better at throwing aside my insecurities and anxieties. I don’t have to be perfect to be a good mom and wife, I just have to be present and put my best foot forward every day. And I have to remind myself that I am enough, I just need to continue to show up.