Dear Work At Home Moms: You Are More Than Enough

This blog post is difficult for me to write because it’s raw & honest & forces me to be transparent & to admit to feeling inadequate, but I think it’s important to write it. We moms need to stick together, to build one another up, to share our feelings instead of bottling them up, and to know that others struggle, too. As of February 24, 2015, my life changed drastically. My little girl was born that day & since then nothing has been the same.

A lot of you know, but some stumbling onto this blog may not so I’ll give a little background info. My husband and I own a photography business. We mainly photograph weddings, but we also photograph high school seniors & families occasionally. Some of our work takes us away from our home (the weddings & photo sessions), but most of our work is done from our home office. I do marketing, blogging, emailing, & many other business tasks from the office just a few steps down the hallway from our bedroom. We also meet clients in our client meeting space, which is in our home. To say that our home life & our business life overlap a bit would be like saying Olivia Pope kind of likes wine.

Sometimes you’ll find me nursing Tenley & gazing down at her soft little face, smooth baby skin, and beautiful long eyelashes. Sometimes you’ll find me laughing & playing with Tenley or reading her one of her favorite books that she likes to chew. (Don’t judge- she’s only six months old). I’m fully engaged with her & not at all distracted by anything else. Sometimes I feel like a great mom.

But sometimes I don’t. Sometimes you’ll find me nursing Tenley, holding her with one hand and typing a blog post or replying to an email with the other hand. Sometimes you’ll find me playing with Tenley, but thinking in the back of my mind about the list of blogs I want to type up or the Instagram photo I want to get posted or the wedding albums I want to design. At those times, I don’t feel like a good mom. I also don’t feel like a good business person.

Why do I torture myself thus? I’m not sure. I suppose it’s my Type A personality. The “I can do it all” mentality that I’ve always ascribed to. The hustle. The desire to be the best I can be. Always. At everything.

But are those thoughts or those ideas helping me to be a better mom or a better business person? I really don’t think they are.

When I feel unproductive in relation to the business after a day spent mostly with Tenley, what am I saying to myself? Am I really saying that raising my daughter is unimportant? That I’ve been unproductive after having fed, clothed, danced with, changed, cleaned, laughed with, read to, bathed, laundered, combed, lotioned, talked to, and cuddled my fleetingly growing and changing and developing little human? Those thoughts of always having to do more & be more & accomplish more- they’re stifling & they subtract from the incredibly important work that I’m doing- the MOST important work that I’m doing- which is raising Tenley.

When I feel unproductive or inadequate, I know that I need to check my attitude, to calm down, to take a step back, and to reflect on what (WHO, really) is the most important in my life.

Of course, our clients are very important. Their wedding days are so significant to us & we pour our hearts into them. My productivity related to our clients hasn’t lessened since having Tenley. If anything, those aspects of the business related to serving our wedding clients have increased. But what I often beat myself up over are the extras that I’m not doing as consistently as I did before I had a baby (the little things like getting weddings published in blogs or writing blogs five days per week to keep our SEO strong).

What I’d love to give myself permission to let go of is the perfectionism, the feelings of inadequacy for not keeping up with the pace I had going before being a mom, and the feeling that I’m not productive after I’ve honestly accomplished much more in a day than I ever did before having a daughter (the accomplishments simply look a bit different now & aren’t as quantifiable).

I rationally know these things. I realize that I do A LOT & juggle a lot of responsibility. But I allow those feelings of inadequacy & sadness to creep in nonetheless. So I would like to put this out there for myself & for other Work At Home Moms- you are enough. You’re doing your very best. You are exactly what your child needs. Keep being the best mom you can & the best business person you can. Those two can exist together, but your daily routine may look a bit different now. Though it may look different now that you are a mother, your worth hasn’t changed; in fact, you’re worth so much more to your family than you could know. Keep your head up & know that you’re doing great. Cut yourself a break every now & then. You’re enough. You’re enough. You’re enough.

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