Frustrated

I never wanted to be a stay at home mom. I love my job. But it is getting harder and harder to leave Ellie. She is just so much fun (OK not all the time, but you know what I mean). And she is changing so quickly. This morning on the phone she said “hi” to Erin. I had to ask her to do it, but still. She is still doing a lot of whining and grunting for her needs and wants but she is also beginning to be able to communicate as well. Yesterday morning I swear she walked into the kitchen, stood by the refrigerator and plain as day, said “Eat” (or as she says, “Eee.”) One of the ladies at daycare said she asked Ellie “are you pretty?” and Ellie nodded yes. I think she gets that you are asking a question from the inflection in your voice.

When I'm at work, I often feel guilty, that I should be home with her and witnessing her every milestone. Helping to be a positive influence on her personality and temperament. Instilling her with all my vast knowledge (ha) rather than paying someone else half my paycheck to do so.

And yesterday when I was at daycare I saw Ellie push another baby. They were standing at the baby gate waiting for food and she just reached out and pushed this little girl. Now I’ve seen this girl push other kids (including Ellie) a lot. She’s pretty aggressive, so she probably had it coming to her. But it made me think about studies I’ve read about kids in daycare being more likely to hit, to pick up on bad behaviors. Ugh. Leo started in daycare when he was 17 months old and from what I can tell, it never had anything but a positive affect on him. But maybe Ellie will be different. She’s such a sweetheart now. I don’t want her hitting. Another ugh.

I know staying home is not all sunshine and smiles and long naps and days filled with enrichment and education. Staying home is the hardest job there is, in my opinion. Frankly I don’t think I have the mental health for it. I do so much better out in the world. I know you can’t have it all, that staying home has its advantages as does working (I won’t even go into the fact that staying home is not a financially viable option for our family anyway).

And of course I have guilt about Leo. I don’t worry about him at all when he’s at his preschool, the “special” school where it’s 95 percent kids with Down syndrome (and 5 percent something with some other cognitive issue). The daycare is great but I know they let Leo get away with things (even though I have told them repeatedly not to and to treat him like all the others). I know it’s important that he gets free play time there (which every four-year-old needs) but I worry that he just gets lost there, left to do his own thing (which very often may be playing with something inappropriately or just doing something he shouldn’t be doing). Yesterday the school had a Tae Kwon Do instructor come in to teach a class to the preschool kids. I had to sign a permission slip and pay $12 and I knew going into it that Leo was probably not going to participate like the other kids. And sure enough, when I spoke to his teacher this morning, she confirmed my suspicions:

“He did a couple of kicks but mostly he just ran around. He had a lot of fun though.”

Fabulous! Maybe I need to lighten up a bit but I guess I just wasn’t thrilled that Leo was allowed to run around while the rest of his peers participated in an organized activity. Who knows what really happened. I wasn’t there and maybe it wasn’t as bad as it sounded. I know I can’t be there every second and even if I was, who is to say I would do a better job? What do I know? When we’re home it’s not exactly all education all the time. I feel like I spend half my time yelling at Leo to stop pushing his sister down.

But I’m still frustrated. But I guess, who isn't?

Edited to add that I'm about to spend nine straight days with my kids, including two cross country flights as we embark on our annual trip to Oregon to see the family. I'm sure I'll be posting here in about nine days about how great it is to be back at work! Life is funny.