Tightrope
By Ruth Gyllenhammer
@ruthiegyll
The familiar tingle of my letdown of milk began while I was mid-interview, formulating a response to the question presented. My suit jacket lay on the chair next to me—I had no armor to hide an impending leak should one appear on my crisp ecru blouse.
My son, my first, was only ten days old. I didn’t yet know about stick-on nursing pads.
The words I was reaching for seemed to be floating in a cloud above me, but my sleep-exhausted brain couldn’t grasp hold of the right ones, much less order them into a sentence that could make sense of my experience and qualifications. The train of my thoughts skidded, halted, and finally veered off course completely. I stammered a response.
One interviewer—young, with long, styled hair and black-rimmed glasses—looked at me blankly before rolling her eyes upward and moving to the next question. The other interviewer, an older woman, had kind eyes and nodded sympathetically—a mother herself, I like to think.
***
A month or so later, I interviewed for a different position. I no longer had to wear a Bellaband to hold up my dress pants. My suit jacket buttoned neatly over a freshly dry-cleaned blouse. My mind was clear, and I addressed each of their questions with the efficiency of a mental checklist.
This is my dream job, I told my interviewers, and I meant it. They hired me, and I started work when my son was five months old.
I had finished graduate school earlier that year, and we had loans to repay. Now, we could go to the grocery store without having to check our account balance first. We could buy diapers without first returning another item in our cart. Our son had a college savings fund.
My husband and I made it work. When traveling, I would screenshot the Facetime calls with my baby. I still have those saved on my phone, the tiny rectangle of my son’s face, eyes wide-eyed at the camera, mouth close to the screen, drooling. It broke my heart to be away, but still, I thought—at least I could help support my family. At least I could apply my training.
I understood there was a trade-off to being away, but I still didn’t know if I was on the right side of it.
***
It was in a moment of bleary-eyed weakness when I made the mistake of posting a complaint slash thinly-veiled plea for sympathy on Facebook. I wrote that it seemed like my husband and my baby boy were conspiring against me to keep me from sleep—my husband with his late-night Netflix binges and then my son with his seemingly perpetual early morning feedings. They were tag-teaming against me. How was I supposed to go to work the next morning with my full mental faculties intact? Insert red face emoji. Insert crazy face emoji.
I tried to capture the full emotion of what I was feeling at the moment: the defeat of exhaustion, the simmering resentment at the imbalance of our parenthood, the desperation I felt to be understood, a desire to laugh it all off in the end.
The first comment I received was: Calm down. Family comes first.
When I read it, I recoiled. I felt it then: the searing burn of shame.
When my son was sick, I was the one to stay home with him.
The health insurance our family had through my job covered all of his well-baby pediatric visits.
I carried a hand pump in my bag, so that if I was delayed in a meeting in another building, I could pump in a bathroom stall to keep up my supply.
And yet, that comment encapsulated the pain point of my experience as a working mother. The internal conflict I felt, exposed. Those five words poked at the embers of guilt, kindling the questions that rose from the most fearful places of my heart: Is what I can give my family enough? Am I enough?
What was written: Calm down. Family comes first.
What I read: You are a bad mom.
***
I had another baby, and another one, working as close as I could to my due date, then taking off as much time as I was allowed. I was both grateful to have work to return to and grateful for the bonding time with my babies, though mostly unpaid.
Each time, I dove back into work, confident that I could execute on my boss’ vision as well as anyone. We bought a house, and on the morning we signed the closing papers, my husband was notified that he had lost his job. The timing never seemed right for me to leave, so I kept going, happy to have a steady income and good work. Happy to have what felt like the best of two worlds.
Then in late winter, we began receiving emails from human resources. Do not come to work if you are sick. Wash your hands. Maintain six feet of social distance, when possible.
Another email arrived. Work will be remote for the foreseeable future.
Another email. Schools will move to virtual learning. Please download this app.
I juggled my son’s zoom meetings then ran upstairs to take my own calls. I begged my husband, please stay home… I am so overwhelmed. But business was picking up for him. It would be crazy to turn down work while we had it.
Instead, I fed my children a steady diet of screen time, screen time, and screen time with a side of sliced apples. Yes, you may watch Paw Patrol again. Yes, here, take my iPad. I took calls in sweatshirts with my toddler on my lap. My coworker, I shrugged with a smile.
At each turn, I felt I reached the end of my rope, only to look over the precipice and see that my rope did in fact extend further into an abyss of uncertainty.
***
Nearly one year after receiving the email that we would be working remotely, I submitted my resignation notice. It was bittersweet to let go of one season in order to claim another—this new season as a homeschooling mom—but it was also time.
Several people said to me, you’ll never regret choosing to stay home with your kids. But did I regret working outside the home? Even with the challenges, my limitations, the uncertainty, my self-doubt—I had no regrets.
Over years, I learned to shift my weight against two sides: caring for my family and caring for myself, navigating guilt over time away from my kids alongside gratitude for good work, holding on to big dreams while holding little hands. On one side: sacrifice. On the other side: stewardship.
I learned that the balance you walk as a mother is a tightrope, a line of tension between two points. While some mothers seem to glide effortlessly, I knew from my line of work that many walk a tightrope more precarious than mine, with fewer safety nets and higher stakes. And yet, we have the same goal—
Head up. Eyes forward. Feel the tension.
Keep walking.
Guest essay written by Ruth Gyllenhammer. Ruth is a bookworm, interior design lover, and nonprofit director turned work-from-home mom. She lives in southern California with her husband and three boys. Connect with her on her website or through her email list where she writes about practice over perfect.
Photo by Lottie Caiella.