Five Reasons To Feel Empowered As A Working Mum

When I first went back to work after having twelve months off on maternity leave with my daughter, I felt so much guilt about becoming a full-time working mum.

If I’m honest, the guilt was intoxicating.

I felt very judged about my decision and I had plenty of people give me their two cents worth about why I should stay at home longer, and I was told on several occasions that I was being selfish for wanting to keep pursuing my career. Some women even insisted that I make more financial sacrifices and guilted me into thinking that I was making a huge mistake. So many of these comments compounded the guilt I already felt about returning to work, and it took several months for me to feel completely comfortable about the choice I made to begin my journey of balancing motherhood and a career.

Now, there’s absolutely no denying that navigating motherhood and balancing a career is easy. I don't think you'll find a parent out there who has found the magic formula and can testify that they're nailing it. Most working mothers, like me, are constantly performing a sea-saw balancing act of preparing lunches, doing day-care drop-offs, & answering emails at 11pm. Then, there’s always the underlying feeling of #mumguilt to top it all off. Yes, it's a hard grind at times, but there are countless benefits and reasons why balancing it all can also be a wonderfully rewarding experience too.

In my role as a Digital Recruiter, I get to meet with extremely talented people every day and a large portion of these people are clever women and working mothers who share the same sentiments as me about juggling shiny careers and motherhood. Just recently, I’ve deep dived into some conversations with working pregnant women in the digital space who feel so conflicted about what they’ll do about going back to work, how long they’ll have off, if they can still have a career and be a good mum, and how on earth they’ll manage balancing their lives.

I strongly believe that there are so many reasons why women should feel empowered to continue on their career trajectory after having a baby, and I feel that it’s my duty to wave the flag out there in the market and be a positive ambassador for working mothers.

Here are my 'Top Five' reasons why I feel that women should feel complete confidence and assurance to pursue the careers that they’ve worked so hard for, and to be the very best mum’s they can be; simultaneously!

You Don’t Lose Your Career Currency

Spending several years at University and making a significant financial investment into a tertiary education, then working your way up the ladder in one way or another means that you’re heavily embedded into your career and coming back (in any capacity) means you get the opportunity to increase your knowledge, value, and of course your salary. Coming back to work also means that you can keep your skills current and you get an opportunity to take your mum hat off and you revisit part of your old self again; the one (B.C) before kids.

The Kids Are Always Fine, Trust Me

When you do the first daycare drop off, you probably won’t agree with this statement, but they are truly fine. The transition can be a little difficult at the start, but sending them to daycare allows them to have an opportunity to learn & experience new things, and it also prepares them for their trajectory into school. The staff that works in either family day care or larger day care centres are also trained to identify any challenges your little ones may face in terms of their cognitive and language development, plus the social skills it can provide children is priceless.

Working Mum’s Are Better Equipped At Ignoring The “Parenting Police!”

Every parent is concerned about how much time and attention they should be giving their kids, and from personal experience, you are often subject to incessant pressure from the “Parenting Police” who can often come subtly disguised as well-meaning relatives.

Once a mother returns to work, generally speaking, they become so time poor and don't have the time or energy to worry about what's happening outside of their own little family unit. You learn the art of not sweating the small stuff, so other people's opinions of how you're running your family life become completely irrelevant.

You Become An Inspiration For Your Children

From my very own observations, I've noticed that a proportionate amount of women in particular whose mothers worked outside of the home are in fact more likely to have jobs themselves, are more likely to hold supervisory responsibility at those jobs, and also earn higher wages than women whose mothers stayed at home full time. This observation may not ring true for you, but I've come to realise that it doesn't matter whether your mother was a high flying professional or not, but rather whether you have had a role model who actively demonstrated to you that women work both inside and outside the home.

Girl Power In The Workforce

You know what makes it easier for working mum's to stay in the workforce? Other amazing women in higher positions. By being a working mum, you’re adding one more great female to the workforce that has empathy and an innate understanding towards the obstacles women face as they balance career and motherhood.

Cheers in coffee & content.

_____________________

Who Am I?

I’m a Human Resources & Recruitment professional working at 'affix' in Brisbane and I've been operating/recruiting in the Marketing space since around 2010. Aside from that, I’m a wife, a Mumma, and an aficionado of Latte Ristretto’s and 90’s Hip Hop.