To all my stay-at-home mum friends: I am sorry, I was WRONG!
Being a stay-at-home mother is the toughest job in the world and I salute all those mums out there who do this job day in and day out!
Motherhood changes everything overnight. Yes, it does. You suddenly become a mature individual who has this little life that depends on you for everything! And if you’re all alone in this journey (should I call it a battle?) it becomes all the more tough for you. And, if you happen to be a stay-at-home mother at this time, let me tell you honestly, you’re gone!
Yes, I can vouch for the last one because I went through it all. When I had a baby I wanted to experience everything and going to work meant missing all the important milestones of my baby that we mothers live for! They are the rewards for our hard work, late nights, dedication, the stress, the pain, and all the postpartum blues that we face.
So here I was all alone with my six-month-old baby, ready to take on this new challenge called motherhood. I thought come on yaar this would be a piece of cake... aakhir karna hee kya hai... Ghar pe hee toh rehna hai din bhar and just take care of the baby. It won't be that difficult, I thought to myself. But I was wrong and how!
Being a stay-at-home mum is not an easy job and here are a few things that I learned in those three years of my life:
1.You get no break: When you're working and leave your child in the daycare or to your parents or nanny, you're away from your child for some time, which means you can have your lunch in peace and take a couple of tea breaks. This is unfortunately not the case when you're a stay-at-home mother and if you're all alone, God be with you, my dear.
2.You get no support from the outside world: There are no excuses if you want to say no to visitors (read pesky relatives) who come visiting you, even though they know that you're handling a baby and taking care of the household on your own. You have to entertain them, despite attending to a baby 24X7. And believe you me, you'd get no help from the other side.
3.You have to be up on your feet, in sickness, and in health: During and after pregnancy you will get a lot of unwanted advice but when it comes to taking care of the baby no one will dare come forward. "Arey mere paas toh rehta hee nahee hai. main nahee sambhal paaoongee," would be the most common excuse.
The people who were after your life to have a baby would be nowhere to be seen when you need them the most. And if you're too unlucky, your husband would be one of them.
In sickness and in health, in rain or in the sunshine, a stay-at-home mum has no escape and no rest. And mind you, no fixed hours too! You have to be in attention all the time, even if it means that you put your health and peace of mind at stake.
4. You're under stress 24X7: At work, you laugh about other things, share thoughts with your colleagues and discuss other matters of interest (and not those that just concern your baby!) with your friends and this in itself is enough to ease all your stress and worries. A stay-at-home mother is constantly with the baby and has no time for others things, which means that the stress keeps building up, over and over again.
5. It's a thankless job: You're with your baby the whole day- feeding him, changing his diapers rocking him to sleep... so on and so forth and the moment he sees your dad, the baby just goes crazy and jumps at him. Doesn't it happen with all of us?
And then you have a husband who would once in every two to three weeks would say," Arey yaar saara din kya kartee ho?"
In the end of it all, I wanted to be free and back to work. I couldn't take it anymore. I needed my space and my "me time". Being a stay-at-home mother is the toughest job in the world and I salute all those mums out there who do this job day in and day out!
Also Read: Being a stay-at-home mother is a thankless job: Shilpa Shetty Kundra
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