I dismissed warnings about being a working mother as antiquated. Then I became one
When my daughter woke up with a fever and a rattling cough, I felt an overwhelming sense of relief.
My husband was away for work and my parents were on holidays, so I looked after her on my own.
For four days, I carefully measured out cherry-flavoured paracetamol, gave her icy water to soothe her sore throat, and held her at night while she babbled through fever dreams.
When she was sleeping, I entertained my younger daughter, set up a fundraising webpage for a school fun run, baked and delivered two slices for a school cake stall, and made sure we had the makings of a costume for a daycare celebration.
In between, I paid bills, booked a doctor’s appointment, scheduled a car service, fed and walked the dog, made dinners and lunches, did the shopping and washing, and read bedtime stories.
It was the first time as a working parent that I felt the relief of doing just one job and doing it well.
Missing from that dull domestic scene was the wrenching sensation of disappointing someone. There was no boss left in the lurch, no overloaded colleagues, no sick child dropped guiltily at the school gates, no deflated preschooler without a costume, and no dwindling sick leave.
That’s because I am, to put it politely, underemployed.
About the same time my daughter was coughing up her lungs, the advisory group Parents at Work released a report showing unemployment is an attractive option for some parents. It showed a quarter of parents had considered or were intending to leave the workforce due to difficulties combining professional and family responsibilities.
Other themes included stigma around flexible work arrangements, lack of support from managers and missing out on promotions.
Over the years I’ve met a lot of parents – mostly mothers – who combine work, parenting and household responsibilities in whatever way they can. Some pay for full-time help, others work part-time, start their own businesses, seek out low-intensity jobs or quit paid work.
And it is mostly mothers who have to navigate raising children and working. Figures from the Australian Institute of Family Studies show almost 60% of fathers do not use flexible work arrangements, while 40% of mothers work part-time.
One friend returned to her corporate job after a year’s maternity leave but was quickly disillusioned and moved to the public service.
“A work colleague joked on my first day back saying, ‘You’re one of them now, only a half day,’ after I clocked an eight-hour day,” she told me. “I know he was joking and I laughed but that was the first stab to my heart.
“I constantly tried to conceal the fact I was a new mum because I knew that people didn’t have the same respect or faith in me being able to get things done.
“They say they’re flexible but I know what people say behind your back. It was never really accepted to leave work early or work from home.”
In the public sector, she said, there are women in leadership roles working flexibly, people talk openly about their family lives and part-time workers are everywhere.
“I still carry the pressure with me though. I’m constantly feeling like I’m doing a shit job at home and at work.”
Before I had children I saw what I thought were examples of thriving working mothers in the pages of weekend newspapers and magazines. There they were, respected public figures dressed in white, holding serene newborns and speaking of a transformative love and a cosy home life that dulled previous ambitions.
Pop culture still encourages us to think of motherhood as some kind of wondrous calling, not the demanding job it can be.
Those soft-focus images also hide the practical choices that need to be made in most families and often do not favour a mother. I earned less than my husband so it made sense I was the one to work part-time.
Under the government’s childcare subsidies, we were in a better financial position if we did not pay for full-time childcare. Sydney living became unaffordable and impractical, so we moved to the country where we have more family support but career prospects are narrower.
I was warned of the realities. A female university tutor and senior journalist told all the women in my secondyear class they should expect their careers to suffer if they had children. About the same time, my mum gave me a book that included Judy Brady’s 1970s essay I Want a Wife, which reads like a shopping list of expectations for mothers.
At the time I dismissed both as antiquated views but many of their warnings ring true in 2019.
In the meantime, while I update my résumé and pick up bits and pieces of flexible work, I wonder why I can’t list parenting as a job. I’ve learned so many things that could be valuable to an employer.
Parents are expert negotiators and peacekeepers. We have perfected deadlines and time management. We can deal with the unpredictable. We remember times, dates and preferences. We constantly deal with difficult personalities and stroke egos. We can operate under torturous conditions. We keep people alive. And we can’t quit.
But for as long as parents – usually mothers – are undervalued or sidelined in the workplace, the only person disappointed is the one left holding the baby.
Stephanie Gardiner is a journalist based in country New South Wales