Yesterday I attended an event that Google hosted for female entrepreneurs. I arrived expecting to meet and hear from some driven and talented women and to come away with a few different story ideas. Both those thing happened but so did something else I wasn’t expecting.
As a working parent I am continually amazed and challenged by the reality of combining work with my family. Some weeks everything goes smoothly, it is a breeze and I pat myself on the back for managing both reasonably well. Other weeks, though, that isn’t the case.
Little things can throw big spanners in the work. In recent days these little things have included my three year old contracting a double ear infection, my baby waking for the day at 4.30am for a week straight and our nanny getting sick. All these things make the work/life juggle a tiny bit harder. Actually, not a tiny bit hard, it becomes enormously difficult.
In the face of these logistical obstacles I find myself feeling overwhelmed and it is hard not to conclude that my husband and I must be doing something wrong. Surely little kids aren’t this hard for everyone, I often think to myself.
Against this backdrop, a session at yesterday’s Google forum proved to be an unexpected but welcome therapy session. After a panel discussion between business-owners Andrea Culligan-Dring, Lauren Fried and Carden Calder, hosted by Jo Burston, in which the women talked openly about the good, the bad and the ugly aspects of running a business, the audience was invited to ask questions.
One woman stood up and asked the founder of BlueChip Communications and mother of three, Carden Carter, a question that really resonated with me. “I’m running my business and I’ve got little kids, can I just ask does it get easier at any point? Tell me it gets easier because sometimes it just feels like a complete nightmare.”
Her words, the tone in her voice and the look in her eyes instantly made me feel better. As did Carden’s answer. She replied that life with small children does feel like a crisis everyday and that it does improve as the kids get older. There was laughter and sincerity in the conversation that ensued.
And it filled me with relief. Other parents find it hard to juggle work and family too; there is no magic formula that makes it simple but it is possible. It’s just a constant work-in-progress. It was a timely and valuable reminder for me that I’m not doing anything wrong. Life with little kids is unpredictable and the only thing we can do is take it a day at a time. We can have contingency plans in place and we can organise ourselves as much as possible but sometimes life will get in the way.
Unlike many of the women at Google yesterday, I don’t run my own business. But I am incredibly lucky to have an employer and a boss who recognises that the unpredictability of my home life doesn’t automatically detract from my value as an employee. Without that I really don’t know how I could do it.
How do you juggle your work and home life?