When I went back to work after having my son, I'd never been more depressed in my life, and I was worried I was headed to a dangerous place. I'd been participating in a postpartum depression study at New York University hospital, and six months in doctors were surprised to see a marked shift in my responses. Going back to work meant turning this little baby over to someone else for 9 hours a day and I wasn't leaving the house.
I loved being a writer and I was grateful for the money I was making, and it was enough to leave me with no obvious answer to whether I should keep working or not. But, each week my paycheck seemed less significant because now I had to subtract the cost of childcare. Before we get to the story, here’s a quick welcome to Mildy Maternal: Diary of a Work In Progress Mom, a weekly check in on how life is going as a new mom who wasn't sure she wanted to be a mom until she was told she couldn't get pregnant.
If you’re not already following me on TikTok, Instagram, or Facebook, here’s a brief introduction. I’m a 34-year-old woman living in New York City with a 14-month-old and I am making my own rules for being a mom because I know nothing. As in, I never even held a baby before having a baby of my own (I know, I think my parenting scares my mom sometimes).
I've also been a professional writer for about a decade and have been working at Newsweek for 8 years. Newsweek is so engrained into who I am as a person that it was in my dad's speech at my wedding. If you asked me in 2023, "are you ever going to want to stop working?" I would have laughed in your face because of course not.
And being a mom didn't completely change that. I still don't want to stop working. If I'm honest, I'm not sure I'd be happy being a full-time stay-at-home mom.
But two months after I came back from maternity leave, I came really close to quitting my job. Like drafted multiple emails close... If you want to read the full-length version of this article plus more from Jenni Fink, subscribe to The Good Life newsletter here.
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