I haven't written here since June.
That wasn't intentional.
There was no planned summer hiatus. No strategic break. No cute little gone fishing sign while I stepped away to recharge.
I was just really tired.
I was trying to manage two kids, a house, a marriage, myself, and the approximately 700 invisible tasks required to keep all of those things functioning. Something had to give.
Somewhere along the way, Basically Coping had become one more thing I wasn't keeping up with. One more thing I wanted to do but couldn't quite find the time, energy or brain space for.
So I stopped. Then, completely unexpectedly, we got a daycare spot for my baby.
Except, increasingly, not really my baby anymore.
He's my little big guy now. A toddler with opinions and places to be and absolutely no concern for whether his mother is emotionally prepared for any of it. I had expected daycare to happen eventually. We'd been sitting on waitlists forever. I had mostly resigned myself to another year at home, piecing together bits of childcare and trying to carve a life out of nap times and evenings.
Then an email arrived. There was a spot. We toured. We said yes.
And suddenly, I have time.
I have time.
Do you understand how fucking weird that feels?
For almost two years, my days have been dictated by someone else's needs. Breakfast. Snack. Milk. Diapers. Nap. Snack again. School pickup. Dinner. Bedtime. Somewhere in there, laundry and groceries and appointments and whatever else needed doing.
Even when I technically had free time, it wasn't really mine. There was always a clock running in the background.
Someone would wake up. Someone would need to eat. Someone would need me.
And now I can drop my youngest off at daycare and leave.
The first time I did it, I braced myself. I don't know exactly what I expected. Maybe some hesitation. A little clinginess. At minimum, a dramatic glance over his shoulder so I could feel appropriately important.
Nope.
He walked in happily, waited impatiently for them to open the gate to his room, and went to play.
Okay then… Glad we had this time together, sir.
I picked him up before nap because we're easing both of us into this, and he was fine. And I was fine.
More than fine, actually.
I liked it. That's the part I think we're sometimes afraid to admit.
I liked being without my child. I liked driving away knowing he was safe and entertained and being fed by someone who wasn't me. I liked coming home without him. I liked being able to finish a thought. I liked not being responsible for another human being every single second.
I LOVED going to the bathroom alone, without someone terrorizing me from the other side of the door. IYKYK.
I didn't spend the entire time staring mournfully at baby pictures or wondering what he was doing. I enjoyed the freedom. And then he came home and for the rest of the evening, he was basically attached to my body.
My independent little daycare man, who hadn't bothered to look back when I left him, apparently needed to spend the evening confirming that I still existed.
And that got me. Because although he seemed very ready to leave me, he also still needed me.
I've wanted time to work. To write. To exercise. To clean a room without someone immediately undoing it. To drink a coffee while it's still hot. To figure out what I might want professionally after spending so long thinking primarily about what everyone else needs.
I've complained and cried about not having that space. I was desperate for it. And now that someone has handed some of it back to me, I'm a little terrified. Because when you don't have time, time itself is a convenient excuse.
I can't write because my kids are home. I can't figure out work because I don't have childcare. I can't tackle that project because nap time is almost over.
There's always a very legitimate reason not to ask yourself the bigger question:
What do I actually want to do?
Now I have to answer it. That's exciting. It's also terrifying. Because this isn't just about daycare, it's the first little crack in a life I've been completely submerged in for years.
My children still need me enormously. My house will continue generating laundry at a rate that suggests several undocumented people live here. School pickup still comes every afternoon. Someone will inevitably get sick approximately six minutes after I establish any kind of routine.
I'm not suddenly free of motherhood.I just have a little room inside it again.
Room to write. Room to work. Room to think. Room to miss my kid.
Maybe even room to figure out who I've become while I was so busy keeping everybody else alive.
Talk soon,
Tara
CEO of Chaos & Co.