La Dolce Vita is Italian for 'The Good Life'. This is what I strive for every day. I strive for happiness, balance, fun and love. Here you will read about my insights and struggles and how I try to deal with life's challenges in a way that improves my life, the life of my friends and family and of my children.
Organising appropriate childcare or tactical military operation?
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I work full-time for around four out of twelve months each year. I have three children aged 8, 4 and 3, the eldest of which has severe food allergies which brought my career aspirations to a screeching halt seven years ago when he was first diagnosed. I have a list of amazingly awesome dream jobs I’ve had to say ‘no’ to so I can be close by in case he needs me, as well as look after my two little ones.
Still, each year I manage to be a career mum for around four months. Some of this is scattered throughout the year but most of it is from December to February each year when I fill in fulltime and life as we know it goes out the window.
“Usually I never see Dad and now I never see you,” my son helpfully informed me as we were racing out the door yet again.
“Well if you like to eat and get new Wii games you’ll have to deal with it from time to time darling.”
“I was just saying,” he mumbled back.
I love work. Work feeds my soul. Work makes me feel happy and productive. I’ve always known that to be a happy and successful wife and mother I needed to keep up my working life. Also, I love being a mum. Being a mum gives meaning to my life. Being a mum makes me a better worker. It’s striking a balance that is a constant struggle.
I’ve never had a conventional job. It would be great to find a fulfilling job two-three days a week during school hours but I’m a traffic reporter on radio and TV. The hours are 5am-9am and 3pm-7pm. These are the most inconvenient times to work when you’re a mum. If I work mornings they have to sleep at my sister’s house or my husband has to be home. If I work afternoons someone has to be with them for dinner.
My sister and I have it pretty well organised. I help her throughout the year and see helps me during my two month stint at the end of the year. My mum fills in any clashes we have and our husbands are called on when we need extra help but that is a last resort because it usually involves them having to leave work early.
When I’m working there are clear signs. I lose weight (no time to snack), a pile of clean unfolded laundry appears on the chair in the corner of my lounge room, there are more fish fingers than salmon steaks in my freezer, the vacuum cleaner develops its own layer of dust and my Foxtel IQ runs out of room to record my favourite shows because I’m too busy and too tired to watch them (I haven’t watched Giuliana and Bill for two weeks. Have they shown the baby episode yet? Has Ashley and JP’s wedding aired!).
When I’m not working the signs are clear too. There’s a lot of Cadbury Marvellous chocolate in the fridge, all the laundry is done, the IQ has at least 48% of its record time left and I’m wearing another pair of new sandals because I’ve been shopping.
When I meet a mum who works full-time all the time I usually want to hug her, give her a hi-five and drop by her house and do her laundry. When I meet a mum who doesn’t work full-time I usually want to offer to babysit her kids so she can get a proper haircut and buy her some chocolate.
‘It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…’ My thanks to Ernest Hemmingway for a phrase that perfectly sums up my life as a working mum. He was talking about the war but sometimes it feels just like a battle to get out the door, to remember to bring the proper combination of toys, my hair straightener, my phone…
Organising irregular childcare is like a military seals training exercise which involves written plans, alerts, reminders and multiple emails and text messages. My sister and I often do a head count, just in case. We are very paranoid. It works. Once I left my son in the car in her garage. Five quickly became six. I haven’t done that again.
As women, as mothers, we are pretty awesome and come February 4 (when I’m back to mummyville full-time) I’ll be feeling pretty proud of myself but also more than ready for a few days of whizzing around the house getting the kids ready for school, dropping them all of and then racing back home and crawling straight back into bed.
