Career Change

Domestic Goddess/Program Director: Able to work under high stress with little to no sleep and eating times will be a chore. Able to multitask on a perpetual basis and complaining will not be tolerated, if you feel like complaining count your blessings then shut up. Weak and high maintenance people need not apply.

It dawned on me as I woke on Friday with excitement because it was Friday that this custom will have to temporarily die for me. My husband will be traveling frequently on business in his new job and that means that from time to time I am a “single” mother. Where we moved to I have no friends as of yet and so I don’t trust any one with my most precious Joshua. Sadly, this means for me that my down time consists of his naps, which occur less frequently.
With this revelation dancing in my head I rose out of bed to retrieve Joshua from his, he had decided it was breakfast time. I realized that I was dizzy, ugh, not vertigo. I’ve gotten bouts so bad in the past that I couldn’t go to work, I always hated calling in sick! Then I burst out laughing, there are no sick days in my new job either. Joshua always needs me no matter if I am dizzy or if I feel that I need a break. He needs me to love him 100% - 100% of the time that he needs me. It was at this point it hit me, working outside the home is easier! All this time I was thinking I was getting off easy not working in my old job. I thought I was shaming, as I took Joshua to the changing table to get ready for the day because his breakfast was over I wiped the sleep from my eyes, no more of that today. He looked up at me and smiled and I realized that weekends will still happen when Mark is home. I can have a bit of a break while he plays with the kids. It dawned on me that Mark would also be able to help if I got crazy sick, those benefits mean nothing. That smile I get to get a hundred times a day because I am home with him. I see the first time he coos a new sound, or learns he can do other things other than cry to get attention. I’ve gotten to witness his scoot morph into a crawl and I wouldn’t trade these and the many more I will get for all the sleep or sick days or “weekends” in the world.
People see me now who don’t know me and think,
“Oh, boring homemaker, we’ll have nothing to talk about but kids and who wants that.” I’m not used to this response and the automatic dumbing down of conversations, if they only took the time to get to know this homemaker they would find their assumptions are wrong. Making friends has turned out to be the single hardest thing about this career change and move. I marveled at the fact that I had seen this before! I’ve always loved homemakers because I wanted to be one. As a Marine I got the privilege to meet many homemakers and found them each fascinating in their own right! But I had seen others respond to these homemakers with the same blank eyes and dumbed down conversations. How little the society outside of Homemakers actually knows about Homemaking!
This fact further manifested itself in that when I was changing my career I had other working mothers say to me,
“You’ll get bored, I did! Couldn’t do it due to boredom!” I looked at them with shock, how? But because I hadn’t been a homemaker before I said,
“Oh, well, I hope not. I’ve wanted to be a homemaker since I was 14 but we’ll see.” I had resented the idea of homemaker for some years when I thought I couldn’t trust the husband. But God gave me Mark and I trusted him explicitly! So I was getting to be the career I always wanted with the exception of a few years. My hatred at being a woman during that time ran deep. I read 1 Timothy 2:15 and snarled,
“Nevertheless she will be saved in childbearing if they continue in faith, love, and holiness, with self-control.” What does that mean? I am saved because of Jesus and am smarter than at least half the men-teachers this Paul is so proud of!” My flesh roared at that verse, how could I fulfill what seemed to be my calling when I wanted so much that my calling would be something else, to be a teacher! What does that mean? So when my career change occurred I knew I would have to deal with this verse again. I went back to it and reread it, I prayed that the Lord would help me understand it. I read the blue letter bible Chuck Smith commentary on it and was gob smacked! The saving Paul was referring to was not dying during childbirth! Why hadn’t I thought of that? My career now is the most important one I’ve ever had!? I was to teach my son and any subsequent children God blesses us with about Him. I was to be the helpmate of my husband! Why had I longed for a different calling? For something better?! I started to realize that I still listen to the secular worlds version of the meaning of texts in the Bible and I was going to delve into this thought more deeply later, stay tuned for that. . . .