Maternity leave… two words which seemed like a good idea!
Before Reuben was born I worked VERY hard so that I can put away some money in order for me to be able to go on maternity leave.
When you work for yourself, leave = no income. So after a few months of work work work and some more work I was able to save enough money to take 2 months off.
I was very excited and looked forward to this off-time. I imagined spending time on myself, coffee with friends, catching up on some lost sleep during the day…
BWHAHAHAHA…. as if! Here I am, in the office, working again – as usual! I realised that it’s not that easy to switch off – especially if you work from home. Every morning I just quickly want to check my emails – and then I end up doing 10 other things as well.
I also realised that I would probably go crazy if I just did nothing all day! Reuben sleeps all day in any case. And if I let go of the admin and marketing etc. now, I will have a lot of catching up to do afterwards… and probably loose some new and existing clients!
So yes, I do have a newborn baby, (and I do spend a lot of love and time on him) but I also have a business, bills to pay – and a mind which I need to keep sane.
Luckily I have a SuperHusband who is also a SuperDad who can lend a helping hand during the night and morning hours when our little dude doesn’t want to sleep!
Now I only have one problem – when someone asks me whether I’m on maternity leave do I say YES or NO? Just like my dad suffers from ‘selective hearing’ – according to my mom – I suffer from “selective maternity leave”. Most of the time I would say NO, I’m not on leave, but when that phone rings and I prefer not to answer, then definitely YES!
