My children are mostly grown up now, but I can still remember the tension I felt when I had to work on Chol Hamoed and my children had school vacation, or the times when my son cried bitterly when I dropped him off at the daycare center. All day I was torn between doing my job and worrying about the kids. Most working mothers can identify with this stress. Often we think, am I doing the right thing or the wrong thing for my family by going to work? What can I do differently so that we can all benefit?
Since many young women work today, I decided to explore some of the choices they make about their working lives. Why do women work? How do they maintain a balance between their home and work lives? Why do some women chose not to work? How does family support help? What impact does working have on the children?
As I spoke to a number of women with young children and tried to learn about the decisions they made, I started with the assumption that there can be more than one “correct” choice. I’m not making a judgment about what is right and what is wrong, because each family and each situation is different. Good mothering can happen in many different ways. (For our purposes, we will describe a good mother as a woman who is able to be there for her children and meet their emotional and physical needs.)
Why Work?
Most women work for financial reasons. Although families in previous generations were often able to manage on one income, many families today need two incomes to stay solvent, either to maintain a certain standard of living, to pay tuition, or because the husband is learning in kollel, which may shift the burden of parnassa to the wife.
But women work for other reasons, too. Many women find it hard to be home all day surrounded by small children and without adult company. They crave the stimulation of a job. Hadassah,* a nurse in the ICU, explains, “I love my job. It’s stimulating, challenging, and allows for critical thinking. Although initially I trained to be a nurse in order to help while my husband went to graduate school, I find it very satisfying.”
Rochel,* a title manager, agrees, “I don’t think I would do well being home all day. I find being home on Sunday is enough for me. I’m a better mother when I’m home, because I’m out of the house for part of the day.”
Sora Wolman, the U.S. Operations Manager for Wooky Entertainment, Inc., says, “I’m the kind of person who likes to be firing on all cylinders. I think my children benefit from having a mother who is energized by the way she spends her day. I make sure that the time I spend with my children is quality time, even though we don’t have so much quantity time.”
One side benefit when a mother works is the pride her children often feel in her vocation. As Ricki,* a mother who works for a large chesed organization, says, “Even though my children complain that I am not always available to them, they take great pride in the fact that I work for such an important organization.”
Laurie,* a doctor, agrees, “My children learn from the fact that I am always involved in chesed and are proud that I have such an important job.”
Another side benefit is the space and breathing room that is a natural effect of a mother having other interests besides her family. Working may prevent her from being obsessive about her children, and help her maintain a more balanced perspective.
Maintaining a Balance
In order for her children to be happy, however, a working woman must make sure that the time she spends at work isn’t at the expense of her family. Taking into account the woman’s personality, her profession, and how many hours she puts into her job, she may have to reevaluate at certain points to be sure her decision to work is still a wise one.
Miriam* worked as a graphic designer for many years but chose to quit in favor of staying home once her family grew older. “Even though my boss was very accommodating and bent over backwards to allow me to continue working, the job just didn’t fit into my life,” she says. “When I turned off my computer to go home, I would be worrying about my project. I got phone calls at home, and it would be on my mind all day. Creative juices cannot be turned on and off at will. Just because I was sitting at work in front of my computer didn’t mean that the idea would come on command. With my personality, being a graphic designer didn’t fit well with being a mother.”
Tova,* a public accountant for many years, with children ranging in age from 3 to 12, says, “I wouldn’t recommend this field to young women. Public accounting is very deadline driven. Even if you’re lucky enough to find part-time work, it’s very hard to meet all the deadlines and still be on time for carpool. The deadlines always seem to coincide with Yomim Tovim, when the kids are off from school. The big tax filing deadline of April 15 always comes out during Pesach vacation, and Rosh Hashanah and Succos is the time when returns that are on extension are due.”
Other women are thrilled with their professions, which offer the flexibility they need. Miriam Singal, a doctor of audiology, describes audiology as her profession, not her career. “My career is my family, but audiology is a great field for me and fits in very well with family life. I started my own practice, because I can make my own schedule. I can take off Erev Yom Tov and Chol Hamoed and plan my schedule around days off from school. I work during my set hours, and I’m home the rest of the time.”
Nechama,* an occupational therapist who lives in Eretz Yisrael, is also able to fit her schedule around her children’s. She says, “Right now I’m working three days a week, every day in a different place, all near my house. The work is never boring, and involves thought and knowledge and not only action. Because there is a high demand, the pay per hour is good compared to teaching professions, so I can work less days and still get a salary that is enough to support my family.”
Staying at Home
For some women, the pressures of working while raising a family aren’t worth the stress involved. They’d rather stay home, even if it involves some financial sacrifice, to provide their children with higher quality care, without the distractions and stress of working out of the home.
“I’m available to get the children out to school calmly,” says Yocheved,* a stay-at-home mother of three. “I can have their supper on the table when they come home from school, and I can take care of the baby myself. Staying home makes for a calm, energized mother, which can only benefit the children.”
Leah,* a stay-at-home mother of four, agrees. “There’s just no comparison between my mothering now and when I was working. Things that were such big issues before are just fine now. If somebody is sick, it’s no problem. If somebody has an appointment, it’s no problem. If a child doesn’t want to go to school first thing in the morning, I can bring him a little later. It’s worth every penny that I’m not earning to stay home.”
Many stay-at-home mothers feel that no one else will give the kind of attention that a mother will give. “Although a babysitter may take very good care of the children,” says Tova,* “there are some things that only a mother will do. For example, my four-year-old daughter won’t eat unless I feed her while reading her a story. A babysitter wouldn’t sit with her while she eats and make sure that she gets the nutrition.”
Support
A woman who is working and raising a family needs the support of her family in order to keep things running smoothly. In today’s culture, we often see young husbands taking a big part in the upkeep of the household. A husband doesn’t say that he is babysitting when he is watching the children; he is an equal partner with his wife in all the childcare.
Mindy,* a special educator, explains, “I could never work full time in the school system without the support of my husband. I have to leave early in the morning, so my husband is in charge of getting the children ready for school, and he is also the one picking up from playgroup when he comes home from kollel.”
Chaya Feldman, a labor and delivery nurse, says, “I could never do this without the help of my mother-in-law. She picks up my three-year-old from playgroup at 1:30 on the days I work, and watches her until she wakes up at around four.”
Impact on the Children
In addition to finding support, mothers who choose to go to work look for solutions to lessen the difficulties involved so that their children don’t lose out.
Chaya Feldman chooses to work the night shift, because it gives her more time to be with her family. “If I worked 12-hour shifts during the daytime,” she says, “I wouldn’t be able to see the children at all on those days. This way I can see them in the morning when I come home from work and in the evening before I go to work.”
Rivky Leichter, also a nurse, has worked night shift for almost six years. “I don’t think my children are negatively affected by my work. They’re used to me being tired most of the time and are so excited when I’m participating in their activities, whether at home or at school. My husband, on the other hand, has it really hard. He has to run the house and organize play dates while I’m at work or sleeping. That is why we make a point of going on a long family vacation every summer. We focus on making up for the lack of ‘family time’ during the year.”
For some women, the hardest part of working is leaving a small infant. Chani,* a resource room teacher with many years’ experience, explains, “Leaving a long-awaited infant is very difficult. I am currently extending my maternity leave, because I want to be with him all the time.” Pia,* a computer programmer, has arranged for her mother to babysit until her children turn a year old.
For others, however, leaving a baby isn’t an issue. Paula*, an entrepreneur, doesn’t even take maternity leave. For the first two months, she takes her babies with her to work, and after that they go to a babysitter. “I actually continued working in the delivery room, after I’d had an epidural!” she laughs. Naomi,* a health professional, says, “People ask how I can leave my little baby to work full time, but the baby doesn’t know the difference. It’s the older children who are more difficult to leave.”
Nechama, the OT in Israel, says, “It’s not fun for my kids that I’m very tired the days I work, but I don’t know if I would be less tired if I were at home all day. My children love coming to my work – I have permission to bring them in the afternoon sometimes – and telling their friends about it. And the days that I work, they often have a special arts and crafts project to do while I rest, so it isn’t that bad.”
Rochel* feels that her children benefit from going to playgroup while she’s working. “I pay a lot of attention to the caregivers I choose,” she says, “and I am very happy with them. My three-year-old has such an excellent morah that he really benefits from spending time with her every day.”
Ricki* says, “I work in the morning when my children are in school, and it’s fine for them. But I wouldn’t want to be out of the house in the afternoon, when they’re home. Even if I do nothing but sit on the couch, I’m still their mother and my presence is very important. Even though my family would benefit financially if I worked longer hours, I won’t do that.”
One of the most stressful parts of being a working mother is dealing with the children’s inevitable sickness. As Miriam, the former graphic designer, says, “The more children you have, the more chance that someone will have a fever or an upset stomach. At some point it just becomes too much to balance the needs of the children with the needs of the job.” Peri,* a physical therapist, agrees. “When one of my children gets sick, it becomes a crisis. I have no time for compassion, because I immediately start thinking, what am I going to do now?”
Women make all kinds of choices. Should they stay at home or work outside the home? Should they work part time or full time? What is the best choice for themselves, their spouses, and their children? As I wrote above, there is no right or wrong answer here. It’s not black and white but many shades of those colors. As Sora Wolman says, “I go with my gut. If it feels right for me and my family, I don’t look over my shoulder to see what everybody else is doing.”
Balancing the Motherhood Equation
by Devora Schor
My children are mostly grown up now, but I can still remember the tension I felt when I had to work on Chol Hamoed and my children had school vacation, or the times when my son cried bitterly when I dropped him off at the daycare center. All day I was torn between doing my job and worrying about the kids. Most working mothers can identify with this stress. Often we think, am I doing the right thing or the wrong thing for my family by going to work? What can I do differently so that we can all benefit?
Since many young women work today, I decided to explore some of the choices they make about their working lives. Why do women work? How do they maintain a balance between their home and work lives? Why do some women chose not to work? How does family support help? What impact does working have on the children?
As I spoke to a number of women with young children and tried to learn about the decisions they made, I started with the assumption that there can be more than one “correct” choice. I’m not making a judgment about what is right and what is wrong, because each family and each situation is different. Good mothering can happen in many different ways. (For our purposes, we will describe a good mother as a woman who is able to be there for her children and meet their emotional and physical needs.)
Why Work?
Most women work for financial reasons. Although families in previous generations were often able to manage on one income, many families today need two incomes to stay solvent, either to maintain a certain standard of living, to pay tuition, or because the husband is learning in kollel, which may shift the burden of parnassa to the wife.
But women work for other reasons, too. Many women find it hard to be home all day surrounded by small children and without adult company. They crave the stimulation of a job. Hadassah,* a nurse in the ICU, explains, “I love my job. It’s stimulating, challenging, and allows for critical thinking. Although initially I trained to be a nurse in order to help while my husband went to graduate school, I find it very satisfying.”
Rochel,* a title manager, agrees, “I don’t think I would do well being home all day. I find being home on Sunday is enough for me. I’m a better mother when I’m home, because I’m out of the house for part of the day.”
Sora Wolman, the U.S. Operations Manager for Wooky Entertainment, Inc., says, “I’m the kind of person who likes to be firing on all cylinders. I think my children benefit from having a mother who is energized by the way she spends her day. I make sure that the time I spend with my children is quality time, even though we don’t have so much quantity time.”
One side benefit when a mother works is the pride her children often feel in her vocation. As Ricki,* a mother who works for a large chesed organization, says, “Even though my children complain that I am not always available to them, they take great pride in the fact that I work for such an important organization.”
Laurie,* a doctor, agrees, “My children learn from the fact that I am always involved in chesed and are proud that I have such an important job.”
Another side benefit is the space and breathing room that is a natural effect of a mother having other interests besides her family. Working may prevent her from being obsessive about her children, and help her maintain a more balanced perspective.
Maintaining a Balance
In order for her children to be happy, however, a working woman must make sure that the time she spends at work isn’t at the expense of her family. Taking into account the woman’s personality, her profession, and how many hours she puts into her job, she may have to reevaluate at certain points to be sure her decision to work is still a wise one.
Miriam* worked as a graphic designer for many years but chose to quit in favor of staying home once her family grew older. “Even though my boss was very accommodating and bent over backwards to allow me to continue working, the job just didn’t fit into my life,” she says. “When I turned off my computer to go home, I would be worrying about my project. I got phone calls at home, and it would be on my mind all day. Creative juices cannot be turned on and off at will. Just because I was sitting at work in front of my computer didn’t mean that the idea would come on command. With my personality, being a graphic designer didn’t fit well with being a mother.”
Tova,* a public accountant for many years, with children ranging in age from 3 to 12, says, “I wouldn’t recommend this field to young women. Public accounting is very deadline driven. Even if you’re lucky enough to find part-time work, it’s very hard to meet all the deadlines and still be on time for carpool. The deadlines always seem to coincide with Yomim Tovim, when the kids are off from school. The big tax filing deadline of April 15 always comes out during Pesach vacation, and Rosh Hashanah and Succos is the time when returns that are on extension are due.”
Other women are thrilled with their professions, which offer the flexibility they need. Miriam Singal, a doctor of audiology, describes audiology as her profession, not her career. “My career is my family, but audiology is a great field for me and fits in very well with family life. I started my own practice, because I can make my own schedule. I can take off Erev Yom Tov and Chol Hamoed and plan my schedule around days off from school. I work during my set hours, and I’m home the rest of the time.”
Nechama,* an occupational therapist who lives in Eretz Yisrael, is also able to fit her schedule around her children’s. She says, “Right now I’m working three days a week, every day in a different place, all near my house. The work is never boring, and involves thought and knowledge and not only action. Because there is a high demand, the pay per hour is good compared to teaching professions, so I can work less days and still get a salary that is enough to support my family.”
Staying at Home
For some women, the pressures of working while raising a family aren’t worth the stress involved. They’d rather stay home, even if it involves some financial sacrifice, to provide their children with higher quality care, without the distractions and stress of working out of the home.
“I’m available to get the children out to school calmly,” says Yocheved,* a stay-at-home mother of three. “I can have their supper on the table when they come home from school, and I can take care of the baby myself. Staying home makes for a calm, energized mother, which can only benefit the children.”
Leah,* a stay-at-home mother of four, agrees. “There’s just no comparison between my mothering now and when I was working. Things that were such big issues before are just fine now. If somebody is sick, it’s no problem. If somebody has an appointment, it’s no problem. If a child doesn’t want to go to school first thing in the morning, I can bring him a little later. It’s worth every penny that I’m not earning to stay home.”
Many stay-at-home mothers feel that no one else will give the kind of attention that a mother will give. “Although a babysitter may take very good care of the children,” says Tova,* “there are some things that only a mother will do. For example, my four-year-old daughter won’t eat unless I feed her while reading her a story. A babysitter wouldn’t sit with her while she eats and make sure that she gets the nutrition.”
Support
A woman who is working and raising a family needs the support of her family in order to keep things running smoothly. In today’s culture, we often see young husbands taking a big part in the upkeep of the household. A husband doesn’t say that he is babysitting when he is watching the children; he is an equal partner with his wife in all the childcare.
Mindy,* a special educator, explains, “I could never work full time in the school system without the support of my husband. I have to leave early in the morning, so my husband is in charge of getting the children ready for school, and he is also the one picking up from playgroup when he comes home from kollel.”
Chaya Feldman, a labor and delivery nurse, says, “I could never do this without the help of my mother-in-law. She picks up my three-year-old from playgroup at 1:30 on the days I work, and watches her until she wakes up at around four.”
Impact on the Children
In addition to finding support, mothers who choose to go to work look for solutions to lessen the difficulties involved so that their children don’t lose out.
Chaya Feldman chooses to work the night shift, because it gives her more time to be with her family. “If I worked 12-hour shifts during the daytime,” she says, “I wouldn’t be able to see the children at all on those days. This way I can see them in the morning when I come home from work and in the evening before I go to work.”
Rivky Leichter, also a nurse, has worked night shift for almost six years. “I don’t think my children are negatively affected by my work. They’re used to me being tired most of the time and are so excited when I’m participating in their activities, whether at home or at school. My husband, on the other hand, has it really hard. He has to run the house and organize play dates while I’m at work or sleeping. That is why we make a point of going on a long family vacation every summer. We focus on making up for the lack of ‘family time’ during the year.”
For some women, the hardest part of working is leaving a small infant. Chani,* a resource room teacher with many years’ experience, explains, “Leaving a long-awaited infant is very difficult. I am currently extending my maternity leave, because I want to be with him all the time.” Pia,* a computer programmer, has arranged for her mother to babysit until her children turn a year old.
For others, however, leaving a baby isn’t an issue. Paula*, an entrepreneur, doesn’t even take maternity leave. For the first two months, she takes her babies with her to work, and after that they go to a babysitter. “I actually continued working in the delivery room, after I’d had an epidural!” she laughs. Naomi,* a health professional, says, “People ask how I can leave my little baby to work full time, but the baby doesn’t know the difference. It’s the older children who are more difficult to leave.”
Nechama, the OT in Israel, says, “It’s not fun for my kids that I’m very tired the days I work, but I don’t know if I would be less tired if I were at home all day. My children love coming to my work – I have permission to bring them in the afternoon sometimes – and telling their friends about it. And the days that I work, they often have a special arts and crafts project to do while I rest, so it isn’t that bad.”
Rochel* feels that her children benefit from going to playgroup while she’s working. “I pay a lot of attention to the caregivers I choose,” she says, “and I am very happy with them. My three-year-old has such an excellent morah that he really benefits from spending time with her every day.”
Ricki* says, “I work in the morning when my children are in school, and it’s fine for them. But I wouldn’t want to be out of the house in the afternoon, when they’re home. Even if I do nothing but sit on the couch, I’m still their mother and my presence is very important. Even though my family would benefit financially if I worked longer hours, I won’t do that.”
One of the most stressful parts of being a working mother is dealing with the children’s inevitable sickness. As Miriam, the former graphic designer, says, “The more children you have, the more chance that someone will have a fever or an upset stomach. At some point it just becomes too much to balance the needs of the children with the needs of the job.” Peri,* a physical therapist, agrees. “When one of my children gets sick, it becomes a crisis. I have no time for compassion, because I immediately start thinking, what am I going to do now?”
Women make all kinds of choices. Should they stay at home or work outside the home? Should they work part time or full time? What is the best choice for themselves, their spouses, and their children? As I wrote above, there is no right or wrong answer here. It’s not black and white but many shades of those colors. As Sora Wolman says, “I go with my gut. If it feels right for me and my family, I don’t look over my shoulder to see what everybody else is doing.”
