Day 4: How I Went From Career Focused to Kid Focused & How I Found Satisfaction and Value in Being a Mother As I Did in My Career

I threw a 3-year tantrum, that’s how.

LOL> 

I wish I could say I was joking, but on many levels, this is the truth. 

I loved my career. Even with its stresses and dark moments, I enjoyed the creative freedom it provided, the projects it presented and the person it showed me I was.

15 years ago, I would have told you that I didn’t possess the characteristics that I would use to describe myself today. I would have used phrases such as “I do design” or “I am a photographer”…

But because of my career, and its ability to have stretched me beyond what I thought my limits were, I know now that even though I am damn good at the design aspect, my core strengths aren’t in that category like many of those who are in my industry. 

Now my strengths sound something like this: 

• Given time, I can figure out most anything

• I can troubleshoot like no other 

• I am a great strategist and long-term thinker

• I have clarity and vision with projects, and I can dial in on micro aspects in crazy ways while keeping big vision/scope in mind 

• I have an almost maddening ability to point out off scaling, color or quality differences (My friend Cathy and all home contractors hated this. LOL.)

• I have a thrifty mind with an eye for quality

• I don’t mind setbacks

• I don’t mind lunatic deadlines

• I love collaboration

• I can deal with hard people

• I can convince most anyone of anything if I truly believe in it

I was proud of the person I had built and the career I had created along the way. So when all that went bye-bye virtually overnight, so did I. Or so I told myself.

As I go through life as a (still) new momma, and even more so as I read what I just laid down in words, I know that what I bring to the game as a mother IS what I brought to my work.

Up until recently though, I didn’t believe myself to be anything but the person keeping everyone above water.  

I would brush off the compliments on how well I juggled twins, comments on the ease in which I seemed to deal with the bumps of parenthood, praise on the way I could recognize nuances and relate to the babes on their level. Those things just seemed normal to me, not unique or special. They did not strike me as gifts or strengths. 

I would repeat to myself that I was just the cook, just the housekeeper, just the caretaker because I felt no value, and to me, I could be replaced. These became my mantras in a sense… and that’s who I let myself be until I became so uncomfortable with what was looking back at me that I went in search of who I know myself to truly be. Hence, Project 42.

The reward is being me. I value motherhood because I value myself and chose to celebrate the decisions that got me here.

Motherhood was a gift given to me just as my career was. It is an opportunity. It is my creation. It’s up to me to make something out of it all the while giving gratitude to my skillset — because I’d be in the weeds without them. And that, my friends, is satisfying to know.

Fun Fact 1: The first ultrasound only showed one babe. I am a believer that someone upstairs thought I’d be crazy bored unless I were super-challenged, so they quickly added a second to the mix before the next doctors visit. (Thank you, Person Upstairs. You did me a solid.)

Fun Fact 2: This picture was taken in Ireland, 16 weeks pregnant… just days after springing the news on Joe’s leprechaun side of the family.