After I had a child, it was hard to find out that I, like my own mother, felt I had to purchase the right to create by doing something useful.

- Antonia Malchik

Mothering

"In the end, I didn't need to be the mother of all mothers. All I had to be was what I am, what most people are, a person who learns." - Hilda Raz

Moving Beyond Words - Revaluing Economics

"In addition to degree of value, however, there are productive areas that aren't valued at all. Take the economic vacuum called "women who don't work." It's a form of semantic slavery that industrialized countries reserve for homemakers (in spite of the fact that homemakers in the United States work longer hours for less pay, and have more likelihood of being replaced by a younger worker, than any other category)....The truth is that almost every woman knows this economic invisibility in some part of her life. Whether or not she is in the paid labor force, a major part of her energy is probably devoted to productive work within the family and household, work that isn't counted as work at all. Its a reality of patriarchal economic systems both in capitalist countries like the United States, where the invisibility of homemaking leads to employed women having two jobs, and in the socialist past or hybrid present of countries in East Europe and Russia, were the so-called emancipation meant the right to do two jobs, one visible and one not." - p 214

"Thanks to our new ability to measure worldwide suffering with computers, the United Nations has come up with conclusions like this often cited one: Women do a third of all the paid work in the world, and two thirds of all work, paid and unpaid, yet receive only 10 percent of the world's salaries, and own only one percent of its property." - 216.

"A woman taking care of her own children is a person who is "not working" - which is why welfare, initially conceived as a widowed mothers' allowance, is treated as a handout, but unemployment compensation, which involves doing nothing at all, is not- though a person or institution raising the same children if that mother died or deserted would be "working" and getting much more than a welfare-level payment." - 216

"Personally, I like the option of treating the full-time homemaker and her or his wage-earning spouse as partners at least as equal as a business partnership - as we are so often assured marriage is - and crediting the homemaker with half of her (or his) spouse's total income. Especially at middle and upper levels, this could half compensate for the fact that consumption increases and elaborates as income goes up, thus demanding a consumption manager with more time and expertise. - p 219-220.

"All this was summed up in Lenore Weitzman's famous statistic from The Divorce Revolution: Women with dependent children experience a 73 percent drop in standard of living after a divorce, while their ex-husbands' living standard goes up by 42 percent. The colloquial summing up is simpler: If women have young children, they are only one man away from welfare...Yet if two homemakers were to cross the street and work for each other's husbands, they would be entitled to an eight-hour day and a forty-hour week, Social Security, disability pay, and unemployment compensation - and perhaps paid vacations, transferable health benefits, and a retirement plan (not to mention a better legal safeguard against violence, which also has economic value). Something is very wrong here." - 220-221

The Things We Miss

I have not had much time to write. Frankly I have been exhausted and overwhelmed with being a single working mom. I don't think it is a one-person job, especially when you are working hard and worrying about paying the bills.

I have been subsisting (again) on up to 10 Excederines a day to keep going during the day. My headaches have come back in full-force and I am back on my daily migraine meds. I don't have the money or the time for all the treatments I used to get to keep my headaches and other stuff at bay, and stress accelerates all of that.

On Friday night, I could not sleep. My kids sleep with me. We decided to start sleeping in my bed because it is bigger and we were running out of space in my daughters bed. The kids always fight over who gets to sleep next to me, so oftentimes I rotate. I started off next to my son, but then I decided I was on the "wrong" side, ie, not my usual side, so I decided to move and get more comfortable.

I moved over, but then my daughter had hogged that side. I had already moved around so much that I didn't want to wake her. So I decided I would sort of roll off. Instead, I landed really hard on my wooden bedframe, that extends about 3-4 inches past my mattress, and then onto the floor.

I screamed, and then I started laughing at myself. Neither kid woke up, but then I stayed up most of the night. It hurt like hell. I have a horrible deep-purple bruise that takes up most of the left side of my ass.

I didn't want to get pain killers, so I just waited for my chiropracter to open on Monday. I have been going and getting treatments there this week. My whole body is out of wack.

I think I knocked something out of myself because I have continued to laugh my ass off all week. I am still in a lot of pain, but everything just seems hysterically funny to me this week. I guess I have decided that my situation is what it is, so I may as well have fun and laugh.

That being said, I still think it is bull shit.

My daughter had her ears peirced a few months ago. She took one out just to be weird, and has been walking around with only one earring for a while. She finally decided she wanted to get the other ear peirced, so we rushed her over to the mall. Then we discovered her ear was infected. I don't know how I missed that. Well, actually I do. I'm too busy working, running kids around, keeping a house up, cooking, and doing everything else.

Then, the other night, I took my daughter out of the bath and noticed that her ear had completely puffed up with puss in the back. Not only had I missed it once, I had missed it twice. That never would have happened before. The front looked fine, but the back was horrible.

It was the end of a long, exhausting day, and all I wanted to do was crawl into bed. But I called the doctor, and they wanted me to bring her right in. So I put hats on the kids wet hair, and we all drove into the doctors office in our pajamas. (To my husband's credit, he met us there.)

It is those little things that really matter and little mistakes can end up being big mistakes.

My husband just keeps saying that he wants to be together again, but I don't want to be treated the way he has treated me. I don't want to go through all the same stuff again. I don't want to be in this situation that I am in right now either, but that's all I've got.

My mom has always told me, "This too shall pass." And that give me a lot of comfort. I just hope that nothing too bad happens in the mean time.

Why aren't you making any money?

Today was my first "official" day back at work all day. Not that I have not been working. I have been. But I have also been taking care of two young children, a house and a husband that apparently doesn't give a fuck about any of us. I have always continued to work, as a mortgage broker, as I have for the last 12 years. I do not make the 6-figure salary I once made, but I have always contributed.

That said, I feel my most important contribution is raising my children. There is no value in that in my husband's family, but to me, that is the highest value.

Today was a difficult day to say the least. Not as difficult as yesterday, but difficult as hell. My daughter hates it when I leave her. She cries and holds on to my legs. I literally have to pick her up and pass her off to someone else so that I can walk out the door while she cries.

My new day will consist of getting up hours before what I would even like to think about and spending an hour-and-a-half driving both children to school before I start work. My husband will never understand what it takes to wake two young children up while it is dark out, get them cleaned up, dressed, fed, lunches packed and out the door on time to make 3 deadlines - 2 school start times, and one for me at work.

Never-the-less, my soon-to-be-ex-husband had the audacity to ask me, "Why aren't you making any money?"

Well, let me explain something.

As a mortgage broker, I get paid on commission. Only commission.

Once I get a call that someone wants a loan, I am lucky if that loan closes within 30-60 days. Then, I get paid on the loan, about half of what the loan fee is, within about a month.

I sent out a letter letting my clients and friends know that I am back to work full-time 2-3 weeks ago.

The reason I am back to work full-time instead of raising these kids like I should and would like to be doing is that my husband is a COMPLETE FUCK UP who quit working entirely for at least a year.

Was I working then?

Yes!

I was working, doing everything around this house, and taking care of our children. And taking care of children that have emotional problems because of their fucked-up alcoholic father is completely different than taking care of children who have 2 parents at home who are functional human beings and both contribute to the relationship.

So I asked my husband, WHY HAVEN'T YOU BEEN MAKING ANY MONEY? YOU HAVE BEEN BACK AT WORK FULL-TIME SINCE JANUARY? (which is how long it took him to get his act together after coming back from 90+ days at Betty Ford and the Caron Center in September for him to go back to work and actually get a paycheck.

And then he said, "I don't want to argue."

Yeah, I bet. Because you have no more excuses for your sorry ass.

Then the pipe burst in our bathroom while the kids were taking their evening bath, and like last time, my husband is NO WHERE to be found. So the hot water squirted into my face and all over the floor and onto the kids. I had to have my 6-year-old-son hold down the faucet so I could put some clothes on and go outside and turn off the water supply to the entire house.

So now we have no water.

And to say I am PISSED OFF tonight, would be an understatement. To say that I still consider my husband the least bit of a man would be like saying pigs fly through my living room at night, smoking heroin and laughing their asses off.

The Virtues of Selfishness

I had to call to cancel appointments for my son today. There is just no money and I am just going to have to face that fact and stick to essentials for a while. My son needed to have two cavities filled tomorrow. It broke my heart to call and cancel. I broke down when I called his counselor. He needs those services. He needs someone to talk to about what he is going through. We all do.

I will never forget the position my husband has put us in.

Someday I know I will dig us out of this hole and we will be OK financially. But I never thought we would be in this position and I have worked too hard to be here. My husband has been reckless, careless and selfish. And he still doesn't take responsibility for it. He never took on another job. He just tries to blame me. He says I should have gone back to work full-time 8 months ago. I never caused this. And taking care of my kids is the most important work, the most important job that I will ever do. So yes, I will go back to work, but they will pay the price. We are always paying the price for his selfishness.

Be Grateful

I can't tell you how many times I have heard women complaining about their children and I just feel like saying be grateful.

Be grateful that it is just your children's silliness or minor rebellion. And not a husband that is alcoholic. Be grateful that you don't have to work. Be grateful that someone is taking care of your family and doing the things they vowed to. Because I think we take our vows for granted. For a long time I took my own dad for granted. How hard he worked to provide for all of us without ever a complaint. He was happy to do it. And I've always just thought that was the way it was. That that was his duty. And same with my first husband. He came home from work - hard physical labor no less, sometimes 20 hours at a time - cleaned and cooked. Even took on a newborn when his mom neglected him. He took care of that baby pretty much all by himself for a year. And he still managed to pay all his bills. I never heard a complaint.

And I wonder. How is it that my husband who claims to work so hard has made the same income as me YTD. While I have been taking care of these kids full time? My husband with all his family's money and talent and everything else. And here I am some "poor" girl taking care to two little kids and I'm making the same?

I have been on commission for 12 years. I can tell you this. You know when your checks are coming. You know because you have earned them. So why is it that husband has been counting on the same big check for over a month? And it's not here. So why do I find out when a copy comes in the mail and not ahead of time? How hard can it be?

And when I ask him about it, he explodes in the car - with our children trapped there listening to all of it. Telling me that I need to go to work.

Considering Prostitution

I am seriously annoyed this morning.

Really, I don't understand my in-laws or my husbands thoughts. The kids are used to being at home with me. They have already suffered emotionally because of all that has happened. And now, my father-in-law wants me to sign on for more debt? Which means what?

How do they think the kids get to school and all their activities? Who else is going to take them? Why should the kids suffer because of their dad's relapse?

My husband keeps talking about living amends - to me that means making us right financially, among other things. So why am I suddenly financially on the hook because of his choices? I doubt that the Fourth Wife would do the same to her precious son and his family. She still buys his cars and suits.

I keep reminding my husband that I am the only woman in his family that works. Is it because I am qualified? That I am the one who has had to? Or because I won't play the game and stroke my father-in-law's ego?

I have never asked my father-in-law for money and I never will. I'd have more control over my life becoming a prostitute then asking him for a dime.

Which brings me to the question that has been gnawing at me...When should I find a real, good paying job?

I love being here with my kids. I wish I could do it all the way through high school. In an ideal world, I think there is nothing more important.

But what I have learned is that I can not depend on my husband completely. When he is making money, he is great at it. But I have learned from experience that there is no 100% in sobriety.

And I never want to be in this position again.

I said that last time. But after a year of sobriety, I felt safe. And after 3 years, I didn't think a relapse was possible. But there are people with 20 years of sobriety that fall off the wagon.

Being a mortgage broker was a good career for a long time. But it has changed. Some people have suggested that I work for a bank, in the commercial division. That probably would pay well and have very good benefits, but it is nothing I'm excited about. I really want to be with my kids.

I keep thinking that the kids are 3 and 6, and time has gone so quickly. So much of that time has already been filled up with drama. When will my kids get the life I had dreamed up for them? When will they be happy?

I realize that their lives are theirs. And they will make their own choices when they grow up. But I also have believed that childhood should be magical. I have always wanted to give my children that.

I feel very exhausted lately. I have a Vegas trip with the girls in about a month and I think that will rejuvenate me. But lately, I just feel tired and lethargic.

I could think of nothing to write this morning, so I opened to You Can Heal your Life this morning to the perfect page:

No matter what age we are, we can always let go of some more garbage and break a new barrier. -Louise Hay

The Promissory Note

We had a nice evening as a family last night. We went to dinner at California Pizza Kitchen and then to the movie theatre next door. My husband took my son to one movie, and I took my daughter to see Up!. It was really a touching movie and I highly recommend it to anyone. It's a kids movie, but it really says a lot about what is important in life. I think it's good for kids to see something that is not all about a happy ending too. This movie shows an old man's entire life - and there were a lot of ups and downs. I left the theatre in tears. (good ones!)

The only thing that soiled our evening was when we picked my husband up at his condo, he brought a promissory note for me to sign. I guess he talked to his dad earlier and borrowed some more money. In any case, his dad said that he thought I should sign the note too, and my husband brought it along for me to do so. I am not remotely interested in signing it.

First of all, it's a very generic note with all sorts of blank space. Most important, it is for $44,000 and does not specify anything. I asked my husband what the amount entailed, and he never really gave me an answer. I told him, if this is all in the name of letting me know what is going on, as your dad said, then why isn't there a list of what this number is made up of?

I am aware that my husband has borrowed money from his father. But I have always considered that their deal. Just like I had to borrow from credit cards, which are now in my name, when he was drinking and not working for a year in order to take care of the kids.

We have already rolled in his first rehab (since we were together) into our mortgage. I am not interested in rolling any part of Betty Ford debt into my name. As far as I am concerned, his father should pay for all of that because it was his carelessness as a father that brought him there.

My husband says if I don't sign the note, his father won't help us financially anymore. Well, I have never wanted his dad to help us financially. I haven't. That's not how I want to live my life - with his dad right there telling us what to do because he loaned us some money.

I know we're in a bad spot, and my husband seems to be working out of it. But signing that note seems as arbitrary to me as asking my father-in-law's wife to sign something saying she won't be fake anymore.

I don't have $44,000. I mostly stay at home with 2 little kids. My income is severely limited at this point, and anything I do make is used to pay off our other debt.

When we dropped my husband off, he took the note with him. But it doesn't sound like the issue is dead to me either.

The Magazine

The magazine got back to me and said that they had narrowed down their decision and had a few questions for me. One was about how much time I could devote to them. They are a start-up and it sounds like it would be a pretty big commitment.

I spoke to a few trusted friends earlier in the day, as well as my husband. He's actually a very good businessman and was very helpful (as were my friends).

I sent them an email back saying it was more than I could commit to time-wise right now. I'm a little sad because I really believe in what they're doing.

But, it all comes back to my kids...they are going through a lot right now and I need to give them my all. I know myself. If I took on a project like that, I would be consumed by it. It would be a great distraction right now. But I need to keep my priorities straight. When the time is right, something will come along.

Group Interview

I honestly can't tell if the interview went well yesterday or not. I do think I probably looked OK because when I went to Kinkos to get my copies, the guy started flirting with me and gave me all my copies for free.

I haven't had anyone flirt with me for so long that when he said they're on me, I made a total idiot of myself and was like, What? What did you say?

I don't think he really wanted to advertise that he was giving away free copies, but he repeated, it's OK, they're on me. He gave me a huge smile, I blushed, said thank you and sort of stumbled away.

So I left a little flustered, but glad that someone had noticed me and been kind.

I couldn't sleep the night before and had been up at 3am so I felt out of sorts all day. I actually got lost going back to my moms condo to pick up my kids. When my first husband and I split up, I found myself constantly getting tickets, getting completely lost, running over nails, just random things. I haven't had a ticket once since then, but I remember at that time, it was so bad that they threatened to take away my license. Of course, being 23 doesn't help either...

In any case, I have not had an interview in 5 years, since I started at the current mortgage company I'm at. And a lot has changed in 5 years. For one thing, this was a group interview, and I was in with 2 other women and 2 interviewers. It often takes me a while to get to know people and feel comfortable around them. And I'm not a competitive person, so I'm not sure this was the best setting for me. Halfway through I looked up at the clock and wished to GOD it would end soon!

Either way, it was good practice for me to get an interview in and I really like the magazine and what they are trying to do. They have a great slogan - Happily Ever Now - and its all about promoting that its OK to be a single parent and you don't have to wait for your prince (or princess) to come to be happy.

Ah well, back to what's important...my son just walked in with total bed-head and threw his arms around me. I asked him, how come I love you so much? He started backing away, gave me a huge smile and answered, because of my butt!, giggling hysterically down the hall...

New Job?

Well, the answer to my question about leaving careers has been answered.

Last week, I had to give up half my commission to keep a loan going (their lock had expired). My clients didn’t even say thank you. I have been working on their loan since January.

Yesterday, a loan I have been working on for several months was declined at the very last minute. No good answer as to why. The market has just changed and they are really sticking on things that wouldn’t have mattered 6 months ago.

Today, another loan got declined after months of work. I have done 3 other loans for these people. Perfect credit, perfect income, perfect assets, they have equity….everything. The underwriter didn’t like the property.

Seems like I am just spinning my wheels. Since I am on commission income, if the loan doesn’t fund, I don’t get paid anything.

I have a job interview tomorrow. That is one good thing about my husband. He has been supportive there. When I told him about the job, he said I’d be great at it.

It’s at a magazine. I didn’t want to tell him what it was because it is a magazine for single parents. LOL, he guessed it though and we both started laughing hysterically.

He said something like, well, I guess that will be perfect for you now! And we both just kept laughing our heads off!