Things I Wish I'd Known Before I Started Working From Home With a Baby
Things I Wish I'd Known Before I Started Working From Home With a Baby
I don’t think you can ever be prepared for life as a work-from-home mum before you actually become one. You find out in real time, as you navigate your way through the challenges and changes that come.
But if I could, here's what I'd go back and tell myself when I first started.
It gets harder before it gets easier.
I think people assume that working from home is harder with a baby. But a baby sleeps a lot, and is often content with snuggles in a carrier. But as they get older, their naps shrink, and their independence grows in fits and starts. What worked in month four is totally useless by month nine. The one thing that does grow alongside the chaos, however, is your ability to adapt. You get faster at resetting the plan and adapting to the changes. And that skill is worth more than any schedule or template.
The loneliness catches you off guard.
Ironically, even though you are never physically alone, work-from-home mum isolation is real, and it's specific. Your co-workers don't get it, your friends without kids don't get it, and even other mums who use daycare or nearby family don't quite get the version of motherhood you’re living, where childcare and deadlines are happening in the same room. This isn't a sign that something's wrong with you or your choices; it just means you haven't found your people yet.
You will rebuild your routine more times than you can count.
A routine that felt solid can be dead within a fortnight, because your child changed and it didn't. That's just what working from home without childcare looks like. Expect to rebuild constantly, and expect it to still work anyway.
You're not the only one doing this.
You might feel like you’re the only one, but there's a whole community of work-from-home mums navigating this exact same juggle. You just haven't found each other yet. But as soon as you start to look, you will quickly realise how large this community is; you just need to connect into it.
Hard doesn't cancel out worth it.
This lifestyle is genuinely difficult and people will say so, sometimes with a look that says they think you're a bit mad for choosing it (and maybe you are). But difficult and worth it are both true. The time you get with your kids, the mornings you spend with them, being there for every milestone and new achievement, tends to answer that question on its own.
If any of this sounds familiar, please know… you're doing something genuinely hard, and you're not the only one in it.
The home office, but with a village.
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