by Stacy Fiore

Created on: June 18, 2010

When I was pregnant with my daughter, I knew that I would be staying home with her. My husband was set to deploy a month after she was born and I knew that I wanted to spend as much time with her as I could. I didn’t want to miss her growing up because her daddy already was. At the time I thought I was staying home for her. I thought that I was doing what was best for my baby while her daddy was gone. I realize now, that I was doing it for me.

After having my son 5 months ago I knew that I would have to go back to work. We didn’t have the money for me to stay home with the kids. At first, I was happy. I couldn’t wait to get back to work, even though I had no idea where I would be going to work at. I started job hunting and looking into daycare centers for my two kids (3 and 3 months). After two long months, I started giving up hope that I would get a job. I was depressed from all the rejection and didn’t know what to do. Bills wouldn’t pay themselves.

That’s when I sat down and really thought about it. I didn’t want to go to work. I didn’t want to miss all of my children’s milestones. I didn’t want to miss the laughs, smiles, any of it. I realized that I didn’t want to leave my kids with strangers. My daughter could at least tell me if something bad happened but not my little 5 month old. He wouldn’t be able to tell me if someone treated him wrong.  That’s when I knew that I wanted to stay at home with the kids, at least until they were both in school.

Is it hard? Of course it is. There are times that they both drive me crazy. My daughter runs circles around me some days. But all the bad days in the world don’t outweigh all the good times I get to have with my kids. All the times that I get to see my little man do something for the first time or watch my daughter try to spell something.

I have realized in the past couple weeks that I am lucky. I’m staying home with my kids while other moms out there are working full time jobs wishing that they could be at home with theirs. I am lucky and I cherish all the moments that I have with my kids whether it is a good day or a bad one.

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