It's unbelievable how much more energy I have now that my child is born. So much energy that I want to get back to work and work after my maternity leave. For real. I wouldn't mind going back to work tomorrow. Little Sophie is just a week old. And so is my maternity leave, but I can't wait to get back to work.
She was born on July 19. Six pounds heavy, lifted from my stomach by the gynecologist and perfectly healthy. On Sunday I was allowed to go home again, after which I basked for a week in the cosiness of my house, the good care of the maternity assistant and the sweet attention of parents and in-laws.
A week where my house was cleaned and all I had to worry about was the little girl. A week in which I discovered that she is even calmer than her big brother was. She's doing great. When she cries, she is hungry. She doesn't cry about anything else. She has stolen the heart of the great crook. I regularly hear Thijmen say things like 'Sophie sweet!' or 'Give Sophie a kiss' after which he very carefully gives a sweet kiss on her head. Which has already led to a wet eye, because Mr. drooled quite a bit, but that aside. In fact, she just stole everyone's heart. My beautiful, sweet little girl. But now that that has 'gone', I would like to go back to work after my maternity leave. Maybe too early for many, but I can't wait.
After a week of being cared for and being in love, it has been beautiful again. So today I went out with her and visited a friend. Suddenly it felt to me as if the world had been recreated. As if I've been living under a rock for months and now I'm awake again. Really awake. I have mountains of energy and want to do something with it.
A woman does not seem to be able to do that much a week after a caesarean section. I do the housework as usual and I have energy again to really pay attention to my oldest. Now he can help more and better, which is very nice. He beams with pride when he has helped well. But now I want more. I want to go back to work after my maternity leave. I want to make myself useful again.
Rest is the motto, I know and I really won't go to work yet. If only because I first have to figure out what I really want after my maternity leave. And of course it's also nice to have time to just go shopping for a day.
My leave will last for about nine weeks. Stay at home for nine more weeks. I'm not a home-sitter. Nine months of pregnancy was probably not too bad compared to that whole maternity leave. Scrubbing and worrying all day isn't really my thing. Fortunately, there are plenty of other things to do. Nice things, like blogging and less nice things like cleaning up. I'm actually interested in that even. Maybe then my house will be really neat, who knows.
But above all, I have the time to take a good look at my career so far and to think about which direction I want to go and what I want to do. I'm thinking more and more about going back to study, but I don't know if that will work financially. Maybe I can get a job somewhere where I can work my way up through work experience. Who knows, I may be discovered as a brilliant blogger and I may start blogging for – say – NRC Next. That would be great too. The point is:I have too many interests and too much energy.
My maternity leave is still about nine weeks away. Nine weeks to figure out what the next step in my career will be. I just hope it's enough. Dear fellow moms, how on earth did you get through this?
