Not all women are meant to be stay-at-home moms. (Likewise, not all men are built to be stay-at-home dads.) It is a career path with a unique set of challenges you must overcome—most involve being more open to talking to yourself and admitting you actually enjoy daytime soap operas.
For me, being the sole caretaker of my son and two fur babies is the best job anyone could have ever offered me. Truly. But anyone with my job title knows its perils. If you are considering walking down this road, take heed of the following side effects.
- You begin to think you are much funnier than you actually are. Because laughing at your internal jokes becomes involuntary, and before you know it, you’ve transitioned into the female version of your dad.
- You may develop an aversion to Pinterest, which manifests itself as nightmares that fill your head with images of glitter and mason jars, and then you wake up yelling the words, “rustic chic!”
- You unconsciously refer to yourself as “Mommy” to complete strangers—like the uninterested teenage cashier at Target, whom you almost forgot to pay. “Whoops—sorry! Mommy forgot her morning coffee.” Cue the blank stare.
- You leave the house in sweatpants and/or mismatching socks and/or house shoes without realizing it. Any makeup on your face is either left over from the other day when you actually got up early, or it is way over-done because you forgot how to even apply makeup, so you look like a cross between a carnival clown and Boy George.
- You begin relating all your life experiences to episodes of Sofia the First instead of Friends. (Or is this just me?)
- You become immune to the smell of spit-up and are confused when strangers wrinkle their noses when standing near you, because you had to have showered this morning….right?
Carrie Taylor is a native Texan, freelance writer and mother of one precious baby boy.
