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Megan Basham @megbasham - I love this post from Emma. This is what I did. In 2008, I was a young wife writing op-eds and going on the Today Show and Fox News and MSNBC to promote a book about how young women could use their hard-won professional skills to help their husbands get ahead so that they would have more financial flexibility to stay home with their babies.
I hadn’t yet had children, though we were trying, and I knew this was what I wanted. But then, a test came. After the book promo appearance, NBC asked me to come on several more times as a political commentator. Fox continued inviting me on as well.
My literary agent at the time, one of the biggest in the business, offered to connect me to talent representation for broadcasting. My editor at random house suggested I sign with another agency. It was the rubber meets the road moment where my husband and I really had to decide, did I mean what I wrote about? Did we believe what we said about God’s design for men and women’s roles?
We decided we did. We passed on the talent agents. We passed on moving to NYC or DC to pursue the opportunities that were being offered to me. And I spent the next 15 years having my two daughters, working very part-time, and staying home with them.
When they were older, and needed less hands-on help from me, it finally seemed the season to pursue some of those things I had set aside so many years before.
I won’t say I never had moments of “I could have been a contender!”
But here’s what I can tell you, when I decided to start writing political columns again, and doing commentary again, the Lord blessed the work of my hands. I won’t say I got to have it all, because I know very well that had I said yes back then (when, let’s be honest, I was younger and fresher faced) my professional achievements probably would’ve been much greater.
But I would’ve sacrificed SO much for it!
I would’ve sacrificed lazy afternoons at the park, staying up late together making the PERFECT Valentine’s Day box, going to the zoo on Tuesday because the weather was nice and we could!
Our lives are long today, and while a career can wait, motherhood cannot. And my own experience is that if you give those years to your children and your family, there will still be plenty of opportunity waiting for you on the other side.
And you won’t regret a thing.
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Emma Waters @emlwaters
When I was in college, I was so terrified of motherhood. I thought it would mean the loss of myself, my time, my body, and my work. My. My. My. My.
And in a sense, it did. I'm not the same person I was before having our daughters. My time is not my own. My body has new stretch marks. And my work is not my top priority. But the things I gave up pale in comparison to the incredible blessings I've received in return.
The pure bliss of little one's calling you "mama," snuggling with you, learning to pray, belting "Holy, Holy, Holy" from the backseat, or delighting when their father--the man you love-- plays with them. Nothing can compare. Thanks to remote & flexible work norms and technology to make it possible, family and career don't have to be "either/or" arrangements in the same way it was for previous generations.