Moms with Careers: How Does She Do It?

Confessions of a Working Mom

The job. The husband. The children. Who has time for sex? Moms with full-time careers let us know what "having it all" really means!

When Allison Pearson started sharing her struggle — juggling a career in journalism while raising a family — in her London newspaper column, she felt like she opened a door on a secret world: working motherhood.

She interviewed 40 working mothers from all walks of life all of whom reaffirmed her own experiences. "One of the most painful things for the working mother is not having the intimate knowledge of your child that you'd have if you stayed home."

Allison took what she learned and wrote the novel I Don't Know How She Does It, a story for working moms everywhere.

"Let's face it, if other people aren't judging us, we beat ourselves up. I know a lot of it is sad, but you can share it through laughter and experiences. So many women have turned up at work, looked down and saw they were wearing nonmatching shoes. I think for many of the working moms here today, this is the best we've looked since the birth of our first child!"

Like many career moms, Michele wakes up at 4:30 a.m. and goes to sleep at 11 p.m. so that she can get work done around the house while her family sleeps.

Although she enjoys her job and the lifestyle it affords her family, Michele worries that she is short-changing everyone. "There's always that little voice inside of me saying, 'In 10 years, are you going to regret that you worked and spent so much time away from the kids?' I think I feel more guilty than my husband for leaving the kids."

Lea Anne doesn't want to deprive her daughters of anything a stay-at-home mom would give her children. She stays up until 3 a.m. to bake cookies, and during her lunch hour, she rushes to her babysitter's to breastfeed her baby.

Recently, Lea Anne's oldest daughter told her something that touched the whole audience. When Lea Anne said she wasn't going to be home because she had a meeting, her daughter said, "But I want to be your meeting." Lea Anne says, "I wanted her to be my meeting, too."

As a pediatrician, Francine takes care of other people's children all day. Being able to attend her daughter's school activities is important to her, so each week she works a 30-hour shift so she can be at home for two days.

"In working full-time, and having a child, there are plenty of times that you feel inadequate because you want to be 100 percent at both. Each day there is something that gets sacrificed."