Throughout her pregnancy, Carrol Stovold had assumed that she would return to work full time after her maternity leave ended.
But a few days after Monday’s arrival of her first child, Katie, the 42-year-old Lake Bluff mother says she’s weighing the options of staying home or working part time. She and her husband, Stan, underwent five years of infertility treatment before Katie arrived and have talked at length about their experiences growing up in households where the mother stayed home.
“I sort of swing back and forth day every day, because I really haven’t been forced yet to make a decision,” said Stovold, who can’t comprehend not working, having spent 15 years in a job she loves.
“I think I know what I’m going to do, but I don’t have to decide for 12 weeks yet.”
If Stovold returns to her job as a social worker at Lake Forest Hospital, she will be in good company. According to a U.S. census report released last week, an all-time high of 59 percent of women with infants entered the workforce in 1998, almost double the level of 31 percent in 1976.
Behind those numbers are individual stories of women arriving at one of the most difficult decisions of their lives. The evolving factors that guide these decisions are nearly always complex and emotional, concerning finances, the search for quality child care, tolerable commutes and, above all, a need for affirmation that they are doing the best thing for their baby.
In addition, women who have spent years climbing the career ladder fear losing their place if they drop out for a few years.
But they feel just as torn when they cradle their new baby and wonder if anyone can fill their role–or whether they want someone else taking their place.
Stovold said she worries more about missing out when her daughter grows older and begins toddling and talking.
She remembers how her mother was always waiting for her when she got off the school bus every afternoon. And when the weather is beautiful and she sees women pushing their strollers, she feels wistful.
“She was the room mother for all the parties and I think, how will I do that?” Stovold said. “How can I be with Katie if I’m at work? I think the ideal situation would be to be able to work part time. In my position, I don’t know if that’s really going to be an option.”
Still raising eyebrows
With a majority of new mothers returning to the workforce throughout much of the 1990s, societal acceptance of working mothers has risen.
But tell that to Laura Sinars.
A partner in a Chicago law firm who is expecting her first child at the end of March, Sinars has seen her share of raised eyebrows when she tells people she is going to work full time after the baby is born.
Sometimes the brow is arched and obvious; other times it’s fleeting and subtle. Either way, she knows exactly what it means:
A woman can either be a mother or a lawyer, not both at the same time.
“I can’t lie and tell you it doesn’t make me wonder if I’m making the right decision to head back to work,” Sinars said. “I suppose that’s a decision that I’ll be reevaluating all the time for a very long time.”
Sinars planned from the early days of her pregnancy that she would return to work. She knew she would be filing legal briefs, meeting with clients and sparring with judges. It’s what she does. It’s what her firm believes she does well enough to earn full partnership.
“I can’t imagine not working,” she said. “I can’t imagine fulfillment without working to some degree.”
But therein lies the catch for Sinars. Work to what degree?
She talks about working from home, as more women are doing. She talks about working part time somewhere in the future, another rising trend for working mothers.
“I suppose the amount I work may fluctuate, but it will always be there,” she said, noting that she has not finalized how long her maternity leave will be.
Sinars was the product of a stay-at-home mom. Her husband’s mother worked.
“My husband has been totally supportive of me going back,” she said. “And in that regard I’m really lucky because I know a lot of husbands don’t feel that way.”
But still, support and statistics aside, Sinars feels the silent pressure that many mothers do.
Of her closest circle of friends (“multiple-degree, very-bright, totally driven women”), only one has returned to work–and that was on a part-time basis. And on the work side of things, the other partners in her firm–very few of them women with babies at home–work long, arduous hours. “I feel the twinges and pulls on both sides,” she said as she rushed between appointments, talking on a cell phone.
Now, the exception
After the crash, the 3-year-old gymnast just wanted her mom.
She cried for her. She screamed for her. She held out shaky little arms for her.
And then–unlike the first 2 1/2 years of Delia Sergeant’s life–on Friday morning her mother scooped her up, wiped away her crocodile tears, teased her for being a “tumbling Jane,” then gave her a cube of ice to hold on her throbbing, curly-topped head.
“It’s the goofy little stuff that you feel really lucky to be here for,” said Monica Sergeant, Delia’s mom, who worked full time until deciding in June to become an at-home mom.
“I guess I’m the type of mother who typically does go back,” she said, “and I did do it for a couple years. But it didn’t work out for me, and that was a hard decision to come to.”
Indeed, all the factors that the census cites as influences on the statistics are perfectly embodied in this 31-year-old mom:
She is young and middle class and college educated–the prototype of the new mother returning to work.
She spent years climbing the corporate ladder–the type of woman most resistant to giving it all up to stay at home full time.
And she is married with only one child at home–the most typical description of a mother in the workforce.
But there is one thing the statistics can’t capture in this personal, soul-searching decision that millions of American woman like Monica Sergeant make every year: the emotion.
Sergeant, who returned to her job at Bank One in Chicago for the first two-thirds of Delia’s life, remembers her moment of truth vividly.
Delia had been sick, in the emergency room on Christmas with a severe middle-ear infection that was causing advanced swelling of her little ear. The little girl was in constant pain, on strong medication and utterly inconsolable.
Immediately after the holiday, when Sergeant returned to work, she was standing by her desk, dealing with a difficult customer when an unexpected thought crept into her mind: “You’ve got to be kidding. I’m doing this instead of being with my sick kid?”
So she quit, became a full-time, stay-at-home mom, and is 2 1/2-months pregnant.
She has no intention of returning to work after the family’s second child is born. She won’t miss any more first steps or first words or bumped heads.
She’ll be in the minority.
A matter of money
It’s no secret that the No. 1 reason many new mothers find themselves back at work is a matter of economics.
Margaret Kulis, 36, plans to return to work two days a week as a librarian after the birth of her second child, but she’s already struggling over the added complications.
Kulis, an Evanston resident who is six months’ pregnant, believes her salary will offset the cost of enrolling her 2-year-old son in preschool, but little else.
Kulis and her husband have started making charts to figure out the finances, and then there are other concerns about commuting time and picking up children from two different places.
“I’m juggling a lot more balls,” Kulis said. “That adds to the whole thing. Then you say, is this worth it? My work when I return will be a luxury because we can’t afford the child care.”
Still, Kulis, who initially delayed the date she returned to work after the birth of her first child, said she found part-time work the perfect solution. After earning a college degree and advancing over 14 years to her current position, she is hesitant to give it up now.
“I feel I’m sort of saving a place for myself in that world; I’m sort of marking time in my profession, to keep a place open for me so it’s ready when I’m ready to go back,” Kulis said.
Bringing baby to work
Becky Beilfuss has been lucky. Her boss agreed to let her bring her 6-month-old daughter to work.
“She has been so supportive,” Beilfuss said.
On some days, the program director for a social services agency feels like Wonder Woman as she efficiently wraps up a project at work while the baby slumbers peacefully in the portable crib near her desk. But other days go less smoothly, when Beilfuss is feeling overwhelmed and stressed and begins rehashing all the reasons she and her husband decided that she should return to work within days of the baby’s birth.
“It’s always been a work in progress, that decision,” said Beilfuss, 38, of Glen Ellyn, who has two other children, already in school. “It’s always something we revisit, that we wonder, how could I stay home and parent?”
The family’s need for two incomes to afford college and the high cost of living in the DuPage County suburb won out. The fact that Beilfuss loved her job–just three blocks from home–and was allowed to keep flexible hours made it easier.
“There is some guilt there,” said Beilfuss, who regrets not being able to attend events at the school her 8-year-old son, Clay, attends. “I see other mothers walking their children leisurely to school, and I have my briefcase in the back of the car and am dropping off Clay at school. Then I’m on my way to work with Hannah.”
Her pregnancy with Hannah came as a surprise, and the family was shocked to learn the costs of child care when they began looking last January.
Full-time newborn care was $165 a week, not enough to offset Beilfuss’ salary. So she approached her boss with some trepidation to ask if the baby could accompany her to work, at least until other arrangements could be made.
“We’ve had the discussion that, if it was ever distracting to my co-workers, she would have to go home,” Beilfuss said.
Soon, Hannah will be just like the majority of children in America. She will spend several days with a home-based child-care giver, and one day a week with her grandmother. “We couldn’t imagine how we could fit this into our lives,” Beilfuss said. “We have made the best of it.”
