March | 2016 | Ledgers and Lollipops

I could not do what I do without my mom. I normally work a 70% schedule, but there are peak times at work where I am working overtime, nights and weekends. My mom steps in and helps me with school drop-offs and pick-ups, feeds my kids and keeps them when they are sick and I can’t miss work. I do have lots of other family and help in my life (I am so grateful to them too, and I will write about them as time goes on), but my mom is the one I can call or text at any time of the day or night (whether stressed out, desperate or hysterical) and I know she will drop everything to help me, talk me down from the ledge, or just tell me not to be so hard on myself. Her voice in my ear encouraging me to let go of her hand on my first day of kindergarten is the same one I hear today in the moments I need it.

I once had a horrible scare when my daughter was two. I was carrying her out to my car in the morning and I slipped on a patch of ice and took a dive with her down onto the cement. She had a thick hood up over her head but it was still a hard landing and she lay so still when we landed with such a stunned expression frozen on her little face that it actually occurred to me she might be dead (I know that sounds horrible, but it’s honestly what went through my mind). She started wailing a split second later (I could breathe again!) as I scooped her up and carried her back inside the house. After a minute she calmed down. No bump. Her crying had stopped- I was the one with tears streaming down my face worried about traumatic brain injuries as I called my mom.

Meanwhile, I should mention I had six Mexican accountants waiting for me at my office.

They had flown in for a one-day training that I was supposed to teach. I had no idea what I was going to do. You really can’t go from thinking your kid is dead one moment to leaving her and jetting off to work. And yes- I job share, but like all good sharing relationships, it was my turn. I had no Plan B at this late stage. To cancel would have been a waste of everyone’s time. I mentally calculated the cost of all that airfare in my head. What kind of employee wouldn’t show up? But what kind of mother would leave? Panic set in.

Just as I had calmed my own hysterical daughter, my mom calmed me down on the phone and told me that if she had stopped crying so quickly and her pupils seemed normal, she was probably fine. She offered to come over, take her to the pediatrician and keep her for the day if it would make me feel better. Fifteen minutes later she was at my house, took one look at my daughter (who was now totally happy) and convinced me to go to work. Fifteen minutes after that, I was in a conference room at work with the Mexicans. If they noticed my eyes were red and puffy they were too sweet to mention it.

An hour later, the first text pinged my phone- a picture of my daughter with a green lollipop on the way out of the doctor’s office. “TOTALLY FINE!!!!” the text said. Then another picture came in around 11:00 of her sitting in the front basket of a ToysRUs shopping cart, clutching six My Little Ponies and a pink Frisbee. Then noon rolled around and the next photo was a close-up of her small grinning face with Chuck E. Cheese loitering in the background “GUESS WHERE WE ARE?!” The tightness in my chest from all the worry and guilt that morning finally started to loosen. I was so grateful to my mom in that moment for turning head bumps into Chuck E. Cheese. Yes, my mom is the only person on this earth who will truly drop anything and everything for me.

She can also drive me crazy.

I can fight with her like no one else. All the advice based on information from questionable sources is usually enough to put me over the edge! If your mom has ever begun a sentence with “Dr. Oz says….”, “According to Nancy Grace…” or “I saw an article on the Facebook….” you know exactly what I mean. My mom is a very enthusiastic amateur nutritionist, child rearing expert, couples therapist, sports psychologist, interior decorator, lifestyle guru, political activist and preeminent scientist with no formalized science education. She will lecture that I should eat an obscure fruit five times a day because Dr. Oz says so, and that a Harvard study says that exercise is a waste of time. These “health breakthroughs” often align quite nicely with my mom’s lifestyle. Unrestrained access to Kit Kats for my kids is a good thing (chocolate is an antioxidant and will make your skin glow!) and six cups of coffee per day will keep prostate cancer at bay (if only I had a prostate!) She has definite ideas, and isn’t afraid to represent me at any class gathering or activity. “They only want healthy snacks” she snorted, handing me a snack schedule from a soccer post-practice parents meeting she attended. “I told them good luck getting these kids to eat BANANAS!”

When she has my kids, she’ll do things her way. This will mean holding my tongue as my son comes home with an expensive new toy because he convinced her (falsely) that he kept his pull-up dry the night before. IPads are perpetually fired up and humming, and McDonalds is a given. “I am the grandma, so I don’t have to say no,” she says. And she’s right. Grandmas should not have to be hardasses with their grandkids. They have earned the right to be the fun ones. Sometimes, I have to sit back and know that it is enough that they are safe and happy, even if the discipline and structure isn’t the same as what they would get if I was there.

Because I’m not there.

Yes, she can drive me crazy. But when I’m sitting in a roomful of people trying to stop my mind from worrying and pick up my buzzing phone to see a selfie of my toddler smiling on my mom’s lap eating a Kit Kat, mouth ringed by chocolate and the caption “LOOK AT THAT GLOW!”, My mom is not the next best thing…..

She is the voice whispering in my ear that I’m good enough. She is the feminist I’ve spent a lifetime studying, before I could even speak or read. She is the fairy godmother who sweeps in when the world seems to be crashing down and tells me to fuck it (in front of my kids, of course). Her magic wand turns head bumps into Chuck E. Cheese. She is my champion.

We barely knew each other when our professional lives came together eight years ago. We actually were not even sure we liked each other. Likely there is a manual out there on how to find a job share partner. We didn’t follow it. It was more like, “You are having a baby and I have a baby and we both want to work a reduced schedule so let’s ask if we can job share!” It had not been done in our department before and we were going to push to be the pioneers. They accepted, which justified throwing us into an office together. We have lots of windows and a conference table and can hold hands at our desks when we outstretch our arms.

We owe an unproductive employee for the Saturday morning we spent talking and really getting to know each other while we waited for work to review. Over time we realized we both loved being mothers and loved our family and wanted our children to be our number one priority but at the same time maintaining our careers and a sense of financial independence. We both wanted to be the best at both. And of course, at times you just can’t.

Over these past eight years there have been lots of laughter and lots of tears shared in this office. We have laughed about the crazy mornings trying to get out of the house and to work. We have cried about having to leave our babies behind or kiss them late at night after someone else has tucked them into bed. We have worked hard – at work and at home – and have doubted ourselves. And we thought, why keep this contained to this square office? Why not share it with others? Maybe others will get a laugh or recognize that they are not the only ones. Hence, Ledgers and Lollipops was born – and it literally took us months to find time to get it started. We are not even sure we can keep it going.

And yes, eventually our periods became synced.

Robbin Makled

I’m a mom of three kids- an eight year old daughter and six and two year old sons. Before I had kids, my life was wrapped up in working as a tax CPA in public accounting firms and a corporate tax department- so wrapped up in fact, that I met my husband sitting three cubicles down from me and we kissed for the first time at an April 15^th end of tax season party (nerd alert!). I also have moonlighted in comedy writing and performances on some well-known Detroit stages, while never quitting my day job.

I met Elaine at my current job around the time we both decided to have kids, and knowing little else about each other except that we each had a good working knowledge of debits and credits and a desire for babies, we embarked on creating a part-time job share in our corporate tax department. Little did I know that Elaine would become more than my work partner- she is a life partner! Wanting to be an involved, fully present mother while continuing to excel in a high pressure job (even on a part-time basis) are my goals, but the two are not always compatible. I have hits and misses and I am just as likely to send my daughter to school with an impressive full-scale hand painted paper mache model of Mt. Everest that we’ve spent hours working on together, as I am to send her with unbrushed hair and no snow pants. As for myself, I am also just as likely to walk into an important work meeting having prepared for hours, but with unbrushed hair and no snow- well, you get the idea. I know how hard it is to try to be everything to everyone, and to sometimes fail miserably. Although we may have different parenting and working styles at times, it is so great to partner with someone like Elaine who can offer support, humor, advice or even just hand me a tissue to dab at my guilty mom tears. If you are a mom, a husband of a mom, or even if you just know a mom, I hope my blog offers you some of these things (except for the tissues). Because we could all use a little Elaine in our lives.

Elaine Oberlin-Nesbit

I am Elaine and have three children – two boys ages ten and eight and a two year-old daughter. I am a CPA and worked for a few years in public accounting before settling in a corporate tax department. I too am a nerd like Robbin (or maybe she is a nerd like me) and married my public accounting sweetheart! I always knew I wanted to have children and I always knew I would be a working mother – like my mother and grandmother – however, I never knew it would be as hard as it is. I like to say taking care of the kids is the easy part – it is taking care of work and the work at home that is hard! I can pack lunches, read stories, manage activity schedules, cloth diaper, pump gallons of breast milk, draft a Prezi, and prep Paleo dinners. But wash and moisturize my face every night before bed? A dream. Put away the mountain of work shoes piled at the front door? A chore. Remember the action item list from a week old meeting? A struggle. Chop and wash lettuce each week for my own lunch? Sometimes. Have clean and organized horizontal surfaces at home? My nemesis.

I would not be where I was today if it weren’t for Robbin. I never in a million years would have thought that I would go to work and sit next to my best friend. Our office could be a dorm room if it weren’t for the 1980s Steelcase furniture and the lack of loft beds. Yes, we do have a coffee maker and a mini-fridge – where else would breast milk be stored?

Ledgers and Lollipops

Managing the Motherload

Monthly Archives: March 2016

Moms- The Double-Edged Sword

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