Momtrepreneur report card

I recently started my adventure as a work at home mom type, and there have been moments when I felt like a complete failure, moments when I thought I was quite clearly losing my mind, and moments when I was apparently ‘not behaving good at all’ and had to be reprimanded by my 4 year old son – “mommy, you are using too many bad words today, too many! You have to stop it now!”

But as challenging as it is to work at home while caring for 3 small kids, it is not impossible, and can even be rewarding. Everyday I try to find the secret formula that would make this initiative ‘easy’, or less hard at least, I have a hunch though that there’s really no secret, instead we have to make do with some mommy-hacking and a few great strategies for working at home.

There are days when I literally just cry over the client deadlines, screaming kids, needy husband, and the complete disaster that is our house, and days when I just am so exhausted it’s almost impossible to even function, but then there are days when I create an entire website in only a few early morning hours and the client totally adores it, days when the house is clean, dinner is cooked, and I still have time for a dvd with my hubby, and days when I can drop everything and head out for a kiddie-sized adventure – and then I know that it’s all worth it.

If I had to pick one thing that I missed the most about a ‘real’ job, it would be having a team, or just people to interact with and talk to on a daily basis, people to share my ideas with and to get feedback from, but at least I do have my darling husband, who, ummm, at least tries to be supportive with his “it looks good, what else do you want me to say? I told you that all websites look the same to me!” standard response each time I solicit his opinion on one of my creations.

My almost-daily haunts are invaluable in inspiring and motivating, or just in making me feel connected, you know, like Chris – what can I say, the woman has 7 kids, and of course, Wendy – she must be like the queen of working at home! Jen talks about motherhood and wifey-hood in a way that I can really relate to, Randa is my example of a successful webby mom, to keep up with the single peeps, I love Organic’s little home in the blogisphere, and there are so many more of you, too many to list here, but I will have a list of my reads out soon.

After much trepidation, I finally began to publicize my portfolio, and gained some really lovely clients, I launched 2 free themes – Sakeena for WordPress and Life for Textpattern, and I taught a web development course, which started off great and slowly waned due to mid-summer-madness-syndrome affecting my students – I postponed the class until September.

It’s funny that some days I lament over my life, or lack of a ‘life’, and I know that there are working moms wishing to be able to stay at home, and stay at home moms longing to work – sometimes it just feels like a no-win kind of situation – but such is the nature of motherhood, it’s our ability to do what we believe is best for ourselves and our families that will help us find peace and fulfillment. My most important lessons – find time for some mom escapes, don’t panic, avoid the parent trap , and enjoy life!!

Now, the contest!!

One of my clients, Silver Lily, who has a really wonderful collection of beautiful handmade jewelry, has generously donated this lovely necklace and earring set – {a gorgeous glamorous sterling silver necklace with sparkling jet stones and a delicate filigree pendant hangs with high cut citrine briolettes. Matching earrings .approx length of necklace 15”.7mm.Earrings hang approx2.5”}

All you need to do is subscribe to this blog, either through your feed reader or email (if you’re already subscribed, thanks! and of course you’re also welcome to enter) and leave a comment here – I am doing a random draw on August 21st. Good Luck!!

Don’t panic, I’ve got you covered

Occasionally, and mostly at nighttime, I feel like I am dying – no, not in an ‘inevitably’ kind of way, but in a ‘right-this-instant’ kind of way.

This past weekend when I thought I was actually having a heart attack, I decided to pay attention to my feelings and visit a doctor, who diagnosed that I am in fact suffering from anxiety and not heart disease.

It was in many ways a huge relief to hear this news, not only because of the obvious reasons, but also because not having any answers was really just adding to my anxiety and making matters worse. It was also a tremendous comfort to know that I was not the only one that was experiencing this (as I felt slightly stupid about my ‘fake’ heart attack), and thanks for all of your comments and emails!

I am feeling 100% better, and not because my problems have been solved, but because I finally understand what is happening to me.

The interesting thing that I discovered was that the anxiety is not necessarily brought on by stress, I mean, it can be caused by stress and workload, but I think that it depends on how each individual person handles stress or workload – I think that the anxiety comes because of things in our lives that we feel are our responsibility, but that we are perhaps overwhelmed by. In many cases when the anxiety is caused by workload, I think it is because the person does not completely enjoy and/or understand the work, leading not only to stress, but also to panic.

My panic is not caused by my workload, I don’t think, because I really enjoy my job, and to me, it is almost therapeutic to lose myself in a website design or a challenging project, even my writing is a point of emotional release for me, and because I love these things, although they may become stressful at times, I don’t feel the anxiety.

I know the cause of my panic attacks, and I am doing everything that I can to find a solution, but sometimes I forget that I am not the one in control. Looking back at all of times that I have felt this way, I realize that those were the moments where I felt like it was my duty to solve all our problems but I didn’t know the answers, all I knew was that I couldn’t do it – that I was failing, which of course led to feelings of insecurity and panic. Often the feelings would just sneak up on me, at times when I felt like I wasn’t thinking about anything, but of course feelings of insecurity and failure do not leave us, they remain and linger, just waiting for us to let our defenses down…

When discussing possible treatments, medication like Zoloft often comes up, and although I know that there are people who need it (some years ago, it helped my mom), I don’t think I am in need of medication at this stage, instead I am opting to employ some self-care strategies.

My first defense mechanism is meditation, and for Muslims this usually comes in the form of prayer – it does help the most, at least for me. Secondly, I am trying to keep up with the squash, or I think any form of physical activity, but the reason I am so in love with squash is because it is a competitive game and provides a welcome escape from the somewhat dehabilitating (I know that this is not a real word) thoughts that fill my head.

Thirdly, I love crafty things, so I am trying to just do things that I enjoy, and sometimes I even include the kids! Today for example, I spend an hour outside coloring the patio stones with chalk – coloring is somehow very relaxing for me. I also started to do art journaling, which is somewhat akin to scrapbooking but without the expense and the stress of having to create with perfection, but more like free expression of thoughts in a visual form, and again the process is very relaxing – I also bought journals (from the dollar store) for my kids so we occasionally work on it together. [a more detailed post about art journaling later]

Here is some more information about anxiety and panic attacks, there is also some other suggestions for self-care.

How are you dealing with the panic?

Wanna be an eMom?

Wendy Piersall of eMoms at Home, whom I have written about many times, is/was looking for a few great writers!

Now, I am a little late on posting this, because of my blog issues, and I know that she’s already had a huge response, but you know, better late than never… and maybe one of your guys could be a completely perfect fit! Good Luck!

These are paid positions in which there is a “base” pay plus several forms of incentive compensation:

Each writer would get a percentage of the advertising revenue from their blog

Each writer is free to incorporate their own affiliate links into their content

The entire team will get free training and advice on blogging, traffic generation, affiliate marketing, and content creation

Compensation will increase with more experience and length of time with the company

Although I am fairly open in regards to topics to write about, I’m interested in both ‘traditional’ mom content as well as perhaps some personal blogs in which writers want to tackle tougher personal, controversial or societal issues – the sky is the limit as I am extremely open-minded. But here are some very basic suggestion ideas (I particularly hope to find someone who wants to cover the topics with a *):

Organization and productivity
Money management
Conception and Pregnancy
Fashion trends for moms
Home improvement, decorating or landscaping*
Recipes and cooking
Freelance service business strategies
Kids activities*
Holiday crafts, recipes, projects (year-round covering all holidays)*
Crafts (recreational how to’s and ideas)
Crafts businesses (the business side)
Contests and / or reviews*
Natural and organic living
Tech products for parents
Kids electronics/games/toys
Book reviews
Anything health-related

Additionally, writers would not have to do any blog setup or maintenance – I would take care of all hosting, design, html, everything. All you need to know is a tiny bit about blogging, writing, and how to create a hyperlink in a post.

This is the perfect opportunity for someone who wants to learn more about blogging and online marketing to grow it into their own home based business, or for an aspiring writer who wants a laid-back ongoing work at home gig. If you know of someone who would be interested in this opportunity, please forward this email to them – or if YOU are interested, let me know!

To be considered, please send the following to “workfor@emomsathome.com”:

Name
Email address
Daytime phone number
URL to current blog OR 2-3 writing samples (article format only)

Thanks to everyone and I look forward to hearing from you!

Warm regards,
Wendy Piersall :: eMom