I Cannot Move Another Muscle

Last week, I moved out of my house.

My marriage is ending, we sold the house, and I moved around the corner to a place where I can keep my kids and puppy in the best possible configuration of “normal,” while navigating single parenting and keeping everything running smoothly at a’parently.

No sooner were the doors closed behind the movers than the true unpaid labor of homekeeping hit me like a freight train.

Filing a claim with the movers for damaged items.

Putting the puppy in daycare for multiple days while a repair issue kept dragging out.

Doing laundry in unfamiliar machines and

Unpacking.

Putting away dishes in a new kitchen. Fixing meals when I don’t know where anything is.

And then, on top of all that, one of my kids got sick. I’m talking five days off school and two trips to the pediatrician sick. Appointments. Copays. Medicines. Humidifiers and nose drops and cough syrup and ear drops and extra ginger ale trips.

I’m a well-resourced mama, with my own mother nearby and an amazing support network.

In all this chaos, I still managed to get in two workouts and several full nights’ sleep.

I’m grateful. But damn, I’m so tired.

And I’m not alone.

American women performed $1.5 trillion in unpaid labor last year. Notice I said “performed,” and I didn’t say “earned.”

Everything I’ve done in the past two weeks to take care of myself and my family was necessary. I’m glad to be able to do it. But there is no doubt it impacted my productivity as an entrepreneur and society sees no value in what I’ve literally spent 12 hours a day figuring out and providing.

We’re on the eve of International Women’s Day and I’m struggling to formulate my own thoughts and response to it - it’s 2020, and we’re still living with unfair systems and expectations, and surrounded by outdated ideas about motherhood that have not adapted to modern life.

Excuse me while I go look for some better options. Maybe they’re in that box over there.