If you’ve been around this blog for awhile, you might remember that, during my many years of stay-at-home mom-hood, I would often tell Emily that “work is for suckers.”
Then a few years ago, I did not heed my best advice, and I went and got a job. Only part-time though! And actually, it was perfect for me. So all was well and good and this particular work was NOT for suckers.
And THEN…I liked the job so much that I thought after Jonah went to kindergarten, I would like to go full time. Be a REAL employee, get benefits, etc. I really wanted to further my career and I thought this was the way to do it.
Long story short, after about seven months of full time work, Mark Zuckerburg of Facebook fame decided in August 2017 that he was going to drastically reduce the reach that Facebook business pages got -especially if they linked out to articles that took people OFF of Facebook.
Which is exactly what I did all day – write articles for the website I was editor for, then post them on Facebook so people would click off to Facebook and go to said website.
So, after August 2017, my job got a whole lot harder. I powered through it for about 10 more months, but the added stress was no bueno. To write article after article and have NO ONE read it…pretty disheartening. Maybe once a quarter I’d find a glitch in the matrix and I’d have one go viral, but it was seriously just luck. When you publish 4 articles a day, 5 days a week, and have one or two out of over 200 really do well…it’s demoralizing. ESPECIALLY when you used to have success on a much more regular basis than that and everyone thought you were great at your job. WOMP WOMP.
In April Bobby’s Lexus dealership got bought out. This, while not all bad, has added a lot of stress to his work load (he is shop foreman now). So, this whole spring we were both VERY stressed. With two VERY STRESSED parents, our household wasn’t functioning well. Something had to GIVE.
So, I asked my work if I could go back to part-time. Back to being a contractor. Have a little less stress and more flexible time. And they said YES!!! I am soo soo blessed by that. To accomplish this, I had to formally resign my full time job, and sign a contract to be an independent contractor. Now I am ONLY writing, not managing the Facebook page or the website traffic, and after two weeks of having that off my plate, I can say I made the right choice. I’m so happy to still be writing, which I love to do, and on parenting subjects I am passionate about. I am also happy to be working less hours, so I actually have less child care and MORE TIME to spend with my kids this summer, and to start managing our household better.
I’m also hashtag blessed to have more time to put into the MONAT hair care business Emily and I are doing together! If you are curious as to what that is all about, you can request to join our Facebook group. I’m also doing beauty product reviews (earlier this week I announced a NEW FAVORITE MASCARA!) there, too!
Finally, I’m so excited to be able to blog HERE more. I have missed writing just for me, and to crack Emily up, a LOT. But working full time left me zero creativity to spare. I can’t wait to spin you some more yarns about what my family is up to these days.
So, yeah, I no longer think work is for suckers, but I do think I’ve found my happy place with work and I’m thankful!
