Reem Gaafar

Several years ago a friend of mine – an architect and interior designer by profession – told me during a conversation we were having that she was working from home while taking care of her young daughter.

‘Oh, you’re working from home? That must be easy,’ I said, scoffing at the mental image I had of someone lounging around all day in a clean, quiet house, tapping away at their laptop whenever they felt inspired to as they waited for dinner to cook itself and the husband to come home with flowers. Fast forward several years, and a recruiter is asking me in a job interview why I had wasted two and a half years of my life (sitting around at home) AFTER I had explained all the consultancies and projects I had worked on while working home, and in my exhausted irritation I have to keep myself from lunging across the table and gouging their eyes out. Because now, of course, I know firsthand what a total nightmare it is to be both a full-time mom AND a freelancer working from home.

As an ex-emergency medicine physician and current freelance public health consultant and medical writer, I chose to stay home to care for my preterm born, moderately naughty twin boys while trying to maintain some kind of link with the professional world that was quickly moving on without me. And I discovered that, contrary to popular belief, working from home while being a mother and homemaker is not at all about lounging around all day with ample time at hand to do what one pleases while the rest of the workforce battles that merciless 9 to 6 workday.

There are a number of pros to working from home, mainly saving time and money on commuting to the office, and being able to care full time for children too young for daycare. It’s a decision that many mothers choose to make and many choose not to – there’s no right or wrong. But if you’re considering moving your business hours home, or if you’re just curious what your co-worker who shows up at the office once every 3 months actually does to earn her paycheck, consider the following:

1. Your home is your workplace, and your workplace is your home.

Read that twice; it’s not as nice as it sounds. Rather than having a fixed number of hours working at the office and the rest of the day to your home, it’s all jumbled together. You can’t simply ‘switch off’ the office mode once you step out into the house, but rather, the office mode is running in the background all day long. This is where the babies’ sleep schedule is master of all. No naps or sleep training? You’re dead meat.

2. Trying to carve out time dedicated to work means that something else has to give.

Which means time that should be spent reading with the kids, doing laundry, cooking meals, running errands, but most often sleeping. And we all know how lack of sleep paralyzes the brain and makes it all the more difficult to function normally; physically and mentally. However, it is almost impossible to carry out tasks that require concentration – such as writing – in the presence of a 2.5ft tall screaming bundle of sunshine that is pulling your hair while hurling plastic blocks and food all over the room.

3. A communication nightmare.

Be it with your clients or your co-workers, the majority of your communication is through email and phone. You have no idea what the context behind this communication is, and can easily misinterpret the meaning. You’re not kept up to date on the smaller details of group tasks, so the information you are basing your understanding on is often outdated, and sometimes completely irrelevant. And in the absence of body language and tone of voice, the same line you’re reading could either be a simple statement of a fact or a condescending scolding. All this combined with the distraction and lack of sleep is a recipe for disaster.

4. You’re working with people, but not really working with people.

They’re all there in one space/office/building and you’re on the other side of town/country at your dining-table-turned-office-desk. Sure, its a break from office politics and the usual drama, but you miss out on building those personal relationships so vital to keep people connected. Just coming into an office every morning, greeting people, hearing about someone’s sick child or awesome holiday, gossiping about your boss’s secretary’s awful new haircut, or hearing a genuine ‘thank you’ for advice given or a pencil lent are all human interactions that make the task at hand more bearable. Frankly, working from home is pretty lonely.

5. People don’t take your work seriously.

I know this because I didn’t take other work-from-home moms’ work seriously either, and whenever I am required to answer the question ‘where are you working now?’, I need to give a long, detailed explanation of how my working from home is an actual job alongside the job I already have: being a full-time mom. Which by the way has no weekends or downtime, no remuneration, and very little recognition.

6. Your kids will most likely grow up hating you.

Well maybe not (I hope), but at the moment all they see is you sitting at a computer or talking on the phone when you’re supposed to be giving them and only them 150% of your attention, 150% of the time. Whenever I am racing to meet a deadline I have to push away those crushing feelings of guilt and self-chastisement that accompany my feeble attempts to block out the screams and tears, and the – occasional – need to lock everyone out of the room.

So you might want to think twice before you consider making the jump from office to PJs, or before asking a work-from-home mom what she actually does all day, anyway. Its not all peaches and icecream!