The birth of “Business Mom”

Happy 10th birthday, Shelby!

Today marks the tenth anniversary of the most significant day in my life. 

Today is the day my oldest child, Shelby, was born.  About a week after we brought her home from the hospital, I had the second most significant day of my life.  This time, it was because my husband and I had made the decision that I would return to my career, and he would quit his job to stay home and take care of our child. 

This was the birth of “Business Mom”- I just didn’t know it yet.

     There were plenty of signs that my life was transforming.  My neat little house looked as though a Babies R Us truck had crashed into it.  All the designer candles that had decorated every free inch of space were gone, never to be seen again.  My hair went from a fashionable, time-consuming style to a plain one that was easy to sweep up into a twist on top of my head.  And my makeup bag eventually decomposed into traces of pulverized blush and a lint-covered lipstick.

     It is said that we are the sum total of our experiences.  So it makes sense that motherhood would start to affect my behavior at the office.  I found myself using phrases such as, “I don’t CARE who started it!” and “You made this mess- you clean it up!”  I’ve even found an instance or two where I could toss in a ”So help me, I’ll turn this car right around!”  Then I started to apply management techniques to the family.  We have family meetings whenever there is anything important to discuss.  I delegate just like I do at the office.  Unfortunately, my husband has told me on several occassions that he is not my employee and that I should stop bossing him around.

     I did not realize I was “Business Mom” until Shelby called it to my attention.  It was at a Girl Scout meeting.  There were three types of moms at these meetings.  The ones that didn’t work or worked part-time would come to the meetings dressed in jeans and sweat shirts.  They would sit around and socialize while the girls had their meeting.   Then there were the “Medical Moms”, always dressed in colorful scrubs, who would drop off and pick up their children.  They did not stay to socialize.  And then there was me.  I never dropped Shelby off at the meeting- I would still be at work in my office- and I would arrive, five minutes before the end, dressed in a suit and heels, usually somewhat out of breath.  At one meeting I rushed in, a couple of minutes late, and Shelby looked up and greeted me by saying, “Look!  It’s Business Mom!”  Her friends all smiled at me and said, “Hi, Business Mom!”  It hit me like a wooden teeter-totter.  My maternal personality and my professional one had melted together like crayons on the dashboard.

     Now that I was aware of the transformation, I started using it to my advantage.  Recently I was struggling with my youngest daughter over potty training.  I consulted the Internet, but all of the articles stated that the child had to be willing to be trained.  I dusted off the one parenting book in my library, and took a peek inside.  It said the same thing.  Aaargh!  I stood there, trying to come up with a strategy.  I quickly glanced through my professional book collection, hoping that some title like “Seven Habits of Highly Effective Toddlers” would pop out at me.  It didn’t- but I did come up with an idea.  Children are human beings, right?  Employees are human beings too, right?  Why couldn’t I try to apply techniques from my business books to potty training?

     The books on leadership said I should “lead by example.”  I knew that wouldn’t work- my daughter had been walking in on me while I was in the bathroom for three years and it hadn’t had any effect on her.  The books on management said that I should design a “rewards system to help motivate the employee.”  I tried several forms of bribery, incuding sticker charts and potty snacks.  Strike two for the business books.  But finally, I found one passage in a book by John Maxwell that might be helpful.  It talked about how nobody could motivate another person- the motivation had to come from inside.  What if I helped my child  discover her own inner motivation? 

     I started right away, explaining how comfortable “big girl underwear” would feel.  We talked about how nice it felt to be warm and dry.  I talked about how she couldn’t attend preschool until she was potty trained.  I reinforced these things for days, giving my daughter a chance to think about them.  Finally, one Saturday afternoon, I reviewed all these things with her and asked her, “So… what will you do the next time you have to go to the bathroom?”  She was sitting at the kitchen table, legs swinging under her while she mulled over my question.  She then looked up at me, smiled, and said very sweetly, “I’m planning on pooping in my socks.”

     Eventually she did potty train herself.  And once she was ready, she was perfect, never having an accident.  I’m not sure if she did it to please me and make sure that there would be no further “Disciplinary Action, up to and including Termination,” or if Time and Nature just took care of it.  Nevertheless, “Business Mom”  is here to stay, with all sorts of ways of combining two worlds that would probably be better left apart.