The year after having your first baby is essentially the craziest year ever. It's filled with anxiety, multitasking, sleepless nights, and, for a lot of people, heading back to the office on top of all that. It's a pretty wild amount of adjusting, but some people seem to really thrive during times of chaos.
Take one superhuman mom, for example, who managed to write a book shortly after her first baby was born. She sneakily accomplished it while on her lunch break at work. It's a truly astounding feat, because most people who have a new baby at home and are back in the office would just use their lunch break to sit and stare into space, maybe daydream about a nice beach and a Rum Runner. But this amazing mother wrote. A. NOVEL.
But the wildest part of the story isn't that she managed the most epic multitasking ever. It's that her husband is all riled up about it. That's right. He even wrote into Slate's "Dear Prudence" column to complain.
So, what is the husband's gripe, you might ask? It's that she apparently broke the deal she made with him to pause her writing ambitions. But still, it seems a little off. You be the judge.
The husband wrote, "My wife is an accomplished author who also holds down a fulltime job in an unrelated field, mostly for the benefits. When we had our first child last year, we agreed that she would pause her writing career — something had to go with a new baby at home."
Well, that makes sense, right?
His post continued, "Except, it turns out she didn’t pause it. She got a great idea for a new novel, wrote it secretly during her lunch break at work, and sold it for $100,000." Ummmm … what?!
Slowing down your writing career after you have a baby makes a lot of sense on the one hand. You're obviously going to be pretty occupied when you're at home. But this mom didn't interrupt her time with her baby at all to write her novel. She wasn't even writing with her baby on her lap or hiring a babysitter to take over for her, or being neglectful in any way. She wrote the book on her lunch break — the time when she could've been, ya know, tending to herself by straight-up just eating food to keep herself alive.
It totally makes sense to get upset when one parent isn't participating in parenting, or is making excuses to come home late from the office. But that doesn't seem like this was the case at all! Mom was on top of her responsibilities and then some. She also just banked $100,000 — so, seriously, what is the issue here?
The dad even acknowledged that minor detail by saying, "I feel so many things right now; it’s hard to be mad at someone when they casually tell you your son’s college education is now paid for, and her lunch hour is technically hers to do as she wishes."
If only he hadn't followed it up with, "But she went against our deal!"
Yes, she did go against the deal. We'll give him that. But it doesn't seem like anyone suffered in any way. His real gripe is that she could've been home an hour earlier if she had, I guess, just eaten lunch and not worried about writing, which is true. But the payoff seems amazing enough for him to bite his tongue.
We also don't see how this would even be a conversation at all if she were a man. Men are allowed to have ambitions outside of parenthood. They're also allowed to have — wait for it — hobbies. Friends. Ya know, normal things that seem to continue for men after they become parents but that for women, largely, get zapped.
We're fully Team Mom on this one, and so is Prudence, who wrote back, "Her lunch hour isn’t 'technically' hers to use as she wishes — it’s 100 percent completely hers to use as she wishes!"
She also shared the perspective that Mad-Dad is probably feeling jealous or insecure, which truly seems to fit, because why else would he really be blasting her on the internet? Settle down. Take the college money to the bank, and maybe try saying thanks, bro. Your wife doesn't owe every spare second of her brain time to you or your baby simply because she's a mom.
