Earlier this week in the middle of night, I was laid in bed struggling to sleep because I was counting up how many months of my career break are already through, and worrying about what would happen after it\u2019s over. My children started off in a very bad place when I first stopped working. The first six weeks of this break were in crisis mode. It was highly intense. The break was necessary and overdue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The hardest part is\u2026 it\u2019s working. The boys are doing a lot better \u2013 things are starting to get easier at home. They are achieving things I wouldn\u2019t have been able to picture 2 months ago when everything had gone to pot. My elder son has been leaving the house, looking after himself more, regularly seeing friends. This sounds pretty normal for an 11-year-old but when he could hardly dress or leave the house not so long ago, it feels absolutely fantastic to see. My younger son is no longer having regular meltdowns, and is tolerating setbacks. This is a huge development compared to a couple of months ago when he was like a tinderbox. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Moreover, after months of very limited interaction – where my eldest son stays in his computer chair and avoids interacting with my youngest, the boys are actually playing with each other and enjoying each other’s company again. I couldn’t believe my eyes when it started to happen and it’s increasing as the weeks roll by. Amazing, truly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is the anguish of a temporary solution. I know it\u2019s highly likely I\u2019ll have to go back to work in 8.5 months.\u00a0And then we may be faced with similar problems to those we started out with: the boys can’t attend school without significant impacts on their wellbeing, and they need supervision.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This consumes my thoughts, because I know this time is precious. I don\u2019t know of any fully concrete plan that can work out when I have to return to my job. The stakes feel high. But precisely because the time is finite, I also don\u2019t want to spend it worrying about this, because then I won\u2019t be able to make the most of it. It\u2019s a hard thing to achieve. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The quagmire of heatwaves over the past month or so has made it difficult to be present \u2013 getting out, planning activities all feels pretty difficult when it\u2019s too hot to think. I\u2019m deeply looking forward to our family holiday in a week\u2019s time \u2013 where we\u2019ll be enjoying cooler climes and, as is still very rare, enjoying time outside<\/em>of our own house. I\u2019m not expecting it to go smoothly, but I am actually excited about this. Excitement for a holiday feels great after being in crisis mode for so long\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n After this, I set my sights on making the most of the time without living in constant fear of this time ending, or being consumed by what happens next!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Time is ticking Earlier this week in the middle of night, I was laid in bed struggling to sleep because I was counting up how many months of my career break are already through, and worrying about what would happen after it\u2019s over. My children started off in a very bad place when I first […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-93","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-career-break"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/reassemblinglife.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/reassemblinglife.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/reassemblinglife.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reassemblinglife.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reassemblinglife.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=93"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/reassemblinglife.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":96,"href":"https:\/\/reassemblinglife.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93\/revisions\/96"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/reassemblinglife.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=93"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reassemblinglife.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=93"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/reassemblinglife.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=93"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}