No Mom Can Do It Alone

Living abroad has so many ups and so many downs. Life can look like a constant vacation but we still deal with all the real life stuff. The difference is that we don’t have a “normal” support system in place.

When you live far away from the people who know you best, finding a solid support system can be really hard. Friendships at home change and your mom or sister can’t be on call because of the time difference. If you’re lucky, you find a support system where you live but people are often transient, much like yourself.

Last October, I hit a wall. I was making new mom friends, which was great, but the day-to-day life of being a stay-at-home mom, far from family and my support network was HARD. I was so overwhelmed and in a spiral of postpartum depression. Looking back I was in so deep, I didn’t even recognize it.

It was on the tail end of the hardest month of motherhood when something clicked and I realized I needed help. I’m naturally a control freak so it was really hard to admit I needed someone else to help me care for my child and stay on top of household things. Trust was another factor. After all, I had been with him day in and day out for 9 months.

Helpers

Having a helper is a very normal thing in Singapore. In fact, I was one of only a few of my friends who did not have live-in help when Charlie was born. So what is a helper? A helper is someone who lives with you and does exactly as the title implies - helps. Some families have helpers who mostly tend to the children. Other families have helpers who mostly do the grocery shopping, cooking and cleaning. It is pretty much up to you what the exact job description will look like for your family.

The idea was so foreign to me. It seemed crazy to have someone live in our home in order to help keep the house afloat. For the first 10 months of Charlie’s life we had a weekly cleaner but this was an absolute headache. The agency we got connected to sent someone new every other week. People would show up late and I was always training people on how to use my homemade household cleaners. Because yes, even in the depths of overwhelm, I still insisted on making all my own household cleaners in order to keep chemicals out of our house.

We only hired a babysitter 4 times in the first 10 months of Charlie’s life. I would see friends and family in the US who had parents or aunts or friends who lived nearby and would just pop over to take the kids for a few hours and give them a break. We just didn’t have that. The constant feeling of being “on” and the expense of a babysitting ($25-30/hour) was draining.

So when I hit this wall last fall, we crunched the numbers. It turned out that hiring full-time, live-in help was going to actually save us money.

The Time Was Right

We arrived in Singapore when I was 20 weeks pregnant. I remember going to a brunch our second week here with about 20 expectant moms (thank you, Facebook) and I just sat there and listened as all of them talked about their helpers or interviewing helpers. It was a whole new world to me. Like most new moms who just want to do what is best or, at least, what most people are doing, I started thinking we should hire a helper too. We ended up doing about 15 interviews before Charlie was born but no one felt right.

When we decided to resume a search for a helper this past fall, Jenny was the first person we met. She was warm, calm, soft spoken and just so sweet. She sat down on our couch and asked if she could hold Charlie. He went to her without a peep. Holly snuggled up against her leg while we spent about 45 minutes asking her questions. She held Charlie the whole time. We knew it was the right fit.

Jenny saved me in so many ways and she has been a god send. Charlie calls her “juh-ji” and lists her when he says all our names in the morning - “mama” “daaaa” juh-ji” “haaaa” (that last one is Holly). She is the reason we survived lockdown and I have been able to climb out of that hole and take the tiniest baby steps to feeling more like myself. 

Avoiding the Spiral

Jenny had to go back to the Philippines this week to take care of her family. The news hit us hard and there were a lot of tears. She is a member of our family and we already miss her deeply. She will be coming back but we don’t know when and the uncertainty is hard for all of us in these crazy Covid times.

When we got the news that Jenny had to leave, I began to spiral again. Will I fall back into the same overwhelm as last fall? How will I manage my business, that I just relaunched, without someone to help watch Charlie? I hesitate sharing this because I fear I’ll come off as whiney or spoiled. But I’ve created this space on the internet for moms to share things openly and free from judgment. I share this in hopes that other moms can relate, in some way, and that we can all support each other.

I’ve had time to settle, keep myself from spiraling further and I am in a place where I know we will be ok and make it through this next little bit of life. Jenny is safe, my schedule is flexible and Charlie is happy as long as he has a car in his hand.

But it did leave me asking - I know so many people raise kids without any help whatsoever - why is it so hard for me? 

As I start to navigate this next season of life, however long it may be, I need to figure out how to balance taking care of myself (something I completely neglected in my first year postpartum) while also caring for Charlie and our home. The thought of it overwhelms me but one thing is very clear - I have to let go of perfection. I have to let go of the idea that I can do it all and I have to lean on the friends who are willing to help. I have to find balance and that means that sometimes laundry will sit wet in the wash machine, dishes will pile in the sink and we will eat frozen pizza for dinner.

No mom can do it all alone.