• When our first child was born, we decided I would stay home, caring for our baby.
• I had a thriving career, but my pay was low, and childcare was expensive.
• I love being a mom, but staying at home made me miserable.

When I became pregnant with my first child, my husband and I made the difficult yet practical decision for me to stay home.

Even though I had a thriving career in higher ed, my income was low, childcare was expensive, and travel (a requirement of my job) wouldn't be feasible anymore — or at least for years to come.

With a few cuts to our household budget, it just made sense for me to stay home. Besides, motherhood would be the most rewarding experience of my life, right?

I was lonelier than ever

When our first baby was born, I was so in love with him and elated to finally have what I wanted most: to be a mom. In those first weeks, I felt strongly that I would love my new role as a stay-at-home mom and couldn't imagine going back to work. However, after my husband's paternity leave ended and he returned to work, I was home alone with the baby, and reality set in.

I was sleep deprived, exhausted from exclusively nursing, and lonelier than I had ever been. I was jealous of my friends who were still working and could get away to do something other than care for a baby. Desperate for connection, I joined several baby and me classes through my local parks and rec, hoping to make a few friends navigating the same challenges.

The moms I met were kind, but our conversations revolved around our children's sleeping and eating schedules and how we were dealing with our toddlers' tantrums. Somewhere along the way, my interests and identity faded away. I needed more intellectual stimulation, I wanted to do more to connect with the community, and I wanted to use my talents outside of the home.

Staying home wasn't for me

As months turned into years, I felt increasingly isolated. I hired a babysitter once a week in the afternoon so I could escape the monotony of child rearing. One of these afternoons, I remember going to the movies alone and sobbing through "La La Land," not because of the storyline but because it reminded me of what it felt like to be alive and have a sense of self outside motherhood.

When I finally summoned the courage to talk to my stay-at-home-mom friends about my feelings, it felt as if I was violating an unspoken rule. Shouldn't I be grateful for this opportunity to bond with my child without the stress of a career? Wasn't it a privilege to be there for all of my child's milestones?

In fact, I knew how blessed I was to be able to stay home with my children, but I still felt so depressed. Five years of staying home and two babies later, it wasn't until I returned to work with a purpose outside the home that I truly felt like myself again.

I truly love being a mom, but I recognize that staying at home is not my strength. Working outside of the home in the community makes me a better mom, more present, patient, and fulfilled.

Stay-at-home motherhood isn't for everyone, and that's OK. We need to allow mothers to speak honestly about the complexities of raising children, including the very real feelings of isolation, loss of identity, and emotional debility that often come with motherhood.

• When my kids were young, I wanted to stay home with them and be there for their firsts.
• Now that they're older, I want to return to a full-time position.
• The gap in my résumé is an obstacle, and I also want flexible hours.

Before having my first child in 2020, I worked every weekend and many holidays as an award-winning television reporter. The combination of motherhood and the pandemic inspired me to stay home with my children instead of sending them to day care as infants. Fortunately, my husband's career took off at the same time, allowing us to have that option.

Now I have two kids — a 4-year-old son and a 2-year-old daughter — and like many mothers, I've always struggled to find the right balance between spending quality time with my kids and wanting to excel in my profession.

I stayed home with my kids when they were young

Initially, I thought I'd return to work when my son was 1, but finding childcare was difficult. It was hard for me to focus on the job search without it, and shortly after starting the job search, I learned I was pregnant again. My pregnancy and a lack of suitable day care with open spots led me to continue staying home, working on occasional freelance projects.

I enjoyed spending the first two years of my son's life at home with him, nursing him around the clock and being there for his first words and steps. I wanted to give my daughter the same undivided attention. So, a few months after she was born, our son started day care. We figured he could learn how to socialize and make friends while also learning from people who've devoted their lives to early childhood education.

The years flew by. We bonded through nursing on demand, and I enjoyed witnessing her learn to walk and talk. I took her to storytime at the library and saw such joy in her eyes as she interacted with other children. By the time my daughter was 2, we decided to send her to day care as well. I knew she was ready — and frankly, I was ready to re-enter the workforce and take my career to the next level.

But finding an affordable day care with an open spot was like finding a needle in a haystack. I lucked out, and she started going to day care for about six hours a day. I've had to increase my freelance projects to pay for it, which has left me with little time to apply for jobs.

I'm enjoying the flexibility freelancing offers, but now that my kids are older, I desire higher pay, benefits, and dependable income. It's an unstable field, and it's hard to make the same amount of money freelancing as I did in my reporting career without working excessive hours, so I've started to casually look for full-time remote roles.

However, this time around, I'm prioritizing a better work-life balance. I want the flexibility to tend to my children when needed, whether they're sick, have a half-day at school, or are out for spring or winter breaks.

It's a competitive job market, and the gap in my résumé is an obstacle

With the numerous layoffs in the news industry, finding remote positions is extremely competitive, even for a veteran journalist like myself, who is bilingual, college-educated, and a Fulbright alum. Often, I'll see that positions on LinkedIn receive hundreds of applications within a day of being posted. Before quitting my previous reporting role, I don't think I fully comprehended how difficult it'd be to re-enter the workforce.

The gap in my résumé also feels daunting. Should I put stay-at-home mom on my résumé, or should I just list the freelance projects I've worked on? During the application process, I've struggled to explain the varied transferable skills and experience I've acquired since leaving my full-time position.

I've done everything from writing for national publications to self-publishing my second book. I blog about my travels and create content for Instagram. I delved into marketing by pitching and promoting my book and blog for two daytime television shows. I've also acquired management skills as chairperson of our family reunion board of directors and fundraised to host two 100-person weekend-long events. But how do I succinctly capture that and previous working experience in a résumé or during a phone interview?

I've wondered if stating I'm self-employed sends my résumé into the rejection pile. Finding full-time employment after taking a break to care for my children has been harder than I envisioned. But, I'm confident the right position will come along, one that utilizes my talents, piques my interest, and pays me at least the same salary I made before, while also allowing me to spend nights, weekends, and holidays with my children.

• My husband wasn't feeling fulfilled with his job, so we decided he should be a stay-at-home dad.
• Our new dynamic has challenged traditional roles and sparks mixed reactions from our friends.
• There are things that surprise me about our arrangement, including FOMO and continued mom guilt.

Having a stay-at-home husband used to be a novelty for me, but after nearly a year of it, we've settled into a routine where mom works, and dad takes charge of the kids when they are not in school and daycare. While for the most part we are happy in our roles, there have been times when I have been surprised about the reactions to our situation — from both our peer network and within myself.

While my husband was never that interested in kids until we had our own, he has since blossomed as a dad, insisting that he thrives even with little downtime as he enjoys spending time with our two boys so much. Certainly, there's no better sound than hearing their eruptions of laughter at yet another of dad's silly games.

It means that when my husband ended up feeling unfulfilled in his last full-time role, it didn't take him long to decide that he would feel more satisfied taking care of our kids. This opened up the space for me to open myself up to full—time work as a freelance journalist, from my previous part-time capacity, and for us both to lean into the environment where we're most happy. While we're now settled into our roles, there are some things that have really surprised me about our situation.

My husband knows things about our kids that I don't

One of the biggest revelations for me is that my husband has come to know certain things about our kids more intimately than I do. For example, their food preferences, and when they need new clothes and shoes. When I take over meal prep on the weekends, he'll often step in when I'm about to put something on their plates that they no longer like, but which is news to me. I shouldn't be surprised that this happens, but it does make me feel a bit out of the loop, and like I've lost my edge as a mom.

I still contribute a lot to the family

I also feel compelled to "help" where possible, even though I am working full time. We split drop offs and picks up equally, and I help with chores like laundry when he's out with our youngest during the week. On Friday afternoons, I pause work to be able to take our oldest to his weekly swimming lesson, and on Saturday mornings, I take our youngest. I see it as our weekly bonding time. As I work from home most of the time, it's usually easy for me to step in.

I don't think this stems from mom guilt or not feeling like I can fully hand control over to my husband. It's quite the opposite, actually. I'm fully aware of everything on his to-do list and how being a stay-at-home parent is hardly the easier option, having taken 13 months maternity leave myself with our oldest son, now 6, when our roles were reversed.

Whether it's doing laundry, cooking, shopping, gardening, financial and life admin, plus providing silver butler service to our boys, he barely has a free moment all day. I know some moms I know who don't do paid work, or work part-time, while their partners work full-time, concentrating solely on their work during the day and being largely unavailable. I can only imagine how unsupported they must feel.

I still feel FOMO from time to time

It's also hard not to let FOMO (fear of missing out) creep in, especially when it sounds like everyone is having lots of fun in the other room while I am working. Or worse, when the boys come to blows and need grown-up intervention, and I have to stop myself from going in.

It can be distracting, but I like hearing what they are getting up to, because I miss them, even though we are in the same house at the same time.

Other people are going to have opinions about our arrangement

Other people's reactions have been strange too — perhaps not totally unsurprising, but a little disappointing and frustrating. We sometimes get asked how we're affording to live on just one income, even though there are plenty of stay at home moms in our school peer group and nobody asks them the same thing. Likewise, no one asks when the stay at home moms plan to get a job, but I regularly get asked this about my husband.

Our situation might not be permanent, as we're happy to flex as different opportunities arise, but I can bet that if I returned to being the primary carer, fewer people would ask about my career prospects.

Older people also seem to assume that my husband is working and I am at home with the kids. For example, at a recent family gathering an old family friend was with us looking on as our boys ran around the room. We were talking about what a handful they are, and the friend said to my husband, "But your wife does all the work, right?"

The friend also asked whether I was a terrible cook, because my husband looked like he'd lost weigh. Little did they know, he is the cook in our house, and always has been, even before we had kids. These kinds of preconceptions from older generations are unhelpful, but I try not to take it too personally and remember that things used to be different.

Mom guilt doesn't go away

The mom guilt does rise up, though, when I see how fast our youngest in particular is growing up. When our oldest was the same age, around 2, I worked four days a week, and Friday was our day together. I don't have that with our youngest at the moment, as it makes sense for me to work as much as possible, so sometimes I feel a pang of regret of what I could be missing with him.

But I have to remember he is with his dad, and when I was bonding with our oldest on our Friday adventures, daddy was at work. At that time, there were things that I experienced and he missed out on, so it feels like we've come full circle. What I love most, though, is how our boys are seeing that it doesn't matter which parent works and which parent is at home.

• William Harrington became a stay-at-home dad to support his wife, Heather's, career growth.
• Heather's career in digital management outpaced childcare costs, which prompted the decision.
• When they married in 2022, William took her last name. He now helps her with her company.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with William Harrington, a stay-at-home dad from Lewisville, Texas. It's been edited for length and clarity.

I met my wife, Heather, through mutual friends in 2010. I was 19 and homeless, and she, at 21, was raising two small children on her own. When she offered me a place to stay, what started as kindness blossomed quickly into love after just two weeks.

Heather's children immediately became a cherished part of my life. I went from not having much in the world to being a young stepparent. As a stepkid myself, I wanted to provide the permanency and stability I lacked while growing up. Heather was waitressing at the time while she taught herself to code.

She now supports our entire family of five, and I stay home to care for the kids and run the household.

By the time we had our third child, one of us needed to stay home

In 2012, after two years together, I got a job as an opening manager at Sonic, working 55 to 60 hours weekly.

Shortly before that, my wife landed her first big job as a digital experience manager at an advertising agency.

Around this time, she got pregnant with our youngest. We weighed the childcare options versus my pay and my wife's, as Heather earned more, and childcare was more expensive than what I made. As Heather's career was quickly ascending, we decided it would be best if I quit my job and stayed home.

Running a house is constant work

At home, I ensure the kids get to school and all their needs are met, and I take care of all house chores and cooking.

Many people in my life imagine I've got all this free time and am doing nothing. Family can be particularly judgmental. Once, a relative asked me, "When will you be a man?" Navigating societal expectations and stereotypes about gender roles can sometimes feel like an uphill battle.

It's hard to be your own cheerleader sometimes with that criticism. Social isolation can also be challenging, as my daily environment doesn't provide the adult interactions I once had in a traditional work setting. When I reflect, I remember my fantastic relationship with my kids, which is stronger than anything I had with my parents.

In March 2017, we bought our first house

Over the next few years, Heather quickly moved from manager to director to vice president and eventually chief digital officer of two companies.

Buying our first house was a significant milestone because I was the first grandchild in our family to own a home. It was such a gift to our children to move from a two-bedroom apartment into a four-bedroom house.

My wife has made six figures for the past seven years, and it covers all our expenses and then some. Having all your bills paid is a unique feeling, but I'm also starting to build a new career path.

In 2019, I started massage school part-time and got my degree. I've always been interested in how the human body works and felt connected to healing.

We married in September 2022

I admire her so much that I even took her last name.

In 2023, Heather started her company, Level Up Digital, a marketing and technology development agency.

In addition to my massage work, I've been helping by learning to build websites, write blog content, and manage digital property. I've never been great at managing money, so I give any funds to my wife so she can handle it wisely.

Working together has been smoother than I expected. It doesn't mean it's always easy, but we check in, take breaks, and make time for our family. I've gained new titles and credibility in the eyes of those who judged me for being a stay-at-home dad.

Home life now is fantastic

Since Heather works from home, we can balance cooking and parenting. As the kids get older, I want to open my own business and brand for massage therapy. I'm most excited about joining in and helping Heather with her business.

We're so happy to be able to give our kids every opportunity they deserve, and I'm excited about the future of Heather's growing agency.

• It was always my dream, but raising two kids as a stay-at-home mom was harder than I thought.
• I lost my identity during my kids' infant and toddler years, and getting it back took work.
• My kids are teens now, and I love to see new moms holding onto their own identities and interests.

I was 27 when I had my first baby, and like most people in their late 20s, I thought I had everything figured out. I'd been raised in a conservative church environment where women were taught their main purpose was to become a wife and then a mother. My husband and I had been married for a few years when we decided to start our family. Bringing a baby into our home felt, at the time, like I was finally fulfilling my purpose.

When my son was 2, I gave birth to our daughter. Our family was complete, and I felt proud I'd locked down a husband and had two babies before 30. All that was left to do was enjoy motherhood — or so I thought.

I love being a mom, but early on, I lost myself

Being a mom has always come easy to me, but in those tear-filled, sleepless infant and toddler years, motherhood had a cost. Now in my 40s with two teenagers, I see how I lost my own identity somewhere between hand-sewing Halloween costumes and scheduling park playdates. Rediscovering who I was at my core was tough once I realized I was lost in mom life, but I'm proof it's possible.

Before I had kids, I acted in community theater, went to a monthly book club, traveled, and maintained things like nail and hair appointments. I also had a career. In an office. Where I interacted with other adult humans daily. When my babies arrived, there was no time for reading, acting, or leaving my neighborhood. I traded salon mani-pedis and pricey blonde hair for drugstore polish and some pretty bad home-hair-dye mishaps.

I don't regret being a stay-at-home mom, though it took a toll

My dad, who was my best friend, died unexpectedly when my first child was an infant, and in one of our last conversations, he admonished me to quit my job. "Babies are only small for a little while, Terri," he told me, "this is time you'll never get back." Two weeks later, my dad was gone, and a mixture of grief and thinking his advice was sound led me to quit a job I adored — an executive director position at a non-profit organization — and become a stay-at-home mom. I don't regret it, but that doesn't mean it wasn't incredibly difficult.

There are so many perks to losing yourself in being a mommy to two small humans. The memories, love, and closeness I still share with my kids to this day make those difficult years of wiping butts, handling toddler tantrums at the grocery store, and navigating the surprisingly icky world of making mom "friends" worth it.

Today, my kids are approaching 17 and 15, and I'd give up almost anything to rock my thumb-sucking baby girl to sleep or hear my toddler son mispronounce "yogurt" one more time. But I'm also glad to have myself back — to know that I'm a mom and a billion other things, from a frequent world traveler to a secret lover of smutty romance novels.

Remembering who I was pre-motherhood was tough, but worth it

A lot of things broke in my life before I rediscovered myself. My marriage suffered in my kids' elementary school years. I started therapy, made tough decisions to distance myself from my family for mental health reasons, took control of my health and lost 100 pounds, and, most recently, stopped drinking alcohol completely. But it wasn't just big changes that helped me rediscover myself. I chipped and chiseled away at my exterior of being "Bennet and Kennedy's mom" to find someone who loves long walks outside, thrifting, keeping a small circle of trusted friends, and cooking. I'm still their mom, but it's not the most interesting thing about me, and that makes me a better mom to them both.

These days, I'm blown away by young moms who refuse to let go of their identity. I hear them on podcasts, see them in my community, and watch them on social media as they parent and write books, go to movie theaters, travel kid-free with their spouse, and schedule a mid-day massage while someone else looks after their kids.

I wish I'd had moms like that in my life when I was younger, but since I didn't, I'm always the first to tell new moms it's OK to take time for themselves in whatever form is meaningful for them. The young moms I cheer the hardest for are the ones I see holding onto themselves while parenting, because it's the key to it all.

• After working at my tech job for six years, I was laid off.
• Now, I'm a stay-at-home mom, and I'm taking care of my daughter while on the job hunt.
• It's complicated, and I'm not sure which part of my life is keeping me busier.

My daughter had been chugging milk like a high school boy after football practice, so I consulted the "experts" on the proper amount for an 18-month-old. I typically rely on our pediatrician and my mother for the best toddler-rearing advice, but for something as trivial as this, I went straight to the sage elders known as mommy bloggers. About 20 ounces per day, one of them said. Good enough for me.

I had my answer, but couldn't help scrolling into the quicksand of the other posts, particularly one with the headline "How to Survive as a SAHM." I figured SAHM stood for something horrible, like Scabies After Hemorrhaging Mastitis, but after Googling learned it meant stay-at-home mom. Oh, that? Easy.

There is an acronym for everything in parenting — LO (little one), BLW (baby-led weaning), SEH (so exhausted, help) — but I'd been too busy to keep track of them all. I had a job. A job in tech I'd had for six years. A job I did well but wouldn't have said I was particularly passionate about, which is fortunate, considering one morning last June, I was promptly let go.

I'm now juggling my job search with being a stay-at-home mom

I have been applying and interviewing ever since, with varying degrees of failure — the most spectacular of which have come after getting to the final round with four different companies. I shouldn't be surprised. The economy is at a tipping point, egg prices are high, and the world is burning, but I figured I'd be exempt from reality. Instead, six months later, I'm still in the grind, not just in trying to secure an income, but in full-time parenting my toddler. SAHM-ing.

Previously, my husband and I had been juggling watching her and working at the same time, which wasn't hard when she was young and when, for a decent portion of that time, he'd been laid off, too, applying, interviewing, and SAHDad-ing.

Now it's my turn. I wake up early and do a sun salutation in the form of trolling LinkedIn and applying to anything I am qualified for, which is plenty — I have 10+ years of experience under my belt, which I've said approximately four thousand times, every time while smiling! When my daughter wakes up, I feed her, change her, play with her, and clean the house. The busy mom in the commercials with the laundry basket? That is me. But that woman isn't also editing her résumé and networking with strangers.

I'm not sure which is keeping me busier

When my daughter has her N (nap), I furiously put on mascara and rehearse my worth as an employee and subsequent human for interviews I've conveniently scheduled while she's D (down). When she's awake, I do more feeding, playing, and cooking, more tired than I was earlier, but slightly more attractive. Soon enough, it's her bedtime and then ours, before we wake up, wash, and repeat.

It's hard not to think I would have been hired by now if I had more time to job search. It's also hard not to think I would enjoy staying at home more if I wasn't spending so much time job searching.

Like most people, it's less that I want a job, and more that I need one. And I'd like a good one, because of said egg prices. Baking is my weekly non-negotiable, and my daughter and I do it together. She bangs the rolling pin, throws flour, and stirs every mixture for the 0.5 seconds I allow. We listen to music and dance. The floor gets filthy. I kiss her round cheeks that taste like butter.

I want this season of life to pass, to get easier. And I don't. The constant rejection from HR people is hard right now, but it's easier to swallow when I have someone who needs me more than their tech companies ever will. Someone who wants me regardless of my experience building go-to-market programs, or my Salesforce expertise, or my (incredible, I will say) ability to work in cross-functional teams. She needs me to be her SAHM. Easy.

• Daniel Peebles left a film career to care for his sons, one of whom has cerebral palsy, full time.
• Peebles' wife, Courtney, started a toy business in 2023, which she runs from their home.
• The family business, Solobo, supports them now as Peebles embraces life as a stay-at-home dad.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Daniel Peebles, a 27-year-old stay-at-home dad in Arizona. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

While I was growing up with my dad in Virginia Beach, he would surf often. When I was 8, he asked me to start filming him surfing.

I learned to love telling stories, and as I got older I picked up the camera again to make videos for my family and friends in our town for $100 each.

I grew that into a successful film career, but I quit to stay home and care for my two children, one with special needs, while my wife runs a company.

When I was 18, I started making real money with film projects

I decided not to go to college because I knew what I wanted to do for a career. At first, filming was just a hobby, but I started to get serious and charge more.

Through word of mouth, local businesses in our area contacted me to ask if I offered filming and editing services. I charged local companies between $1,000 and $3,000 per project.

In 2017, I met the woman who would become my wife

Courtney was working as a producer at a megachurch. We worked together on film projects and hit it off. We married in 2018 and moved in together.

I realized that the film projects I was doing here and there would not be enough income for a family — I needed a real job.

In 2018, I worked for six months at a mortgage company. Courtney was a multimedia specialist at the time. We were making good money but were miserable and wanted to spend more time together. We both quit at the end of that year.

I went back to freelancing for film projects in 2019

Our first son was born in December. Courtney stayed home with our son, and I picked up freelance film work, but I lost all my film clients when the pandemic hit. Since opportunities were scarce, I networked and got a full-time job as a film director at Ironclad.

I was grateful for the work and the $80,000 salary. With bonuses, it was well into the six figures annually. Our second son was then born in May 2021.

My younger son has cerebral palsy, which meant a lot of care

I traveled constantly. There were some weeks where I was gone three weeks out of the month. Every time I left home, I felt a ping because I didn't want my sons to grow up with a dad who wasn't around.

After my son's diagnosis, I started scaling back and moved into more postproduction, which kept me at home.

My son requires supervision at all times and is on long-term care through our state. I'm the registered provider under the program. If I weren't registered, attendants would come to our home whenever needed.

Courtney became frustrated with our younger son's toys

Courtney found that the toy industry lacked toys for neurodivergent kids. My younger son had a lot of mobility issues with his hands. She couldn't find any toys to help him with those movements.

She started making things just out of cardboard, and then she kept having more ideas. Courtney started Solobo LLC, our family toy business, in March 2023. We invested $10,000 we had saved into prototypes.

At first, she worked on product creation, marketing, sales, and logistics for the business at night while I worked during the day.

We decided I would quit my job and let Courtney pursue her dream

As the business grew, I told Courtney how miserable I was being away from her and the boys, and we talked about her passion for the business. I hesitated about becoming a stay-at-home dad, but it seemed to be the right choice.

I was on my way to becoming the lead director of production when I quit my job at Ironclad in June 2023. I took the leap even though we had no savings at that point.

My dad traveled a lot for work while I was growing up, and I didn't get to see him as much as I wanted to. Staying home with my sons was more important to me than the money.

My day-to-day life as a stay-at-home dad is totally different

One of my kids wakes me up — they're my alarm. I get up and cook breakfast for the family. Courtney goes upstairs to work while I play with the boys.

We have activities a few times a week. I teach them practical things, like how to swim. The boys go to school a few times a week, too — it's an inclusive learning space through play.

I help Courtney with fulfillment coordination, inventory, and logistics at night. We have a few regular subcontractors and a team of pediatric experts.

Money is tight at times, but the business pays our bills

Our relationship has become stronger. Courtney and I first met through work, so it's cool to be working with my best friend again. I get the privilege of spending more time with my boys than most dads, and it's beautiful.

I've had people approach me who are genuinely puzzled that Courtney and I don't get tired of always being around each other. We work, laugh, cry, and dream together, and I wouldn't have it any different.

How I grew up — dads work and moms stay home — I felt there was a stigma for stay-at-home dads, but I did it anyway. I can see how we're building a better future for our boys.

The toy business continues to grow

I love the stay-at-home dad life. The only reason I would consider returning to work depends on the level of care our son needs (as he gets older) and where our business is by then.

Everyone thought I was crazy when I quit my film industry job to become a stay-at-home dad, but it was the best decision for our family.

• While struggling with parenting duties, Babette Lockefeer considered quitting her business.
• Her husband didn't agree with her decision to stop work and be a stay-at-home mom.
• Lockefeer was angry at first but later realized she wouldn't be happy if she wasn't working.

This as-told-to essay is based on a transcribed conversation with Babette Lockefeer, 35, from the Netherlands, about navigating motherhood alongside her career. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

Four months after my second child was born, I wasn't living life as I'd envisioned it.

I was in the midst of a big project for my business as a leadership and team facilitator and struggling to balance my career and motherhood. I felt overwhelmed, stressed, and sleep-deprived.

In the summer of 2021, I told my husband I wanted to quit the business. He immediately said no.

At first, I was angry. I'd always valued doing important work and my career, and I was willing to stop doing that for our family, but felt he wasn't letting me.

Over time, I realized he was right: I wouldn't have been happy as a stay-at-home mom. Talking with my husband and processing my feelings helped me realize that being a mother wasn't a detriment to my career. I had to deal with some insecurities and make some changes at home to understand I could do both.

I was always a high achiever at work

I started my career in 2014 as a consultant at McKinsey. I spent two and a half years there, but in 2016, I joined Alibaba as a global leadership associate. I spent around half a year in their Dutch office, helping Dutch e-commerce players connect to the Chinese market.

In the summer of 2017, my husband, who I'd met as a student, and I moved to China, and I worked for Alibaba in Hangzhou.

I really enjoyed it. We had monthly trainings where we learned more about China, e-commerce, and leadership. The training made me realize that my real interests lay in leadership development. In 2018, I left Alibaba and started my own business in the leadership space, TheoryY.

I was also pregnant with my first child at that time. Five months after his birth, in December 2019, we decided to leave China and move back to the Netherlands.

Soon after we returned, the COVID-19 pandemic hit. I got pregnant again and had a second child in February 2021. Because of the pandemic, it was difficult to have family assistance with childcare or access to day care.

Around 10 weeks after giving birth, I started a new project with my business after being referred to a new client. Our newborn wasn't fond of sleeping, so we had a lot of broken nights.

For me, motherhood was about having a healthy attachment with my children, being present, and attending to all of their needs.

This was impossible to achieve all the time. I was too tired, overwhelmed, and full of doubt. With hindsight, I still did a good job as a mother, but I'd internalized the perfect mother myth.

Society's picture of an ideal mother is in direct conflict with that of an ideal employee. The employee is always available and wants to go the extra mile, but the mom also needs to be fully committed and always have the space to attend to her children's needs.

I was always a high achiever at work, but now, I had less time and energy to go the extra mile. I was working fewer hours than before having children, but when I was with my kids I wasn't always present because I was thinking about work. I felt like I wasn't doing a good job on the work front or the motherhood front.

My husband didn't think quitting would make me happy

My husband worked full-time. He was very involved as a dad. When our second child was born, he took some parental leave, spread across the year, plus six weeks of birth leave. But because I was self-employed and had more flexibility, I was always picking up things that fell off the wagon — which was a lot of the time during COVID.

I would spread my hours around, sometimes working in the evenings so I could still do the tasks I was hired to do. We never had a consistent schedule, and I felt like I was firefighting. Whenever a child was ill or had a doctor's appointment, the mental load was predominantly on my shoulders.

When I spoke to my husband about quitting, he said he didn't think it was the right decision. He also wanted to spend time with our kids and thought it wasn't fair if he was the sole breadwinning parent.

He also said he didn't think I'd be happy as a stay-at-home mom. I disagreed, saying I wasn't happy as it stood.

I spoke with my husband, processed my feelings and decided to continue working

From our first conversation, it was clear we weren't aligned, so we continued to discuss it.

I shared that I felt I was undervalued and wasn't appreciated by him unless I was achieving something professionally. He told me he still appreciated me now that I was a mom and wasn't on a steep career trajectory at the time.

I decided to continue working, but we also changed some practical things about our household. When our third child was born in July 2023, my husband was granted 26 weeks of parental leave by his new company, and he took all of it, taking full end-to-end responsibility for the household for the first time.

It allowed me to trust him fully with the kids and family chores going forward, so our dynamic has become more equal. We don't split things 50-50 all the time, but regularly discuss how best to divide responsibilities between us.

Looking back, I'm grateful that my husband could see that, in the long term, it wasn't a good idea for me to quit working. I need the intellectual stimulation that comes from a job, and my work fills me with the energy to show up as the mom and partner I want to be.

Do you have a story about balancing parenting with your career? Email Charissa Cheong at [email protected]

• C-suite executive Michaella Solar-March's husband became a stay-at-home dad in 2017.
• The couple found it financially smarter for him to stay home than to hire a nanny.
• Solar-March balances career and family and feels the pressure as the sole financial provider.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Michaella Solar-March, a 40-year-old C-suite executive in New York City. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

When my husband and I met in 2011, we were in love with our careers. I worked as a marketing director in the music industry, and he was a bartender and vegetable farmer. We both worked late but always made time to see each other.

We discussed getting married and having kids but never discussed the logistics of starting a family with our work schedules. We got married in 2012, and in 2015, I got pregnant with our first child.

Now, as a family of four, I work full time, and my husband stays home to watch the kids.

We both used to work full-time jobs with nontraditional hours

My husband worked in hospitality and often got called in on nights and weekends to cover shifts. I worked at Soho House in a global role and traveled internationally for two to three weeks every month.

We hired a full-time nanny so we could both continue to work. After nine months, we realized it felt like our nanny was raising our child. While we loved our nanny, we weren't comfortable taking such a backseat role in our son, Townes', life.

My husband loved his career but found that being a present father meant more to him. He didn't grow up with his father around — his parents divorced when he was three, and a single mom raised him. He wanted to be a present and constant support for Townes.

We decided in 2017 that my husband would be a stay-at-home dad, and I'd continue to work as the family's breadwinner.

It was less expensive for my husband to stay home with our child than to have a nanny

We realized my husband's salary was slightly more than what we paid our nanny. It seemed like a financially smart decision for him to leave his job. It also helped us both erase any anxiety about Townes and his care.

When we had our second child, Roma, in 2020, I was the global CMO for a commercial real estate business. Alex returned to work in 2019 as the general manager of a hospitality brand, and we thought we would hire another nanny for our daughter. Then the pandemic started.

We started interviewing nannies remotely and couldn't get comfortable with the idea, so again, Alex quit his job and resumed full-time childcare responsibilities.

The identity shift was hard to understand

When we first started dating, our identities were wrapped up in our careers. When my husband first became a stay-at-home dad and I became the breadwinner, I struggled with our new identities. I felt grateful that I could continue my career but guilty that he had to pause his.

I was also proud of his work and enjoyed the nightlife culture that came with his industry, so leaving that behind was a lifestyle shift for both of us.

My husband never felt bad about this shift. He poured everything into being the best dad, managing the household (cooking, cleaning, and handling the groceries), and constantly reassured me that he was more than OK with taking on this role.

I feel a lot of pressure to provide financially for my family

Neither my husband nor I are independently wealthy, so the long-term stability of our family and creating financial security for our kids are solely my responsibility.

I feel a lot of pressure. I'm naturally ambitious and self-motivated, and I take pride in being good at my work. Yet, I inevitably feel I have to overdeliver and drive value for my employers to ensure job security.

While I'm lucky enough to have an incredible boss and team, that pressure is always an undercurrent. If I'm not working, we can't pay our bills.

Being a C-suite executive and a mother requires compromise

I'm now the chief marketing officer for a Brooklyn-based real estate developer and management company. I'm fully committed at work and home but always feel I'm letting someone down.

I often miss dinner time with the family because of work commitments. Townes made a rule that I'm only allowed to be on my phone at home if I'm dealing with something for work. As my kids have become more aware and emotionally mature, they notice when I'm distracted.

I also feel societal pressure. There's an unspoken expectation that you must be an exceptional employee, mother, friend, community member, and over-performer in every area of life. Those titles are often in conflict with one another.

I have to compromise. I'm no less committed to an area of my life, but I acknowledge that sometimes I can't do it all and must make a choice.

I'm showing my kids a different type of family dynamic, and I'm proud of that

I had a stay-at-home mom who worked from home but was hands-on in the house. This allowed my dad to go out and work long hours every day. My family is now inverted.

I'm proud that my children see me go to work daily, knowing I come home every night after doing work I love and excel at. I hope this shows them they can pursue their professional passions with commitment and ambition.

Sometimes, Roma asks, "Why can't you stay home with Dad? Why do you go to the office every day?" But I know that in 10 years, I will have shown her what a working mother looks like. I also know that when I'm with her, I focus on giving her the attention and support she needs.

While our family setup might be unusual, it works for us, and I'm not sure it would work this well if we did it any other way. Eventually, my husband wants to go back to work, but not in a full-time capacity.

Want to share your story as a female breadwinner? Email Lauryn Haas at [email protected].