Women At Work

Sometimes life is full of surprises. I admit that I normally revel in these tiny unexpected moments of bliss, even sometimes when they might not be so blissful. I don't know, I guess there's a reason Tom calls me a Drama Queen. Call me crazy, but I like change - too much of the same thing really bores me.


However, I also do not like it when things don't go my way. I don't think I'm overly selfish, I just like to plan and I like to be in control of my plan, and I really don't like it when I'm not. My plan was to take four months off work after I had Nora - I have so much sick and vacation time saved up that I would have been paid my regular part-time salary for 2 of those months, so Tom and I figured we could go 2 months without. Unfortunately things didn't go as planned. It became glaringly obvious that the temp we hired (who was recommended by our CPA) was NOT working out about 5 days after I gave birth. I'd get 3-4 phone calls a day with him asking me the same questions over and over. It got to the point that it was more stressful babysitting this guy and fixing his mistakes then it would be to just go back to work and do it myself. At first I was extremely frustrated - not only because I didn't want to go back to work yet, but also because I really love my job and I didn't want to end up resenting it. But one of the reasons I love my job so much is because I have the best bosses in the world and they sat down with me and we worked everything out so that I would only have to come in once a week at the most. Tom also had to talk me down a couple times, reassuring me that everything would work out, and that he could stay home on the days I went into my office.

So two weeks ago I woke up at 5:00am - well actually I woke up at 2:00am to feed Nora who then refused to let me put her down, but I handed her off to Tom at 5:00am and got up to get ready to catch the train. It was kinda weird. Like I hadn't taken any time off at all, it was just back to routine as normal. It was even 30 degrees outside, just like my last day of work back in January.

My bag was packed with everything I needed to spend a full day away from my nursing daughter - a breast pump, milk collection bags, sanitary wipes to clean the pump, lots and lots of extra breast pads, and two ice packs to keep the milk cold on the train ride home. By the time I got to my office my boobs were already killing me, but I had so much work to do I had to ignore them for a couple of hours. By now my milk had let down three times and, fearing I would drown in my own milk, I decided to take a break and pump.

Even though I have my own office, I decided to pump in the bathroom since I have a rather large window by my door that looks right out into our reception area. At this point I only had my small one-boob pump (my sister sent me her big one last week, and even though it makes me feel like a cow, I love how efficient it is), so I took my bag into the bathroom and started pumping away. Like I said, I had been up since 2:00, and had only gotten about 2 hours of sleep, so sitting down without anything to do but listen to the (extremely loud) hum of the pump, I promptly feel asleep, right there on the toilet in the last stall of the floor's public restroom. I have no idea how long I was out, but it couldn't have been too long after I drifted off that I fell forward off the toilet and into the stall door in front of me. After I got my pumping back in order someone came into the bathroom and yelled "What is that NOISE??" I wasn't sure if I should just ignore her, or yell back, "IT'S A BREAST PUMP!" I tried to decide what to do quickly, but I was still kind of tired and maybe I hit my head too hard on the door, so I just sat there, pumping away, my mouth hanging open while I tried to decide what to say. Then the woman left without using the facilities, which I thought was kind of weird, but maybe she just had to look in the mirror or something. The other two times I pumped that day someone came in, which I found rather annoying because there's barely anyone on our floor and I almost never run into to anyone in the restroom when I use it. But I had been gone for almost two months, maybe some of the empty offices had been rented.

A week later I ventured back to Seattle with all my pumping paraphernalia. I grabbed the elevator along with 3 other women and while listening to the group's conversation I realized it was going to be a long day. One woman asked the other two women she was with if they had heard the buzzing in the bathroom yet. "No," they said, "It must have just been on that one day that you heard it." "It was weird," the first woman said, "because I know someone was in that stall but she didn't say anything." This is when I realized they were talking about ME. "Well she WAS in the bathroom, maybe she didn't feel like having a conversation." I was just staring at the floor trying to decide if I should pipe up and come clean that it was me when they turned to me and asked if I had heard it. "Umm...I don't know...what did it sound like?" Stupid! Why didn't I just say "Actually I think I know what you're talking about and I think it was my breast pump!" Then the four of us could have a nice laugh and be on with our day. But no. I had to act like I didn't know, and the answer I got to my question was, "Well to be honest, it kind of sounded like a vibrator." Great. Now I definitely couldn't own up to it. But it just got worse. "Oh my gosh," one of the other women said, "what if it was?! What if there's some perv in our building??"

And just like that, I was the Creepy Colman Building perv. The doors opened on my floor and I got off the elevator - halfway down the hall I wondered why I didn't just say "Maybe it was a breast pump." I would have dispelled any horrid rumors and I wouldn't have to admit it was me all along. More people came into the bathroom while I was pumping that day but no one said anything, and I just kept telling myself that I was doing this for Nora. When I got home that evening I opened my bag to put my milk in the freezer only to find that I hadn't closed the bags tight enough and they had spilled out everywhere. Nice. I hadn't done it for Nora, I had done it for nothing.

Thankfully the aforementioned awesome bosses said they would get blinds for my office window so I can pump in there - and no, I most certainly did not tell them it was because I was about to be black listed as the Colman Building Perv.

I hope any men out there reading this really appreciate what working mothers have to go through!