Hats off to working moms

This year my youngest son began grade 1, which means that this was the first time in 15 years that I've been at home without kids. At first I thought that it would be wonderful...................freedom at last!!!!!!!!!!!!! But after awhile I began to feel guilty - that I now needed to be a productive member of society, and that since all of my kids were in school, I was somehow no longer worthy of staying at home. My guilty conscience eventually drove me to start applying for jobs.
Well, considering I needed a job that would still allow me to drop off and pick up my kids from school, I became quite limited as to what kind of job I could consider. I did actually find an employer that had a shift that they called the "mommy shift", and was eventually interviewed and told that I was hired, but for some bizarre reason, they never did call me in. In retrospect this is the biggest blessing that could have occured!
Two months later December arrived, all of the housecleaning and laundry that was caught up in September after the summer holidays began to pile up, Christmas parties, shopping, and concerts started accumulating, and I began to re-evaluate how I was going to cope with my life as a "mom", if I were to add a career to the mixture. I decided that in order to keep my sanity, it just wasn't going to be able to happen. Thank goodness I realized this before it was too late. (the thought of a few relaxing weeks in a psycho ward is not such a bad thought, but I think the kids would miss me.)
I don't know how those of you who manage a career and a household do it. Coming home after a long day of work to a household of chores, homework, and extra-curicular activities, has got to be overwhelming. Hats off to ya!