Hi Ho, Hi Ho...

Dear Girls,
Think of the hardest thing you've ever had to do in your whole life...and do it twice. Leaving each of you - both of you - to go back to work is far and away the hardest thing I've ever had to do in my life. I'm your Mommy, I'm supposed to be with you, I'm supposed to stay with you...unless I have to go back to work. But here I am, again, the night before going back to work after being with my new babies and I'm a wreck and you both are none the wiser. And as I'm sitting here tonight holding you, Anna, going through all of these feelings (that I've been repressing for the past several weeks) I think to myself, "Why not try to explain to them (and the world as it may be) WHY I'm going back to work?" What can I say to you to make you understand when you are older why I chose to leave you and go back to work, and why, since it is a CHOICE it is still such a hard one?
Let's start there, I guess. I don't have to go back to work.
I am going back to work because...I like it. And I'm kinda good at it. And I'm exactly as far as I ever want to be in my career but I've got lots of room to grow and do better. I don't want a corner office. I don't want a fancy title. I want to keep doing what I do which is sell shit and make money.
And that brings me to...our lives will be better because I'm working right now. I'm a better Mommy to you because I work. You will have better things and opportunities than I had, and than Daddy had, because right now I work. Sounds crazy, doesn't it? I mean, Mommy and Daddy didn't exactly grow up poor but we didn't grow up rich and I've got news for you, we aren't rich, either. Sorry about your luck. But I want you girls to have your college paid for, wherever you want. I want our family to have a lake house of our own where we can make lots and lots of wonderful memories and where you might even get to take your own girls some day. And dammit, if I'm going to be honest if I want you girls to have the cute shoes you're getting the cute shoes.
I could probably go on but you probably get the idea. So what's so hard about this? If I WANT to go back to work, what's the problem? Well, the problem is wanting to work to contribute towards a better future for our family and wanting to be the perfect Mommy...well, they kind of go against each other. There are still lots of people out there, in our own family even, who don't really believe you can do/be both. And for me, honestly, I feel like a bad Mommy wanting to work because isn't that equivalent to wanting to be away from you? You're only this little once and I know, it goes FAST. So tonight, as I look into both of your precious faces I think, "Wow. I'm a shitty Mommy." And there are people out there who think so too, and this doesn't escape me. I've endured a lot of shit for being a working Mommy. And it makes me mad. And it hurts my feelings. And it's hard. Then I think, "Well, we can make the appropriate sacrifices and I can stay home, right?" I guess, we could...but...but, but, but...
Girls, I'm not a perfect Mommy. I'm not even close. I probably never will be and when you are teenagers you will remind me on an hourly basis how far from the perfect Mommy I really am. But I have to believe that I'm doing what's best for me, as your Mommy, and for our family and in the end for you girls. I don't deserve anyone's sympathy even though I really want it because tomorrow is going to be a really SHITTY DAY for me and of course Daddy gets out of it because he has to be at work at 6:00 am so he'll be long gone before either of you even wake up. So again, I've got to take you over to someone else's home, so she can take care of you for 4 days a week while I'm off doing other things. Trust me, we searched far and wide, found someone we believe will take good, loving care of you (not to RAISE you like people have also said to me in the past...) and I hope and pray that someday, when you are Mommys I pray you will have a CHOICE whether you want to stay home with your babies or be working Mommys and whatever you CHOOSE to do I know in my heart you will make the right choice for you, and your babies.
Hi ho, hi ho...off to work I go.
Love,
Mommy