The sound of one hand typing

With the other hand holding the baby, KIRA VERMOND gets back to work with her newborn son

SPECIAL TO THE GLOBE AND MAIL

07/20/2002
The Globe and Mail
Metro
C1

A couple of hours after my son Nathan was born, while lying in a hospital recovery room I asked my husband to hand me my purse.

"Just tell me what you need," he said, digging around in the pockets, probably thinking I would ask for some Tylenol or a bottle of water.

"Pass me the Blackberry, will you? I want to check e-mail," I answered.

Before all the mommy-police chastise me for ruining such a special moment with thoughts of work, I do want to point out that the epidural was still working its magic and I was feeling pretty groovy. Besides, my son was in deep newborn sleep, and probably wouldn't have known whether I was checking e-mail or dancing a jig or drying my hair.

But my unwillingness to part with my old work-whenever-I-want-to life didn't end there. It's been three months now since he was born, and in my determination to work about 15 hours a week as a freelance writer, I've picked up a few tricks.

I've learned how to type with one hand, for example, and to type with two while nursing in an office chair with a pillow on my lap, something I've dubbed the "stealth feed."

A couple of times, I've answered the phone using my most professional voice in this position, pretending the baby was in the other room. I just didn't want to give my clients that particular mother-with-child visual as we discussed an assignment.

Tricks aside, I've learned that it doesn't take a village to raise a child. It takes an army -- especially if mom works from home and is self-employed.

My team includes my husband, who opted to work from home for the first three months so he could be around for his son's first smile. Then there's my baby-crazy sister, who I pay to baby-sit for five hours a day on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays. There's also my mother, who drove for an hour one weekend so I could steal enough time to crank out an article. (And I mean crank. There's nothing like knowing you only have three hours before the baby sitter goes home to alleviate writer's block.)

It doesn't end there, with immediate family. Since that hazy, warm morning back in April when Nathan spun into my life in a tiny delivery room in downtown Toronto, brothers, sisters, friends and more friends have held the baby -- while I checked e-mail, picked up voice mails, wrote notes on scraps of paper and struggled to keep my professional life from tanking.

Now don't get me wrong. I love my little boy and sometimes find myself thinking this whole work-for-money idea is vaguely preposterous. What do you mean I have to write some company's brochure today, I often think, when all I want to do is watch my sweet one make those adorable sucky noises in his sleep?

Then my husband walks into the room with the latest stack of bills in hand and that fantasy is shot. Maternity leaves -- the kind where you focus on baby alone -- are not for the self-employed.

Part-time work is my personal solution, even though it's not a perfect one.

At a recent mom-and-baby group -- where seven or eight first-time mothers come together once a week to commiserate -- I was reminded of a Canadian Labour Congress paper that said 95 per cent of mothers have primary responsibility for child care.

Listening to the other women in the group talk about their careers in advertising, marketing, social work and so on, we all agreed on one thing: After taking care of babies all day (and often all night) going back to work would be a breeze.

As one woman said as she nursed her little girl in the Second Cup where we met: "I love my baby, but I need to work so I can stay sane."

Working part-time, we all decided, would give us the best of both worlds.

While I've had a challenging time coming to terms with my new and harried life, my husband has tried to find his own path of fatherhood and working from home.

A few weeks ago, for example, I walked into our shared office and found David talking to his boss on the phone, holding the baby in one arm and typing with his free hand. The conversation sounded like every other he has had with fellow computer programmers. -- incomprehensible to me. But in the middle of the rapid-fire tech-speak there was a pause, at which point my husband said: "Mind if I call you back? I'm covered in crap."

Just like that, I realized we would be all right. We were coming to terms with our new role as working parents. We would work around the baby's schedule -- and in some cases, his bodily functions -- and come out of this adventure with a sense of humour, some brain damage and if we played our cards right, a beautiful and healthy little boy.

Never mind the lack of maternity leave for self employed parents. Never mind the severe lack of sleep, the bare cupboards because we haven't gotten out of the house to shop in weeks and a dwindling bank account. Never mind the shortage of daycare positions in this country. Even if we were covered in our son's finest from time to time, if we kept calm, everything would turn out okay.

At least, that's how I feel today. Ask me again after David goes back to the office this week.

-30-