Life is a race

I need a change in career. I’ve always known that, but having postnatal depression has just made it all the more apparent. I lost valuable time with my babies growing up, because the workplace infiltrated every minute of time I had on maternity leave, and hauled me back into the office far sooner than I would have liked. And now I face a summer with Bill and me alternating time off to look after Lily over the school holidays, leaving precious little time for us to take a proper holiday off together as a family.

If I could do anything I liked I think I would become a classroom assistant with children in their first year of primary school. Then at least I'd get some time off with my kids. But it isn’t as simple as that. I currently work in an industry where women get paid an average of 16 per cent less than men for doing the equivalent job, but if I moved into the world of classroom assistants I wouldn’t even earn as much as somebody stacking the shelves in Aldi. Is it just me or is there something criminal about an economic system that values supermarkets over education? I’ve been a check-out-chick and shelf-stacker before. Nothing wrong with that, but I don’t intend to go back to it just because it pays more than doing something I’d really rather do. But then why should I suffer financially because I want to help kids develop their full potential?

Anyway, it’s all academic, because £6.15 an hour as a classroom assistant won’t cover the mortgage, nor will £6.50 an hour for stacking the shelves in Aldi for that matter, so I guess I’m stuck for now surrounded by men being paid ridiculously more than me. Men who, possibly as a result, feel more valued than me and are less close to the edge of quitting!

On a lighter note I did the Race for Life yesterday. 10 000 participants and almost as many spectators in one small park in the blazing sun – boy was that a bad idea for someone who suffers panic attacks in crowds!! My counsellor said one way to deal with panic attacks is to concentrate really hard on one object and try to lose yourself in that, forgetting the wider chaos around you. Not a recommended strategy in the Race for Life. Most objects in front of me were the backs of other women – backs displaying little pink squares emblazoned with the names of loved ones they had lost through cancer. One particularly heartbreaking group was two women and a small girl, of about 3. Each had a photo of the same young man on their pink square. For one he was a brother, for one he was a husband, and for the little girl, he was her daddy. They were clearly enjoying the day and it must give them a sense of empowerment to be able to do something constructive and so communal in the face of such private and individual sorrow. It just brought a tear to my eye every time I saw them. In a sad sort of way this made me go even quicker, because I wanted to get in front of all these sad, sad stories and not have to see those ghost like faces on little pink squares anymore. But for that family, and for so many like them, there is no getting away from the ghosts, however fast you run.

So it was a very humbling experience, and I’m definitely going to do it again. I am walking a little bit slower than usual this morning. I’m not sure if that is aching muscles or the cheap slip-on sandals I’m wearing. Probably the latter. I’m usually someone who walks at the pace of a professional speed-walker, striding ahead leaving poor little Lily and Poppy squealing at me to slow down. But today I’m having to take life at a more leisurely pace because if I go too quickly my sandals fly off. Maybe I should take to wearing them everyday – it would force me to take life a bit more slowly…

Then again, I wonder how much a professional speed-walker gets paid..?