I’m sitting here with a glass wine, eating left overs. My partner and I have just tucked our kids into bed. He’s wandering the garden, doing jobs. I’m sprawled on the couch.

This is a diary entry from The Honest Files. I feel tired and emotional, the tears have come easy all day. That’s not particularly new for me –  I laugh easy and I cry easy – but it doesn’t make it any less embarrassing when you’re blubbering to your boss because you’ve gotten to work later than you’d like. Pull yourself together Eliza.

Tuesday mornings are always fairly hellish. So many of you know the story, getting kids breakfasted, dressed, toileted, packed up and out the door, while trying to maintain some semblance of personal hygiene and pride in appearance, is like walking through a car wash in nothing but a raincoat. You get out the other side, but it’s not pretty.

And so it was this morning. I woke up early, with the same blind ambition of getting the kids to day care and myself to work in an organised, timely fashion, as I do every week. We were actually doing quite well today, the house was mad but we were on time. I waved goodbye to Ash then proceeded to load every limb with the bags, laptop, baby and shoes. Out we go. Except we didn’t go, because one of the kids had an incident that required a full costume change. Back we go. Stay cool Eliza. (I didn’t.)

Day care delivery involves a crying baby being unvelcroed from my body and I walk away feeling a mixture of guilt and despair at the growing child care bill that due to my poor management I haven’t kept up with. That’s embarrassing but it’s real.

I get in the car wanting to drive like a demon but remind myself of the advice I once heard,  ‘when you’re feeling rushed, that’s the best time to take things slow’. It’s true. Mistakes happen when you rush, no use killing myself or anyone else because I’m late.

I get to work. I re-read my lesson plans. I start getting organised. I realise I’m supposed to be on yard duty. I rush out the door and find myself 10 minutes late. My boss is already out there. Far out is the phrase I’ll write, it is not the phrase I thought.

She didn’t berate me. She didn’t give me an awful look.

She asked those words that are posted on social media regularly, but I’m sure are not asked often enough, ‘Are you okay?’

Well, my friends, out the tears did flow. ‘I’ve just had one of those mornings,’ I blubbered. There were kids, there were parents, I’m not a pretty crier. Embarrassing.

But you know what? It’s really not embarrassing. Because the truth is, I wasn’t okay. I was feeling strung out. The little one percenters had built themselves into a mountain that needed to fall away at my feet. My boss collapsed them for me and I fell. I needed to.

So we had a chat, I pulled myself together. I spoke to another colleague/friend, I cried again, then I pulled myself together again. I’m not good with people being nice to me when I’m emotional.

Then, on the day went. I taught some beautiful, enthusiastic, energetic kids. They had no idea what had transpired before they walked through the door. They just walked in with their stories of loose teeth and favourite teddies and we got on with the lesson. Teaching is hard but it’s wonderful.

There are some things I learned today:

‘Are you okay?’ is a phrase I need to ask more. It’s often not the big things that are weighing on our minds, but the little things, all adding up. If I can pop that balloon of pressure for someone else that would be so good.

This is not my time. In lots of ways, this is not my time. This is not my time to take on extra responsibilities. This is not my time to be the first at work. This is not my time to wear the latest fashion, heck, this is not my time to wear ironed clothes. This is not my time to get everything right. My time for all of that will come again, but this right now, this is not my time.

This is my time for nurturing. And when you employ a mother, you employ a nurturer. We may not get there early, and we may not be able to take on extra responsibilities, but we bring so much more.

We bring compassion and empathy and love, as well as the same working knowledge we had before. We cry easily, but we laugh easily too. I’ve done a bit of both today, and I feel so much better.

Eliza xx