Is it difficult or easy to work at home?

Is it difficult or easy to work at home?

It's been 10 years since I embarked on this adventure and I still don't have a clear answer. I can definitely see that it is very good for the household for the mother to work from home, but I cannot say whether it is easy or difficult for that woman, that mother.

I worked continuously between 1998 and 2009, I was pregnant when the magazine I was the Managing Editor of closed down, I wanted to take my severance pay and quit instead of moving to another magazine. I wanted to raise my daughter on my own, I thought I could do ‘outside jobs.’ I tried, but it didn't work out. Both me, who got used to earning my own money, and my husband, who was trying to support the household with a single salary... The period between 2012-2014 is very complicated, let me not write at all. Even I miss the order. I wrote in detail in my first book, Maniac Mum, published in 2017. 😊

When I decided to do something online from home, no one said ‘how nice’ to me, let me say that from the beginning. No net salary to enter the house, no this, no that, no this, no that, I struggled a lot. It finally happened. I was writing articles for other websites, providing support, and when they asked me what I was doing, I would just say ‘I'm an editor.’ Imagine, it was really hard to tell at that time. Gradually, things settled down, shopping centre events, social media, and the business came back on track. I have passed 10 years. However, many people met the concept of ‘working from home’ with the pandemic. Even corporate companies call it ‘remote working model’, I call it working from home. 

Without further ado, I will only write the pros and cons from my point of view. First the cons...

• I don't usually have time problems, I'm independent, but even then it's difficult to organise myself.
  
• All the work at home is waiting for me. I didn't have a helper for a long time, now I get support every fortnight. 
• You are in a meeting when you get a phone call asking ‘what are we having for dinner?’.
• Since my job has no hours, I continue to work in the evening when the family is sitting together.
• Income changes every month. Since there is no clear income, I have a hard time making plans.
• When we are with the elders of the family, they never stopped saying ‘hah, you have your phone in your hand again’.
• Just when I am concentrating on something, I see the fingerprint on the door and start cleaning it.
• Since they think you are ‘sitting idle’ at home all day, the requests for ‘you are at home anyway’ pour in one after another.
• I miss people. I want to go and work somewhere, have a chat. I get up in the morning, get dressed, put on make-up. I mean, sometimes I talk to the pressure cooker while cooking because of boredom. ‘Why should I spend money for no reason? I want to continue my current job and do other jobs, but there is no return from even one of the companies. I mean, in a job where you go to two offices a week, if I have the qualities they are looking for, I don't understand why they don't call me.
• I was never such a fan of cleanliness and organisation, now everything catches my eye. Even while writing this article, I got up and cleaned the coffee machine, for example.
• When my husband comes from work or my daughter from school, I always want them to talk to me because I am alone all day long. Also, I am a Gemini, I love to talk so much... I'm capricious to say ‘Take care of me’.

And let's get to the pros of working from home...

• I am not accountable to anyone but myself about my work.
• I can prepare an article at night and leave it blank the next day.
• I have no travelling expenses.
• I can easily do the work that needs to be done between working hours. 
• I don't have to go shopping in the weekend crowds. 
• I can step in immediately in ‘pick up from school, take to school’ situations.
• I can get in the car and go out of the city and continue working from there.
• I have no problem with traffic, if I am going somewhere, I wait for the traffic to ease. 
• When the camera is switched off during meetings, I can even spend the whole day in my pyjamas.
• I have time for sports. But I can't motivate myself to go to the gym, that's different. I used to skate every morning, and one day I will go back. I wonder when.
• When my daughter was little, we played a lot, we did a lot of activities. We had a great time. 
• I confess, sometimes I tell everyone, including my husband, ‘I have a meeting’ and turn the house into a movie theatre and watch a movie. It happens twice a year at most, but I felt like writing.
• I can only wear sportswear, no work clothes. 

I mean, I can't say that working from home is very bad or great. I'm so in the middle... I always say ‘thank God’ for everything, yes, but I think I need to socialise in between. When I say socialising, I mean going to the office, attending meetings... Earning a net income... 

If it were up to me, I could write pages and pages, but I keep thinking that you will get bored while reading. But this subject will continue. I can talk and write for hours, especially about the resistance of employers to ‘not hiring’ those aged 45 and over.