Being a mum is valid and valuable work, so I put it on my CV

Earlier this year, I donned my rant pants and published an Instagram post that was a serious departure from my usual random hot takes on life.

I was in the thick of parenting as the full-time primary carer of my two young girls, and I'd been doing a lot of thinking about what mothering looked like and meant to me.

I wasn't completely sure motherhood was even for me, but the moment I roared her down into this world, I was transfixed, transformed, utterly at her service.

There was nowhere else I wanted to be.

Navigating daycare and a return to work

As the months passed, my mum's group grew smaller as they and other friends began navigating the path of daycare and a return to paid work.

I went back to one of my jobs when my daughter was 11 months old, and after a short flirt with daycare that left everyone distressed, my partner and I decided outsourcing care was not our jam.

It was an obvious decision, but one that forced me to acknowledge an invisible social pressure to have my child in daycare.

I'm proud of the way we managed to make it work but it wasn't easy — we tried again unsuccessfully 16 months later — and it took a lot of tears, time, negotiating, sacrifice and space to hear what our two year old was telling us very loudly and clearly.

And so, my Instagram rant started, I'd been thinking about mothering and motherhood and the joy and the mess and the wonder and the monotony and the love and the loneliness and the care and the cleaning up and the friendship and the repetitiveness and the laughter and the adventures and the responsibility.

About the luck and the guilt and the weird invisible social pressures and the resilience and the transformation and the loss of self and the growing and the pride and the patience and the advice and the expectations and the learning and the legacy I'm leaving and how many Bluey episodes are acceptable in an afternoon…

I haven't disappeared but in the eyes of the system and the payroll, I have — yet skills and talents that I've cultivated over the last 39 years are put to good use and challenged every single day.

Valid and valuable work

This post, much to my surprise, resonated deeply. Friends shared stories of wanting to include mothering on their CV but were laughed at, not feeling like it was work worthy of taking up space on those precious pages. I was flabbergasted.

It's not to make anyone feel uncomfortable but I need to agitate the narrative, because until I became a mother, I never really gave any of this much thought either.

I never thought about the little value society places on the biggest job of raising its future, about how the label 'stay-at-home mum' diminishes and simplifies the hours of never-ending and complex unpaid work.

I never thought about how a mother is always working, about the lost income, the lost superannuation, the low nurture culture that can exist because of the lack of support, and the potentially difficult decision to return to paid work earlier than preferred to earn an income, accrue super, and around it goes.

Time to step out of the shadow

In our house we've worked hard to carve out a 60/40 split of the care load (minus the overnight milk raves).

It's been an important and deliberate shift, but what needs to come first — more dads breaking patterns to share the care load or workplaces making this an option to start with?

I'm a mother, and I'm also a provider, protector, companion, confidante, cleaner, cook, educator and entertainer in the greatest, most productive and all-consuming role of my life and career.

This is valid and valuable work, yet isn't seen through the same economic lens or with the same sense of importance that comes with paid work outside the home.

It's time we step out from the shadows.

Jess Ong is based in Darwin/Garramilla. She is passionate about harnessing and unpacking the complexities that come with motherhood. Follow her here.