You know those annoying blog posts/magazine articles that have titles like, "How to do it all!" or, "Making it work as a Working Mom." Or the interview questions that beautiful and successful women are always asked, "How do you find the balance between work and children?" "Can you have it all?"

I don't want to get into this, because: A. It's clearly been covered, and B. I have only been back to work for one week and I already feel like I'm failing in a hundred different ways as an employee, as a mom, as an author. Never mind as a wife, friend, daughter, sister, church member. So obviously I have no light to shed on the issue and I don't know how to find a balance and it breaks my heart when I have to leave my baby at home for work and it makes me cringe to think that my boss doesn't feel like I'm measuring up since I had my baby, and it makes me sad that writing - which is my outlet, my dream - is slipping through the cracks.

I don't know what I'm trying to say here, other than that the pressure is real. I feel so much pressure to provide for my family physically and financially and emotionally. I feel pressure to be the same worker I was before. The same wife, the same everything - when the truth is I've been born again and I'm a new person, trying to wedge myself into my old life, but I don't fit there any more, no matter how hard I push.

I'm not sure there is such thing as balance. I think you just get by and do the best you can and hope that those around you - your baby, your boss, your husband, etc. all learn to forgive you and accept that your best is enough.

Balance. Psh. Give your mom a hug.