It is Day 2 of my vacation and I have decided I would like to be a stay-at-home mom even though my only child turned 18 last week. I took the career path instead of the stay-at-home mom path and it is among the biggest mistakes I have made in my life – which is really saying something because I have made a lot of really big mistakes. Really big.

I have always had “issues” with work. When I was 14 I got my first “real” job – the kind with a paycheck instead of $2/hour baby sitting some snotty nose kids. I handed out towels and baskets and cleaned locker rooms at the community swimming pool. I unwittingly broke the child labor laws when I took a second job at an ice cream parlor when I was 16. (How was I supposed to know that kids couldn’t work that many hours a week?)

In college I washed dishes in the cafeteria and stacked books in the library. I taught kids how to swim and saved others from drowning. My first job out of college was as a cashier at a fruit market. In 1981 I got my first journalism job, which paid a whopping annual salary of $9,800.

Alcohol is my drug of choice – work is my second. I self-medicated my depression and bipolar for decades with drugs, alcohol and work. Alcohol alleviated the physical symptoms for a few brief hours – then made my depression and mania much, much worse. Work fertilized my denial – I can’t possibly be a drunk if I never miss a day of work and win all these awards, right?

I beat myself up: “You will feel good about yourself if you work harder.” I never felt better so I kept working harder. Then I had my daughter. I went back to work when she was only 6 weeks old. I worked even harder to get my work done so I could get home to my daughter. When I got home I worked even harder to be the perfect mommy – I cooked, cleaned, sung lullabies, cut the grass, washed the clothes, told bedtime stories, made Halloween costumes, colored Easter eggs, helped with homework, went to soccer, ballet and step-dancing, kissed boo-boos and had tea parties. But everyday at 3:20 – when the bus would have dropped my daughter off at her bus stop after school – I looked at the clock and kicked myself for being at work and not at home.

Day after day, year after year I tried to convince myself that I would feel better – I would be proud – if I could do just a little more – work a little harder, achieve a little more. Then I took up triathlon and running marathons. After a few marathons, century bike rides and dozens of triathlons, I still didn’t feel better. So, I drank more, worked more and got more stressed and depressed.

I came of age in the 1970′s – Gloria Steinem, Bella Abzug, ERA and let’s not forget Helen Reddy: “I am woman, I am invincible.” Speaking as a strong, accomplished woman 28 years into a successful career I am here to tell you, we got seriously screwed. Oh yea, we got our right to work alright. Yippee. But you still gotta have those babies. Only you women can do that. So, have the babies and then go back to work and we will pay you .75 cents for every dollar we earn, okay?

Gee, how did we think this was progress? How did we get to a point where we look upon stay-at-home moms as pussies who couldn’t keep up with us real women? Puh-leez. Are you kidding me? The price I paid for my cape almost killed me. Take my cape, please. I don’t want it anymore. I want to be a stay-at-home mom of an 18-year-old daughter. I hope it’s not too late.

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