My Mama Salary

Okay. So humor me here for a minute. IF a special needs advocate makes $68,000 in New York, New York according to Indeed.com, that means they make $32 and hour and change (For a 40 hour week). Not bad. But the thing is, that mamas and daddys of kiddos with special needs are doing similar jobs, with a pay rate of $0.

Let that sink in for a moment.

Today I spent three hours on the phone with two different providers. I have been fighting THIS fight since September. How many hours have I spent on the phone in that time? How much would someone with the title of 'Advocate' have been paid?

I will never stop advocating for my son, but I want people who don't get it to understand is this. IT'S A DAMN LOT OF WORK AND IT'S EMOTIONALLY TAXING. I mean no offense when I say this, but it's got nothing on trying to schedule your kids extracurriculars or figure out which baby sitter to hire. So with that being said, imagine a 40 hour a week full time job on top of that? Keeping the house in some semblance of clean, or at least not total squalor? It's a damn hard job, this Mama thing.

So to some it may seem annoying to have to keep making these calls. But on my side of it? I thought I solved this problem three times, and in the meantime I've shelled out hundreds of dollars on things that should've been covered by our insurance. It feels something akin to standing on the roof of a train as it bumbles down the tracks, shouting to a train on my right, and then passing that information along to the train on my left. I think I'm being clear and articulate but they have a whole schedule of stops and passengers who need things too. So I won't ever have their focus. It feels like shouting underwater. I can try as hard as I want, but ultimately, there are others (the water in this metaphor) that get in the way. I can try as hard as I want, but my pay out isn't measured solely by the effort and grit I put into it.

So with all that effort expended, I'm supposed to find time for myself? To make sure I have a full cup to pour from? Pft. Oh okay. Sure.

Enter The Miracle Morning, the latest book I picked up. Give it a read, I'll review it soon. But let me just say this. It was 429 when I woke up. And I didn't go back to sleep. AND I feel rested. So I'm thinking it's a good one.

So any fellow sped mama's out there. Hold your head high. Hang in there. You're doing a fantastic job despite any setbacks you may be encountering. Deep Breath in, deep breath out. Now go start your day and buy that book!