Women throughout the world are juggling several roles. Some of the roles that women fulfill are as spouses, mothers, friends, sisters, daughters, employees and employers. Needless to say, women are quite fantastic! They can really manage it all. One of the unique roles women have the opportunity to fulfill is to be a mother.

There really isn’t anything that compares to being a mom.

While this is an incredible path many take, it also isn’t for everyone. I get it. It’s is huge decision to have kids and your life changes a lot. As I look back on my life pre-kids, I have a ton of fun memories and think of myself at that time as being independent.

Fast forward to my life post-kids and I still make a lot of fabulous memories and still consider myself to be a strong, independent woman. I can check many of the boxes; married, mother, educated, employed, but I love the person I have become.

Being a mother is not the only thing that defines who I am.

However, I am super thankful that it is a large part of my life.

I was raised in a household of parents that worked. I grew up with the desire to have a career and I did just that. In the meantime, I got married and we have had two amazing little girls. Now our daughters are ages 7 and 10. They are independent and are growing into their own skin. I hope that I not only tell them, but show them the importance of being a working mother.

I may not make it to every soccer practice or piano lesson, but we make it work. I don’t feel that my girls have to miss out on activities since I am in the workforce. We have a great little network of family members that help us with our kids. I might miss out on a child’s activity, but that could I also mean that I am on Capitol Hill speaking with representatives and senators about the produce industry or that I’m at work completing a project.

It is my goal to not only make a positive impact in my home raising kids, but also in the workplace and community.

The African proverb holds a lot of truth, “It takes a village to raise a child.”

It would be hard for my husband and I to manage getting our kids to every activity, if we didn’t have help from our extended family, but I know that we could do it if we needed to. It’s amazing what you can do, when you need to make it work.

A working mother today, may look quite different from when you were raised and that is just fine. Times have changed. I am not cooking dinner every night, but I don’t beat myself up about that. I figure, we might be sitting down for pizza tonight, but at least we are together as a family. My advice is don’t sweat the small stuff, everything works out.

Though this is my story, remind yourself working and motherhood looks different for everyone.