What Do I Want to Be When They Grow Up? E-Book

Karen Johnson

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Ratgeber
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 301

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

Helpful, inspiring guide for mothers seeking to flourish and succeed after their kids grow up

In What Do I Want to Be When They Grow Up? (And Other Thoughts from a 40-Something Mom), renowned parenting influencer Karen Johnson provides a fun, easy-to-understand, and inspiring guide for mothers currently experiencing an empty nest, or who see one on the horizon, and are looking to lead their best, most fulfilling lives and feel comfortable that they're not alone in their struggles. This book draws upon stories and experiences from Johnson and mothers around her, helping readers seek out new passions, including new career paths, to avoid feeling as if they are solely defined by motherhood.

In this book, Johnson explores topics including:

• Taking risks, putting yourself out there, getting stronger mentally and physically, and fostering positive relationships
• Navigating the wondrously weird world of perimenopause and aging bodies with confidence, knowledge, and grace
• Working through the very real emotions of guilt, anxiety, failure, and shame that often accompany this transitory period in mothers' lives

What Do I Want to Be When They Grow Up? (And Other Thoughts from a 40-Something Mom) earns a well deserved spot on the bookshelves of all mothers seeking to develop individualism, mindfulness, and genuine feelings of contentment and happiness as they turn the page to the next chapter of their lives.

Leseprobe

Praise for What Do I Want to Be When They Grow Up?

“This book is for every mom who's spent years making sacrifices for their kids, and now worries about what happens when those years come to an end … for every mom who is still waiting for ‘someday’ when she'll finally get everything done … for every mom who wonders if anyone truly sees her. With her trademark wit and some very profound insights, Karen Johnson is the mom friend everyone needs to get through the trials that come with the territory.”

—Rita Templeton, Parenting Editor, SheKnows; former Deputy Editor of Scary Mommy

“Motherhood, marriage, sacrifice … the whole wad of adulting is in Karen Johnson's book, and it's exactly what you need to feel less alone.”

—Clint Edwards, bestselling author of Fatherish and Breaking Dad

“As a middle‐aged mother navigating the ever‐evolving landscape of motherhood as my son grows up, I found myself deeply resonating with Karen's stories and insights. She beautifully explores the crossroads of motherhood and middle age, offering valuable guidance on how to navigate this new chapter—a time of rediscovery and reinvention beyond the role of ‘snack‐getter.’”

—Tara Clark, founder, Modern Mom Probs

What Do I Want to Be When They Grow Up?

(And Other Thoughts from a 40‐Something Mom)

Karen Johnson

Copyright © 2025 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights, including for text and data mining, AI training, and similar technologies, are reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

ISBNs: 9781394286300 (Paperback), 9781394286324 (ePDF), 9781394286317 (ePub).

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Library of Congress Control Number: 2025000806 (print)

Cover Design: Paul McCarthy

Cover Photo: Courtesy of Karen Johnson

To eight‐year‐old me, handwriting books in her bedroom and binding them together with twine, telling everyone, “I’m going to be a writer someday”…

We did it. I’m proud of us.

Prologue

I don't like surprises. I mean, of course I like the good kind like when my husband proposed in our tiny apartment kitchen a hundred years ago and I was utterly, entirely shocked. That kind I love. LOVE. But as a type‐A anxiety‐ridden perfectionist, I like having a plan. I like knowing what's coming next. And I like being prepared. The word “spontaneity” doesn't really get much usage in my world. But there have been two times in my life when a major life change hit hard and the ground under me shifted, like an earthquake that threw everything off kilter.

Unsteady ground? Don't like it. 0/10. Do not recommend.

The first time I felt one of those unwelcome surprises was when I became a mom. The “becoming a mom” part was beautiful and exactly what I wanted—that wasn't the shock. It was everything else: the loneliness, the isolation, the abrupt shift of leaving my career, the feelings of failure and staring at the clock, counting the minutes and hours until I'd see another adult.

I was not on steady ground, and I didn't know what to do.

The second time I felt the whiplash of a “Whoa, I did not see that coming” event was as I entered all the sweaty glory of perimenopause. I did not know my body would change so drastically and so fast, and I have to say this has also been a very unwelcome surprise. Also 0/10. Zero stars.

But now another big one is heading my way and maybe heading your way, too. Yet another major life change is on the horizon as our little kids have grown into big kids and are starting to strengthen their wings so they can fly off in the near future.

So, I've decided to be prepared—as best I can. I'm learning about myself so I know what I need (and will need) as a woman, a wife, a mom, and a writer. I'm self‐reflecting about why I have struggled in the past and thinking about what I can do in the future to solidify myself in solid ground.And I'm writing this book to share my thoughts so that maybe I can help you prepare a little bit, too.

So yes, if you're a woman, this book is for you.

If you're a mom, this book is for you.

If you're a perfectionist or if you have anxiety (or if you're a perfectionist WITH anxiety—yay for you by the way), this book is for you.

Also, this book is for anyone out there who:

Gave up their career to raise their kids.

Is the default parent.

Is in the throes of perimenopause (or really just wants to read about how super fun it is!)

Is a little (or a lot) pissed off about, well, everything. (Let's be pissed off together!)

Has ever driven their pet turtle to the vet in a Tupperware bowl. (That's weirdly specific, but yes, there's a chapter on our high‐need pets.)

Has neck, arm, and eyelid skin that is getting looser and wrinklier because they're, well, aging (like everyone else).

Has felt grief and regret that in some ways, motherhood didn't turn out like it was supposed to.

And finally, if you're just the kind of person who wants to read someone else's real, honest, raw stories about being a mom and navigating life and trying to figure out what she's going to do when the kids aren't around anymore to beg for takeout or fight over having to walk the dog, this book is absolutely for you.

The stories in this book are true. They're mine. I share them with you as a series of tiny therapy sessions (for you and for me) and also to hopefully make you laugh and feel less alone. And maybe, if we all do it together, we can learn to unapologetically just like ourselves—how great would that be?

We're all in this sweaty‐perimenopausal‐what's‐next‐for‐me time of life together. I know I need girlfriends to get through it, and maybe you do too. Thanks for reading and for being here.

—Karen (The 21st Century SAHM)

Chapter 1What Do I Want to Be When They Grow Up?

I'm a planner. (Shocking, right, when you see that I have a whole chapter in this book dedicated to anxiety and perfectionism.) And in the summer of 2008, I had a plan for exactly how life was going to go. Glowing and pregnant with my first child, I was also on the cusp of a big change professionally. Not necessarily because of the baby who'd soon be joining our family, but because my husband and I were planning a move (from Wisconsin to Kansas) for his job. I was an English teacher at the time, so the summer months were the perfect time for me to visit Kansas, tour potential high schools, and meet some principals, hoping to make a connection and land a new job myself. And, while we were there, we checked out neighborhood options, as well.

I had it all mapped out. I'd get a new job as a teacher, be a working mom who brought her kid to daycare or had a nanny, and we'd likely live in a bungalow‐style house, near Kansas City, where we could raise our little baby in an eclectic and vibrant community full of quaint bakeries, botanical gardens, and libraries we could walk to on Saturdays.

Boom. Plan.

Except none of that happened.

In reality, my story followed the path of so many women with lofty ambitions to do it all and have it all. And then, at some point, reality smacks them in the face with a sippy cup full of day‐old milk and they realize they can't.

The Best Laid Plans …

So, what happened? Why didn't I end up heading the English department at a high school in Kansas and walk my baby to the farmers market on Saturday mornings?

I MEAN, I HAD A PLAN.

Was it because I hated my job? Nope. I loved teaching. Absolutely loved it. Also, I had already earned my undergraduate and master's degrees in English and Secondary Teaching. Why wouldn't I continue working in a career I was passionate about? A career I was really freaking good at? A career I'd be paying for until I was in my 40s (because, you know, student loans and all)?

Why did I walk away? Why do so many of us women who love our careers—careers we worked our asses off for—walk away as we pivot into motherhood? And why is it usually us doing it and not the dads?

(You're probably expecting an answer here, but I don't have one.)

For me, there was no aha moment when a light switch flipped and I knew my teaching career was over. But sometime after my baby was born, my husband and I were standing in our tiny apartment kitchen, and he looked at me and said, “You're not going back to teaching, are you?”

He knew. He was right. And that was that.

Maybe it was due to the mom in me emerging and finding myself pulled to cul‐de‐sac neighborhoods with minivans rather than the urban downtown vibe I thought I wanted.

Maybe it was because almost immediately after starting his new job, my husband began traveling often, and I knew the only way I could teach high school English was if I dropped my tiny little baby off at a daycare at 6:30 in the morning.

Or maybe it was because I was, frankly, overwhelmed by motherhood and knew with my whole heart that I'd never again be able to give myself to teaching in the way I used to.

Honestly, it was likely a combination of all of these, but yes, that was the end. I never got my teaching license in Kansas and never went back to the classroom after we moved.

My first child was still an infant, and my teaching days were done.

Sixteen years later, I still refer to myself as a former teacher and I still treasure those seven years in the classroom as one of the most important times in my life.

But it's true—instead of teaching Shakespearean sonnets and the value of a good transition between paragraphs, I've spent the last decade and a half changing diapers, attending play dates, reading animal farm books, potty‐training three kids, washing straws, lids, and endless tiny cups, building Lego sets, and sweeping crumbs off the floor.

It's been a beautiful, messy, exhausting ride, but the reality is that throughout parenthood, my two college degrees have merely collected dust while my husband's career flourished.

It was a choice I made—a choice I 100% do not regret and I fully believe was the best option for me at the time—but it changed the entire trajectory of my life. I never imagined before becoming pregnant that the end of my time in the classroom was near, and then, suddenly it was.

The Default Parent Uber Driver Life

My youngest is now 12. The others are 14 and 16. They're in school all day long, which leaves lots of quiet hours for me and the dog. I've been freelancing as a writer and editor since the second baby arrived, so I've got something (a lot, actually) to show for myself when it comes to “work” and that awkward question SAHMs often get that makes us twitch with rage: “So what do you DO all day?”

But no, it's not a full‐time job. There's no office holiday party or retirement fund or health insurance. I swap in one pair of sweats for another, throw in a load of laundry, do a little work, take the dog for a walk, make sure dinner is prepped for later, put the laundry in the dryer, run the dishwasher, register a kid for something, make an appointment for another, rinse and repeat. Day after day.

During the school year, the high schoolers arrive home at around 3:15, the tween at 4:25. By 5:00, I'm in the car almost every day, driving them all over town to practice, rehearsal, a game, or a friend's house and often don't come up for air until many hours later.

It's not a bad gig. In fact, I'm quite blessed to be the one there for everything, the one absorbing all the car ride convos where bits of information leak out, the one helping edit essays and quizzing them on vocab, the one helping them navigate friendship woes and cheering them on at every game, show, or competition they throw themselves into.

But now that I'm less than a decade from the last one moving on to a post‐high‐school life, I do wonder … What do I want to be when they grow up? Is this it? Freelancing, still doing the laundry, and walking the dog every day at noon? Is that enough? Do I want a turn at a thriving, booming career like my husband has had? Do I want a big retirement bash like he'll have someday? Do I want a justified reason to actually wear real pants once in a while?

Are these even options for me?

Knowing that, as the default parent, I'm endlessly on standby for:

“Mom, can you bring me _____ (insert book, computer, phone, charger, uniform, food, etc. etc., forever and ever, amen)” …

Or “Mom, I don't feel well. Can you pick me up?” …

Or “Mom, my game is an hour away so we need to leave right after school to get there on time”…

I know that any steady “job” or career aspiration, at least for now, has to fit snugly between the 8:30 and 3:00 hours. And that I have to be able and willing to respond and possibly hop into my car on a moment's notice during those hours too.

Of course, kids with moms who work full‐time survive and thrive even if their mother can't appear like a magician with whatever they forgot at home. But because my husband works long hours and sometimes travels, the after‐school‐driving‐all‐over‐the‐state part of my job … that one's here to stay for a few more years, so I'd have to find a career that frees up when the kids do.

But wait! I do have those two degrees taking up space in the hall closet!

“What about teaching?” people sometimes ask. “Why don't you return to the classroom?” And to be honest, I don't fully know the answer to why that's a “No” for me, but I think it's a swirl of factors. Career fields go through monumental change in a decade's time, and that's how long it was until my third and last baby was in school. By 2018, the landscape of teaching looked completely different from anything I'd known. When I left the field in 2009, most of my students didn't even have cell phones yet. No one had a smartphone. I can't imagine time‐hopping all these years and adjusting to what a classroom full of adolescents looks like now.

Also, I graded papers every night, every weekend, back in my pre‐kid 20s. Those hours are gone now, entirely consumed with my own children. Sure, lots of moms do it—I have several friends who remained in the classroom, raised their own kids, and are badass teacher‐moms who make it all work. For me, it's too much. I never gave myself the chance to evolve, to share the mental load with my husband, to learn what it looks like to manage mom life and teacher life simultaneously. Re‐entering the teacher workforce today feels like diving head‐first into a pit of lava.

I believe I'd be setting myself on a straight path to overwhelming failure—a path where as I'd feared all those years ago, I'd be doing two jobs, and neither of them well.

I've spent my children's entire lives as their default parent. I've been there for every need, every call from the nurse, every snow day, every school event. And any parent with older kids knows that even when they are big enough to go off to school all day long, the needs don't stop. How could I possibly make the shift to going back to work full‐time? Our system has worked for the last 16 years because my husband cannot be on standby, whereas I can. I am the stable, stationary one who is always home. Always there. They rely on that—him and the kids. And, to be honest, I love being that person for all four of them.

And finally, I guess I just see those seven years as a wholly separate chapter in my story. I loved the teacher I was, and I want to preserve that memory. I can't ever be her again—completely and utterly devoted to her career and her career only. Those seven years are preserved, almost as if they are in a snow globe, untouchable, sitting on a shelf, bringing back memories and making me smile with pride at the time I taught Hamlet and To Kill a Mockingbird in another life.

Scared to Try, Scared to Not Try

What is next, then? I have six years until my last baby leaves for college. And as much as I want to chase my dreams and toss my hat into the ring of … something, if I'm being honest, I'm also terrified.

I'm scared to put myself out there: What does that other world full of “career people” even look like? Is there even a place for me anymore?

But if I don't try, then what? And that's the scariest question of all.

For now, here I am, in the middle. My kids are all in school full‐time, but I'm still the default parent they call for everything. Every third Wednesday is a half‐day of school, so I that's when I schedule orthodontist appointments and usually try to fit in another errand like haircuts, as well. Right now we're out of eggs and cheese, so I'm going to run to the grocery store real quick for a few things, and, while I'm out, I'll pop into Kohl’s and grab new sneakers for my oldest, whose feet won't stop growing, and oh yeah, I need to refill the dog's medicine, too.

And that's why so many of us slog through the grueling baby and toddler days only to emerge on the other side when all the kids are in school, wondering what we should do with ourselves now. Except we're still the household managers with nine thousand tiny but very important tasks to manage daily, and we have to be at the front of the car line to get the youngest one to practice on time, so we actually have to leave the house at 2:45.

Teacher, writer, mom, wife. These are the various maps by which I've lived my life. For now, and for the past decade and a half, “Mom” tends to be the compass and everything else falls into place around it.

After another 16 years? I might have a different compass or a new map. Maybe I'll have real‐life coworkers and a reason to wear pants that button. Or maybe this is it forever and I'm Team Sweatpants for life.

I don't know yet. For now, I guess I'll go throw in a load of towels while I keep wondering what comes next.

_______________________________________________

Notes on Chapter 1

If this story sounds familiar to you, you might also be wondering what you’re going to be when they grow up. So, as you muddle through these middle years, remember these three things:

First of all, (and most importantly), if you want your life to include more than motherhood, that's nothing to feel guilty about. You're a great mom and it's okay to want more because you deserve it. Write that on a Post‐it and stick it to your mirror.

Secondly, the time to start prioritizing yourself is now (like yesterday, actually). This way, when the house is actually quiet in a few years, you've already taken a few steps toward your new, well, “you.” That means giving real, meaningful thought to what you're passionate about. What parts of you lay hidden all these years because motherhood consumed your every waking breath?

Also, if you wonder if you're qualified to put yourself out there, remember that through motherhood, you've done a million jobs you had no training for, but you figured it out. As moms, we multitask, run a household, manage calendars and schedules for multiple people, meal‐plan and cook to meet different dietary needs, and field punches on the daily in the form of emotional meltdowns, failed tests, and friendship drama, just to name a few. And that's just on a Tuesday.

There's nothing you can't do.

But if you're stuck, here are some ideas. I have lots of friends in the same boat as us—with older kids who have flown the coop or are about to—and here's what they're doing:

Going back to school. New degree, new me!

Starting their own small businesses, selling their own unique creations, like custom‐made clothes.

Marketing their services—things they're good at—home organization, cleaning services, photography, personal assistant work.

Pivoting career paths entirely and putting themselves out there to do a job they've never done before. They just knew they'd be good at it, so they aimed high and landed the role.

Joining the real estate business and killing it.

Flipping houses. (Fingers crossed they'll help me redo mine.)

Dusting off that old degree, but taking it in a different direction. Former teachers are subbing, tutoring, and teaching online school. Friends who used to work in marketing are reaching out to local businesses to see who needs help getting the word out on social media.

Opening up their homes to in‐home daycare for little ones.

Training to become foster parents as they know their home is meant to have kids running through it, and they felt a calling to help kids who need some love and stability.

And me? Well, looks like I'm writing a book.

The truth is, that next chapter is coming, whether you want it to or not. Someday they will all grow up. So what are you going to be?

Chapter 2Guilt

In childhood, it was a new friend. We didn't know better, so we welcomed Guilt into our circle, not knowing how fast this frenemy was sadistically worming its way into our psyche.

When you accidentally broke the vase at Grandma's …

When you talked out of turn at school and received a glare from the teacher …

When you stained your new dress with spaghetti sauce even though you promised to be extra careful …

It's not hard to train young children to accept Guilt into their innocent little lives.

By the teen and young adult years, we were well acquainted, as Guilt had shown itself now quite a bit over the years—always there, looming, lurking, fully seeped into our subconscious where it had grown roots—first a tree, then a forest.

That boy who likes you and is in your personal space? “Be nice or you'll hurt his feelings,” Guilt said.

Don't want to take that extra shift at work? “But your boss really needs you to come in, even though you were supposed to have today off. He's short‐staffed!” Guilt told you.

“Don't eat that piece of cake. You didn't work out this morning,” Guilt whispered in our ear, over and over.

How Guilt Creates the Zombie Mom

Knowing this history, it's not surprising that Mom Guilt is so pervasive, such a powerful force in our well‐being (or lack thereof) as we navigate the journey of child‐raising.

Mom Guilt is just a spawn of something that's already been there for as long as we can remember.

But once you're holding that tiny baby in your arms, Guilt and all its spiky tentacles takes on new forms, grows new roots, and finds new corners of your mind to sink its teeth into.

Working mom?

“How could you leave your child in the care of someone else?”

Stay‐at‐home mom?

“Why are you wasting your college degree? What do you do all day?” “Why are your kids watching screens and not playing outside right now?”

Missed “Muffins with Mom” at your child's preschool?

“Wow. All the other moms were there.”

Not volunteering at school?

“Hmmm. Thankfully other moms care enough to help out.”

House isn't clean?

“Get it together.”

Haven't showered or done your makeup or hair in days?

“Do you even try? What does your husband think?”

Gained weight?

“You really should make time to work out, eat healthier, lose the ‘baby weight,’ practice self‐care.”

Child misbehaves?

“Why aren't you disciplining them?”

Kids eat junk food?

“Don't you even care what goes into your child's body?”

Looking at your phone and not at your child every second?

“Why did you even have kids?!”

And it grows stronger and stronger.

If our teens struggle with mental health issues, we blame ourselves.

If we lose a pregnancy, we blame ourselves.

If our kids get sick or get hurt, we blame ourselves.

Mom Guilt is the loudest and the strongest of all the Guilts, isn't it?

That's because Mom Guilt partners up with that dangerous “You can do it all!” mindset and together, they set you up for complete and utter failure. And it's because of Mom Guilt that there's a sea of exhausted zombie moms shuffling through the halls at parent‐teacher conferences. Moms who have been up since 5 a.m., have already worked a full day, have dinner cooking in the crockpot, and need to rush home after meeting with the math teacher (“How can I get him to practice his math facts more?