Balance. Is there such a thing when it comes to raising kids and working? I have always worked in some capacity while raising my three kids, sometimes more, sometimes less. My husband and I seem to be on a splintery teeter-totter, first one requiring more time and effort, then the other, but both getting pokes along the way. Each takes their turn feeling the strain while the other picks up the slack. Normal life, normal partnering, as all good relationships do. I don't regret this, even through the difficult times. Our kids are resilient and strong. They have learned how to band together and work as a team. They have learned the value of hard work and what it means to contribute to a household, a family, a community, and a society. I work as a sonographer, or ultrasound tech. I see people in their happy moments and also in some of their saddest, and in many in between. Sometimes when I come home from a long day at the hospital, I will tell my family of different patients who stood out to me to give my kids a perspective they couldn't possibly yet achieve in their young lives. I'll use those precious moments around the table to tell of a sweet grandmotherly woman struggling with cancer or a college co-ed with a sudden onset of ovarian torsion. Warnings and funny stories, comments and shocking moments, all shared. We don't separate work and home, they are all part of us, just as their school stories are part of them. Part of the reason we both work is for dual coverage of healthcare. In our family of five, we have three diabetics, one deaf child, and two with scoliosis. Our son jokes that my husband is the weirdo because he's the only one who doesn't have anything! But these trials are small, we know. We have prioritized giving and serving with our kids whenever we get too down on ourselves. Nothing makes you happier than serving others! We have tried to teach them to look outside themselves and to serve those around them. This is truly where they will find the greatest and most lasting happiness. Our kids have all begun working at a young age, around fourteen, not because we’ve asked them to, but because they have wanted to of their own accord. Because of this strong work ethic, my oldest, who is now seventeen, recently went on a humanitarian trip to the Philippines for seventeen days, paid for entirely by herself! I could not have been more proud of her. She was able to serve the people in San Pablo by building a kitchen for their school and teaching the kids English. Balance. I think it is taught to me more than I exhibit the trait. When I am overly exhausted, someone will notice and offer to clean up for me, or put a movie on. When my kids are stressed about school, I will calm them with an extremely aggressive mom hug until we are all laughing and the tension is no more. Balance is what family is about. One is down, the others bring them up. In a larger sense, that is society. That is how we should be treating one another. We help, we lift, we fill in the cracks, and make each other whole.