The One-Handed Supermom

One of the best things about having a business partner with a new baby is that I’m constantly being brought back to my first few months as a working mother. I forgot how much effort it is having a newborn, especially considering I was working about 20 hours a week at the same time.

As Lorna goes through her struggles with figuring out a schedule, juggling a colicky baby while trying to work, and dealing with the frustrations of a spouse, I find myself saying, “Oh yeah, I remember that.” “Yep, that too.” “Oh boy, I wouldn’t want to do that again.” It’s like I get the experience of having a new baby without actually having a new baby (which is the best way to do it, in my opinion).

One of the things I remember the most is doing everything one-handed. I had a baby who wanted to be held all the time, so I developed coping mechanisms that required baby-holding in one arm and supermom-caliber work with the other. This included things like cooking, eating, folding laundry, checking email, and even typing. As a shout out to Lorna and to refresh my memory of those early struggles, I decided to take a one-handed typing test to see just exactly how much of a burden that was.

I went to TypingTest and took their one-minute quickie test. I used only my right hand. And I got 38 wpm. Thirty-eight freaking words per minute. That’s pretty fantastic as far as I’m concerned.

Perhaps it was a little unfair since I didn’t actually have a child in my other arm, but I’m still ridiculously proud of that number. I guarantee I wouldn’t have been able to get that high of a number before my daughter was born.

One more point for the talents of the WAHM!