Maternity leave is boring
But that's not necessarily a bad thing.
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I write this nearly a month into maternity leave with my third kid. With three boys under four, I know a little about taking—or not taking—leave.
Maternity leave—or perhaps parental leave more generally, though I can only speak to my experience—is strange and disorienting. I recently heard Tamar Avishai describe it as similar to the early days of the pandemic, mainly if you were lucky enough to be trapped at home. There's a "weird out-of-time-ness" to the experience. Days blur together in an endless cycle of feeding, burping, changing diapers, and trying to get sleep that never seems to add up to enough.
I recently described it as lonely, and it is. But I think there's a better word for it: boring.
Don't get me wrong, there's plenty to do. You're busy. But that doesn't mean it's interesting. Newborns are little more than potatoes, especially in the first six weeks. They eat, sleep, poop, and repeat. They don't smile. They don't engage. Most of your time is spent obsessing over things like whether their poop looks normal, if they're eating enough, or why they won't sleep longer than 30 minutes at a time.
That's it. It's an endless stream of monotony that—while critical and necessary—lacks the richness of human interaction or the satisfaction of seeing progress.
This is even more pronounced now that I have older children. It's incredible to hear my big boys tell me about their days at school, what songs they learned, or how they played outside. There's joy and reward in those conversations. In contrast, there's something suffocating about feeling trapped under a newborn who is finally napping (especially when you have to go pee).
The Myth of the "Real Life"
What makes this experience particularly challenging is the feeling—however unspoken—that this boredom somehow isn't real life- that it's something to get through so you can get back to the "good stuff," the moments of joy, insight, or impact.
This is a lie.
The truth is that the boring parts of life are not separate from it—they are life. Humans often imagine life as a series of highs: exciting experiences, big moments, deep insights. In this framing, the boring, foundational parts—like caring for a newborn or handling tedious work—are obstacles to be overcome, distractions from the real story we think we're supposed to be living.
But life doesn't work that way. The boring bits are not an interruption; they are part of what it means to live. They are unavoidable, and, more than that, they are essential.
This isn't to say you should celebrate monotony or pretend it's more enjoyable than it is. But the foundational pieces—whether it's changing a diaper, inputting data, or simply waiting—create the scaffolding for everything else. They are not detours; they are the road.
Necessary Boredom in Professional Life
The parallels to professional life are striking. Every career or project has its share of foundational, unexciting work. It's easy to glamorize the moments of creativity and accomplishment—launching a product, delivering a successful pitch, closing a big deal. But behind every highlight is a pile of groundwork: the research, the testing, the meetings that seemed endless but were essential.
Think of a startup founder. The press loves to write about the big fundraising round or the breakthrough product launch. They rarely cover the founder spending months debugging code at midnight or repeatedly pitching uninterested investors. Yet without those moments, the success wouldn't exist.
This tension also applies to roles that feel thankless. Take my role as a product manager, for example. The exciting part might be the vision and strategy, but the day-to-day work often looks like wrangling stakeholders, prioritizing backlogs, and clarifying requirements. This isn't glamorous—but it's what makes the vision real.
And just like parenting a newborn, this foundational work doesn't often provide immediate feedback. There's no applause for handling a tedious customer escalation or documenting processes for a feature release, but these tasks build the stability and structure that allow for future growth and innovation.
Embracing the Boring Bits
So what does this mean for how we live—both as parents and professionals?
It means we stop imagining that life is happening somewhere else in the moments of excitement and achievement. Those moments matter, of course. But they are rare. The reality is that most life takes place in the mundane, in the unremarkable day-to-day tasks that are easy to dismiss but impossible to avoid.
The goal, then, is not to avoid the boring bits but to embrace them for what they are. These moments may not be exciting, but they are real. They provide texture, structure, and meaning, even if that meaning is only apparent in retrospect.
In parenting, this might mean accepting that the days of endless feedings and diaper changes are not a failure to live fully but simply part of the process. They are the foundation for the moments to come: the first smile, the first step, the first "I love you."
In professional life, it means understanding that the tedious work—the emails, the spreadsheets, the meetings—is not wasted effort but a necessary part of building something bigger. The payoff comes later, often in ways you can't predict.
The Long View
What ties these threads together is perspective. When you understand that the boring parts of life are unavoidable—and essential—they stop feeling like something you need to escape. Instead, they become something to experience, move through, and, ultimately, remember.
The next time I'm trapped under my napping newborn (definitely later today), I'll try to remind myself of this. This is not an interruption of my life. This is my life. And when he finally smiles at me for the first time, I'll know that every boring moment led to that one.
The same is true of the work we do. The boring bits are not a distraction from success; they are the price of it. Embrace them. Because whether you like it or not, this is the road we all walk.
An Aside on Media Consumption
Books that I’ve finished/am currently reading, since starting leave:
Ambition Monster by Jennifer Romolini
The Perfectionist’s Guide to Losing Control by Katherine Morgan Schafler
Of Boys and Men by Richard Reeves
What are Children For? by Anastasia Berg and Rachel Wiseman
[in progress] One Billion Americans by Matthew Yglesias
[in progress] Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder
[in progress] It Ends With Us by Colleen Hoover
Shows I’ve watched and/or am watching:
West Wing Rewatch (Max)
Nobody Wants This (Netflix)
[in progress] Slow Horses (Apple TV)
[in progress] Silo (Apple TV)
[in progress] Dune Prophecy (Max)
[in progress] Landman (Paramount+)
[in progress] Shrinking (Apple TV)
[in progress] American Sport Story: Aaron Hernandez (Hulu)
[in progress] Only Murders in the Building (Hulu)
Send me more suggestions!
As I get ready to head on maternity leave for my third little one I relate to this so much. I completely agree about the boring bits often being the building blocks to the bigger moments. Love this!