7 Ways Working Moms Balance Baby & Job

1. A Will to Work

"I'm happier working than if I wasn't working. I'm actually a better mom and a better wife, and probably a better employee," says Chattanooga, Tennessee, mother Mary Stewart Lewis from her cell phone as she and her three-year-old son drive home from a baseball game outing with clients. This Bell South corporate saleswoman says work nourishes her self-esteem.

Baltimore, Maryland, environmental planner and landscape architect Allysha Lorber grew up with a mother and grandmother who worked. "Just the fact that they had that extra something that they could teach their kids about and that I can teach my daughter about, it makes me feel good," says Lorber, who was promoted to senior management just before her now seven-month-old's birth.

Samantha Cabot, who lives in Los Angeles, California, is a senior marketing manager for the staffing firm Robert Half International. She takes pride in her work and in raising her two young daughters. "I really enjoy working, and I think I have a lot to teach my children about how the world works through working," she says.

Lorber recalls someone once saying it's not fair to your children to be a working mom. She counters, "I don't think it's fair to [you] to sell yourself short if it is something you want to do, because it's not that hard once you get a system down."