Jekyll and Hyde: To stay home or be a working mom?

I have been struggling with how to write this post. It is a difficult topic for me because I have always been busy. When I say always, I pretty much mean always. To backtrack a little, I have been a dancer since kindergarten. I always had school, dance, church. Every week. In high school it was worse, School, dance team/marching band practice, dance studio classes, church, social life, extracurriculars at school.. etc. College... ya. I finished my undergrad after 5 long years because I also worked close to full-time at one job and had two or three part time jobs (at the same time), plus college dance team...

Needless to say though here I am saying it I have always been a busy person. It is my personality, I like to stay busy. I assumed that after I finished my degree and got married that I would have one job and my kids would go to daycare because I worked so hard for my degree and to have a career. I was planning on being bored during maternity leave because I would not be "busy." I was planning on wanting to come back after 8 weeks because I missed work and being busy. I didn't anticipate the timeline of life though... more so the conundrum of life. Which brings me to the topic of discussion:

Continue a career or be a stay at home mom?

I consider this a conundrum because I definitely wanted to have kids before I was over 30. I definitely wanted to have a career related to my hard earned degree and even pursue additional degrees. Alas, you really find it difficult to have your cake and eat it to. Sure it is TOTALLY possible. Women do it everyday. I was not prepared for the emotional aspects.
Here are a few pros and cons:

• PRO: Have a career and make plenty of money to help support your family and send your kids to a great daycare. You want them to have a social experience anyway
• CON: Missing out on many milestones and opportunities to socialize your child yourself
• PRO:Using your degree to promote your passions and get paid to do it.
• CON: Promoting your passions may mean long hours and full work schedules which also means less time with your family.
• PRO: Setting an example for your children by working hard to pursue your dreams.
• CON: Except they won't understand for a few years and usually they are too tired by the time you get home to really play or talk or anything.
• PRO: Moms across the world do it all the time and dads do it all the time.You won't be the only one with a kid in daycare.
• CON: Missing your kid so much you can't even look at a picture of him without tearing up a bit

I know that it is supposed to get easier (that's what I tell the parents of the kids in my class anyway) But it is still so hard. I have so many thoughts contradicting each other. I want to stay at home with my kid. I want him to have a social experience. I want to work. I want to use my degree dangit!  I want to go back to school. I want my husband to be able to do what he wants too. We can't have it all.