How French wine and croissants changed this mum's perspective on life

Yahoo Lifestyle Australia’s columnist Edwina Munns is an advocate for working mothers. She has navigated the Weapons of Mass Destruction Branch of the United Nations, uprooted her family to deep rural France, and tried to learn Mandarin three times. Today, she’s probably doing two loads of laundry and wondering if beans on toast is a nutritionally sound dinner. You can follow her over at Edwina Munns.

When was the last time you took some time away from work? I don’t mean a long weekend or even your annual leave. I mean truly, downing tools for an extended period and doing something completely different to what you do for a living.

It’s no surprise that taking leave from work is good for your health. But as it turns out, extended breaks can also be good for your career.

My husband and I spent a year planning a joint mini professional pause, three months in rural France with two babies. And while the journey turned out to be more National Lampoon’s than Midnight in Paris, I’m still here encouraging you to do the same.

Put down the $4.50 coffee and step away from your Outlook inbox. Take a leaf out of Dr Seuss’ book, ‘Oh, The Places You’ll Go!’ and completely disrupt your regular operating rhythm.

In planning our own radical sabbatical we’d forgotten the saying ‘parents don’t go on holidays, they take care of their children in another city.’ We had envisaged replacing the frenetic pace of our regular lives in inner Sydney with nightly cheese boards and playing cards while sipping French wine in the rose garden.

The reality of our adventure kicked in even before we’d left the country. Our two-year-old gave us a tantrum for the ages and one we, along with the border security team at Sydney International Airport, will likely never forget. We looked at each other and contemplated not getting on the flight, but a kind steward (and a glass of champagne) eased the early anxiety.

There were several other less Instagrammable moments - wrangling seven bags and a pram on the London tube during peak hour, losing internet and then power while deep in the French countryside, and eventually, being medically repatriated after a seriously sharp turn of events.

We learned a valuable if not obvious lesson - life continues to throw you curve balls, even while on holidays. But despite the major and unexpected health blip, at the heart of the trip was our desire to spend three months together, just the four of us.

We were committed to schlepping our toddler and three-month-old baby to the other side of the world - away from our busy lives at home and into a quietness we thought the French countryside would offer.

Only four weeks into our mad journey I asked our daughter if she’d finished her dinner. She replied without hesitation, ‘c’est tout’ - that’s all. We’d been in the country less than a month and she had started speaking the local language, the sponge that she is. While walking in a neighbour’s fields she kicked her gum boots through the long grass and wild herbs and exclaimed ‘mmmm I smell mint!’. She helped us buy cheese from local farmers and played with their donkey. Shockingly, her ability to order a chocolate croissant in perfect French was evident almost upon landing.

And while it wasn’t all language lessons and quaffing fresh herbs - there were very, very s*** days (see above medical repatriation), baby car sickness, long flights and tourist traps, even the really hard bits were rewarding simply because we were together, and we were so far away from our daily lives.

Having nothing to do was simultaneously terrifying and exciting. Next door’s rooster was the only noise for miles. For a brief period there were no more mad dash mornings: rushing onto a packed bus to get to daycare in time, often covered in Weetbix, ahead of a long day at work. In France, if everyone was out of pyjamas by 10am it was an early start.

We wanted different and we got it.

And I know it’s a cliché, but I promise you many years from now while you prepare to take your last bow, your final thoughts are not going to be, ‘I’m so glad we paid off the lifetime mortgage 13 weeks earlier than originally planned. Truly, that was the pinnacle of my earthly existence.’

Instead you’ll recall the fluffiest four cheese soufflé you ever encountered. Sharing a drink with locals in roaring Biarritz. You’ll remember walking from carousel to carousel in Bordeaux until you found one that was open, simply because that’s what your toddler wanted to do that day.

Seeing your son spontaneously roll over for the first time, absolutely beaming with joy, when you would’ve been at work otherwise.

And you’ll know that that was the absolute best possible spend of those 13 weeks, and that it was so important you did it. So go do it.

C’est tout.

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