Noah got his first set of shots this morning, something he was clearly not pleased about. But he settled down fairly easily and even dozed off on the way home.

I gave him Tylenol, as our doctor suggested, and put him down for a nap at home. And he slept for several hours. But when he woke up, he was miserable. Inconsolable. Off-the-charts loud and clearly in pain.

Nana -- that's Damon's mom -- is staying with us this week, so she was trying to calm him as I came down the stairs to go to work. Even though she has 55 years of experience taking care of kids, I, of course, felt that only I could make my baby feel better, so I snatched him.

And I did a pretty good job, I must say. I got him to eat, and I found a combination of tricks that seemed to soothe him for brief periods at least. But the half-hour I spent doing that was a half-hour when I should have been driving to work.

I finally had to hand him over to Nana and leave. And as I walked out the door, he screamed and screamed.

I know he's sleeping now and he's fine, but, damn, do I feel awful. All I want to do is go home and hold him. I forgot how hard these first weeks back can be.

How do you handle being away from your young children if you work outside the home?