The One Where I Tell It Like It Is

So, I am sure that you are wondering how I have, as some (Faced out of Facebook now) have pointed out (begrudgingly, may I add) that I am doing it all. Well, it has taken the support of many people, such as my very progressive husband, my family, my friends (not all—let’s face it) and myself—yes, my most important fan, ME. I like what I am doing and what I have been able to accomplish with kinder in tow, but it has taken some major adjustments in the way that I look at “school” work and motherhood. While a childless me may have written well until the dogs no longer barked, as a mother, I am in bed by 9—lucky enough to stay awake to read for fifteen minutes.

Here is a day (not an extraordinary day, but the most ordinary of all the days in the week):

Wake up at around 6:45 (I know, not too bad)…a little bit of morning fog in the brain (as the youngest apple in the bunch didn’t sleep well), make their breakfast, make their lunch, take a shower, let the dog out and the cats in. Get dressed, fix my hair, fix my bag for the day, remember the many items on the calendar that week, remind my husband (for the third time) to get up. Remind my husband to make the bed, so I don’t have to. Make the bed. Get the apples dressed (after the second one, it’s hard to match their clothes, but I feel okay about it), get their shoes on, get their hair combed and their backpacks ready. Get out the door on time. It can be done, but if it can’t, you woke up early enough so that it is not a big deal. Really, not a big deal. The most important thing is to share the tasks.

The husband takes one to school, while you take the other. He gets one dressed, while you get the other and so on and so forth—it works this way, but he needs to be committed to make it work.

Accept, recruit and hire all the help you can. It takes a village to raise a child and it takes the same village with a few others to write a dissertation with children in the room—yes, that same room that was supposed to be your own, but that is now the playroom, the yard, and, more often than not, also the potty. I had the fortune to have parents around to help, but no cleaning service (it never occurred to me until recently and then ended up deciding against it, but this doesn’t have to be your case). I decided that grad school afforded me the best of both worlds: I could work on a career and stay home with my children. I am exhausted, but finding my way back with the help of self-therapy (lots of YOU can do it in front of the mirror, the one with the little handprints on it) and multivitamins, glucosamine for my popping knees and lots of caffeine (I’m off the wagon).

 As soon as the first baby came, let’s call her MinnieMoo, it was obvious that my bohemian rants on paper would quickly become a thing of the past—there went my fourteen lines of iambic pentameter and the room of my own. Let’s face it, it’s now me who’s crawling out of the yellow wallpaper—but that’s a story that takes place on Bourbon Street and deserves its own posting.

I now take one day out of the week (Saturday) and write all day, while my husband spends the day with those little rascals, which are also his. I make sure that when I do write, I am productive. I have done this since I started grad school and it has worked out for me. Seminar papers were began as soon as the first day of class, and conference papers and grant applications were completed months before the deadline. Why? Because there isn’t such a thing as writing the night before when you have children—too many things could go wrong or go so well that you will not feel like stopping what you are doing to do something else. Always start early, as early as you can. And write in your head, if necessary so, by the time you get to sit down, you will know exactly what to say, how to begin and conclude your article, how to set up your argument, and where you left off your thread--assuming that there is a thread left and you can find it.

We all know somebody who finds the time to show up at every talk, participate in every workshop, edit for at least three journals, publish three articles in a month, go to the gym, look hot and keep her hair in semi-decent condition—but that cannot be you. YOU have children and the sooner you come to terms with that, the sooner you will feel good about those smaller (and smaller by no means means inferior) goals that you are able to accomplish throughout your day. You sent in an abstract—That’s hot!! You answered five out of seven e-mails—Good for you! You finished grading before the baby woke up—How do you do it?! You managed to have an intimate moment (read as hot but tired sex) with your husband (only one leg was shaved—but better than none) during Little Bug’s nap time—Winning! Make attainable goals for yourself and don’t beat yourself up about it, even if you have to reconsider later. When Evelyn Hunt Ogden wrote Complete Your Dissertation or Thesis in Two Semesters or Less, she was not talking about you. YOU will need a little more time!