Today is my last day at work (and by work I mean both paid employment and postgrad studies), for a year potentially...
Packing up my desk, I feel surprisingly emotional. While physically I am craving the time off - the opportunity to nap during the day, to have my heat pack handy, to not have to change out of my pyjamas - it's a different story emotionally. I enjoy having a daily routine, somewhere to go to (even if I have been getting in shamefully late these days). More than having somewhere to go is having people to see - I like that on any given day at work, I will interact with people, share an office with my colleagues, have people to discuss publications, research, blogs and personal stories with. It sure beats spending the day alone at home, and it helps that I genuinely like my colleagues.
What I will also miss is feeling like I have a purpose, something that has become more important to me since entering (step)motherhood. At home sometimes, it's so easy to become bogged down in domestic routine almost to the point where it starts to feel vaguely oppressive - and not because I have a partner who doesn't contribute his fair share, because this isn't the case. It's simply that some element of your individuality, a sense of command or equal footing - of reaping immediate, tangible rewards of your hard work - is lost among the chores and tending to of children who (despite being appreciative at their core) do not thank you for your efforts. At work, I feel as though my thoughts, my intellectual input, is sought and valued. The work I do is acknowledged and appreciated, and there are tangible rewards to my efforts. I feel like I am truly in my element as myself and not someone merely fulfilling a required role.
By no means do I mean to to imply that parenting is not fulfilling and rewarding in its own way. Neither do I mean to deride or belittle those who don't work or those who are stay-at-home parents, or suggest that one even needs work to have meaning in their lives - far from it. But for me personally, there is a certain sense of self-actualisation that I get from my work that is truly meaningful to me, as corny as that may be. It's this, along with the friendly faces in my office and along the corridors, that makes me a little misty-eyed looking at my bare desk today.
I like to think of it though as not the end of an era, but the end of a chapter - one that heralds the start of another chapter, and does not preclude a reappearance of this current chapter's contents later down the track.
Friday 31 August 2012
Monday 27 August 2012
NINE MONTHS
Things I have previously taken for granted and really miss:
- Being able to put my shoes on by myself
- Being able to cut my own toenails
- Sleeping on my back
- Not waking up twice a night to go to the bathroom
- Rolling over in bed in one smooth motion
- Wearing jeans and other non-maternity leggings attire
- Walking properly
- Drinking (what I wouldn't give for a cold cider in this glorious spring weather...)
Things I am enjoying about being 9 months pregnant:
- Having an excuse for guilt-free afternoon naps
- Having a peculiar motivation to clean the house and do other previously dreaded domestic tasks (I think they call this "nesting")
- That the end is in sight!
Friday 10 August 2012
THE JUGGLING ACT
Driven perhaps more by morbid curiosity to hear the vast array of responses, rather than a desire to find a definitive answer, I have read article after article addressing the (not-so) age-old question, How can women successfully juggle having a career and raising children? To be honest, I am getting tired of reading the same unhelpful content that goes along the lines of one of these options:
a) Women can have it all, they just need to reassess what "all" is and become comfortable with this new definition of "all". Through this, women should learn to accept the guilt they feel about doing an inadequate job either at home, at work, or both, as opposed to wider society making any changes or concerted efforts to reduce the need for these feelings of guilt (to me, not too dissimilar to the argument that if women don't want to be sexually harassed, they shouldn't dress inappropriately).
b) Women can't have it all, and it would be beneficial to them to stop pretending that they can.
c) In order to have it "all", you need to have enough disposable cash to be able to afford full-time childcare/a full-time nanny to help raise your children, or a supportive partner who is willing (and can afford) to stay at home to raise the children and tend to domestic chores. Not so feasible for anyone who isn't rolling in it, or doesn't have a partner (or one who can/will give up his/her career to become a stay-at-home parent).
d) Instead of trying to offer an answer, simply create a dialogue where women offer advice and insights from their personal experiences, which are usually along the lines of "There is no right time to start a family, so just go for it", and "It will be hard, but you will be so in love with and derive so much joy from your children that they will automatically become your priority at the end of the day".
Let me rephrase my earlier comment by saying I'm not fed up with women making an effort to try and discuss, reason and hypothesise about how we can reach some semblance of equality in achieving the career/home-life balance that men have been privilege to for decades. I think it's admirable and encouraging that women are creating dialogues about how things can be improved, or even if a solution isn't offered, at least the problem itself is being given air-time.
What bothers me is this attitude, like with so many other issues relating to gender equality, is that the burden of responsibility of change seems to always fall on women. We are the ones that must come to terms with these shortcomings, we are the ones that must resign ourselves to these facts, the sooner we do, and the sooner we stop fighting it - the happier we will be with what society offers us!
There is also commonly the token comment (I hate to say it, but usually from a man) who offers a "feminist" opinion that essentially states women need to stop "whinging" about this problem and, if it really is such a problem, they shouldn't try to have both kids and career in the first place. Basically, stop complaining and just pick one and be happy with that. Wow, what a great solution. Rather than trying to address the broader prejudices that make it challenging for women to have both, and making not just women but society (including, yes, men) accountable for these prejudices, let's place the burden on women to reign themselves in and shut the fuck up. How progressive!
Maybe the key is that answering this question will not suffice with words and verbal definitions of why or how there is difficulty in this balancing act. Maybe actual, practical change needs to come first, to facilitate the construction of an answer that doesn't involve a sacrifice of desires or resignation for women.
a) Women can have it all, they just need to reassess what "all" is and become comfortable with this new definition of "all". Through this, women should learn to accept the guilt they feel about doing an inadequate job either at home, at work, or both, as opposed to wider society making any changes or concerted efforts to reduce the need for these feelings of guilt (to me, not too dissimilar to the argument that if women don't want to be sexually harassed, they shouldn't dress inappropriately).
b) Women can't have it all, and it would be beneficial to them to stop pretending that they can.
c) In order to have it "all", you need to have enough disposable cash to be able to afford full-time childcare/a full-time nanny to help raise your children, or a supportive partner who is willing (and can afford) to stay at home to raise the children and tend to domestic chores. Not so feasible for anyone who isn't rolling in it, or doesn't have a partner (or one who can/will give up his/her career to become a stay-at-home parent).
d) Instead of trying to offer an answer, simply create a dialogue where women offer advice and insights from their personal experiences, which are usually along the lines of "There is no right time to start a family, so just go for it", and "It will be hard, but you will be so in love with and derive so much joy from your children that they will automatically become your priority at the end of the day".
Let me rephrase my earlier comment by saying I'm not fed up with women making an effort to try and discuss, reason and hypothesise about how we can reach some semblance of equality in achieving the career/home-life balance that men have been privilege to for decades. I think it's admirable and encouraging that women are creating dialogues about how things can be improved, or even if a solution isn't offered, at least the problem itself is being given air-time.
What bothers me is this attitude, like with so many other issues relating to gender equality, is that the burden of responsibility of change seems to always fall on women. We are the ones that must come to terms with these shortcomings, we are the ones that must resign ourselves to these facts, the sooner we do, and the sooner we stop fighting it - the happier we will be with what society offers us!
There is also commonly the token comment (I hate to say it, but usually from a man) who offers a "feminist" opinion that essentially states women need to stop "whinging" about this problem and, if it really is such a problem, they shouldn't try to have both kids and career in the first place. Basically, stop complaining and just pick one and be happy with that. Wow, what a great solution. Rather than trying to address the broader prejudices that make it challenging for women to have both, and making not just women but society (including, yes, men) accountable for these prejudices, let's place the burden on women to reign themselves in and shut the fuck up. How progressive!
Maybe the key is that answering this question will not suffice with words and verbal definitions of why or how there is difficulty in this balancing act. Maybe actual, practical change needs to come first, to facilitate the construction of an answer that doesn't involve a sacrifice of desires or resignation for women.
Saturday 4 August 2012
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