Yesterday I posted a question from loyal reader of the blog, Fia about having children in graduate school. To give you a brief recap, I wrote:
I gotta tell you, little muffins. This email had me all sorts of sideways. First, I was distracted by thinking of ways to photoshop a bottle of Jameson into Zeus's hand. Then I found myself thinking, "Wait one damned minute! These emails are supposed to be about worshiping me! Not every Tom, Dick, and Harry on the intertubez!!!" Then I found myself thinking, "Ugh, another email about whether or not to have babies in grad school...."And then I reread this sentence.
I found out I am pregnant, we want a child but I just accepted a PhD position. Should I have an abortion?What the balls!?!?!?!!?!! I'm not going to lie, that I found myself slightly unnerved by this. Not because of my afore-mentioned mackerel snapping ways, but because it upset me to think that someone would feel so overwhelmed by academia that they would consider this for that reason alone.
So, here's how it is. Dr. Isis has a small child herself who absolutely ran amok tonight, sizing and copying all of Fia's pictures into here took like 14 hours, and I am absolutely exhausted. Probably too exhausted to formulate a coherent response to this tonight. I am going to settle into bed at a decent hour for the first time in months. I will offer my answer tomorrow night.
I have to tell you, it seems serendipitous that this question would come now because, to be honest with you, I am exhausted. Little Isis is almost three and shenanigans have ensued. Today at Costco he absolutely lost his shit because I would not buy him a vacuum cleaner. One part of me felt horrible because he was clearly distressed by this. The other part of me couldn't help but laugh at the situation. My child has an unhealthy obsession with vacuums. If this does not last until his teenage years I will be convinced that someone is pulling a cruel, cruel joke on Dr. Isis.
In addition to Little Isis's wackaballoonery, there is the usual familial drama, my science is hot but is taking up a huge amount of time, and tomorrow I am hosting my research group and collaborators for dinner at my house. I'm still writing a blog and trying to be a domestic and laboratory goddess. I'm not sleeping well for some reason and I am a little exhausted.
Actually, to be honest, I have occasionally felt overwhelmed this last month. The state of my career (which is good) frequently gives me anxiety. I play a mean game of "what if." What if these next experiments don't work...What if my grant does not get funded....What if my article gets rejected....What if my students hate me?
However, I have never felt overwhelmed enough by my work that, when I wanted a child, I either questioned my decision to have him after the fact or my question to have him while I was pregnant. That part of Fia's post really got to me -- I want to be very, very clear. I don't want to discuss the ethics of abortion here. What got to me was that this friend of hers wrote to her, expressed her desire to have a child, but considered not having the child because she felt it would be incompatible with her career. I suppose, that said, we should establish one vital truth on this blog:
There is no good time to have children. They are always an inconvenience and are generally incompatible with everything except cuteness. That said, some people have ugly children.
Some of you may say that graduate school was the ideal time for you because your time was more free. Others may counter and say that they were poorer than they've ever been in graduate school and couldn't afford the daycare. Some of you might argue that early faculty is the best time because you are financially more secure, but then there is the whole nuisance of tenure and, you know, the nuisance of not having it. Only you know when you want to spawn. I say, operate on the assumption that there will never be a perfect time.
But, never being a perfect time in your career should never amount to considering making a choice about procreating that you are not happy with.
I had Little Isis at the end of graduate school. It wasn't easy. It hasn't been easy. It will continue to not be easy. That said, I think there are a couple of things that I have done right that have made it more manageable:
2) Being in the right environment. This has probably been the biggest factor in my "success." I work in a fantastic environment. We hang pictures that our children draw on the freezers in my lab. Two of the women in the space are still nursing and we have a pumping area for them. One of the women frequently brings her baby to work and the baby is welcome in the appropriate areas. At our dinner party tomorrow, everyone will bring their children and the children are all friends. My boss's daughter babysits Little Isis and people are respectful of daycare/sick children/school plays/vacations. I think that everyone I work with has committed to the importance of a healthy, happy family life and that makes this all possible.
Dr. Isis only has a few goals in life -- 1) I want to do hot, hot science, 2) I want to be a good wife and mother and 3) I want to work with people I love. So far, so good. I see no value in working somewhere that would make me miserable.
3) Realizing that I cannot do everything. I won't lie. I'm still working on this one. I try to be everything to everyone as much as I can, but this new reality is something I am still struggling with. I've got something things I have been wanting to tell you about with regards to this, but I may not get to it tonight.
Mama's tired. Let's finish this tomorrow?
Education
Life Science
Comments
(I should preface this with the fact that I do not have children of my own; however I used to work in childcare.)
The thing about kids is, they are inconvenient. They do take up your time. They are a lot of effort.
The questions you should ask are: are you willing to put as much effort into your children as you are your career? is the effort and time worth it to you, for the sake of their adorable, infuriating little selves?
Working in childcare there was a group of children I saw in there, from 6am to 6pm, every day. They barely saw their parents, and it did affect them; they were more callous, less empathetic children, their behaviour tended to be more extreme, and they were less likely to have bonds with anyone.
Some of them would latch onto anyone who treated them in a partental manner; but as soon as that person left the room they'd find a new target and behave just as affectionately, but with no real attachment or fondness. They didn't care that the person they'd been clinging to had left, they jsut moved onto a new person. I think that this is because the staff changed on a semi-regular basis - some worked part time or casually, and we frequently had people going on maternity leave - but these kids had no adult figure who was consistently in their life, no dependablly-present carer.
Others in the group of those in every day all day, if they were very young, used to literally cry unconsolably for hours at the departure of their parent in the morning, deeply distressed.
I think parents should be as entitled to rewarding, time-consuming careers as anyone, and that those careers should be important. But I've seen cases where the career always takes overwhelming precedent, and the child is a kind of 'hobby,' for when they're not working. Those parents wanted a career and kids, but they weren't prepared to manage both so that the child got as much care, attention, and time was they needed. The child was just shoved into the time left over from the career. And it affected them deeply.
Whether or not you are willing to make that balance, that compromise is vitally important. And if you're not willing to try to do that, it's not fair to your child.
Posted by: Ace | August 21, 2009 4:13 AM
(In relation to my above comment I should probably add, this is not just the mopther's responsibility - fathers should make just as much effort to make time for their kids, even if our society puts an unfair amount of emphasis on this being mostly the mother's part.)
Posted by: Ace | August 21, 2009 4:16 AM
For your consideration, this is how we did it.
We had our first in while we were both in grad school, about 2.5 years ahead of graduation time. We swung it by working split schedules for the first 18 months: one from 4-noonish, and another from 1ish to 10ish(more fluid, because dependent on the first). We only worked weekdays, with culture starting and ending on the weekends. On the weekends, we cooked huge meals so there was no need to cook during the week, and soaked up on family time. During this time, we were blessed with fully functional labs with understanding advisors and co-workers. Additionally, our schedules were similarly flexible.
At 18 months, with our theses in sight, we put our son in day care, and worked slightly offset schedules (6-4, 8-6), splitting pick up/drop-off duties. Once I defended, I stayed home and raise our child for 6 months while my spouse finished up.
My thoughts are that grad school (when funded by a full-research-time stipend) is a time when your primary professional responsibility is focused on you. One will never again have so few sources of demand for your time, and never again have so much flexibility to set your own hours.
Posted by: microfool | August 21, 2009 6:06 AM
Dear Ace,
this is actually *not* the kind of discussion I wanted to spark, but so be it. As a mother of two, who both attend daycare 5/7, I feel offended by your post.
To explain my feelings, I come from a nation where it is expected from the mother (note, not the father, but that is a different discussion) to *stay at home for at least three years*, - otherwise she is branded a "bad mother". This believe lingers very deep in the society, and every time someone gives me this crap I am surprised by how even highly educated people can think this. Further, mothers who work full-time are also thought of as bad, and full-time day-care is thought to be bad for the kids (although science says otherwise).
The post of yours is exactly one of the reasons that make people consider abortion when they think they have to choose between a career and a family.
Therefore, I would be very pleased if you could put your post in relation to the situation many women and men find themselves in, - the need for two incomes and the wish for a family, and maybe a career. Because you are promoting the one-income family, - one spouse stays at home.
I would be very pleased if you could support your case with scientific data. I would also like to know how many of the not all day daycare kids showed signs of "extreme behavior". Further, I would very much like you to state whether what you observed in your opinion was due to the extremely long hours (12hrs a day?) these kids were in care or due to the five days out of seven.
I have seen data that proved the opposite of what you are claiming here (not for 12 hrs care a day, but 6-8), and tonight I will dig up the papers and post them here.
Posted by: Fia | August 21, 2009 7:43 AM
Dr. Isis, I am confused. You said (1) Little Isis is nearly three, (2) you had him near the end of grad school, and (3) we all know you're running a hot lab as a faculty member. How'd you get from the end of grad school to running a hot lab in under three years? Either I'm missing something, or you're on the super-duper-ultra-fast track.
Posted by: DamnGoodTechnician | August 21, 2009 7:59 AM
Dr. Isis, you are SO RIGHT about the henning. I joined a new mom's group when I had my little bug and it has really been so wonderful. I don't have family around, but me and 'the moms' meet for coffee once a week, go out to dinner, etc. They have been such an amazing support network. And, believe it or not, scientists aren't the only ones expected to work >40 hours/week, night, weekends, etc. My social worker friends work their butts off and it's so hard for them to say no since they work with abused children. I don't know what I would have done without them, especially the first few months.
Posted by: ajo | August 21, 2009 8:38 AM
Ace has a very good point about the kids who stay in daycare for long hours having certain negative effects. I've seen this first hand. Fia I don't think Ace's observations can be disproved with studies -- there is too much subjectivity -- one study shows long hours are detrimental, another shows it isn't.
Fia, what comes across in your post is defensiveness at keeping your child in daycare for long hours. It may help to know that there is no evidence whatsoever (discounting questionable studies) that the short term negative side effects last over the long term. You'll have plenty of time later to make up for any lost nurturing when young.
I didn't keep my kids in daycare for long hours -- in fact I took time off and stayed home for the reasons Ace mentions (again valid in my experience) and because it is somewhat unsafe to keep a very small child is daycare -- it is a risk I didn't want to take. Also my kids were falling ill every second week and staying home when I tried to put them in daycare.
My approach to childcare set my career back quite a bit. I kept up my (non-lab) research though and that's what helped me get back on track. For those of you who need labs you can do some sort of writing while home and will have to start up again with postdocs etc.
Posted by: aurora | August 21, 2009 8:54 AM
Oh, one more thing. 'Henning' is super important (I like the word). It is great if some of your hens are in your work setting. If you work in an all male arena like I do it becomes more difficult. Maybe you can one at least one or two hens to make things tolerable.
Posted by: aurora | August 21, 2009 9:02 AM
Little Isis is in preschool from 8-5 every day and is very well-adjusted. I think that the biggest factor is the type of environment you choose for your child. We scrutinized a lot of places and chose one with a very clear educational curriculum. He goes on field trips, has outside play time, and the school has regular, age appropriate, pre-defined learning objectives. ZThe teachers have college degrees. Although we also work with him at home, he is learning another language, is beginning to learn phonics, and they have regular art and performance projects.
Yes, I imagine that there are environments that could be detrimental to a child's development, but I feel very comfortable leaving Littie Isis where he is for 9 hours a day. In fact, given the quality of interaction he has and the opportunity to play with other children his own age, I would argue that his development has been enhanced over the period when he was home with us.
Posted by: Isis the Scientist | August 21, 2009 9:40 AM
FWIW I have three kids (19, 17, and 11) and am married to a stay-home mom. Thus, I have seen what it takes in terms of time and attention to rear children, at least up to the age of nineteen. I have a great deal of admiration for ANYONE who can raise kids while in any job, much less grad school or tenure track faculty. I barely have any time for myself as it is, and I'm not even the primary caregiver of our kids (really just the 11-year-old, as the other two are respectively 1) away at MRU, and 2) would rather pretend his parents don't exist - such is life).
So tip of the hat to you women (let's face it, you wind up being the caregiver 90% of the time) who can have and raise kids under those circumstances. Bully!
Posted by: TGAP Dad | August 21, 2009 9:42 AM
I had not one but TWO children while earning my terminal degree. Did that make it harder? Probably. Would I do it again? You bet, especially since my junk apparently had an expiration date on it and I just had to have it all taken out for health reasons. Isis you are absolutely right that there is no "good" time to have children; they ARE incompatible with pretty much everything and I won't lie, my career has suffered. A lot. I haven't published anything in years and am an adjunct (although I haven't pursued anything fulltime or permanent; I know my limits and one of my kids has catastrophic medical issues that mean that sometimes I just have to take a semester OFF). I teach via Distance Ed. because it means I am home with my boys if they need me (special circumstances there--one child can't go to daycare for medical reasons). It's not easy. But I am also only thirty and and the career will still be there in fourteen years when all of my little chickens are out of the nest (or at least of the age where they *should* be). I have no regrets.
Posted by: MFA Mama | August 21, 2009 10:14 AM
Nothing substantiative to add, but a quote from my dad seems appropriate: "You won't know if you're ready for children until it's about three years too late."
Posted by: Ranson | August 21, 2009 10:38 AM
Another vote for henning. Lunch out day with other FEP's is a carefully guarded weekly event in my life. It's my cheap version of therapy.
Posted by: Female Engineering Professor | August 21, 2009 10:57 AM
We all go through periods like this -and, you will get through.
Specifically in regard to #3... http://bluelabcoats.wordpress.com/2009/08/12/on-realizing-im-not-martha-stewart-and-that-is-perfectly-ok-with-me/
Posted by: drdrA | August 21, 2009 11:47 AM
Interesting to see all the comments. I think this is one situation where women should hold two seemingly contradictory views firmly in head. Yes, it is great to keep small kids at home. Yes, it is great to send them to a good daycare. Simply because one size doesn't fit all. What works for one just doesn't work for another.
Sort of like religion - it is possible (no essential for peace) to hold Chrisitanity, Islam, and Judaism (and other big world religions) in equal standing and just choose to believe/follow the preachings of one religion usually the one you are born into and respect the rest.
Posted by: aurora | August 21, 2009 12:12 PM
I would have written your post, too. I've sat in on a million discussions about the "best" time. I had them, before I had children. The answer is that there is no best time. Having children is a career risk, especially for a woman (but not irrelevant for a man, who plans on and will be involved in their raising). Therefore, you should have children when you want to.
I think a more productive answer to the question is not to try to tell people when the best time is but to collate how people who have managed did it. Unfortunately, many people stall when they take the career hit. Who doesn't? and how did they manage?
I've deduced a few answers from others, and none of it depends on time. The first is what your child is like. The people who mesh child and family often have children who do it well -- they have no special needs, they're easy going and comfortable with change. That's an outcome you can't predict ahead of your children. Next is your own personality Are you good at multi-tasking, at balancing different responsibilities, do they truly love what they do? Then, there's your partner: What does your partner do? What kind of flexibility will they have? What are their expectations about contributions? And, finally, there's a dose of "luck": did the experiments work out the way you'd hoped? how hard was it for everyone to get a grant? Did a job open up in a place where you could live at the right time? None of those things depend on timing, though they might all interact with it.
And, there's a psychological trick we've evolved for. Once you have them, it's a very rare person who can imagine their life without the children, even if you lost a lot of your other goals in making the decision. We're built for that. You meet women who regret not having children -- all the time. We have to admit that. It's not anti-feminist, or pro-patriarchy to admit that Hewitt is right, that many successful women truly regret not having children in their lives.
So, if you want to be a parent, find out as much as you can about what it will be to be one. It will change your life. Children do not fit in the corners of a life. But, don't wait for the perfect time, once you've decided that being a parent is something you want. The only caution is to make sure you want to be a parent, and that you're not just checking something off a life list of things you think you *should* do.
Posted by: nn | August 21, 2009 12:22 PM
"Fia I don't think Ace's observations can be disproved with studies -- there is too much subjectivity -- one study shows long hours are detrimental, another shows it isn't."
What? Are you a scientist? And, if so, what other subjects are immune to study?
Clearly the effect of daycare on lifelong development and well-being is very difficult to study, and no current study can be seen as conclusive. But, it's certainly not a subject that cannot be studied.
Posted by: nn | August 21, 2009 12:28 PM
Last year the women's center at my school hosted a lunch/seminar on the topic of "When to have kids in Academia". It was fabulous. They had two professors and two grad students talk about their experiences. One of the professors had had her son while she was an undergrad. He's now a teenager and she's the department head. The other professor had her daughter in her first or second year as assistant professor, and her daughter was just over a year old at the time. One grad student had a nine-month-old and talked about balancing research and childcare and the fun task of telling her advisor she couldn't go present a paper because that was when she was due. And by fun, it sounded like she really thought it was a funny, fun story about the vagaries of research - which speaks well for her advisor. The other grad student was four months pregnant. There was the whole range from planned to unexpected pregnancies and easy to fussy babies.
Hearing all the stories it became quite clear, and was emphasized by the speakers, that 1) all times are good and bad for having a kid and 2) how easy or hard it is will depend a lot on how your baby is, which is out of your control.
It was a great experience and resource for students and post docs, and the discussion was very good.
And for some reason they were all in mechanical engineering, which was particularly encouraging for me.
Posted by: Emily | August 21, 2009 1:04 PM
Oh, and I thought of another important factor -- what childcare arrangements are available to you. The discussion above, about childcare that didn't work very well, doesn't mean that all non-parental childcare is necessarily the same. People come up with other solutions. We used: 1) relatives, sometimes paid 2) a childcare located close to where we live & work, which had consistent staffing. Those things were available for us because of luck and other choices we made: 1) live close to where we work, even if that meant less housing, but, we could afford to live there. 2) living in a city where we had relatives.
Posted by: nn | August 21, 2009 1:19 PM
Oh, and you do need caregiving help -- people who try to balance work & family without it are probably going to short-change both, in an academic career. So, that means you (and your child) have to be comfortable with shared caregiving. Some children (and some mothers) don't want that. That's largely incompatible with an academic career.
Posted by: nn | August 21, 2009 1:20 PM
"They barely saw their parents, and it did affect them; they were more callous, less empathetic children, their behaviour tended to be more extreme, and they were less likely to have bonds with anyone."
Of course, just as some children are ugly (that cracked me up, btw), some are rotten little buggers. Maybe the parents only worked so long to escape their hellspawn!
I'm kidding! Mostly. My bruised ribs sometimes make me wonder though...
Posted by: becca | August 21, 2009 1:47 PM
Ace--I think you take make a very important point. I actually think your perspective is very interesting, because it is exactly the point that Sarah Hrdy raises at the end of her newest book, Mothers and Others--her concern that kids that grow up without secure attachments to caregivers, often perhaps because of daycare with high turnover of staff, may not have the opportunity to develop full capacity for social bonding and empathy. That said, Hrdy is not stating that daycare itself is bad, or that mothers n(or fathers) should stay at home--she herself is an amazingly accomplished scientist who managed to do hot science and have children. Her point is rather, that humans evolved in a context in which children were raised by multiple caregivers, both parents and alloparents. And so while multiple caregivers, such as relatives, babysitters, nannies, and even daycare, are important to the child's development, they need to have secure attachments to them--something that is difficult if caregiving staff at a daycare is constantly changing. But once again, that's going to variable based on the particular day care.
Posted by: michellespidermonkey | August 21, 2009 2:39 PM
Childcare does not hurt children. Full stop. If you are considering children, but you are concerned because maintaining your career would entail putting the darling(s) in care during the workweek... you should lose those concerns pronto. (Of course, whether you can afford full-time care is another matter.) I have seen plenty of wonderful children emerge from daycare families, and I have also seen some truly wretched, radioactive little abominations spawned by well-intentioned, stay-at-home parents.
As for the maladjusted kids described by Ace @1, they were in daycare twelve hours a day, every day. So either the parent(s) were working year after year of twelve-hour days, in which case they were probably too exhausted to provide any significant nurturing, or they were avoiding their children, which speaks for itself. These extreme cases just show that parents who have no time or energy for their kids can expect unpleasant results. It is not an indictment of daycare when used as directed.
Posted by: D | August 21, 2009 2:57 PM
Something that often gets overlooked in these discussions - and I think it's unfortunate - is the corollary to "there are women who regret not having children."
There are women who regret having children.
Posted by: mimms | August 21, 2009 3:17 PM
Just wanted to say something, from the perspective of a child whose parents "left me" at daycare/preschool 9 hours at a time back in the late '80s:
I love my parents so much. I have always been well-bonded with them, and with my sister, and we are all still very close. I knew that my parents needed to work to make money, and that they preferred spending time with us whenever they could. They worked hard to provide for us, and I am forever grateful.
I also loved the 2-3 teachers that cared for me at daycare, and remember them well. And, I loved going to daycare, as it was an opportunity to make friends and learn things like Spanish that my parents couldn't teach me, to go on field trips to see interesting things, hear new stories and play new games, and more. I actually think that being a daycare kid prepared me really well for the public school system, as I had already observed and practiced social interaction with my peers. (Not to mention how it helped my immune system!) I always kind of felt sorry for the kids who had never been away from their parents until the first day of school, and the separation trauma it caused them at that point.
It makes me sad to hear all of this negativity about daycare. For many children and parents, it is a positive situation. My husband and I are finishing up grad school now, and we look forward to starting a family soon. If we can find quality, affordable daycare like I had, we will happily use it.
Posted by: a happy, healthy daycare kid | August 21, 2009 3:36 PM
There are also women who never regret NOT having children.
All options should remain on the table. There is no shame in deciding that someone is just not ready/willing/able to be a parent, or decides that having a career will make them less able to care for a child that they bring into this world. Perhaps that individual who was thinking "abortion" when faced with the responsibility of becoming a parent, is one of those people. It is a shame they didn't realize it BEFORE they got pregnant, but if they are thinking in those terms, perhaps they should dig deep into their psyche and figure out what role they want to have in this world-- before they continue their journey in this life.
Posted by: Patient | August 21, 2009 3:38 PM
Actually, the effect of childcare on children's adjustment and behaviour has been studied very comprehensively: here's a summary of the NIHCHD study of early child care. Children in good child care were fine, but the situation Ace describes sounds far from ideal - high staff turnover, kids spending 10+ hours a day in child care. Most of us do NOT have such child care arrangements. In fact, high staff turnover made me choose a different nursery for my son than for my daughter.
I can see that the availability of child care would be an important factor. However, as Isis said, there are always ways and means of working around this. For example, in graduate school, UK students often have the option of doing a PhD part time.
For me, the solution has been to live and work in the UK. In Germany, where I come from (Fia, are you German, too?), because of the "only bad mothers put their kids into child care" stance, there is very little high quality child care for little ones available. I most definitely do not plan to return to Germany before both of my children have reached school age.
Posted by: perceval | August 21, 2009 3:41 PM
Children in daycare have higher risk of accquiring infectious diseases
Nest & Goldbaum J Pediatr. 2007; Lafuente et al. An Pediatr 2008
Which may protect them from allergies in later life
Krämer et al. 1999 (I do not have a medical degree, but I have the feelings the authors should have formulated this a bit more careful).
But: Several studies found that medium amount of out-house childcare has a positive effect on school readiness and receptive language (Adi-Japha & Klein, Child Development 2009; Dunham et al., Developmental Psychology, 1992, Caughty et al., Child Development, 1994. Two studies found no effect.
Employed mothers were found to spend a greater proportion of their time with their children in social interaction, and time in work was associated with a higher quality home environment (Huston & Rosenkrantz-Aronson, Child Development 2005).
I do not believe otherwise until facts are presented.
Quality, not quantity time counts. In any case, 12hrs in daycare everyday seems to me not the sensible thing to do - but if for some parents their career is more worth than quality time with the kids, then, yes, maybe it is a good thing for the kids to be in quality care rather than with their parents who apparently do not want to see them dearly.
But that is also not necessary for a scientific career - and what I would like to emphasize again is that daycare on each working day in a way so that the parents can both work full-time, - which usually equals something between 6-9hours per day, - is normal and will *not* lead to behavioral extremes in children. Telling the opposite is exactly what makes people think either-or and ponder abortions instead of embracing the possibility of having both. family and a career.
Posted by: fia | August 21, 2009 4:03 PM
nn - unfortunately people don't understand the sujectivity involved in such studies - it is one of my specialties. There's a lot of bogus statistics in science studies too. So yes, people will continue to do these studies and it doesn't really matter - at a personal level you got to do what you got to do and hope for the best. Best to find out how different people do things (like some said earlier)
You know what's really sad, over at the mommybloggers they are determined to put down women who leave their kids in daycare and they are armed to the teeth with data to prove their case -- come here and my lovely scientist friends, one who questions whether I'm a scientist, are equally determined to convince themselves that daycare is just fine, no problemo.
Yup just like religion.
Posted by: aurora | August 21, 2009 7:09 PM
There are some crappy day care providers out there. Many are very low cost, and it is often lower income women who have to use them. It is the reason some of my relatives have done their best to stay on public assistance as long as possible. I get irritated when the discussion revolves around the whole career vs. quality time issue, as though the only families who worry about this are college educated and are making a choice about how far to go in their careers, not whether they have to chose between paying bills and their child's well being.
It's sad that it is not a national priority to make sure that all American families do not have to worry about who will take care of their children while they work.
Posted by: sea creature | August 21, 2009 7:48 PM
I may have been rationalising at the time, when not many other mothers were returning to work when kids were small, and I chose (and was encouraged) to return to the lab, but I decided that I was more comfortable with the 'village-raising-the-child' philosophy than the 'one-mum-one-child-in-every-house-in-the-street' philosophy. The latter is a very recent development in human social systems, and when I observed what was happening in the houses in my street, it did not seem to me to be 'natural' in any sense at all. Now, we did decide we could only have one high-powered career and one less-intensive career, and that is a personal family decision that people need to make for themselves. It all seems to be OK now, after the event, and I'm happy I stuck to my principles at the time. Apart from my kids gaining advantages (they are now all adult and highly successful, very well-adjusted and still love their parents and communicate with us at a deeper level than I ever communicated with my own parents), I MYSELF LEARNT A LOT. I had never had experience with babies, and had had very little to do with little kids, and my closest friends either had no kids (yet) or lived in different cities. I had no family nearby (and didn't want them there at the time - their ideas were not similar to mine). The day-carers that I chose showed me how to interact with kids, helped me see that babies and kids with different personalities need to be treated differently, showed me a range of solutions to what I thought were 'problems' but may have just been 'normal' .... etc etc. (I chose a woman-at-home-with-other kids when mine were tiny, supplemented with various playgroups -aka 'henning', and then various nursery school arrangements as they got older.) Eventually grandparents came to live nearby, too. At the time, it seemed to be advantageous for the kids to learn to relate to different people, adults as well as other kids, as they sometimes had conflicts with their mother, PARTICULARLY the days they were home with her all day (WOW - AM I MAKING AN ANTI-MOTHeRHOOD STATEMENT HERE? So be it if I am. I should be fired......... Wait a minute - it is too late for that, the kids have grown up and left home.......Maybe I WAS fired.)
Having said all that, I refer back to the Wisdom of the Goddess - it is important to choose carers that you are happy and comfortable with. It is important to realise you can't do everything (although, even in my dotage I am still struggling with that too, and got chastised by one of my adult daughters only last night on that point).
So, with the 20-20 vision of my own hindsight, I suggest you do what you love doing .... you can do MORE THAN ONE THING that you love doing.... it may be both science and child-rearing.... it may be taking time off to stay home full-time...(and someone suggested that many programs allow for 'leave of absence' where the time taken 'off' does not 'count'). If YOU love doing it, you will do it well and everyone around you (as well as yourself) will benefit.
Yes, I have done 'research' on this. Just ask my kids.
d.
Posted by: d. | August 21, 2009 8:30 PM
Therefore, I would be very pleased if you could put your post in relation to the situation many women and men find themselves in, - the need for two incomes and the wish for a family, and maybe a career. Because you are promoting the one-income family, - one spouse stays at home.
-Fia
Not at all, Fia! In fact, I specifically stated in post@2 that I am not saying that parents should not have full careers, and that BOTH parents should be making sure their work does not dominate their life to an extent that their children suffer for it.
I am NOT saying one parent should stay at home full time. What I AM saying is, people should not be working such intensive hours that their children have very little time with them.
For most children, childcare seems to be fine. But these are kids who, in the mornings and evenings, do actually have a chance to spend time with their parents and whose parents make sure that they have time put aside to spend with their children. These parents often worked full-time, and the kids were in there from around 8.30-5.30, but the parents and children nonetheless spent quality time together.
The children in the group I described on the other hand, did not have this experience. Some kids even had dinner at the centre, and were put to bed as soon as they got home. They were basically ignored by their parents on the few occasions they actually had time together with them.
As for the maladjusted kids described by Ace @1, they were in daycare twelve hours a day, every day. So either the parent(s) were working year after year of twelve-hour days, in which case they were probably too exhausted to provide any significant nurturing, or they were avoiding their children, which speaks for itself. These extreme cases just show that parents who have no time or energy for their kids can expect unpleasant results. It is not an indictment of daycare when used as directed.
- D
Exactly!
Posted by: Ace | August 21, 2009 10:03 PM
Posted by: Danimal | August 22, 2009 12:16 AM
LOL. Children who stay in daycare for long hours have certain effects?
Are you aware that there exist other countries where the vast majority of children go to childcare. The childcare rate of my generation in my country was higher than 90%. In sweden 50% of children go to childcare. In France, 33% of children age 2 and 95% of children age 3 are enrolled in childcare. I guess there are whole countries full of extreme, unemphatic children with attachment problems?
Posted by: lila | August 22, 2009 6:42 AM
lila - I think the discussion is largely on daycare centers for infants. When the kid is one or two and older only professional mommys keep their kids home or perhaps if there is some problem. The issue for older kids is shorter/longer hours in daycare centers. Its all about balance.
Thanks Isis for bringing up childcare. I had a lot to say on this as I have several kids which makes me a rarity in academia. This is one topic I know a lot about. All the comments were useful too.
BTW you all ought to go read the mommy bloggers where I've been hanging out to get some tips on teaching ABCs and cool crafty ideas - once you get past the product pushing and creationism crap on some blogs, they have a lot of useful things to say. I kinda like them.
Posted by: aurora | August 22, 2009 8:41 AM
Lila--it's not "all children that are in day care" but those that spend long periods of time at a center that is not conducive to forming stable attachments to the caregivers... I imagine that they day cares in Sweden and France may be different from the US, because of the fact that they are better supported and funded and thus can probably have better child-to-caregiver ratios and stability in staffing. Additionally, in Sweden, there is a much better systems of maternal/paternal leave... And in general, most European countries have shorter working hours than the workaholic Americans...
Posted by: michellespidermonkey | August 22, 2009 9:56 AM
My son, who is now 3, also developed an unhealthy obsession with vacuum cleaners. :)
(unfortunately I think they grow out of it, but I have the luck of being able to shrink down my swiffer handle and have him swiffer the kitchen and bathroom every week...score one for mom!)
And in regards to all the other chatter...I had my son before I started my undergraduate degree (think what you wish) and I am now in my last year at my fancy ivy covered MRU. People always ask me 'how do you do it?' and say things like 'wow that must be terrible/tough/unmanageable'. I always tell them...'well I guess I just don't really think about it that much.' The point being that I am not going to sit around and mourn my fate and wonder if I should have sacrificed my son for the sake of my hot science career. Instead what I have done is go to a semi-fancy private college for two years, transfer to an even fancier ivy covered university for my last two years of school and now I do hot cutting edge research and still get to take my son to the pool when I want. To me, what I have going on is my life and I embrace it to the fullest. Of course, balancing hot science, being domestic, being mom, and oh yeah...those things they call classes...is not without its challenges, but the most important factor is having the right mindset about everything. Without that, something (your kids, your career, your relationships) is going to suffer.
On daycare....its about the quality of time spent with your kids, not the quantity. And if your kid is really having troubles at daycare, go to a new daycare. Be picky, its your child.
On the PhD considering an abortion....Look dear, you must have gotten your degree in something other than science to not think that just even the whole biology of conception isn't amazing in itself, let alone that it was able to come together and work on your behalf. To say that you want a child but 'not right now' is selfish. If you weren't prepared for the consequences of sex (a child!) then you shouldn't have been having the sex.
Posted by: g | August 22, 2009 10:22 AM
LOON ALERT!!!!!111!!11!1!1!1!
Posted by: Comrade PhysioProf | August 22, 2009 11:24 AM
g, you lost me at the 'every sperm is sacred crap.' There are many benefits of the sex beyond procreation. Further, realizing you are not ready to have a kid is a sign of maturity, not selfishness.
Posted by: gnuma | August 22, 2009 12:55 PM
Another important aspect is that having children cannot be planned. There are those like Danimal who can get pregnant when they intend to, but there are also those like myself who were finally ready and then lived through years of unexplained infertility. One in six couples experiences fertility problems at least once - this can be for the first, second, third, or fourth child. And it ALWAYS sucks, and you can't "just adopt" and "just give those kids who are already out there a home" - adoption is far more complicated than that.
So, when thinking about having an abortion, it's a good idea to consider the question "What if this is our one and only shot at having children of our own?"
g, ever heard of failed contraception? Yeah, thought so.
Posted by: perceval | August 22, 2009 3:04 PM
@perceval: Sorry to hear that. With my wife and I it practically worked the first time we did it after deciding we wanted a child. I never thought it would be that easy (I expected months) as I had heard about other couples struggling (or having fun depending on your point of view). I think the idea is when a couple is ready, just stop using contraceptives and have fun, no pressure, no hurry.
Posted by: Danimal | August 22, 2009 3:30 PM
a. I am definitely NOT a loon
b. I never said anything about every sperm being sacred....wtf is up with that? I said biology is cool.
c. The consequence of having sex can sometimes be (unplanned) children...aka failed contraception.....
Posted by: g | August 23, 2009 8:05 AM
I'm with DamnGoodTechnician, I want to know what is UP with that timeline??? Did you totally skip the postdoc stage? That is unheard of in this day and age in the fields with which I am familiar...
Posted by: crystaldoc | August 23, 2009 9:08 AM
This is such a heated topic, and I have been involved in it every since I returned to work. I like a lot of nn's comments.
I did a lot of stuff all out of order. I was all on track up through 3 years of BS in physical science, and then unplanned pg. So, I married the man I'd been engaged to for quite some time already, and got my BS pg enough that those gowns just did not cover it up. I burned out doing hot science in undergrad.
I had my String Bean and stayed at home with her. This was after a lot of discussion and some effort to go to grad school at that time. This is where that luck thing comes into play, and overall, for my family, it was easiest and best that I stayed home. Along came Pumpkin.
String Bean is an independent child who would raise herself in the wild just fine. Pumpkin regularly discusses with us careers and lifestyles that allow him to remain living with us, his beloved parents, for the rest of his life. This is a child that does not take change well. We started talking about moving 2 years in advance of an expected move, to get him used to the idea. So, the personalities of the children do play some roll. But, I grew restless. Turns out I'm a better work outside of home mother than at home mother.
I've been working part-time or full-time since Pumpkin was 1. We've had many variations of childcare: parents swinging shifts, relative-care, nannies, and daycare. We used the method that made best sense for our family at the time, each time.
And, yes, my kids are a little past the infant-toddler stage, but they ask to go to after school care all the time. This week, I'm planning my schedule and Pumpkin says "Can I go to after school care a lot this week?"
Now I'm an older grad student. I have grad student needs that most grad students don't have. Sometimes my advisor and department do not know quite what to do with me.
No matter what there are trade-offs.
Posted by: Balancing Act | August 23, 2009 5:39 PM
One thing related to the notion that children are inconvenient --
This is true, albeit only in the context of comparing life with children to life pre-kids. The children themselves are NOT inconvenient.
Posted by: Callinectes | August 25, 2009 1:07 PM