The working-(academic)-mum lifestyle.

I thought I would change lanes for this post and share my experience as an academic mum and some of the challenges that arose after having children.

I have seen the landscape change over the years with fathers now taking time off as stay-at-home dads after their partners go back to work as to prolong the start date for childcare for their little ones. I have also seen mums bring baby to work for a few hours so they can work from the office and interact with their colleagues face-to-face and even some conferences are now providing on-site care or travel opportunities for academics who need to bring their children along.

This is a far cry from some of the conversations I had with female colleagues when I first started out in research in the early 2000s where many felt that they couldn’t keep up with their male colleagues and be competitive for grants if they took time off to have children. Many even confessed to having strained relationships with their almost adult children because they chose to put work ahead of family commitments to be able to stay at the top of their field. These are all personal choices of course, but I imagine they would have been difficult ones to make at the time.

As for myself, I clearly recall the day I left my 6 month old baby at childcare for the first time so I could go back to part-time work at the university. As I left I broke down in tears and called my mother (who at the time lived interstate) and cried down the phone, “What have I done?”. I was racked with guilt at having left my young child with ‘strangers’ so that I could continue my contract and complete the projects I was committed to, even if it was only for a few days a week. However, on the other side, I found that life with a baby at home alone (as my husband at the time worked long hours and both our families lived interstate), to be very isolating at times. I had been working full-time in academia for several years prior and really enjoyed my work and my relationship with my colleagues. It felt like I was doing something that mattered and was contributing to society in a positive way, and I struggled with the idea of being away from that environment for too long.

Adding to the angst was all this ‘water cooler’ talk about people taking time away from research for too long and then making themselves obsolete as techniques and technologies advanced. Furthermore, most research contracts are fixed term due to the grants they are tied to, so how can you take a year off to raise a child if that is all the time that is left on the grant/contract, without compromising both the project and putting added stress on your supervisor to find a temporary replacement whilst holding your position?

Que the added guilt for going back to research part-time (3 days a week) and feeling like I still needed to do full-time equivalent work. Always feeling (intrinsically) like what I do is never enough, struggling to find flow with breaks between days, losing many days in the first year because, you know, daycare and every virus known to man passing through your child to the family like a carousel of plagues. Then there is the perpetual cycle of guilt….when at work, feeling guilty for not being with my child, when at home taking care of my baby, feeling guilty for not being at work.

It took me a very long time, years even, to finally be able to find a balance between being a mother and working. And by balance, I guess what I really mean is being at peace with my decision to be a part-time working/ full-time mum. Because let's face it, you never stop being a mum even when you are at work. 

There were a few realisations that helped me change my perspective and hence my ability to navigate the balance between working and being with my children, especially in those early years. 

1. University life can be flexible which allowed me to work school hours so that I could focus on my work when I was there and then focus on being a mother when I was home.

2. I could adjust my lifestyle to ensure it was comfortably within my income, rather than work longer hours to maintain a lifestyle. Provided all mine and my family's basic needs were met, I was happy. 

3. Working fewer days just meant I needed to be more focused at work and utilise my time much more efficiently. It also meant that I had to learn to work in tandem much more effectively with my colleagues so that my absence didn’t compromise the projects I was working on.

4. I realised how quickly the years pass when we have the children at home with us and that I am able to go back to full time work when they are much more independent.

5. My children seeing me working would hopefully instil in them a good, strong worth ethic. 

To make things a little more complex, I decided to go back and undertake my research PhD once both children were in school full time. However, I tried to be as strategic about my day/week as possible to minimise any disruption to their life. This included splitting my day so that I was running experiments during work hours then switching hats once I picked up my children from school and then continuing my reading/writing/analysis and planning late into the night once I had put them to bed. This will be a routine that many working mothers (and fathers) recognise.

When as mothers, we take on these additional responsibilities (such as further study for career advancement), there are going to be some sacrifices made. Whether it’s time with family, time at work or even just time for ourselves. It would be misleading and simply downright irresponsible of me to say ‘Being a working mum is easy and you can have it all!’.  What you have is constantly shifting priorities, a balancing act worthy of a cirque-du-de-soleil performance while trying to manage family, work and self (not always in that order) depending on which one most urgently needs your attention at the time.

But can a healthy working-mum lifestyle, especially in academia be attained?

My honest answer is, it depends. It depends on whether you are supported at work, home and in the community, it depends on how you prioritise things in life and what you are comfortable sacrificing short term, and it depends on how important your career in academia is to you. Ultimately, it will come down to what you decide is best for you and your family and accepting the changes that come with it. 

When thinking about going back to work, especially in the first 5 years of a child’s life there is a lot we must consider. There are many social and economic factors at play and although I often feel privileged to be able to live in a time and place where I can be both educated and working to support and provide for my family, I would be lying if I didn’t say that I often wonder whether I did the right thing going back to work so early.

Without getting into a philosophical rabbit hole, I will say that at times I have struggled with the idea of putting our young children in the hands of ‘strangers’ to raise (even if part-time) and separating ourselves from them at the most impactful time of their lives when they should be forming strong attachments to their parents and caregivers. Although I appreciate that it does take a village to raise a child, I believe that the village should be a carefully curated one that (where possible) begins with the family as the inner circle and extended family and community members next. I believe, there needs to be a balance between a woman working to provide for themselves and their family and being so career focused that you barely know your child’s best friends' names. Not to mention that we often risk burn out, and therefore cannot put forth our best effort either at home or at work. 

I want to close by saying, this article is simply a reflection of my own experiences and thoughts and is in no way designed to discount all the parenting sacrifices made by fathers. It goes without saying that fathers play an important role when it comes to supporting their partners and helping them work out if, when and how they go back to work or not. This article was simply written to share my struggles with this part of my life and hopefully provide something to consider for others coming into a similar situation.

Finally, I ran a short survey to find out when mothers went back to work after having their first child and if fathers took leave afterwards to be at home with mum and/or baby. What was most striking to me was that fathers reported that they had only 2 weeks of paid parental leave and any additional time off was taken out of their annual leave or as unpaid leave. Thankfully, this seems to be evolving as some Australian universities (see this article by University of Melbourne) now provide up to 28 week of paid parental leave to fathers.

What are your thoughts and experiences as an academic parent and do you think support for new academic mums and dads is improving? How would you like to see it improve?

Feel free to share in the comment section below.

 #STEM mums X (Twitter) survey

#STEM dads X (Twitter) survey

Stay curious,

Vicky :)