When I was a much younger woman (oh, 3 years ago), I would look around at my coworkers and think, "where the hell are all the women?" From the moment I decided (belatedly) to major in Economics in college, suddenly I was virtually the only woman in the room. It was perplexing. What were they doing??? (Although I did enjoy breezing by a long line of men outside the bathroom into the always vacant ladies room at conferences.)
Then I had a baby.
Oh.
I see.
As Bertrand's study points out there are two types of working people in the world. There are men (with and without children) + women without children. And there are women with children. This began to dawn on me once I had my own baby but until I read her study it was hard not to feel (particularly given people's reactions to this idea) that perhaps I was just biased by my recent descent into motherhood.
Pre-baby I thought it was just a matter of finding good childcare and presto, I'd be back to my old self again. What I didn't realize was that many of the challenges/changes would not just be mental and logistical, but would be physical. (In other words, much harder to transcend.)
Even if you have the healthiest of pregnancies, odds are you will feel like retching or crawling under a desk to nap for much of 9 months. You will spend countless hours in waiting rooms at the mercy of your ob/gyn/midwife. You will doze through the requisite birthing class to which you frantically race to after work each Tuesday for a couple of months. If you do not have the healthiest of pregnancies ... well, let's just say making your quarterly numbers isn't going to be top of your priorities. (And that's assuming you get pregnant easily and don't have to go through the hell of fertility treatment.)
And then there is birth. Let's just say you won't be racing around the office 24 hours post-partum. (And those myths about Super Biz Woman rocking her 40 hour newborn to sleep under her desk while she catches up on emails ... people, after you push a honeydew sized human being from your nether regions, you're going to need a long nap!)
And then there is breastfeeding which may leave you unable to leave the house for a couple of months. But more on that later.
And then there is the moment when it dawns on the babe that you're walking out the door. And they don't like it one bit. And they've got the lungs to show it.
Point being, I now know that getting "back to work" isn't just about attitude and egalitarian marriage or a good nanny. And much as I hate to play pessimist here - having a baby changes women's physical reality in a way that makes in impossible to resume life as normal for a long time, if ever. By my calculation, at the very least each baby wipes out a good year in a woman's working life, if not several years, no matter how involved her partner is.
When it comes to just a good, solid working life, working motherhood is completely doable. But if your goal is to be truly extraordinary, then it's going to be a rough road. Excellence requires extraordinary time and selfishness, neither of which accrue in abundance to women who birth humans. Not to mention, getting "to the top" at the expense of this gorgeous little person you created becomes increasingly unappealing.
So, while some radical changes in working life might help mitigate some of these inevitable challenges (and I have some ideas on that front too), as long as women bear, birth and breastfeed babies we are never going to see parity at the top. Never.
It's not just a matter of time. It's not just about discrimination or bad husbands or lack of female role models or fear of math (ha ;). It's just a hard a load to bear for a human being. And the human beings bearing the load happen to be women.
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5 comments:
What a great post from a perspective of someone like yourself! Finally.
I think I'd like to take half the time off for my pregnancy IF and only IF I get seriously sick during it (I don't know how well I'd be).. and then maternity leave after that..
But those are all questions I can grapple with later, but thanks for starting the discussion in my head
I have had some long term temp jobs during this depression. I have worked at two publishing houses, and a liberal arts college admissions office. Women seemed to make up 75-90% of the working people in each office. As some news stories have reported, women have seemed to be weathering the economic downturn a little more easily than men since a fair number of them tend to work in education, health care and the arts. Those industries have not been as ravaged by the downturn as compared to the typical male industries such as construction, finance, etc.
This post resonsates with me, but it also depresses me.
I want to have a great career and become a senior executive or a successful entrepreneur. I may or may not want to be a mother. But it seems as if it's extraordinarily difficult to have both. I'm afraid of losing my ambition, but I want a really satisfying personal life - and a big part of one's personal life, especially for a woman, is her relationship with her romantic partner and her children (if she has any).
As to the "having it all" myth - I can't imagine which leg of the stool I'd give up - a fulfilling marriage? A successful career (not a job)? A good relationship with my child?
I think - I've sort of already decided... I'll have one baby. That's my compromise.
You make a clear delineation between men and childfree women, and mothers. Do you think there's also a delineation (albeit not as stark) between mothers of a single child vs. mothers of multiple children?
I remember my aunt telling me that 1 kid was manageable, but when she had her second kid logistics got more than twice as difficult.
This post resonsates with me, but it also depresses me.
I want to have a great career and become a senior executive or a successful entrepreneur. I may or may not want to be a mother. But it seems as if it's extraordinarily difficult to have both. I'm afraid of losing my ambition, but I want a really satisfying personal life - and a big part of one's personal life, especially for a woman, is her relationship with her romantic partner and her children (if she has any).
As to the "having it all" myth - I can't imagine which leg of the stool I'd give up - a fulfilling marriage? A successful career (not a job)? A good relationship with my child?
I think - I've sort of already decided... I'll have one baby. That's my compromise.
You make a clear delineation between men and childfree women, and mothers. Do you think there's also a delineation (albeit not as stark) between mothers of a single child vs. mothers of multiple children?
I remember my aunt telling me that 1 kid was manageable, but when she had her second kid logistics got more than twice as difficult.
FB (and wellheeled actually) - very interesting website! Totally impressed by young financial independent types. Good work!!
wellheeled - short answer, yes, I think 1 child is absolutely more manageable than 2 and certainly gives you that amazing mother feeling just as well as 2.
I know it's depressing, I've been wrestling with the hope and the gloom for 2 years now. I do have lots of hopeful things to say but I just had to throw a note of honesty in there too. The hopeful bit is that I think you can have 2 kids and a fantastic career, any woman can do it, but not every woman will WANT to do it. That's the key. Women have a greater challenge in doing working parenthood and it means we will never have 50% female CEOs. We're just not. But it doesn't mean that we can't have 30% and, even if we have only 10%, that you can't be one of them with children. (CEO role just used for example.) Point being - if you want career, marriage and kids - go for it. But just know it's going to be challenging. There's no point pretending otherwise. But lots of things in life are challenging! :)
More posts to come on that front. But just wanted to make that clear.
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