the security breach

I'm extracting a segment of an email that I wrote to my sister, Janet, early this morning in response to her question of, "How are we doing?"  I think this sums it up pretty well.  It's raw, it's honest. It will hopefully be something I look back on one day soon and say, "Yep, that was a really rough time, but wow - this grind was worth it, thank you GOD."  

**********************************

It's really incredible how much change we have intentionally subjected ourselves to and how HARD everything feels. If I'd known then, what I know now, I think I would have gone back to Texas and said, "Let's take this in baby steps, instead of ... you know ... let's flip our entire world upside down the triplet's junior year of high school, and beat it with a broom for months on end."  

The kids are actually phenomenal, hanging in there and persevering like nothing I could have imagined.  William earned his Eagle Scout, and is excelling on the rock climbing team.  Elizabeth will be earning her Eagle Scout, soon, and is running cross-country and making a load of new friends. Carolyn is still working on her Eagle Scout, running cross-country with her sister, and recently landed an elected spot on student council.  Henry is remaining involved in scouting, has increased his friend count 10 fold, and goes rock climbing with William, when he is not playing video games. I don't like the games, he does. It's a compromise.   

As for me, I've been hanging on by a thread and it is fraying fast.  My courage has been replaced with a debilitating fear and every so often, I get a glimpse of myself and say out loud, "STOP IT. It's time to RISE." I've been terrified that something bad is going to happen to Charlie and/or the kids, and the vulnerability I feel at this point is unlike anything I've ever experienced. For someone who craves order and control, this is the exact opposite reality. 

It doesn't help that we've had Elizabeth to the urgent care for what we thought was a broken foot (thankfully not); Henry now thinks he broke his finger (hopefully not), and their school went in to a 2-hour lock down last week because of a gun threat.   My heart is constantly in my throat. 

That courage of conviction I possessed, has been replaced by a trembling anxiety that finds me clutching a tea cup, hugging my knees, and crying, "Why did we do this?? HOW COULD I DO THIS TO MY FAMILY?  How could I be so reckless?" 

We owned our nicely furnished house. I had a good job.  We had a community. We gave it all up because... why again?  That reality was at least tangible. This one is not. 

It would help if we had friends or family in the area to reassure us. It would help if we had several definitive jobs lined up. It would be good to know that benefits for our family will continue next year. It would definitely ease my mind to know that we could buy a great house, at a reasonable price, any time we want.  But we don't really know anyone here. The job market feels extremely difficult to crack in to and takes time.  Real estate is dismal in this area (low inventory and ridiculous prices) and we've been in an expensive, extremely "tired" rental for a week - with another three weeks to go - before our furniture even arrives.  After camping for 12 weeks, we are still in sleeping bags for another 4 weeks until our beds are unpacked. Our couch is being conveyed with the Texas house, so we'll continue to sit in camp chairs until we have a better line of sight on where we'll ultimately be.  I suppose.  

I desperately want to settle in, but I can't. 

Is Vermont even where we want to be?  The breathtaking beauty of this area that I experienced in July, has given way to seeing a lot more trash on the streets.  Rundown homes. Homelessness. What seems like a lot of people teetering on the brink of poverty.   I've heard living in "The Woodlands" is like living in a bubble and it's true.  It's only when you're outside of the bubble that you realize how nice it actually is.  The things I didn't like about it, are now the things I miss.  Why must I be so fickle? 

Winter is coming soon, and we're nervous about it - despite having just bought season ski passes.  I found a new dentist last week, that gave me the worst cleaning I've ever had. Now, I need to find a new dentist.  The smallest things, like this, shoot me in a to a pit of despair.   

Why am I not looking for the positive?  Where is my faith? 

Why are we HERE?  I was thinking that God put us here, the universe unraveling as it should and all, but now I'm wondering if it was the devil? 

OMG. Was the direct line that I thought I had to the Holy Spirit hacked?! 

Like Andy Dufresne who climbed through 500 yards of raw sewage on his belly to reach freedom in The Shawshank Redemption, I'm furiously hoping / praying that we will soon be gloriously holding our hands above our heads on the other side of this mountain.  We've wanted this "simple" life for at least 20 years. Now we're almost here, and I'm thinking retreating back to the prison through the sewer pipe would be easier because the known is a lot more comforting and easier than the unknown.  But then I remember:  To achieve something extraordinary, we must be willing to wait and grind longer than anyone else.  Lord knows I have endurance, but this has been one hell of a grind.  I'm ready for a vista.

Do me a solid, God.  Please do me a solid.

PS: Today or anytime this week would be super.  Until then, a huge dose of patience would be great. 

PSS: One of the greatest gifts about this belly climbing experience through the sewer, is how close our family is growing and how we are truly in the trenches on all of this, together.  We grasp the critical need for one another, and the children's compassion and faith, is blooming before my eyes.  No sooner did I write that PS above, William said to me, "Mom, don't forget that good things come to all who wait. Today is all we have, which is why the prayer tells us, "Give us this day, our Daily Bread. Patience is a virtue." 

Wow. Out of the mouths of babes. 

... and so I clean

You know what's funny? 

Whenever we go out of town for an extended period of time, I always insist on cleaning the house from top to bottom before we leave. Not just a little clean, but a deep clean - the kind that typically involves dumping out cabinets Marie-Kondo style and scrubbing toilets like the Pope is coming to dinner.  Once everyone is packed, they are always the first out the door and in the car, while I'm always last out, dragging a mop / broom / vacuum behind me.  My pattern of cleaning before we take off on a trip, is as predictable as the sun that rises in the east and sets in the west each day.   

Charlie has tried more than once to psycho-analyze this behavior and the only plausible explanation we can derive is that I really like coming back to a clean house.  But also, somewhere in the back of my mind, I've thought, "What if we never come back?"  While it's definitely a dark notion that the entire family would perish while we were away on vacation ... it could happen.  And once I stifle the horror of that scenario and suppress the tears of this imagined event, my mind reverts to our extended family and neighbors that would need to come in to our house and help sort out our affairs.  

The absolute last thing I'd want them to think after, the requisite "Oh my gosh! How terribly sad that they're all gone!" is "WOW, who knew that they were total slobs?!"  

The one scenario that had certainly never crossed my mind is that while we would be traveling in an area where we have always wanted to live, we would receive news that would take me to my knees so hard and so fast, that I would immediately look to the heavens and ask if God had a hand in this? And then after seeking counsel with my husband and children, we would make the unanimous decision that we would stay right where we are, and never return.   These are the kinds of things that happen in fantasies .. or movies.  Most certainly never in real life.

Alas, that exact scenario played out for us on week five of what was supposed to be a six week road trip, touring the eastern seaboard with the kids. The goal of our summer trip was two-fold: 1. To continue our quest of visiting the top National Parks, and 2. Since the triplets were entering their junior year of high school, tour colleges in areas that we might not otherwise have a chance to visit. 

We'd just wrapped up a tour of the most northeastern national park in the United States, Acadia, and were starting to make our way back west - through Vermont - before dropping south to Texas. We'd also visited almost a dozen schools, the last on the list was the University of Vermont in Burlington.  We were only supposed to be in town for three days, beginning our drive back to Texas on Monday, July 26th so that the kids could have a few days at home before school began on August 11th.   

Now, before I get to that... for years Charlie and I have wanted to live in Vermont.  

 

It's very curious how our souls have always been pulled to this beautiful little New England state.  In 1996, just after we'd wrapped up graduate school and before we bought our first home in San Diego, Charlie interviewed with a company in Burlington, and I interviewed with a company in Montpelier.  Charlie's interview last 15 minutes and he felt incredibly discouraged.  My interview lasted four hours and included lunch. I felt incredibly optimistic.  He was offered a job, I wasn't.  It still cracks me up to this day.   We turned down his opportunity and stayed in San Diego, where we'd welcome our triplets eight years later and Henry 33 months after that. 

Three years ago, we brought the kids to Vermont for the triplet's 14th birthday in October. 

I'd found a quaint bed and breakfast in Chester and over a cup of coffee in the kitchen, Charlie told the owners that he loved to entertain and cook, and could really see himself owning a B&B at some point in his life. The owners exchanged a look and then told us that they had just made the decision to sell their place.  Charlie and I exchanged a look and said, "It's a sign!" The Henry Farm Inn near the William River. 

 

It seemed like it was meant to be and my husband's dream of channeling Bob Newhart might actually come to fruition.   My organization was going through a restructure, and there was a chance that our family would be relocated to the northeast.  Perhaps this might actually work out?  But over the next few months, we discussed the specifics with the owners, before ultimately deciding that the timing just wasn't right for our family.  My job would still remain in Texas for at least the foreseeable future.

So here we were, once again, in Vermont - sitting on the banks of the spectacular Lake Champlain that Sunday evening, toying with the idea of what it would be like if we actually lived here?  

What if...? 

What if ... I just resigned and we did something completely different?    

How often have we said, "Live your life with NO regrets!"?  Are we really living our best lives with no regrets? Will we ever leave the Lone Star state?  The chance of our family getting out, intact, was growing more and more slim as the kids graduate from high school, and likely attend college "in-state." 

And oh, Burlington is just so beautiful.  We loved the lake and the town and all the awesome shops along Church Street that had "Help Wanted" signs in the windows; perfect for 16-year olds who are excited for part-time work.  The kids liked the university, the outdoorsy vibe of the area, and the prospect of four seasons - which we've all desperately missed since we've lived in Texas.  Extra points for the proximity to UVM Medical Center, the Burlington International airport, the awe-inspiring mountains every where we looked, the epic bike trails that zig-zagged all the way to Canada, the environmentally conscious community, the arts - the crafts - the breweries - the Ben & Jerry's.   

So when the course-altering news came on Monday morning at 10:05 that my 20-year career with ExxonMobil could possibly be over by the end of the year, with a probable move to New Jersey within 2022, it certainly felt like it was a miracle that we were here.  The universe was forcing our hand. 

If it was just me and Charlie, the answer would probably have been easy - we'd go back to Texas and do what needed to be done, despite the fact the oil and gas industry is anything but dependable these days and is expected to continue contracting 10% a year for the next three to five years.  Charlie and I, alone, could weather that uncertainty.  But, as I've done every moment since they've been on the earth - I looked at our children and I prayed for guidance.  

Do we drive all the way back to Texas and put the kids in to a school that they'd never have attended if not for my job in the area, and take a chance that I'd be employed in four months, or make the move to a place that's been on our hearts for 25 years?  The COVID case numbers are ramping up yet again in Texas, and the triplets are entering their critical junior year of high school.  After 18 long months of remote learning, more than anything, they need stability and in-person instruction.  What they definitely don't need is the prospect of quarantine, more remote learning, and a possible move in the middle of their junior or senior year, if and when my tenure at ExxonMobil comes to a grinding halt.

Although the answer was rather immediate for all six of us, it has not been an easy decision. To be blunt, it's been one of the hardest and most soul shaping decisions of my life.  I was at a significant crossroad, and ultimately, decided to cross the bridge and resign from the company so we could fulfill our dream of living in this beautiful little state. 

 

On the downside, the anxiety, worry, and second-guessing has been intense.  But on the upside, the excitement and anticipation of this new chapter is absolutely thrilling; as is the exhilaration and incredible validation of removing myself from a situation where I was significantly under-valued.  Another upside is that the house was spotless, and ready to be listed for sale within the month.

And that, children, is why it's always a good idea to clean your house before you leave on vacation.

yes, it's true ... and wow it's exhausting

I'm sure I've mentioned it at some point before ... but even if so ... it bears repeating that I'm the first and only woman that has ever worked in the technical services group of our organization. This group is predominantly comprised of men that are >50 years old and are endearingly referred to as the "gray beards."  It's been very flattering, and an absolute honor, to be chosen to work amongst this group of highly qualified and respected individuals.   

That said, even though I've reached this somewhat "pinnacle" of career success, when Charlie forwarded me an article today about women in the workplace, I felt myself furiously nodding my head and saying aloud, "YES, TO THE OH MY GOSH CUBED." And then, because I am nothing if not a loose cannon dead set on knocking down barriers for the career progression of women in industry as effectively and efficiently as possible, I forwarded it on to my supervisor and suggested that he bring it up during his next Diversity and Inclusion Networking session.   

(He hasn't responded yet.) 

After I read, and then re-read the article, I informed Charlie, who had originally sent me the article (and I'd therefore assumed that he had read it the whole way through), that the Stanford biologist that was interviewed, is related to our family.  Joan Roughgarden is our brother-in-law's sister and I'll be darned if this isn't just one more piece of evidence that the universe is, indeed, unfolding as it should!  

Here's the article, in the off chance the link above doesn't work. 

Why Aren't Women Advancing At Work? Ask a Transgender Person.Having experienced the workplace from both perspectives, they hold the key to its biases.

By Jessica Noodle

Fifty years after The Feminine Mystique and 40 years after Title IX, the question of why women lag in the workplace dogs researchers and lay people alike. While women are entering the professions at rates equal to men, they rise more slowly, and rarely advance to the top. They’re represented in smaller numbers at the top in fields from science to arts to business. 

Some suggest that there is something different about women—women have stalled because of their personal choices, or their cognitive and emotional characteristics, whether innate or socialized. Another possibility is that the obstacles to women’s advancement are located within their environments—that they face barriers unique to their gender.1 

But while bias has been experimentally demonstrated, it’s hard to study in the real world: Just as it’s hard to isolate a single environmental pollutant’s effect on human health, it’s been near impossible to isolate gender as a variable in the real world and watch how it affects a person’s day-to-day experience. 

Until now. Trans people are bringing entirely new ways of approaching the discussion. Because trans people are now staying in the same careers (and sometimes the very same jobs) after they change genders, they are uniquely qualified to discuss the difference between how men and women experience the workplace. Their experience is as close to the scientific method as we can get: By isolating and manipulating gender as a variable and holding all other variables—skill, career, personality, talent—constant, these individuals reveal exactly the way one’s outward appearance of gender affects day-to-day interactions. If we truly want to understand women at work, we should listen carefully to trans men and trans women: They can tell us more about gender in the workplace than just about anyone.

Ben Barres is a biologist at Stanford who lived and worked as Barbara Barres until he was in his forties. For most of his career, he experienced bias, but didn’t give much weight to it—seeing incidents as discrete events. (When he solved a tough math problem, for example, a professor said, “You must have had your boyfriend solve it.”) When he became Ben, however, he immediately noticed a difference in his everyday experience: “People who don't know I am transgendered treat me with much more respect,” he says. He was more carefully listened to and his authority less frequently questioned. He stopped being interrupted in meetings. At one conference, another scientist said, "Ben gave a great seminar today—but then his work is so much better than his sister's." (The scientist didn't know Ben and Barbara were the same person.) “This is why women are not breaking into academic jobs at any appreciable rate,” hewrote in response to Larry Summers’s famous gaffe implying women were less innately capable at the hard sciences. “Not childcare. Not family responsibilities,” he says. “I have had the thought a million times: I amtaken more seriously.”

This experience, it turns out, is typical for transmen. For her book Just One of the Guys? Transgender Men and the Persistence of Gender Inequality, sociologist Kristen Schilt interviewed dozens of FTM (female to male) transgender individuals. One subject noted that when he expresses an opinion, everyone in a meeting now writes it down. Another noted, "When I was a woman, no matter how many facts I had, people were like, “Are you sure about that?’ It’s so strange not to have to defend your positions." When they suggested women for promotions, other men said, “Oh! I hadn’t thought about her”—they were able to promote women because their advice was taken more seriously. Personality traits that had been viewed negatively when they were women were now seen as positives. “I used to be considered aggressive,” said one subject. “Now I'm considered 'take charge.' People say, ‘I love your take-charge attitude.’"

The effects of FTM transition, however, aren’t universally positive. Race, it seems, has the ability to overshadow gender when it comes to others’ esteem. Black transmen, for instance, found they were perceived as a “dangerous” post transition. One subject said he went from being “obnoxious black woman” to “scary black man”—and was now always asked to play the “suspect” in training exercises. 

“Men are assumed to be competent until proven otherwise, whereas a woman is assumed to be incompetent until she proves otherwise.”

What happens when the opposite transformation takes place—when a man becomes a woman? Joan Roughgarden is a biologist at Stanford who lived and worked as Jonathan Roughgarden until her early fifties, and her experience was almost the mirror image of Barres’s. In her words, “men are assumed to be competent until proven otherwise, whereas a woman is assumed to be incompetent until she proves otherwise.” In an interview, Roughgarden also noted that if she questioned a mathematical idea, people assumed it was because she didn’t understand it. Other transwomen have found changes not only in perceptions of their ability, but also their personality. In Schilt’s work with transwomen for a forthcoming book, she found that behaviors transwomen had as men were now seen as off-putting. What was once “take-charge” was now “aggressive.” And they had to adapt; the transwomen quickly learned that “being the same way in the world would be detrimental to your career.”

Unlike those of us who have only experienced the world a single gender, Schilt’s subjects were able to see very clearly that “men succeed in the workplace at higher rates than women because of gender stereotypes that privilege masculinity, not because they have greater skill or ability." Bias is a hard thing to acknowledge. “Until a person has experienced career-harming bias,” wrote Barres in his response to Summers, “they simply don’t believe it exists.” And people tend to think the problem is located elsewhere: “Everyone thinks that there's bias out there, but ‘I'm not that person,’” says Schilt. 

But, says Schilt, bias is both more pervasive and less invidious. And addressing it is going to take more than just waiting around for the old guard to retire: The “fantasy of a demographic shift just isn’t true,” Schilt says. ”It’s our culture. It's how we organize gender, separate by gender, men's rooms and women's rooms—it's so ingrained in us that these things are different. And it's not just men, it's also women who have the same ideas.” The experiences of trans people are bringing these factors to light in a wholly new and unclouded way. 

Of course, the sample size is small here. And there’s no perfect agreement on cause-and-effect. Chris Edwards, a trans advertising executive, says that post-transition, he was given greater levels of responsibility—but he thinks it’s because the testosterone he took changed his behavior. He became less timid and more outspoken—and was seen, at work, as more of a leader. Indeed, some suggest that transmen might experience these workplace benefits partly because, post-transition, they are happier and more comfortable, and that this confidence leads to greater workplace success. But if that’s the case, one would expect that transwomen, armed with this same newfound confidence, would see benefits. The opposite seems to be true. 

To truly understand trans people’s experiences of workplace gender bias, more research is needed. But the window to do so may be closing, as people are able to change genders at younger and younger ages. Puberty-inhibiting medications are becoming more mainstream, meaning young trans people can choose to suppress the development of secondary sexual characteristics from a relatively early age. (The treatment became available in the U.S. in 2009.) A child who identifies with the opposite gender and seeks treatment is now able to experience the world, for most of their life, as that gender alone. 

And the group of trans people who are vocal on the subject is already fairly small; many seem to feel they have much larger issues facing them. When asked how people react when she describes the different treatment she receives as a woman, Roughgarden responds simply, “I don't bring it up.” Ultimately, Schilt says, it’s not trans people’s responsibility fix gender bias. Roughgarden agrees. “We're trying make a life,” she says. “We have to live in our actual roles, we can't sit in a coffeehouse and complain about how this is the world. This is the world and we have to live in it. We have to navigate it.” 

1

It’s been shown, for example, that both women and men attribute women’s success more often to luck, and attribute men’s more often to ability. Women also received fewer rewards for sharing opinions and taking leadership roles. One study showed that a female fellowship applicant had to be 2.5 times more productive than the average male applicant to be deemed equally competent.

Jessica Nordell is a writer and multidisciplinary creative living in Minneapolis.

changing gears

This past week, on one of the days that I was remarkably not traveling and in the office, my co-worker dropped in to say hello. As he stood in my doorway, talking to me about the happenings in his life, he mentioned that earlier in the month, he had moved his middle child (and only son) off to college.



Although this is his second child to leave the nest, and he still has an eighth grader at home, he said that this child leaving home has really hit him hard.  It especially hit him when he was cutting the lawn over the weekend because it dawned on him that this was the first time in at least seven years that he, himself, had cut the grass because that had been a chore for his son.  His voice cracked and abruptly trailed off as he said, "I can't believe he's already gone... where does the time go?"



Tonight is the eve of my nine-year-old triplets beginning fourth grade and my seven-year-old beginning first grade.  Whomever said the days are long but the years are short, was right on the money.  As I sat down last night, filling out the stacks of paperwork for the new school year ... the forms were so familiar, it felt like I had just done this exercise ... what, a month or 12 ago?

As I was tucking the kids in tonight, it struck me that in another nine short years, our oldest children, God willing, will be healthy and strong freshman enrolled for their first semester of college. When you factor Henry in to the equation, the empty nest that we will experience over the next 12 years is absolutely mind-numbing.

Stay in the moment, Jen.

Stay in the moment!



Although people have long told me that kids grow up so fast, sometimes I forget how fast that happens until I slow down and take an inventory of where we are on this path. That's when the wet towels that were left on the bathroom floor - and the apple cores that were discarded in the cup holders of the van - aren't the end of the world.



As parents, we really don't have our children for very long at home, and each day that I do have with them, is becoming more and more precious to me.

The dichotomy with me ~ and several of my working mother friends ~ is that at this juncture in life, we can see and sense the incredible growth potential in our careers. But if we continue to pursue the current career track, we will inevitably miss so much of our children growing up.   I've been to training seminars and have read books galore about how women can achieve the optimum work-life balance. But as I've put those tricks and tips in to practice, I find that they don't work very well for someone like me: Someone who, despite the training and coaching, is simply unable to shut one thing off to focus on another. Someone who cannot change their "altitude" from work to life, and life to work, very seamlessly.  There's a lot of turbulence.

As I was pondering all of this recently, I had an epiphany that as a working mother, I can have it all.  Maybe I just can't have it all at the same time.  

In life, you have to be willing to shift your priorities from time to time.



It's been a long process and all consuming decision, but I'm preparing to shift. And fervently hope that when I do, my transmission doesn't fall out on the roadway of life.

the path (xv)

Thinking back, I don't think I ever really explained much of what has happened with me at work. For that matter, I think the last I wrote about it was in October when I drafted up that post about surviving severe weather.  Let's see, what's happened since then?

Well, I can't really go in to the details. 

But ... I can say that my situation has improved dramatically for which I am extremely thankful. I'm fortunate to work for a great company, with a lot of wonderful people, and I was very disappointed at the prospect of leaving.  It was quite unexpected that on November 1st,  I was assigned a (new) temporary manager and on January 1st, I was moved in to the "Think Tank" with a group of scientists, the majority of whom possess PhDs and more than 30 years of experience. As the only woman in this group of 12 mostly gray-haired men, I often find myself wondering why in the world they selected me?  Do they not realize that I had a significant learning disability in grade school and am still sometimes stumped by fractions? Thankfully, I haven't had to deal with too many fractions as I've been working on some of the most environmentally complex projects that face our corporation.

(Phew.)

Meanwhile, my former manager, who helped me to become a stronger and more spiritual person, was moved out of our organization and to a heavily guarded location in the Asia-Pacific region.  I sincerely wish him the very best in life and hope that he grew from the experience of working with me, as much as I grew from the experience of working with him. Now that it's over, I can truly say I'm a better person because of it.

Due to my experiences in the workplace over the past few years, particularly since I've become a mom, I've had an especially keen awareness of stories regarding women trying to navigate the path that often straddles motherhood and career-hood. These stories are seemingly everywhere - in the newspaper, books and film.

Last week I watched the movie Mona Lisa Smile.  This film came out two (um, make that 10?) years ago but I saw it for the first time last Tuesday.  When Katherine Watson [Julia Roberts] realized that her female students from the 1953 graduating class had it in their minds that they were destined to be homemakers and wives to their husbands, and not the scholars or professionals that Katherine thought they were in school to become, she angrily told her Wellesley College Magnum Cum Laude students, ".... you physics majors can calculate the mass and volume of every meatloaf you make."   

She then flashed up slides of women modeling brassieres and irons and told her class, "You can be so much more." Towards the end of the movie, one of her students, Joan Brandwyn [Julia Stiles] is accepted to Yale Law School, but turns it down because she wants to start a family instead. Her decision is unfathomable to Katherine, who implores her that she can have both her career and her family.  Joan's reply is that she would regret not having a family and being there to raise them, more than she would ever regret waking up one day and realizing that she could have been a lawyer.

(This was the most poignant part of the movie for me.)

The expectations - and demands - that so many women set on themselves to be academically successful and then successful in the workplace can be so high.  Joan probably could have had both ... her career and her family.  But from my perspective, it's not always "that" easy and I think that a lot of women in this day and age are fooled in to thinking that it is or should be.  While I believe that it certainly could be easier than it is to raise a family and maintain a career, a few things need to change within our own mindsets (and corporate environment) and that isn't going to happen overnight.

Consider, neither of my grandmothers worked out of the home; nor did either of Charlie's and both of our mothers were home with their children full-time until they went to school. Generationally, working mothers in the professional environment is still a relatively new occurrence and yet, there are a lot of women today who take grave exception to any notion that mothers are not as capable and focused as men in the business environment.

Last week, I read an article in The Washington Post.  The title of the article was, "Billionaire investor's take on motherhood roils U-VA."  The article was about Paul Tudor Jones, a hedge fund billionaire, who said during a symposium at the University of Virginia that as long as women continue having children, the hedge fund industry is likely to be dominated by men. He was quoted as saying, "As soon as that baby's lips touched that girl's bosom, forget it."

He was referring to two women who worked with him and once married, became mothers, and no longer had the intense focus needed for macro trading.  His comments caused an uproar among women educators and those in the business world.  WHAT ROILS ME is the outcry to his comment and that Jones has since released an apology for stating what I consider to be The Obvious.

Women, if they chose to have children, will likely discover that they have a bond to their children that is greater than any bond the world of chemistry has ever known.  In 99.999% of the female population, once a woman has a baby, everything changes: her waist, her bosom, and yes, even her intense focus.

Several years ago, Johnson and Johnson launched a brilliant ad campaign built upon the truth, "Having a Baby Changes Everything."  One of my favorite phrases in this campaign is, "You were always destined for big things. So who'd have ever thought the biggest thing to ever happen to you would be the smallest?" 

Why in the world should we attempt to cover up that a woman's focus has shifted after the biggest thing to ever happen in her life?  It's not a handicap or a function of inequality .... it's a reality.  And the more that people try to argue against this fact that a woman's life is no different after she's become a mother (particularly in the workplace), the more challenging and longer it's going to take to have POLICY in place that is going to more readily allow mothers the flexibility (and desire) to continue with their careers if they so choose, or need.

At least in my case, I was on a rapidly upward mobile career track, until I had children. And then things slowed down.  It should come as no surprise that taking almost a year off for maternity leave, and then working part-time for a year, before taking off another year for maternity leave, followed by another year of part-time work would put the brakes on my accelerating career.  Before children came in to my life, there weren't distractions such as school plays and swim meets and sick little ones that only allowed me to get two hours of sleep at night. There certainly weren't pictures on my desk that would prompt me to daydream about what they were doing and what I might possibly be missing between the hours of 8 AM and 6 PM.  And there wasn't the sometimes gut wrenching guilt that can derail me when I'm packing for a week-long business trip.

Some women love to work. Some women have to work. If you're in the latter camp, it's nice when you enjoy what you do and don't feel bitter about being away from home.  I'm fortunate in that I thoroughly enjoy my day job, but I'm a mother first and foremost. And even now, as a 20+ year veteran in the prime of my career, I wouldn't hesitate giving up a week rubbing shoulders with executives, to instead spend a day at Disney Land with my children on their birthday.  My focus, like most of the working women I know, shifted once I had children. 

I've lost count of the number of women who, if given the option, would give up their full-time, hard-earned careers to have the ability to spend more time home with their children at various points in their child's life.  Even for those women who were the most gung-ho career women to ever live and have hired full-time nannies so they can continue on with their gung-ho careers ... yes, even for THOSE amazing go-getter women, it's irrefutable that their focus has shifted from what may have once been an all encompassing career to the little beings that they are now blessed to raise.

Very few of these women would like to give up their careers completely.  But all of them, crave some degree of flexibility.  What I've discovered is that you're either lucky enough to work for a company (or manager) that allows flexibility, or you're not.  There is no policy governing flexibility because flexibility is dictated by business need. This makes sense economically, but there are other factors that could be considered which may include job sharing and/or work place and/or work hour flexibility.

Time and time again I see highly qualified women stepping down (or stepping aside) from promotions because the pull to be a mother is greater than the pull to be an executive. It's not that she couldn't be a CEO, it's that she wouldn't be a CEO under her current work demands or arrangement.  What a woman brings to the table is often so different than a man and that skill set cannot be discredited. Most woman that I know offer communication, collaboration and coordination skills that are an integral part of continuous improvement in an organization.  And as I've written before, allowing employees to find a healthy balance at dictated by their life circumstances (i.e., children), will ultimately yield a more productive, energized, loyal, healthy and diversified work force.

So my response to Paul Tudor Jones would be this...

"Women aren't going to stop having children. So until such time that there are policies surrounding improved flexibility in the workplace - the hedge fund industry; nay business world, is likely to be dominated by men. If we want to see more women in the workforce, especially at higher levels, we must allow them the flexibility to attend to their #1 priority - their family. "  

It's because so many women come back to work on the premise (or under the expectation) that they are going to accomplish all that they accomplished before they had children (and then some), there is a tremendous amount of anguish among the working mothers I know and their numbers in the upper echelons of management are lacking.  Most women who have children bow out of the game, or turn down the promotions because of the impact it may have on their time at home.  There aren't enough hours in the day, fuel in the tank, or years that our children need us. As Phyllis Schlafly so eloquently wrote, ".... maternal tuning-in never turns off."  So it's simply a choice most of us have had to make regarding where our best energy will go.

Understanding the sacrifices that I'm willing to make, and those that I'm not ... our family has found a balance which for the most part, works. As fate would have it, I have a husband who is incredibly supportive of my career and was able to establish a career for himself that allows him the flexibility to be home with our children. It's safe to say I wouldn't have reached my current level, in the well respected "Think Tank", if I wasn't focused in the workplace. But I'm definitely not as focused as I was before the four biggest things to ever happen in my life, arrived in less than three years. I made the conscious decision to have children; I made the conscious decision that I wanted to be a mother.  It was a choice.  But without Charlie willing to make the choices that he's made, it's unlikely that I'd be at the level I've achieved in my professional life, especially given the general lack of workplace flexibility I have, which is comparable throughout today's corporate America.

Last month, I told my current supervisor, a man whom I've truly admired, that one of my career ambitions is to move in to a role of management. After a lot of soul-searching, I've determined that the primary reason I'd like to move in to this type of role is so that I can be better positioned to understand, and hopefully remove, some of the barriers that are deterring other women from advancing professionally within our organization.  So I told him that from a diversity and inclusion perspective, it is important that there are more mothers represented at the leadership level.

Little did I know how quickly the corporation would respond to my request.  Next week, I'll have someone assigned to work for me for the first time in my 12-years with the company.  I'll be the direct supervisor of a young woman pursuing an engineering degree. She will be coming to work for us and I'm sure that when she comes in to our office that has a 20 / 80 ratio of women to men, she is going to quickly realize that her gender is outnumbered 4:1. (Look at that ... two fractions in one sentence!)  

I'll admit, I've been somewhat conflicted expressing my interest in management because I feel like I'm toeing a very fine line between "The Professional" and "The Mom" and I don't want to fall too far over to "The Professional" side.  However, it's clear that there needs to be more working mothers at the management level who are balancing careers and family and visibly demonstrating that sometimes the balance works and sometimes it doesn't.  People need to see and understand that, while also seeing the value that working mothers continue to bring to the table.

There are days I still struggle with our arrangement and question if it should be me that is home with our children - while Charlie is in the office. (I don't know if my guilt or maternal instinct is stronger?) But more often than not, I see my children looking at me as a woman who is capable of supporting her family and my employer looking at me as a dedicated employee who has her priorities in the right place. As a result, I feel empowered to lobby for policy on flexibility in the workplace, while also continuing to demonstrate the critical business need for women in the workforce today....



For those women who will be in the workforce, tomorrow.

*****

(Post Script: I'm trying to scratch the itch of something I've been meaning to write for quite a while and am not sure if I grazed the mark or missed it completely. Forewarning, chances are moderate to high that this will be edited several times after it's posted.)

the path (xiv)

Last year, I wrote a series of posts that explored "the path" that I've been on thus far in my life. For a while now, I've felt moved to add to that collection. Consider these additional installments further soul-searching, history revealing stories that help me better understand the person that I am today and who I hope to become, tomorrow.

***********************************

Growing up, I went to seven different schools before I was in ninth grade. So by the time I reached high school - I didn't feel like I had much stability in the friendship department.  What does it take to be a friend? What does it take to be liked? What does it take to fit in?  Those were just some of the big questions that I was navigating at a critical point in my life: my early teenage years.  

My freshman year, I became fast friends with someone who was a native from the town. A native from a town that was very keen on its natives. It was a southern town that less than 26 years prior had undergone desegregation of the public school systems and held very firmly to its conservative roots.  The new friend was beautiful and athletic and had been very popular in middle school - which was a catalyst for her being very popular in high school. Moreover, her older brother was a senior heart throb on campus.

One Saturday afternoon, we arranged that she'd come over to my house for a few hours. My house being a very cozy two bedroom condominium on the second floor of a complex that I lived in with my mother.  And what I honestly didn't know until the day she was scheduled to visit was that my mother would be gone for the day.  So when she arrived to an adult-less house, the first thing that she did was call her quarterback boyfriend and invite him over. And then, she asked me if we had anything to drink.

I'm sure everyone's thinking that I had more to do with the trouble that we were about to get in to, but let me just state for the record: Up until my senior year in college, I'd always been very naive.  For example, when one of my college roommates asked if I'd like to "join" her and her Citadel boyfriend for the evening, I thought they meant by going out to dinner. When she said, "We were thinking of a ménage à trois..." I thought she meant a FRENCH restaurant.  Cross my heart, that's a true story.  Just ask my mother whom I called in a state of hysteria at 10 PM once I fully understood their intentions.

So there I am in ninth grade, holding a glass of ice water for my new friend and she scoffs at me.

"No, what I was wondering is if you have something to DRINK." She poured out the ice water before asking where my mother kept her "alcohol." My first instinct was to show her to the bottle of alcohol that we'd use for medicinal purposes - before I thought it best that she clarify. She laughed again as she set about opening various cupboards until she found what she was looking for.  My mother was not much of a "drinker" but she did have bottles of Kahlua, vodka and Creme de Menthe for when guests (that were older than 14) might come over.

My friend took all three bottles out of the hutch and poured approximately equal parts, in to her glass. Then she walked back in to the kitchen and opened the fridge. She extracted a Diet RC cola and a jar of maraschino cherries, which she liberally added to her cocktail.  At approximately the same time, her boyfriend arrived and they started to make out. And right about then, a little alarm in my head started to go off:  WHOOP WHOOP WHOOP.

The next hour was a blur. I do remember trying a sip of my friend's special concoction and thinking it was the grossest thing I'd ever consumed. So I ate a graham cracker instead. Meanwhile, my friend inhaled her drink and poured herself another one. Her boyfriend kicked off his shoes and turned on the college football game (Clemson vs. Alabama) on our 12-inch television set.  After her second drink, my friend who was leaning on her boyfriend's chest - dozed off to sleep.

I knew that her father would be coming to pick her up at 5:00 PM and since it was around 3:00 PM, I thought it was fine if she just took a little rest.  What I didn't expect was that less than five minutes in to her nap, she'd projectile vomit all over her boyfriend and my mother's couch.  The boyfriend jumped up, helped me get my friend up, and together we walked her in to my bedroom.

See, I really was naive. Because if I'd had any idea what was happening - or what was about to happen - I would have brought her directly in to the bathroom.  But no. We brought her in to my newly renovated bedroom and had her lay down on my lovely bed with the lovely down comforter.

And of course she threw up. Again. 

All over my bed. And her blond permed hair. And her Forlenza shirt and sweater vest and Guess jeans. I pulled her upright and together, with her boyfriend, we brought her in to the bathroom. Once we sat her limp body on the toilet seat, I decided that a shower was definitely in order.  So we got her in to the bathtub before I shooed the boyfriend out of the room so I could get her clothes off.

(Modesty. There's always time for modesty.)  

I filled up the tub and shampooed and conditioned her hair. I drained the tub and refilled it with clean water. I rinsed her off, dried her off, and dressed her in my clothes until her clothes - that I had put in the washing machine (twice) - could be cleaned.   With her boyfriend's help, I got her out of the tub - dried her hair - brushed her hair - and had her lay down in the bathroom with a bowl.  I then stripped the covers off the couch cushions, stripped my bed, and queued up the next four loads of laundry.  I scrubbed. And scrubbed and scrubbed.  It wasn't long before the house smelled like a combination of PineSol and Creme de Menthe with a subtle hint of vomit.

Her father called. He was on his way over to pick her up because she was supposed to be babysitting the neighbor's children in less than an hour. I re-dressed my friend in her freshly twice washed albeit not completely dried clothes (while ignoring the chunks of maraschino cherries that were still embedded in her sweater vest) and recruited the help of her boyfriend to help me get her down the flight of stairs to the street level. Her boyfriend then kissed her on her inebriated head before hopping in his car and leaving me to await the arrival of her father. Alone.

A few minutes later her dad arrived. So long as I live, I'll never forget watching him pull up in his white two-door BWM 325i. The sunroof was open. The sun was glistening off his short silver hair. I nudged my friend to stand up and making sure she had her sunglasses on - opened the passenger side door and helped her get in to the car.  Her father was chatting about something, so seemed unaware of his daughter's condition. In hindsight - this seems unbelievable to me, but I know for a fact that he pulled out of the parking lot without so much as a question as to why his daughter wasn't talking and acting rather floppy. 

From what I understand, when they arrived back at her house, she opened the car door - got out, took two steps and passed out cold in the driveway. Her parents quickly deciphered that she was two sheets to the wind.  That night, after my mother had arrived home and I fully revealed to her what exactly had happened earlier in the day - my friend's father called to talk with my mother and ask if perhaps she could come down and meet him at his Law Office one afternoon later in the week?  My mother obliged.  And. As it would happen, my friend's father told my mother that his daughter was forbidden from spending time with me in the future.

It was clear that I was a bad influence and since they were an upstanding Christian family in the community, he had a reputation to protect.  He went on to tell my mother that it really was no surprise that this situation had occurred at OUR home considering my mother was a divorced, single parent, and obviously provided no guidance or boundaries for her child (me!).  There's more to the story surrounding the trouble my friend seemed to find herself in throughout high school. But twenty-eight years later, that whole situation still leaves me almost speechless. (I don't think anything could ever leave me completely speechless, but this one definitely comes close.)

the path (xi) (the drastically modified version)

Since at least my college years, my modus operandi has been full throttle.

I tend to go after certain things with a passion that I sometimes recognize as unhealthy, but often have an impossible time controlling. When I see a hill, I usually pick up the pace.

Note: This definitely doesn't pertain to running speeds.

Heaven knows that in every foot race I've ever participated, I'm usually less than two paces ahead of the ambulance picking up stragglers from the course.

My track record certainly makes me feel invincible. But what I've come to realize is that I'm not invincible. While I do have perseverance and a strong work ethic that is in my blood, when there is absolutely no opportunity for recovery and you are always "full throttle", eventually you break down.

It's important to add that within the first month of my current job, my boss told me that it was his career aspiration to be an executive within our company and anything less would be considered a personal failure. Now, considering I work for one of the wealthiest companies in the world, that's no easy feat and is achieved by less than 1% of the work force.

Suffice it to say, my daily work routine is intense.

Remember when I wrote this??

(Did I call it, or what? I knew it would be!)

For the past 20+ months, or ever since I've been in my current job, I've been full throttle and there has been very little time for recovery. I get through one project, and am hit head-on with another, sometimes multiple projects, simultaneously. Each project is new and different and the learning curve is steep. The experience that I've gained has been incredible, but the effort to understand and get to the top of a hill, especially in good form, has been all consuming.  Hence the reason I've updated my blog so infrequently and have yet to send out our annual greetings. And have resigned from leading the Girl Scout troop next year. And have turned in to a hermit who treasures QUIET time like nothing else. And have eaten 10 boxes of Thin Mints in the past month.

(Actually, that has more to do with the awesomeness of Thin Mints and my inability to control myself around chocolate. We'll be shipping cookies out tomorrow, so if you ordered some from us and are wondering where they are, I promise they're on the way!)

Last May, when I had a cold that continued to get worse in to June, I requested to work from home. But I was told that if I was well enough to work from home, I was well enough to work in the office. Moreover, if I'm home sick, I shouldn't be working at all. But I knew that if I didn't work, I'd be missing critical deadlines, that would have had a domino effect on a billion (with a B) dollar project which I was tasked to lead. And because I didn't want to take the full blow for being late on that project, or be subjected to work even harder once I got back in to the office, I skipped in with a box of Kleenex and Mucinex tucked under my arm. Less than 12 hours later, I was in an ambulance on my way to the hospital.

After that hospitalization, with what turned out to be a severe case of pneumonia, and a subsequent three month disability (and many, many, many tests), I was diagnosed with Sjogren's Syndrome. It's a cheerful-sounding (pronounced: show grins) autoimmune disease that was made famous last year by Venus Williams when she took an extended hiatus from professional tennis. It honestly makes me feel so much better that even someone as physically fit as Venus was totally leveled by the disease.

While I, thankfully, don't have all of the symptoms, I do have the fatigue and body aches, Raynaud's, and periperhal neuropathy. I also have developed an acute case of TMJ that was diagnosed last month when I chomped clear through my polycarbonate night guard. (I just keep thinking how it's a darn good thing I'm not a horse or I would've been turned in to a bottle of glue by now.)

I've concluded that because I was a relatively healthy (and creative) person when I arrived here, and my health (and creativity) has been on a steady decline ever since, these seemingly constant challenges are a result of my environment.  

Or rather, my inability to adapt to this particular work environment.

For as long as I can remember, I've heard the argument that companies will use you until there's nothing left. They will work you right in to the ground. But I've rallied against that claim because I know that a company is as good as it's management. My former manager, for example, encouraged all of his employees to form triathlon teams and find a healthy-work life balance. He inspired and was a role model, both personally and professionally, for everyone around him. I don't recall work ever being too difficult for me, before? I had an amazingly relaxed manager that allowed me incredible freedom in my schedule. I worked from the house and had unsurpassed flexibility. Best of all, the children weren't in school, so my family was welcome to come with me on almost every business trip.

My current work situation couldn't be any MORE different and it's been very difficult because I haven't been in a position to make any changes. I've always been a deep thinker about this kind of stuff, but my deep thinking has reached a whole new level as I wonder, nearly every single day, "What the hell am I doing?" and "How do I get out?"

I've written before about the "curse" on the woman who works hard to pursue a college education and then, advanced degree, excels in her career, surpasses her husband's earnings, has children ... and instantly feels conflicted.

Is she a mother or is she a worker?

Is it possible that she can effectively do both?

Most of the women that I know are genetically programmed and even if she loves her career, there tends to be a pang of guilt whenever she leaves her children. I know for a fact, men don't struggle with this sensation nearly the way that women do.

In our case, because of circumstances and choices we made at the time, Charlie stayed home to be the primary caregiver to our children. And while he is the most wonderful husband and father I know, and many a woman have told me that they need a "Charlie", it's a well documented fact that I've always been restless and struggled with our arrangement. I've never been able to fully "embrace it" (aka: suck-up my responsibility) like so many people have encouraged me to do.

But ... but ... it was me that pursued all of the fertility treatments and never gave up trying to have our children. It was me that put on 200 pounds, in two separate pregnancies, and almost lost my own life the first time around bringing our babies in to the world. And yes, I'd do all of it again in a heartbeat because our children are the best thing to have ever happened to either of us. But I'll shamefully admit that I also do get resentful when I feel like I have no option but to work, especially since I do have a good career with an (otherwise) good company and there is stability that is uncommon in today's world.

But to work 70+ hours a week and have to clean the house on a weekend, because for a while there, there was no excess money in the budget for a weekly maid service and even if there was, I'd have to first find one, and Charlie is outside running around and having a grand old time. Sorry, sometimes my hand starts to cramp from squeezing all those juicy lemons in to lemonade. Although, lemon juice is also a wonderful furniture polishing agent. Did you know?

To make a long, long, long, (xiii series) story short, I told my beloved in December that he needed to get his rear in gear and find a job that would offer our family benefits because I could not do it anymore. Yes, he is amazing and I'm truly the luckiest woman alive. But I'm literally dying and he needs to do something to get me off the crazy train.

Also, at the risk of being called a overly dramatic self righteous ego maniac ungrateful for a good job in today's economy anal retentive controlling perfectionist who can't get out of their own way MOTHER that knocks out her preschooler's front teeth: I'm also a little SELFISH and it's MY turn to go out for nice long walks and send Charlie text messages of me sitting in a sunny coffee shop enjoying a muffin with our son while my husband sits in a cubicle, with his ambitious boss staring over his shoulder, and fights off another panic attack because of > insert today's HAIR ON FIRE critical drama ____ here".

I imagine a hockey game where one player who is cut and bruised and bleeding limps off the ice as a fresh and clean looking player, who a moment ago was smiling and laughing, has a look of terror wash over their face, as they slowly ease out of the box and in to the fray of the game.

"Um. You mean it's MY turn? Oh My God. What's gonna happen?"

Of course my husband has been giving me all kinds of grief about this. He believes that I could get a transfer to another role. And I probably could, but I'd still be in an office setting 40+ hours a week. And although he does work hard with the children, he loves this arrangement and would really prefer to continue working on his own. "Oh yeah, now that the kids are in school all day, you want to stay home. I SEE HOW IT IS." So I just tell him, "Come on, Charlie. You know those frozen Thin Mints aren't going to just eat themselves!!"

But all joking aside, my man is THE man. He jumped on that ice and after flailing around for a lap or two, he scored and then he scored again and again and again. He had offers back in California, here in Virginia, and in states we've never even visited. At this very moment, he has a job offer in hand, from the most amazing little company, less than three miles from my mother's house. My husband would be working with an absolutely wonderful man whom I worked for almost 25-years ago. I love the guy not only because he was one of my first bosses and remembers me fondly as someone who always worked hard, always was happy and always was smiling ... but because he always had a stash of peanut M&Ms to share.

Of course, for Charlie to accept the job, I'd say goodbye to my current career and all of the stability that it has (and will) offer. We'd need to sell our wonderful house with it's wonderful potential, in our wonderful neighborhood, and move. Again. We'd be significantly reducing our income, which does factor in to the equation because although money is no good if you die an early death making it, it actually IS necessary when you have four children who like to eat (and eat and eat and eat), outgrow their shoes every six months, and will be going to college at approximately the same time.

The ideal situation is us both working part-time, from home, again, just like what we had, before. But that's not an option. At least not yet. And we really need to make a change.

So what are we going to do?

I have absolutely no idea.

Sound decision making has never been one of my stronger suits.