Three Teenagers!

I always have the expectation of scary music accompanying those words; for some reason it never does, but you should see the looks on peoples faces when I say "I have three teenagers."  The music must be in their heads.

I officially have three teenagers as of earlier this summer.  I think I'm "supposed" to feel old, tired, and very afraid.  Not happening...in fact I am feeling pretty darn happy about the whole thing.  I wonder why?

Well, I'm not old; actually I am relatively young*.   My kids are fantastic (knock on wood).  No behavior problems, only developmentally appropriate attitude problems, good grades, mostly nice friends (they are teenagers after all), goals and plans for now and the future, hobbies, chores that they actually do, some common sense, and healthy doses of humor.  Somehow this combination just doesn't inspire fear, dread, or an impending sense of doom.  Something must be wrong with me... 

Oh, ya...I am a little tired. Maybe I will come to my senses after a good night's sleep :-P


*Please understand that the definition of young shifts relative to my age, and will likely continue to do so.

Crazy, Wonderful Week

OK, so I am back for an update, but life is soooo busy right now and I don't know when I will post next.  Can I just say that this has been an amazing week.  You know, the kind of week where great things are happening, problems arise but are all solved readily, and most things on the "to do" list are accomplished.

Last Saturday I watched some of my friends walk for their PhDs and MAs.  Two of them had family in from out of town and small apartments so I got to host a double Grad Party on Sunday, complete with bocce, cake, a fire, and s'mores - so fun hanging with everyone's family!  Monday was a clinic day and an evening rehearsal for my oldest daughter.  So far, so good; but that's inevitably when the crazy sets in...The neighbor needed to go to the ER, so we watched her kids.  My son and youngest daughter worked together to keep it sane while I picked the oldest daughter up from her rehearsal (I love having teenagers!), then my kids got themselves ready for bed while I took the other two home and put them to bed.  They were just tucked in when their mom got home, and she had already arranged to have some of her other friends help out over the next couple days while she recuperated. 

Tuesday at 8AM I headed out of town for two days to collect dissertation data; our tutor was going to spend the night with the kids.  I was halfway to my first destination when she texted me...poor thing had come down with the flu!  Well, 2 lane winding roads through the mountains are no place to make a phone call, and there were no places to pull over...so I let it go for the moment and enjoyed the beautiful drive.  There is nothing quite like the view when you crest a mountain pass and look down at a huge lake with a quaint little town on the shore, tall, jagged, snow capped peaks in the background, and morning mist still rising off the lake...too bad I couldn't stop to take a photo.  At least I was present in the moment to appreciate it.  An hour and a half later I got to my destination and started contacting friends to fill in.  By the time my meeting started I had a volunteer (it honestly didn't take much effort, I have amazing friends)!  The meeting was fantastic, and I got to know a colleague a little better in the process.  (Did I mention I think I work with truly excellent people)?  I headed back to town to take care of a couple things to make my friend's evening easier; the few hours of extra travel time were worth it.  It also helped me to slow down again and enjoy the pace of the day; I guess I had a more settled feeling having navigated the "worst case" scenario and ending up with a "best case" solution.  Of all my local friends, the kids know her the best and she has a great relationship with them. 

That was the end of crazy (by my definition).  There is a value to not being in a rush; focusing on the journey rather than the destination.  As I was driving to my second destination I saw big horn sheep in the mountains and deer in the fields, sang as loud as I wanted, and stopped to enjoy a beautiful sunset on a back road out in the middle of nowhere.  When I finally arrived I slept like a baby, which I almost never do in a hotel...go figure.  The next day I went to the final meeting, collected the last of my dissertation data, and met some wonderful colleagues in person (after a year or more of knowing them only as voices on the phone).  We finished up early so I stopped at a few interesting places on the way back and still got home in time to have dinner with the kids and spend time together.  All in all, it turned out to be a fantastic trip.

Thursday was consumed with data; updating files with errors in the archival data, re-analyzing the data and creating graphs that reflected the corrections, creating a new spreadsheet to gather some additional information for a different (but related) project, and spending time talking through each task with the RA who is working with me on the projects (who happens to be a brilliant and hard working single mother).

Today was another clinic filled day, followed by an evening concert for my oldest daughter.  Sounds like Monday but with a concert instead of a rehearsal; kinda like the bookends that held this crazy, wonderful week together.  She had a solo and did beautifully.  I got to see some of her friends and my friends who had solos as well (there were adult and child performers), saw colleagues and their families (including my RA and one of my committee members) at and in the event, and spent an evening taking in some live, fun local music with my youngest daughter.

The weekend is looking busy; I really need to go to the grocery store again, drop off the glass recycling, and take the kids to get summer clothes.  And my youngest has a friend coming over to play and work on a school project (I expect it will turn into mostly play).  I would really like to do some writing of my dissertation results.  I already know I am going on a hike with a couple friends Saturday and having a group of friends over for lunch on Sunday.  I guess that looks like balancing housework, family, professional work, and friends.  And just like Tuesday, if something goes a little crazy I will slow down, look at what I need and what my options are, and adjust accordingly.  Maybe sometimes the key to juggling is knowing which ball to set aside or switch, and when to do that (or when to stop and take in a sunset, because juggling can cease and life is still working just fine).

Ask yourself...

If you are considering tackling any graduate program, it is vital to reflect on how (and if) this endeavor will help you achieve your goals, both short and long term.  Another important query to sit with is whether or not you have the capacity to delay gratification and the drive to keep going when things are overwhelming and the light at the end of the proverbial tunnel is ridiculously distant.  The journey is a difficult (and expensive) one even without children; if you cannot answer these things you may want to wait.  At the risk of sounding cheesy, you may want to ask yourself "what is my motivation?"

Research on creativity suggests that intrinsic motivation holds you longer and will see you through the difficult periods more effectively than extrinsic motivation.  This is true for artistic creativity, but also for intellectual endeavors.  Basically, if you are in this for extrinsic factors such as $$ or status you are less likely to persevere or be as effective in your work.  Even worse, you are more likely to get burned out and disillusioned, which partially accounts for the relatively high rate of non-completion in PhD programs.   Intrinsic motivation, however, is fueled by a sense of passion; it inspires curiosity and creativity not only in your work but in how you manage to navigate the challenges along the way.  This is the stuff that moves you forward.  So you have 200 pages of highly intellectual and technical (and probably dry) reading for 1 of your 4 classes this week... no problem, the discussions with your classmates are very stimulating and there is an underlying desire to share perspectives and ideas that makes most of the reading feel worthwhile on at least some level.  A 20 page paper... can do; you wanted to look further into the relationship between two constructs and this is a great excuse to go there in depth.

One problem inherent in graduate study, even for those whose primary motivation is intrinsic, is the unavoidable evaluative component.  Evaluation is a necessity, but it adds an extrinsic motivational factor.  The natural flow of the process is altered, anxiety rises sharply, and the directions you go in may look different because you are meeting the demands or expectations of evaluators.  I am not saying that it is necessarily a bad thing, but research on creativity clearly shows that the evaluative component has a negative impact on quality, productivity, and enjoyment of any activity - even the one you naturally gravitate towards.

Whether you create poetry, sculptures, mathematical equations, or original research projects there is an element of creativity that drives the process.  In order to remain creative and manage the high demand and pressure while maintaining buoyancy and flow you have to return to yourself.  There are countless questions you can ask in order to explore this. What drives you to engage in a project?  What does it mean to do it?  Where does it stem from? Where might it take you?   The point of these questions is not to look at external factors (i.e. I might get a cool publication out of it), but rather to look inside yourself.  Academia is inherently evaluative, and naturally gives rise to the challenges associated with extrinsic motivation.  Intrinsic motivation requires nurturing in this environment.  Balancing the two demands finesse.  Know your professors expectations and demands (as well as their quirks), but also know yourself. 

So, what is your motivation?

A matter of perspective

I felt like a crappy mother yesterday.  Expect these days in grad school.  I felt like a crappy friend the day before that.  Expect those days too.  In fact if you plan to attempt to be a grad student while you simultaneously have children, friendships, and other non-academic commitments you will inevitably have days or weeks where you feel like you suck at everything.  (If all you are is a grad student, you will have times where you feel like you are terrible at that, so make sure it isn't the only thing you are doing). 

So what makes me a crappy friend?  The day before yesterday I had a friend text me to express high levels of exasperation with her husband, who also happens to be a good friend of mine.  He forgot to take care of an errand.  This was not the first or second or even twentieth time, and that is a difficult pattern to accept sometimes.  As she vented herself into a frenzy, I simultaneously sunk into empathic failure.  Her concern and frustration were valid, and I could acknowledge that.  Where I got stuck was the presentation she gave of having to do "everything".  I happen to know he helps around the house, is a great parent, and earns enough that she doesn't work outside the home but still gets to have a cleaning lady. Seriously? Everything?  That is what I do.  I don't have a cleaning lady.  I don't have a wage earning partner, or a co-parent, or someone I can ask to run an errand, or someone I can get a hug from at the end of the day.  Don't get me wrong, I am not feeling sorry for myself; I just didn't have enough "give a damn" left for the drama.  I chose this path for very good reasons, but that doesn't mean it is easy.  And even I have days where I am wiped out and there isn't enough empathy left in my cup to share with my dearest friends.  So instead I called her on her drama, validated her feelings of frustration, and told her I would be in touch later when I could participate in the conversation in a more loving way, because I do get it.  I just sometimes don't get how people can be so blind to the gifts in their lives.  Maybe that is because I am so unaccustomed to the things she takes for granted, and I take for granted my freedom from the frustrations that she faces being in a partnership.  So I felt like a crappy friend...

Then what makes me a crappy mother?  Yesterday I spent the morning with a client at the inpatient unit, then saw clients at one clinic all afternoon, followed by a late client at yet another clinic.  I did not get done until 730 in the evening, and I was completely exhausted.  I had a text from the kids waiting for me; no one had eaten yet.  OK, so now I was anticipating arriving home at 8 to three hungry birds, having to decide what to cook, preparing that, and all of us eating at 9ish. I just didn't have the energy in myself to do this.  So I called the house "choose where you want me to get dinner from and text me what you want so I have a list when I get there."  I cringed, knowing what was probably coming...and true to form, the choice was Taco Bell. OK, look for the positive; at least I don't have to cook, they get to eat sooner, and we'll crawl into our beds at a semi-decent hour.  They were so excited when I walked through the door with "toxic hell" that they all hurried into the kitchen, set the table and poured milks, and we had lively dinner conversation.  They had even fed he dog before I got home!  As much as I dislike it, feeding such questionable ingestibles does not plummet me to the level of "crappy mother", nor does being hard working and occasionally absent in the evenings.  But I don't like it, and when it happens I feel like a lousy mom...

Well, this gave me an opportunity to call myself on my own drama as well.  I DON'T do everything.  I have three wonderful children who I love spending time with.  My not-so-little darlings are full participants in this busy life; one loads the dishwasher, another unloads it, and the third sweeps the kitchen.  They do their own laundry for the most part.  They help with taking care of our geriatric pooch.  My son enjoys mowing the lawn sometimes, and my youngest daughter likes digging in the garden.  They usually remember to write stuff on the grocery list when they notice we are low.  Sometimes they need reminders and sometimes they function more independently, but they rarely fuss or complain (especially compared to the average teenagers).  And they sometimes even enjoy hugs.  With 2 on the spectrum and the other a 14 year old there are fewer hugs than I would like; but this isn't all about me, its about our family.
 
Another thing I have learned from experience is not to believe everything I feel. Feeling like a bad mom or friend doesn't  mean I am a bad mom or friend.  It just means I am human.  I suppose I better get used to that, because I expect it won't change any time soon.

Getting in my own way

      One of the things I like best about self-reflection around a particular experience is the opportunity to see both where I am engaging well and where I am either avoiding or getting in my own way.  This week's frenzy prompted some exploration of all three things; lo and behold, I found ways to increase mobility.  Funny how that works (and it works best if you are willing to be honest with yourself about both the pretty things and the ones that feel icky). 
      I am happy with the emphasis I am keeping on my kids and my friendships.  The kids are a no brainer, and parenting them is easily what I love best about my life.  It helps that they are bright, fun, reasonably balanced, and well rounded youngsters; and I was afraid teenagers would be horrible!  My friends are also important.  Having grown up in a family that moved frequently, it became easy to not get too close to others or to not let them know you are going to miss them; proximity was always a temporary thing.  Being older, and having a few friends who have been around long enough to be historians in my life has impacted that perspective.  I have always valued my friendships and I will always hate goodbyes, but that doesn't stop me from connecting with people.  I feel the pressure of leaving soon, and my initial reaction is to pull back and just be busy (I wouldn't even have to fake it).  Instead I am leaning into those connections, choosing not to disengage from folks, and acknowledging that there will be a feeling of loss because there was relationship.  I like that in the sense that connection does not end when proximity changes; those we are closest to remain present in our thoughts and hearts (and on our phones and facebook). 
     OK, so I am happy with that, but what about the rest of the stuff?  Well, I made progress there as well.  It took looking seriously at what I was avoiding and why to solve my dilemma.  I cannot make my kids not get sick, so in reality I will miss school and work sometimes.  But there is more to it than that.  I have been stuck in the hell of screwball archival data for several weeks without progress.  I was stymied and had not received much from my chair (its his data set).  I knew he needed to take care of some things that were outside my ability to fix, and he had not yet done that.  And he needed to merge the files and find the missing data from one of the sets.  And we talked about before Thanksgiving, at the end of the semester, and via e-mail over break.  OK, enter avoidance.  I was avoiding talking to him about it again.  I hate confrontation, I hate nagging, and I completely identify with competing demands so I don't like to pressure people.  But I REALLY need this stuff fixed so I can do the first phase of analysis for my dissertation, select the target cases for the second phase, and go collect my own data set to wrap it all up.  Did I mention that the semester ends in 13 weeks and that means I will no longer have any undergraduate research assistants to help with transcription and coding after mid May?  My challenge to myself on Wednesday was to talk with my advisor, while looking at the data set together so I could show him exactly what I needed.  In the process of identifying exactly what I needed to make clear to him and how I intended to do that I solved my IRB trimming issue as well (phase 1 will be IRB exempt which saves me from writing about 2 hypotheses in the "500 word only" description section).  Once I got over my avoidance and spoke with my chair, he was on it.  I have one set of tasks he demonstrated how to address; he set himself a deadline of next Tuesday for the other work.
     Now comes the hardest part; admitting where I am getting in my own way.  In addition to working on (or trying to work on) my dissertation, I was doing some extra work for the agency where my dissertation research is housed.  They had data to collect, inventory, correct, clean, and enter, but they were short handed because a colleague was on maternity leave.  I was offered a comfortable hourly rate to help fill the gap, so I did.  I do have 2 teenagers, a tween, and a $1200 per month grocery bill after all.  But it was not leaving me enough time to work on my material.  I had to talk with my chair (as he was the one who wanted me on this other project) and tell him the ways in which my time was being spent and the ways that choice was contributing to my dissertation situation.  Until my own data collection is done, I just cannot spare the time to work on this other project.  It is disappointing for my chair.  It is disappointing to me as this means tightening my belt a bit more, but I need to get as far on my dissertation as possible in the next 13 weeks.  I needed to adjust my expectations and priorities to stop getting in the way of my progress by being over committed, even if the overcommitment developed for good reasons. 
      So its onward and upward, I guess (or maybe forward or sideways)?  I am sure there will be plenty of other opportunities for self reflection as I hiccup my way through this project and the rest of my crazy, busy, joyful life.  Hopefully each time will yield similar results that help me keep it all together and mobile while retaining some semblance of sanity  :-)

Sitting with the mirror

      I hate to admit it, but even this supermom gets overwhelmed sometimes.  Last week was zany from the beginning; my youngest got injured in Gym class (first hour on Monday) and I had to rearrange the day to accommodate a visit to the doctor and still see my clients.  It all worked out, which basically means that I did not fall behind, but I only maintained.  The rest of the week felt much the same - sitting with a friend in the ICU, attending a training, shifting client schedules, sleepovers, kids activities, my neighbor backing into my car, comps help for a friend -extra stuff came up that needed to fit in around an already packed life.  All of it was important, and I was happy to do it (except the car thing) but I am tired.  This week started the same way; by 10 AM Monday I had a sick kid needing to come home from school and a full client schedule; sacrifice another lunch break to the Gods of Juggling. 
      As I was running back to the office at 1245 yesterday, I passed one of my girlfriends.  The proverbial "How are you doing," was followed by honesty this time.  I dropped the Minnesota nice "Oh fine" long enough to tell her that I wanted to run away and cry for about an hour and then I would be fine.  She's another single mom / grad student, so she knows what I mean when I say this.  It means there is too much going on, it does not seem likely to change any time soon, and true respite feels light-years away. So what did she do?  The angel picked up dinner and came over at 6, we plunked our kids in front of a movie picnic style and then we sat at the kitchen table discussing our philosophies of life, transition, and why the world is so damn crazy.  We also spent some time wondering what insanity could possibly drive 2 otherwise intelligent and rational women to engage in this academic pursuit.  I think the most important thing we did was laugh together, though.
      I realize that what I need is to sit with everything that is happening in my own world, but I just cannot seem to carve a space to do this. I have been trying to, but interruptions are inevitable, competing demands create a cacophony in my daily life.  So today another kiddo fell to the bug and had to get picked up from school, no dissertation work happened, and I am missing an afternoon meeting (now the feeling of being behind is creeping in)... some weeks are just like this if you decide to climb the mountain of academia pulling a little red wagon with 3 kids. 
      I wish it were warm; I would go back country camping where cell signals are nonexistent and no one could find me for a while.  Even better, I wish I could find an island out in the middle of nowhere and pitch a tent for a few days.  But I want & I wish never got me very far on the road to "here", and I seriously doubt they will get me far on the road to "there" either.  They are part of the illusion and I am a reality kind of gal.  So when the wind blows the smoke away, I am left with the mirror.  My favorite thing about a good mirror is that it provides the opportunity to see more honestly.  Clearly, I am tired and busy and the Gods of Juggling have been exceedingly demanding lately.  I also have amazing family and friends in my life, and we come together in various ways to share whatever might be happening.  Many of us are in the middle of really big, exciting, and somewhat stressful transitions which gives us plenty to talk about - most of it quite positive.  It is also important to admit that when there is a lot of uncertainty, even positive events can feel scary to me.  Despite this I have to find a way to provide a sense of calm and stability for the kids while we wait to see what happens next, and that means finding a grounded and solid place for myself in times of uncertainty, even while having weeks like this.
      OK mirror: you, me, and some quality time once the fry guys are in bed.   I can sit with this, but I am going to studiously ignore any wrinkles or gray hairs that might have appeared - just sayin'.  Even supermom can only take so much reality in a given time frame!