Did you have empowering conversations as a working mother before maternity leave? I recently finished the book “Heading Home” by Shani Orgad. It re-affirmed that despite “feminist progress”, a neofeminism has emerged wherein a lack of social change led to a failed promise of equality for working mothers. The book interviews 40 highly-educated women (lawyers, doctors, CEOs, and the like) who exchanged their careers to be SAHMs. The overall consensus from these women was that they felt the need to stop work due to lack of support from both the workplace and at home.
While some tried the balancing act of career woman and motherhood, they ultimately decided it was impossible to be successful at both. The women all had plans to return to their professions eventually, but found it difficult to do after a few years out of the industry. It was a bleak collection of stories, one that highlights the women’s confusion as to how they ended up where they are.
A Few Takeaways from Heading Home
At the end of the book, I had a few key takeaways that I wanted to bring up. First, the stories seemed to have a disconnect between expectation and reality. These women expected equal division in the household, but upon re-entering the work force as mothers they found that most of the housework was still on their shoulders. Even if they had a nanny or housecleaner, the mothers still acted like CEOs of their homes. I get that because I recently published a post about how I treat motherhood like a business. Yes, I am guilty of being the CEO of our family.
But the inequalities at home didn’t end with just running family matters. Most of the women interviewed had the responsibility of leaving work if the kids got sick. And the women were the ones who altered their working hours, negotiating flexible schedules or WFH situations. Many chose to go back part-time whereas their partners carried on per usual working the traditional M-F 9-5. I also relate as I cut my working hours when I had Casey and Mike has difficulty calling off work or requesting for more WFH days. Women often suffer in their careers by cutting their hours.
The Importance of Conversations
The truth is that these women failed to have the right conversations in their workplace and households. They had extremely high expectations of themselves as mothers that they admitted their partners didn’t have as fathers. But the discrepancy was never discussed. The social upbringing that women have today still champion the notion that women are the main caregivers of society. These women embraced that belief and assumed the role of SAHM because they felt they had to. But why did they never speak up? These are highly educated women! Some of them even made more than their husbands.
I think women still suffer from imposter syndrome. Many of them indicated that they felt like they could not keep up with work. Even though they did great before having kids! Heck, most of them thrived and LOVED their jobs. So what changed their perception? True equality requires that these women feel supported. If they aren’t supported at home, they won’t be fully functional at work. Likewise, if they weren’t supported at work, then they’ll feel failure as mothers. Instead of bearing the brunt of that responsibility on our shoulders, we need to have conversations with our spouses and our bosses about equal opportunity.
So I wanted to gather in this post a list of conversation topics that I think is very important to have with people at work and at home. I recommend expecting working mothers to have their conversations early, and earnestly. Before maternity leave is best, because when you are in the thick of it, managing these difficulties get even harder.
Conversations Working Mothers Need to Have Before Maternity Leave
At the Workplace
- What are my rights in regards to getting the maximum maternity leave so that I can make the transition to working motherhood? I learned this from my first go-around. I came back 2.5 months after my C-section to cover for a doctor but they had to give me a pumping break every two hours which disrupted my production at the dental office. This time around, I asked for a full four months off. I simply explained that it did not make sense from an efficiency standpoint for the practice to pay me a daily rate wherein I am taking a break for an extra two hours. The practice agreed that giving me the extra time off will keep production high at work, and at the same time, give me the amount of time I want to breastfeed for my new baby. When I return, I will be done with breastfeeding and can work regular hours. I am therefore more useful to the practice.
- Are there any extra benefits you are willing to offer when I return from maternity leave? When I returned to work the first time around, I negotiated a higher daily rate as well as flexible work hours from one of my offices. I quit the office that refused to raise my daily rate. I think that being a working parent (moms and dads) is very difficult to do. And if your work expects you to deliver the same results, I expect to have higher compensation for working essentially two jobs. Plus, in order to be at work, I need to pay for childcare. So I need additional income to support the new lifestyle. Women need to believe that they are an ASSET to their workplace. If your boss or job doesn’t value you enough to give you that raise, you need to value yourself enough. You need to work at a place where you are VALUED.
- Will there be a private pumping room available if I have to return to the office? Can I get a pumping break every two hours? As I mentioned above, I negotiated more time off and will not need a pumping room this time around. However, some moms do not see patients and want to breastfeed longer. For my first baby, one office gave me a private pumping space with breaks every two hours. The other office did not. The result of not having a private break room or pumping breaks was that I stopped breastfeeding earlier than I wanted to. It created a lot of frustration, stress and resentment on my part. I ended up leaving the latter practice for not having extra benefits after mat leave. I warn mamas who want to breastfeed after returning to work that they need to negotiate these two things. You do not want to pump at a public restroom. Either negotiate some time working from home, or have a private space at the office.
- What are the options for a flexible work schedule? Can I offset my hours? Can I work from home or have a hybrid schedule? Will you reduce my travel days? Let me start with the caveat that it is not our sole responsibility to have flexible work hours. Our partners, too, need to ask this of our boss. I ended up cutting a day from work after becoming a mom. But my husband also works from home two days a week under a hybrid schedule. We both made changes. If you travel a lot for work, you can request sending someone else on your behalf or to travel less. Another option is to ask if they can add travel accommodations for your baby and your needs. And I don’t mean shipping the milk back home. I mean bringing the baby and caregiver with you.
At Home
I really think that setting yourself up for success requires conversation with the people you choose to surround yourself with. You are only as good as the five people you spend the most time with. It is important those people are on the same page. I wrote a post once about Questions Expecting Working Moms Should Be Asking Their Significant Other. I think it still stands and is a wonderful starting point for conversations working mothers need to have at home. And I mentioned earlier my post on being the CEO of Family Matters is perfect for the business savvy. If you have already read both of those posts, you might find the next few conversation topics useful.
- What are your family’s expectations of you as a working mom? Sometimes, the problem lies in the disconnect. If your husband or parents believe that you should be the main caregiver, then you will never have the support you need to be a great career woman. I prefer to reiterate that true equality means I am NOT the main caregiver. My children will have alloparents who are equal caregivers as me. It’s impressive how social upbringing still heavily influence people’s actions at a subconscious level. So talking about this point is key!
- How can we quantify role equality? The worst part about discussing role equality is not having examples of inequality. At the same time, you don’t want to keep a tally, as that is unhealthy too. One of the ways in which I can have the conversation with my husband about role equality in a factual manner is to keep a calendar. On my Google Calendar, I just write down what I do every single day. And when it starts to feel imbalanced (that I am taking on more housework than my partner, or that my career is suffering because of my caregiving tasks), I revisit my calendar first – and alone. I analyze where I could have delegated or avoided the task altogether. How much of this is on me? Then if it wasn’t simply me taking on more responsibility, then I talk to him about how I am drowning. And I start asking him to help with certain future tasks. Analyzing the past and creating a solution for the future is better than just saying, “You suck!”
- What are our career goals? Explicitly stating career goals makes someone more likely to support you at home. Say something like, “I expect to make $X 6 months from now. In order to do this, I need to do XYZ at work.” This will motivate your family to help you at home, because ultimately, the financial goal will benefit everyone. Of course, everyone has career goals. So the best thing to do will be to trade off hitting your goals. For example, if I want to hit that goal in 6 months, my husband will support me for 6 months at home in order to hit it. If I don’t hit it, then it would be fair to say that the next 6 months can be focused on him hitting whatever goal HE has. No one parent deserves to hog all the career-advancement opportunity. And by placing timelines, both parents will surprise themselves at how fast their career actually advances. You have double the motivation!
- Who can act as an alloparent to our children when we are both busy with our careers? Every parent’s main concern for their child is love and attention. Sometimes, both parents are doing well at work and sacrifices are slim-pickings. Who would act as alloparents? For us, finding loved ones who really care for Casey was top priority. Once we established that, everything else fell into place.
