How the Career-Babies Binary Fails Us

Photo by Brooke Lark on Unsplash

When I went off to college with a dream of being a high school biology teacher, I quickly realized I hated college biology courses and switched my major. I ended up in Psychology with the dream of being a guidance counselor.

I was very career focused and wanted to find the perfect job for myself so that I could find a job I loved after graduating that paid well.

After I went to grad school, I realized I’d actually love to be a stay at home mom. The possibility seemed impossible when I considered the magnitude of my student loans, but it was a daydream for the future. I wanted to be able to stop working outside the home so that I could focus on raising a child.

I was very family focused and wanted to work hard to save up so I could afford to quit working.

And then I had trouble conceiving, and then I got divorced, and then my 30th birthday came and went, and still there was no baby.

I began to daydream of different things. Of foster parenting and the possibility that I’d never have a biological child. And though I mourned the loss of the baby I wanted, I came to be at peace with the likelihood that I would never be a biological parent.

You’d think that this process would have opened me up to throw myself into my work and my career, to move up and climb…