The One . . . ? Pt. 2 #phdorbust

Click here for Part 1

It’s been 15 years since I started to think that I didn’t want children, but that has admittedly been an off and on consideration – I actually spent a good part of my 20s striving to get married & have children. About the time I turned 30, I decided I’d had enough. I’d been accepted to the PhD program of my dreams, I was single, newly out, and ready to revel in everything my life had become. In this, I decided that having my own children could not be part of the equation, as I’ve no desire to get pregnant after 35. Of course, I also could not fathom having babies in the midst of a doctoral program. Sure, other people do it all the time. I realized long ago that I am not other people. Besides, I had no prospects & wasn’t really trying to be in the market. I had a degree to earn; I could adopt some older kids later, as was already my plan.

As irony would have it, once I decided to stop living in search of other and to finally focus on loving me & pursuing my true passions, I met the person who is absolutely great to and for me. Except the child department. This is no small matter. Then again, I wouldn’t even have this person in my life if I hadn’t come here for the degree, so what of that?

My partner is rather awesome. Ever the encourager, he helped me start to assess my motives & motivation for everything, since I was feeling so frustrated and he knows I process through oral questioning. Why had I completely given up on all possibilities of giving birth? Why did I cling to the idea that babies and PhDs are mutually exclusive? Do I really need to get this PhD right now? And why was I torturing him with pictures of other people’s adorable children [and in the next breath commence to bitching about how dealing with babies would be sooooo awful]? And then there was the ringer:

Him: You keep talking about how [field supervisor] works too hard & sacrifices herself for the sake of others… Well right now, you ARE [field supervisor].

Me: (O_o)  . . .   (o_o)  . . .  ( ._.)

The last (okay, only) time I did the 31 Day Reset, I wrote this beautiful life story that included a PhD, nonprofit, husband, children, and a dog. In my story, I also get to travel and share my research with the world. I also made this:

This was less than a year ago. Fast forward to March 2011. From then to July – just four months – I went from wanting to have it all to refusing to allow space for something I’d been dreaming of for years.  And herein lies my conflict:

I didn’t become adamant in my anti-childbearing stance until I started considering what it would take to be successful in my PhD program. Now that I’m feeling disillusioned, I wonder what my stance would be if I hadn’t pursued this degree (whether by choice or by chance).

Today I read this article about universities that are beginning to embrace the idea of non-academic careers for their PhD graduates. I gotta say, reading that, plus looking back on why I started this whole journey has given me a whole new lease on life. I wanted to do another 31 Day Reset before/at the beginning of this school year, but I never got around to it. Now I’m thinking: instead of a reSET, I need a reVIEW. I think that I might reinvent the wheel far too often for myself. Amazing how easy it is to get so caught up in what we think we can’t do that we forget what it is we wanted in the first place. Not that there isn’t room for change or growth, but that’s different from suddenly abandoning ship altogether.

I’m not necessarily looking for encouragement at this point; I just desperately need to process my life. This is my time to take a good, hard look at what I’m doing, what I truly want for my life, and consider the possibilities for getting those things. After finals. *sigh*