Balancing Mommyhood and Earning a PhD

“Mommy, wanna play with me?” Such sweet words when you are under pressure for deadlines related to homework and writing 20 plus pages of work. I must admit even though I am now towards the end of my program, there are still times that I don’t always “get it right” but there are a few things that I have learned along the way that have been helpful.

1. Incorporate play time within your day.

This could include taking a break to go to the park or just reading or playing cars with your toddler. I have noticed that taking breaks within my routine to do this gives me time to regroup but also my kid looks forward to this—he will even say, “are you done with your homework yet?” and this will also remind me to take a break. Rather than just taking one long break, I noticed that short breaks within the day—even 15-30 minutes at a time, have been the most useful to my routine.

2. Scheduling your day by the hour.

Seems kind’ve intense but if there are 3 top things that you must complete for the day, planning your day by the hour can help to get this accomplished. This includes scheduling for breaks.

3. Play a podcast in the background.

I used to find playing music in the background while I’m working as a means to keep me upbeat and going but lately I have found listening to motivational, inspirational, and uplifting podcasts to be quite the motivator (my favorite being the podcasts by Joel Osteen). Some may even find podcasts on humor to be motivating too!

4. Don’t be afraid to ask for help.

I often have to travel for conferences related to my research and in those instances we will solicit family or pay a babysitter/nanny to help with childcare while I prepare or while I am away at a conference (as sometimes my husband is also traveling for work as well). When all else fails, I love bringing my family along to travel but my husband and I have clear rules on how to remain professional while at these conferences—in other words, there is not an expectation that I will be spending majority of my time with the family but more that when my conference sessions are over we will be together. We treat conferences as a job as indeed I am working. I also found speaking to other moms in attendance to be helpful as they often would offer tips or share stories on managing graduate school life with a family.

5. Focus on the things that went right instead of what went wrong.

So often, I would beat myself up at the end of the day, adding anxiety about what I did not do on my to-do list for that day. I noticed when I started focusing on the things that I did accomplish and was patient with myself, it added to my motivation for the next day that I will get whatever task that I need to get done for the following day, re-prioritizing the top 3 things that I want to accomplish for the day.