Transcription
Hi, it’s me Namulanta Kombo and this is Dear Daughter, my podcast with the BBC World Service. Dear Daughter.
This episode we’re talking about a struggle which I think is common to many parents - how to juggle all the different demands on your time and attention - particularly if you work outside the home. Someone needs to give a bath to the child. Someone needs to feed the child. You know, when a child is ill, you take the child to the doctor. You know, it's it's it's all consuming and it is non-negotiable, negotiable. There's no way I can just say, well, I won't give my child, you know, a bath. I won't take him to the doctor. So there was just too much work.
You may remember me talking to my mum about work-life balance back in season 1. She told me about her time as a working mother in the 1980s. “One evening I was in the office and I was with my boss. And he made a comment. It's 8:00. I'm thinking, OK, I need to be at home with my children. And he said, it's just early. And he said, but other people are working. And I turned round and asked him, Where is your wife? And he told me she's at home. He said she's with the children, of course. And that night, I decided, I decided that come the following year I'm not going to be working in an environment where somebody is making me choose between my children and work.”
So when Solene wrote into the podcast about the same struggles forty years later and in a different part of the world, I knew I had to speak to her. And just 5 minutes into our chat, I could see just how much she has to juggle home and work life. I’ve been doing the school run just before coming here so I’ve just had time to brush my hair before being on screen.
Episode 2 - Being ‘Super Woman’
Would you mind telling me a bit about yourself? Where are you from? Where did you grow up? Where are you living now? All that type of good stuff.
So I'm originally from France, and, when I was 19, I moved to London to study, and I never thought that I would stay, but, I found London so mindblowing, such a dynamic and multicultural city that I thought, I'm just never going to leave. This is where I'm going to live all my life. I should also say, when I was at university, I met a lovely British student who became my husband so we built our life in London and I have three children, they're 14, 12, and eight. And I'm an academic. I work in one of London’s universities. I love my job, I love teaching, I love doing research. And when I had children, I just didn't want to leave that job. I didn’t want to take a long break. First, because it would have been very hard to go back on the career ladder, but also because I loved my job, but I didn't see that many women at senior level. There were not that many professors who were women. And in fact even fewer women with children who had made it. So I thought, if I can't see it, it must be for a reason. And obviously to be it, you need to see it. I love that to be it, you need to see it.
And now that you are a mother, you've written this lovely letter to your daughter, and she is the youngest of the three?
She's the youngest of three. She's eight. So if you would Solene, could you read your letter out to your daughter?
Dear Daughter,
I never had any doubt that I would carry on working after having children. My parents had instilled in me the values of hard work and financial independence. I loved my job and the intellectual stimulation that it provided. I also knew that you would one day fly the nest, and I wanted to keep my identity and passion. What I had not anticipated was how challenging it would be to juggle motherhood with work. The cost of childcare in England is prohibitive. The nursery fees were higher than my full salary. For years I worked just to pay for childcare. Without the salary of your father, it would have been impossible to carry on. That made me feel far from financially independent. At work, motherhood often felt like a handicap. Meetings were scheduled at unhelpful times. Leadership roles were given to others. My progression was slower than my male colleagues. Tiredness made it hard to perform to the best of my abilities. Raising small children is a joy, but physically exhausting and all consuming, as my grandmother used to say. There are two 24 hours in a day for working mothers. A whole new day starts at school pickup time. I felt guilty for not spending all my time with you. I thought that I was a bad mum and at the same time a bad employee for not performing at work as I used to do. I just couldn't win. I would have thrown in the towel on many occasions, but for the unfailing support of your father. I am glad to have persisted. I've learned with time not to set myself impossibly high standards. My best is good enough. You and your siblings are growing up and I'm now experiencing the joys of raising teens. Physical exhaustion has been replaced with an emotional rollercoaster, but when juggling family and work gets a little too much, I just look at my three beautiful and happy children and feel incredibly lucky. Perhaps I'm not doing that badly after all.
Your maman
Thanks, Solene. Do you remember that first moment you realised that: Oh my gosh this is going to be hard? Do you remember when that was?
The penny dropped quite quickly. The broken nights. I never had a baby who slept really well. You know, you sometimes hear his mom saying, oh, you know, mine's okay. I can sleep for, you know, 4 hours or 5 hours in a row all night. That wasn't. Or all night. That's just. That's unfair. That was never the case. I actually remember distinctively not having time to eat. It was just so full on. I mean, we were two. My husband and I looking after this little baby. And it was just so full on that it was 4:00 in the afternoon and we had still not eaten anything, and we just went to the biscuit tins and just started, you know, stuffing ourselves just to get a little bit of energy. I mean, looking back, how is it that one doesn't have the time to do anything? And what about the penny dropping with work balancing the first born, the second born and work? So. You know, with work, you know, I could see myself as this, you know, high flying, you know, professional managing everything. Superwoman. That just never happened. It‘s still not happened. I think it became clear that the time that you spend with your child is non-negotiable in the sense that, you know, your child needs you, your child. Someone needs to give a bath to the child. Someone needs to feed the child. You know, when a child is ill, you take the child to the doctor. You know, it's it's it's all consuming and it is non-negotiable, negotiable. There's no way I can just say, well, I won't give my child, you know, a bath I won't take him to the doctor. So there was just too much work and looking after a child just was all too much. So work had to just take the second place, which I found really hard because I was very driven… the workplace, as I said in my letter, was also not very parent friendly.
You know, times have changed. I mean, there still there are still many changes to implements, but…when I say meetings were scheduled at unhelpful times. And if you have a meeting between the hours of four and six, well, that's that's when you collect your child from school or from nursery. You know, I've learned to say no. I've learned to say this meeting should be moved to, you know, midday, for example, very often people say, oh, yes, of course we can have it, you know, between 1 and 3 or ten and 12…you've got to say to the people, you've got to think of, your colleagues with parental duties.
Solene says, for all its flaws, lockdown was actually a turning point for working parents…
I mean, I look back at, you know, Covid with horror. I've been scarred for life by the homeschooling, you know, homeschooling three children. Oh my gosh, don’t start and you can imagine I was only doing colouring and counting, but I was going mad. But actually, there have been positives when it comes to flexibility. You know, I remember giving a class online was just unthinkable before Covid or having a meeting with colleagues online. You know, at home, working from home several days of the week was just unthinkable before Covid. Now it's just part of work. No one bats an eyelid if you say, well, I actually can't go to work today, can we have our meeting online?
I don't know if it's been an option for you to have that family support, you know, just geographically. Do you feel that that's an invaluable addition to the people that can benefit from having a grandma or an aunt or whoever, even friends just pitch in and help?
Absolutely. So I had no family living close by and being able to help regularly. I could ask for family help if, let's say I had, you know, a conference for three days, and, you know, I could ask my parents-in-law to come by giving them plenty of notice. But I didn't have anyone to help, you know, regularly for the school pick up or when one of the children was ill. My husband has always been incredibly supportive, but he works very long hours. His work is not flexible at all. So there were many times where he couldn't help. So that was a big problem.
So with little family support and the feeling of being torn between work and home, Solene found herself struggling to know what to do when she thought her children needed her.
So I remember every day, each day before a lecture, feeling almost sick physically because I was worrying that one of the children would wake up in the morning with a temperature and I wouldn't be able to take them to nursery it actually happened several times that I had a lecture at 10:00, and, one of the children wakes up with a temperature, so I can't send, him to nursery, and panic would just strike. So I used to call a temporary emergency nanny agency. I'd have someone coming, I’d be in an absolute state. And I remember leaving home and feeling terrible, feeling guilty and just awful to leave behind my sick child with a stranger in my home. So I remember when my youngest was ill and I called someone to look after her at the last minute. I remember my eldest saying, oh, so you're going to call one of these, you know, ladies who's going to look after her whilst you have to go to work? And I said yes. And he said, oh, you know, that's great. She's lucky because she'll just have someone, you know, playing with her all day and giving her goodies because she's ill.
There was one particular moment that juggling being the perfect employee and perfect mum left Solene feeling like it was all a bit too much.
It's actually very raw, I used to work in a university outside of London, and I had to take a train to go to work, and I had to drop the children on certain days at eight on the dot. Otherwise, I’d just miss my train, and I'd miss my class. One day the school gate just didn't open at eight, and I found myself like a maniac, just banging on the school gates saying, you know, will you open that gate? And since the gate was not opening, saying to my eldest teenager, can you just wait with your little sister in front of the school gate? You know, I've got to run, and I knew that the gate would open in two minutes, but actually running to the train station and having this awful, this rush of emotions saying you're getting your priorities here seriously wrong. That's a key moment, I think, in my life where I just thought, I've got to rethink my priorities. My teenager should not be left in front of the school gate with his little sister.
What would you have done differently, in terms of the school gate?
Well, that was actually a wake up moment. It helped me to refocus. That's the moment where I said to myself, I can't do it all. Something has to give. And, it's not my children. I actually left the university, as I said, it was a university that was located outside of London. It was a very prestigious university. It was the best in a way, where you could work. But I just left and looked for a job in one of the London universities because I thought I've got to give the priority to my children, and I'm just so much happier now. You know, I was at the highest, you know, where I could be professionally. But actually the balance was not right, because, you know, I, I couldn't do the school drop off properly. And you're happier. Everyone’s happier. And I'm much happier. Absolutely. And every time I do the drop off, I remember that moment. You know, there is no point trying to set yourself these impossible goals. Yet we still do it. I mean, I can't I can't tell you how many times I've gone to bed just telling myself off for everything I felt that I'd done wrong as, as a mum, you know, I'm much better now, but I was terrible. Mum guilt is just something that I don't know. It's it's. Actually, actually, I think one thing to reassure you that I say to, you know, junior colleagues is, you know, don't worry. Children will be fine. I mean, I've always found that it's, sending them an important message, which is that, you know, if you want to have a career and raise children, it is possible. It may be a bit stressful. Hopefully it will be less stressful for them, when they become parents. But it is possible. So I think it's just self-imposed guilt.
Do you remember having any, any little rituals or anything that you would do when you needed to talk yourself off the mum guilt ledge?
Take a deep breath and just think, I've just what can I do to make it work? You know, I had the poisonous parrot saying, you have not done enough. You're not doing enough. And then I just said, nope, I'm just, my best is good enough. But, I mean, it's hard. And Solene thinks lives can be made easier for working parents if they receive the support that they deserve - she thinks it’s a collective responsibility.
In order to be able to carry on working and raise children at the same time. You know, you really need support from the state, you need support from, you know, the workplace. You need support from your partner if you're lucky enough to have a supportive partner. And I remember distinctively an interview on Desert Island Discs, a BBC Podcast, as you know. Minouche Shaffik who is a high powered woman, she actually used to be my boss at one of the universities I worked at and someone asked her a question about the glass ceiling for women and she said. The problem with that metaphor is it, it implies you're sort of banging your head against something, and then eventually it shatters and all these other women can flood through, and it doesn't really work that way. And I like the sticky door a bit more, because it helps if there's somebody else pulling on the other side. What I just referred to, you know, good bosses who are willing to take a risk on you, give you an opportunity. There might be a bit of a stretch and then support you. And often, even if you get through the door, the door shuts again and it sticks again, and it takes another person to nudge it and someone else to pull it open for them before it stays open for everyone.
Just to use that analogy of, you know, the door and the push and the pull. As you have gotten more senior in your career, what have you been trying to do to make that door a bit easier to push?
Yes. Well, I think I said at the beginning of the interview, to be it, you need to see it. So already to have got where I am. I think it will give hope to, you know, my younger colleagues that it is possible. I've also suggested changes when I worked in my previous institutions about how to make it easier for women to return to work.
I had a great conversation with my mum, actually, Solene, about work life balance for her when she was just starting out. Well, what she said to me is that it can't be done alone. She said, you either you fight the battle. At that point, you're alone and you're in survival mode, or you try and win the war and you just have to have, you know, critical mass, basically. And that's the only way to educate and make changes with your employer. And I'm talking to you about it now.
Do you feel like you're less in survival mode and, you know, thriving a bit more overall?
So, less in survival mode. Well, because I mean, looking after young children is physically exhausting and now the children have, have, have grown. You know, raising teenagers is not as physically demanding, but it's certainly, emotionally, demanding, you know, new challenges. I mean, I'm having to deal with their normal, I suppose, then their natural desire to assert their independence. I will often start a sentence and my child say no. I said, well, I've not even said what I have to say. I’ve just said two words. So I think the main challenge with teenagers is to actually keep the connection alive with them and to create quality one to one moments. You know, I've had to learn about the football Premier League in England and where our local team, you know, Arsenal is in the ranking, just to be able to talk with them. Our family are Arsenal supporters as well. And it's torturous. So we have that in common.
But, as they approach adulthood, what do you hope that you've instilled in them?
Well, you know, they will have seen the struggle of juggling parenthood with work. And they will help their partner. Or it may be that they decide to, you know, take a break. Or they may share, you know, equally the juggling. It's not necessarily easy, but it's worth it. And that they need to be there to support the other or need to ask for the support of others. And to your little girl when she joins perhaps the corporate world. And, you know, she's facing some of the things that my mom faced, that I am facing, that you are facing. Keep pushing, you know, keep pushing that sticky door because it's worth it. You know, if you find that your work is fulfilling, it's worth it. But don't hesitate to say if it doesn't feel right as well. Don't hesitate to speak to your boss. Don't hesitate to speak to your colleagues. One needs to say things must change.
Solene, you ended your letter with perhaps I'm not doing that badly after all. Is it gradual that you've realised? You know what? I'm not actually a bad mom. You know, the kids are doing fine. What has been your measure of success?
Their happiness, just to see them happy. They have friends. They like going to school. They like their extracurricular activities. They love football. They're like, they're very outgoing children. They make me laugh. They're just well-rounded children.
Do you ever feel that you are too harsh on yourself?
Absolutely. Gosh but that’s the story of women. Yeah, we just. Just way too harsh, on ourselves, you know, we can't be superwoman. Nor should we. And, it's this idea that we should be top class. You know, it's impossible. In the past I’ve been very guilty of beating myself up for not being there for every moment for my children and balancing the things I want to do for myself and my own life and I’m just learning to enjoy the journey and delegate, allow myself a bit more grace. And just talking to Solene reminded me, the kids will be fine, they will be okay, they are resilient. But I do also feel that we’ve all had that moment where you’ve screamed at the children or, in the case of Solene, left her kids at the gate ironically to take care of other people’s children and nurture them as a lecturer. That moment was a turning point for her but have you had a similar moment? A turning point where you realise that you’re getting your priorities wrong?
We’d love to hear from you - send us an email on deardaughter@bbc.co.uk or send us a voice note via whatsapp on +44 800 030 4404.