What if love isn’t enough?

In the >6 yrs that I’ve been a mom to monkey and the >1.5 yrs I’ve been a mom to two animals, I’ve made lots of mistakes. I’ve raised my voice when I shouldn’t have, ignored the signs of on coming flus, put my science ahead of my kids. I am not the mom that has amazing birthday parties for my kids, has an awesomely decorated home for halloween or who would rather be a stay at home mom than a working mom. I’ve always thought that was OK.

Its wasnt’ the amount of time I spend with my kids or how little I raised my voice that mattered it was that I when I was with them, I was engaged.

What mattered was that my kids know how much I love them. I tell them everyday, multiple times a day. I chase them around to give them hugs and kisses.

But I also have to leave them to their own devices for a weekend so that I can mark 71 papers in 2 days, only vaguely pay attention to them because I have to buy a car and need to figure out how to get a decent one as cheaply as possible. I have convinced myself this is OK because love conquers all.

What if it doesn’t? A young child, a child, from monkeys gymnastics class passed away few weeks ago. From the cryptic messages we’ve received from the gymnastics studio its clear the death was unexpected and not accidental.  This broke my heart. I knew this child. I have spoken to hir mom. I have witnessed this mom speak to her child and about her child. It was clear that she loved her child fiercely. She was her childs strongest ally / advocate.

Yet it wasn’t enough. S/he still chose to end her own life. A child, not yet a teenager chose to end hir life.

It broke my heart. If this mother, who I admired for the way she could communicate with and support her child, could not protect her child from whatever demons had hir choose death over life, what hope do I have?

Monkey is a sensitive boy. He feels it intensely when I correct him or when I am absent because of work. Mr.SM may have a heart of gold and may have the best of intentions when he wakes up every morning; He is not the A parent. As wandering scientist noticed for herself, I too am my children refuge. What if I am not enough? Mental illness is a scary beast of a disease and can affect children. I do not know how protect my kids from an illness I can not see.

 

Calling all the car experts

My Jetta TDI is going to die.  Its death is not immanent. I’m lucky, I have sometime to plan.  I figure I have about 2 years max, 1 year more likely before I’ll have to dish out a significant amount of cash to replace it.  Unfortunately, what I’m supposed to replace it with has me at loss. I think I’m being realistic is asking for a vehicle that seats 5 comfortably, has enough trunk space to pack up food and ski / kayak gear for a family, isn’t massive, super expensive or a gas guzzler and enable AWD / 4WD.  Ideally I would like optional 3rd row seating so that I can actually take monkey and his friends places.  Don’t bother suggesting a mini-Van, despite the fact that I’m willing to consider a station wagon, Mr.SM will. Not. Buy. A mini-Van.

Suggestions?

 

On the importance of presenting at lab meeting

Dr. Becca put a post up a post today, asking about lab meetings and how different PI’s run them. I totally and completely understand that 1 style does not fit all and that everyone is going to have a different opinion. In the comments I mentioned what our lab does and then I was going to go on a rant about why I think its important to have students give “formal” presentations in lab meeting. However, I realized  my rant many reasons were going to turn into an essay, so I”m posting it here.

How does our PI keep on top of us? She’s busy. Alot busier than she was when I first started as she took on a Dean position a couple years ago. When I first showed up 3 years ago, we only had a weekly lab meetings, her door was always open so we often would often have spontaneous 1 on 1 meetings.  I recognized the need for  deeper dive into the literature, so the lab started a weekly journal club in addition to the weekly meetings.

Our PI does not attend our JC and we do not do formal presentations at it. We sit around a table, each person presents a different figure and we discuss the papers figure by figure. Everyone really likes this format because it does not take alot of time to prepare for,  its casual and we usually imbibe while we do it.

This has changed since our PI became a Dean. Our PI is now only around 2.5 days of the week because half the time is S/he is off working in the black hole deans office.  Since she would like to stay on top of what we’re all doing (we all have different projects and our lab studies 2 distinct systems) we now all have weekly 1 hr meetings with her. As we all TA, we decided to have lab meeting and jc alternating weeks so that our non TAing time isn’t booked up with meetings and seminars.  At lab meeting we spend about 10 minutes on lab business – ie accusing each other of discussing which lab items need to be clean or replenished.  A person then presents their data using a formal presentation style.

This is HUGELY important to the development of a student. All of us need practice at presenting our data.

We need to be able to tell an audience what we are doing, why its important and what its potential impact is.  We need to answering succinctly what are we doing and why to an audience that isn’t intimately involved in the project.  You have to be able to present this to your committee, at seminars and conferences. As a student, you better get your feet wet and practice in front of a group of friendly’s vs having a committee member ask you at your first meeting. Trust me, “My PI said so is not a valid answer”.

This is important as a newbie when you’re trying to figure out what your project is as well as a senior grad student to keep your eye on the bigger picture.

Putting together a formal presentation makes us look at our data and ask WTF does it mean? Where do I go next? If you follow me on twitter you know that I’ve found data. How do you lose data? Easy, I get on my little hamster wheel and start dissecting larvae, staining them with the crap load of stains I think I need to do, image them, deconvolve, quickly look at, rinse repeat.  Then I go on mat leave and don’t look at anything. Come back, I forget I’ve done some stains and so I get on the hamster wheel and work. The thing is if  I’m not looking at my data and  thinking about it what it tells me I”m going to get lost in the forest. Your data is your map.  Lab meeting forces me to do that. So then I go back to find figures and see that how I’ve did xyz stains 1.5 years ago. It makes me look at my hypothesis and say I’ve shown this to be false or true. Look I have these phenoytpes so I think this may be going on.  I was working on going down path A but my data (MY MAP!) tells me that I need to change directions and go to path B because that is what the data is telling me.  Or maybe I”m so set on going down Path A that I don’t see the really really cool detour with the flashing lights that my lab mates can see. Or I don’t the big fucking cliff I’m about to fall over on. My lab mates might.

This is great practice for learning how to give a talk. When most of start in the lab we give very basic presentation. I did this trying to figure out that. Its mostly a bullet list of stuff we’re doing to start off our projects.  Then as we grow, we start doing the presentations like I am now doing them. What questions am I asking with these experiments, how do they relate to what I am asking and why? How does this data fit in? Now when I’m putting together my lab presentation I”m trying to put together “my story”. How is my paper going to flow. Not sure I would’ve gotten here as quickly if I wasn’t listening to our rockstar postdoc give her presentations like this.

Sure post-docs and PI’s may have this down pat. We students do not. We need lab meeting to help us.  The caveat to the above situation is that you have to have a supportive environment. Which isn’t to say you ask easy questions of your lab mates, it means you ask really hard questions without attacking the person. You provide constructive criticism. If you don’t think something will work, you don’t say the person idea is shit. You say hmm, have you thought about how x, y, z may effect your idea. My job as a lab member is help thicken my own skin and that of my lab mates.

This part may be particular to our lab, we all work on very different projects. Yes we all use the same model organisms but we look at different systems and our asking different questions. We all make up random flies that may be useful to other members.  Lab mtg is a great way to show off a new technique or communicate a new fly line we made to ask a specific questions. Someone else maybe able to answer something in their project with it. We all don’t really talk that much. I’m in a 7:30am and leave when the others are coming in. We all work different hours and only overlap by a couple of them.

These are my reason for having formal lab meeting vs the rapid fire round table approach.

S.I.X.

My Dearest little monkey,

Today you are S.I.X. in a few minutes it will be exactly 6 years since you were literally sucked out of me.

You are an amazing young boy. I look at your little sister and I have these vague recollections of you.  You being a mischievous little imp, one that broke out of daycare and tried jumping out windows. A crazy active little boy who would not let me sit down. That boy is still in you, is see it in the way you play with bear. Now I also see the young man you are becoming.

You are kind.  You are the  person  who can ski in more challenging terrain than his friends, but stays with them because “we stay with our friends mommy”. You are empathetic..  When you accidentally hurt your sister, you’re ususally more upset than she is. And its not because you’re scared of getting in trouble.
You are sensitive. This has been something new I”m learning this past year. You are not only very aware of what is being said about or to you. You are very aware of how other people are treated. You almost always strive to be kind and nice to everyone. To be friends with the person who is mean, because “they’re still learnng to use their words”
You are goofy. You come by your nickname honestly, because you never miss a chance to be silly or goofy. You make everyone around you smile.

Most of all my love, you are an amazing big brother. The way Bear lights up when she sees you and how well you manage her constant need to be around you is amazing. She want to do whatever you’re doing and be where ever you are. It is not easy to have a mini-me. I know you get frustrated and hide from her sometimes. But most days you light up just as much as she does. You are so gentle with her. You are amazingly patient.

Five was a hard year for you.  I often wonder if keeping you home with me was the right thing to do. Whether I short-changed you are not. I often wonder if I’m doing the right thing by being in school instead of focusing on you. I’m so tired all the time, or managing your sister that I don’t get lots of 1 on 1 time with you. I miss that. I know you miss that too, but what makes me cry the most is that you would never trade your sister for more time with me. You can’t wait to have her come home with us.

These letters are getting harder to write every year. Every year I have to think back to how much you’ve grown. How much you’ve gone from being my little baby boy to my boy. How quickly you’re becoming a young man. I hope you know how much I love you. How much I want to keep you safe in arms forever.

Happy 6th Birthday Monkey. I LOVE YOU

Losing the need to be liked

I hate being perceived as the bitchy lab mate, the bitchy mom, wife, daughter etc. I have embraced and accepted the fact that I’m the bad daughter (in-law) and I’ve also accepted that I’m a non-perfect parent.

I can’t seem to get over the desire to have people perceive me as “nice”. Its inhibits my ability to actually stand up for myself or to speak up because I don’t want to be thought of as being rude or mean. I thought I had been getting better at it. Being a blogger and on twitter has definitely thickened my skin, but at the same time when put in new situation (ie Monkeys soccer team), I don’t want to be the one rocking the boat.

But someone has to rock the boat. Especially when shit isn’t right. If I don’t get over my desire to not be perceived as bitchy, then I can’t really complain what is happening.

What is happening? Monkeys coach is an overachieving, self-promoting, ass.  At this age, the kids are supposed to be playing for fun and all the kids are supposed to play for equal time and all positions. The coach is playing the kids to win. Weaker kids are being sat out and the stronger ones are playing in the games. Its BULLSHIT.  At 5, kids are smart enough to pick up what is going on, even if they don’t express it.  My son shouldn’t ask why he didn’t get to play. The other parents son should be stuck in goal for 30 minutes. Yes, life isn’t a care bears tea party, but a 5 year old learning a sport doesn’t need to be told that.

Another parent wrote to the assistant coach and team manager that a group of us had noticed what is happening and are not OK with it. At the same time the coach emailed the parents asking for input on where practices should be held because weather is changing, the sun is setting a lot earlier. He strongly advised against indoor practices because it hampers skill level and the kids could get hurt on the hardwood.

I responded with the following email:

Thank you very much for asking for parents feedback on setting practices times.

Also thank you for volunteering {redacted}. That is very kind of you.

In regards to practices, my preference is for indoor practices for these reasons:
the games themselves move indoors when the weather changes
if the kids decide not play because they’re cold and miserable does skill development matter?
the goal of {redacted} is to first promotes participation at all levels of play, second promote good sportsmanship, third to  promote fair play and lastly to increase skills in the game.
If there is risk of injury on hardwood, there is also a risk of injury on gravel and all weather fields as well as a risk of illness from being out in the cold weather.  {redacted}
ball will roll / behave differently on a grass field vs all weather field vs a gravel field

Its challenging as working parent to have practice time change constantly, so if we could pick one time and stick to it, that would be really appreciated.

I would like to re-iterate that we appreciate you taking our input and volunteering the extra time.

The private response I got was:

Save any comments you may have until practice Thursday. I find your comments very disruptive.

The public response, the one sent to all the parents because my initial email had gone to all parents was:

Wow. Thanks for your very detailed opinion {redacted}. I thought I had the most soccer experience on our team but I stand corrected.

I am including all parents in this email so you can see the emails from the league on winter practices and our practice schedule.

2/3 of our practices or more will be outdoors and only January games will be indoors so there will be lots of outdoor soccer in poor weather. Soccer is an outdoor sport. After next season, 100% of games will be outside and only cancelled in severe weather or snow.

My initial reaction was, what did I do? How did I cause this? I was NICE in email.

But the thing is, the dude is an ASS. As a coach its his responsibility to take our feedback. It took me 24hours to not feel sucker punched. To fell like it was my fault. And to stop worrying about what the other parents are thinking. I had a right to express my opinion, to provide reasons for my opinions and EVEN if I was being rude, its his job as the COACH to be respectful of parents.  Secondly, in sending this email to all parents, he’s letting them know that people like me, who give reason explanations as to why this disagree with him are going to smacked down. Rudely. WTF!!

My PI is AWESOME at not giving at shit. Its because she is confident in her actions and behaviors that she doesn’t care if a person or parents don’t like her. She only worries about the issue / task at hand. I need to learn to be like that.  She wouldn’t care if the parents thought she was shit disturbing because she is confident that she is doing the right thing. How I worship that women. I will be channeling her at the next practice.

 

How Not to Engage in Science Communication

Those of you who follow me on twitter know that I lost my shit yesterday. Not in a calm, rational, lets have a debate of the facts way, but in a visibly angry, shaking, refraining from telling this person that they’re a fucking idiot type of way.

How did this happen? Well I was at monkeys gymnastics class and had just walked into the viewing area after combing through bears hair to remove the wonderful lice that have taken up residence there. I was minding my own business when I overheard a parent telling other parents they were waiting to innoculate their child against Chicken Pox Virus (CPX)because if the child contact cpx, hir immune system would be stronger.

Parent: “getting over the virus will strengthen child’s immune system”

SM: deep breath, calmly “that is actually not true”

Parent: “will that is your opinion”

And cue me losing my shit.

SM: “No it is NOT my opinion it is scientific FACT. I am a scientist. I not some celeb listening to oprah.

Parent: “Well how do you feel about the flu vaccine”

SM: “its necessary for elderly, children and immune comprised individuals”

Parent: something about making choices and she’s entitled to those.

Cue me going fucking ape shit. As in this converstation is no longer between me and the parent but me telling off the WHOLE group of parents.

SM: “No its not just a choice you’re making for yourself. You are putting other children at risk. You are going to let other kids get sick. It is because of people like you that pertussi and whooping cough are coming back. Its because of people like you that kids are dying”

Parent: “I am not putting society at risk because I will inoculate my child if they don’t get CPV before a set age:

SM: “Do you know the reprecussion of having CPV? Its not just the mild scars and itching as a child. At minimum, you will develop Shingles when you’re older. Ask any elderly individual how it feel to have shingles. Its lighting your skin on fire”

SM: To entire group of parents “I am sorry for reacting this way, but it is a privilage of our education and where we live that we think we can choose not to have these vaccines. Ask any mother in Africa or the middle east and they would kill to have these vaccinations”

At this point a grandma got involved and told me to ask the women if she given her child the polio vaccination. Had any of us had to watch our children suffer with whooping cough.
Many of you may think I did the right thing. But I”m not sure. I was visibly angry. I was shaking and was pissed off at the attitude of this parent. Maybe I changed the minds of some parent there or confirmed to some parents that vaccinations are right. What I did not do was engage on a debate of the facts. What was this parents pychoNaturapath telling hir? I just put this parent on the defensive. It was a lost opportunity. I let every parent there know that if they didn’t agree with me, I was gong to bite there heads. That does our cause no good.

But seriously how can I not lose my shit when you are listening to a fucking Naturapath!!!!

 

The I’m not perfect guilt – redux

I’m sure we’ve all heard about working mom angst. The conflict us working moms feel about missing those oh so important moments because we’re busy earning the coin that supports our family. Or in my case, getting that designation cough PhD cough that guarantees me nothing. Ahem, but moving on…

While on maternity, I had pulled monkey out of his awesome on campus daycare because it was on campus (>1hr commute away) and because well, I couldn’t really afford to spend $700 / month on childcare when I was at home. I would’ve kept him enrolled part time at some sort of Montessori daycare if I was eligible for some sort of EI or top up.  Since I’m wasn’t, monkey was home with me.

I SUCK at the whole SAHM type things. I don’t bake, I don’t do crafts, and I certainly did not encourage monkey to do those things. Truth be told, he watched way more TV than he should’ve because I just needed some peace. He was enrolled at local community centre preschool, but it definitely was not geared for kids like him. He’s probably above average intelligence, from a family with a good socioeconomic standing.  This is not being condescending, but realistic. He was enrolled in a high quality daycare where he was engaged socially, physically, and intellectually. This continued at home, before I had bear.  Families from lower socio-economic situations don’t normally have access to the resources I did. The kids could be of very high intelligence and the family could totally value books and education. But when you’re struggling to get food and shelter, you don’t always enjoy the luxury of being able to put the effort into kids that the organic brushed cotton sleeps, latte drinking, vaccination questioning middle class moms can.

After bear was born the exhaustion set in.  I just couldn’t be the uber mom.  To be honest, I wasn’t worried about being the uber mom because my parents didn’t do all the stuff I used to do with monkey and I am successful. If success is defined as not a criminal and not dependent on the social safety net.

Today his kindergarten teacher told me he’s behind on his fine motor skills. His ability to write, draw is not up to her expectations.

I’ve known this. I’ve suspected for awhile but kept brushing it off because I’m tired.  I figured it was developmental and it would click eventually. But monkey is noticing it too. He sees that he’s not as good as his classmates and then he doesn’t want to do the art.

This is where the guilt sets in. If only I hadn’t had bear. If only I waited a year to have bear. If only I could’ve put him in montessori part time, if only I was a good SAHM. If, if, if, if.

I am the mom that he has. I love him. Thats what matters. Right. Right?!!!

fucking guilt