Southern Belles with Babies & Briefcases

I went to law school with some tremendous, impressive women. Cerebral rock stars. There were more women than men in my class and they dominated the top of it. After graduation, many of them filled prestigious positions at big firms in the neighboring big city.

Five years after graduation, few of them remain in the practice of law. What is particularly interesting to me is that these women, most of them now mothers, have not left the workplace, they have just left the practice of law. It bothers me because, even on my most challenging days, I believe we need women in the law to effectuate positive change for women and families on a grassroots level.

I have read all of the books I can find on the bigger Mom/Work issue(s) (Naomi Wolfe's Misconceptions, Judith Warner's Perfect Madness, Daphne de Marneffe's Maternal Desire, and so on) and I am noticing that although these books are brilliant and well researched, they only identify the problems. I'm sure that brings comfort to many women who felt alone in the same way The Feminine Mystique helped an earlier generation. But, the books leave my most important questions unanswered. I don't want to just complain about pitfalls in the FMLA.

Generations of women before me have made sacrifices that have allowed me to be in my profession, so I can't complain. I feel terrible complaining about anything related to motherhood because I am blessed to have my daughter in my life.

My question is simply, how can we make the practice of law more accessible to parents and how can I be more efficient in managing the balance?

To try to answer those questions, I've been interviewing former classmates and women who I have litigated with and against, on the subject of how they are managing the work-life balance and why the law is particularly inflexible. The answers have been a fascinating look into the profession.

Rather than tell you what societal issues came up, I think it's better to focus on what is working for some of them. I'm hoping this can be part of a series and when I hear something helpful, I will pass it on.

The greatest piece of advice so far was from someone I had a case against in the past. I called her up and asked her to meet me for coffee one afternoon (her beautiful kids are 2 & 4) and she was so gracious with her time.

She said that she finally had to reconcile the fact that her own Southern upbringing --her definition of what it meant to be a wife and mother, her own expectations for herself in that regard-- and her current career demands are incongruous. Accepting that fact has really helped her.

For her, this came to a head when guests popped in unannounced after she had been in court all day and had just walked through the door to squeeze her kids. She was mortified. "I had to get over that the house was a mess and that there weren't cheese straws on the table and flowers and h'ors d'oevres. It's okay if those things only happen on special occasions."

She and I both want to have time to do those things: to make people in our lives feel special with the kind of the hospitality we've been raised is appropriate, but that our schedules won't permit it. Her guests could have cared less about the cheese straws, or their absence. Once she got that, she felt more free to live her life.

She said a million little things that resonated with me, but that story sort of personifies the inner bind we all feel about living up to our expectations for ourselves. I've read a lot of articles where people feel strangled by the cheese straw type of thing, (or whatever the cheese straw is for them) and that it's a burden put on them by society. I don't feel that way. Those are things I would like to do, there's just not enough time.

Last Christmas, I felt so overwhelmed. I wanted to do every cute felt, snow flake, mittens, cookie, cocoa, knitting, string popcorn, Christmas book, caroling activity in every kids magazine. I wanted to add new traditions for every part of every holiday. I finally realized that it wasn't that I had too much to do, it was that I was taking on too much. I wasn't making any choices. I have found some solace in knowing that I don't have to do every single thing all of the time. Some days there will be cheese straws and some days there will be cheese pizza.

My friend's practical survival tips:
1. Type up a list of birthdays and holidays for the year and keep them on you to work on year round. Keep the file on your computer to make changes as needed.
2. Have one area for clean laundry where you can close the door. This way, if you don't get everything folded and put away, the kids can go in and dig for clothes which they really enjoy.
3. Hire a babysitter some Saturday morning so that you can work on a house project that is draining your energy.
4. Re-evaluate how you are spending your time for each hour of the day. What's working, what's not. Re-group and make a new schedule.

More on this later...