Recently I got an exciting offer to move out of my current career into a new field which would be a lot of hard work initially but would pay off eventually. When the job offer came I was all excited and jumped at it. For the past 3 weeks, I have been arguing both sides of the argument, Why I should take it and Why I should not?
Why is it so hard for a woman to make a decision to just go for it? I am sure if my husband got an exciting offer like that, he will jump at it and the whole family will follow him and I will be on his side taking care of everything for him, when he gets acclimated to the new role. However I have not seen the same thing for my job offer. I got a lot of advice and assurance from my family members that pretty much said, whatever you do, we will support you. I think that phrase has been used with me so many times I do not know what support means. Can anyone explain to me what support means? I feel like the corporate culture of America has taken over my family decisions and family members are so afraid of telling right at your face that this is not going to work.
Like for example, my mom said that she will support me if I want to make the switch, I am wondering how is she going to support me, she lives on the other side of the globe and if she decides to come here, She would be dependent on me for every thing. So why couldn't my mom say, hey it is your decision, you know you have to manage a family and a high stress job? I dont think you are ready for it.
My husband said he will support me on my decision if I go to the new job. I am wondering how...he travels at the drop of an hat and his life is more controlled by his boss than himself. I would end up doing all and crashing and burning in couple of months. So why didn't he tell me, you are not ready for it? Is he so afraid that it would come in arguments later and I would say it is all because of you...Why is there a need to say everything in a polished way in even a very close relationship, where you expect your partner to know you and guide you?
I did not start this blog to write about the reactions I got, but rather why is there no decision that I as a woman make, just does not involve me, but involves the whole family. I can argue the fact that it should not, but truth of the matter is, it does. I think when a woman becomes a mom, she takes responsibility for humans other than herself and she decides to nurture the kid into a wonderful adult. That is a huge responsibility and a full time job. The social structure does not see that as a job neither do the kids award the mom for all the hard work. So a woman has to start looking outside of her family for an identity and when she does, she has to struggle through the balancing act as the mom job is not going away for her life time. This balancing act can only be successful when there is a strong support structure that would take over when the mom decides to take a break from her Mom job for a day or two.
For my decision, I know that I do not have a support structure and I do not want to penalize the kids for my career aspirations. So I am choosing to stick with my current role.
My only hope is that when I grow older that I would be content with the decisions I made. I have talked to a lot of my mentors who are in their late 50/60s all they say is I wish I had more time with my kids when they were younger. Well here I am taking the opportunity to spend more time with the kids and keeping my fingers crossed that it would all be worth it at the end.
Why is it so hard for a woman to make a decision to just go for it? I am sure if my husband got an exciting offer like that, he will jump at it and the whole family will follow him and I will be on his side taking care of everything for him, when he gets acclimated to the new role. However I have not seen the same thing for my job offer. I got a lot of advice and assurance from my family members that pretty much said, whatever you do, we will support you. I think that phrase has been used with me so many times I do not know what support means. Can anyone explain to me what support means? I feel like the corporate culture of America has taken over my family decisions and family members are so afraid of telling right at your face that this is not going to work.
Like for example, my mom said that she will support me if I want to make the switch, I am wondering how is she going to support me, she lives on the other side of the globe and if she decides to come here, She would be dependent on me for every thing. So why couldn't my mom say, hey it is your decision, you know you have to manage a family and a high stress job? I dont think you are ready for it.
My husband said he will support me on my decision if I go to the new job. I am wondering how...he travels at the drop of an hat and his life is more controlled by his boss than himself. I would end up doing all and crashing and burning in couple of months. So why didn't he tell me, you are not ready for it? Is he so afraid that it would come in arguments later and I would say it is all because of you...Why is there a need to say everything in a polished way in even a very close relationship, where you expect your partner to know you and guide you?
I did not start this blog to write about the reactions I got, but rather why is there no decision that I as a woman make, just does not involve me, but involves the whole family. I can argue the fact that it should not, but truth of the matter is, it does. I think when a woman becomes a mom, she takes responsibility for humans other than herself and she decides to nurture the kid into a wonderful adult. That is a huge responsibility and a full time job. The social structure does not see that as a job neither do the kids award the mom for all the hard work. So a woman has to start looking outside of her family for an identity and when she does, she has to struggle through the balancing act as the mom job is not going away for her life time. This balancing act can only be successful when there is a strong support structure that would take over when the mom decides to take a break from her Mom job for a day or two.
For my decision, I know that I do not have a support structure and I do not want to penalize the kids for my career aspirations. So I am choosing to stick with my current role.
My only hope is that when I grow older that I would be content with the decisions I made. I have talked to a lot of my mentors who are in their late 50/60s all they say is I wish I had more time with my kids when they were younger. Well here I am taking the opportunity to spend more time with the kids and keeping my fingers crossed that it would all be worth it at the end.
