A Working Mom's Job is Never Done: Take Time for Yourself

I struggled with my blog topic for the first time this month. I felt pulled in many directions and could not focus on writing. I wanted to come up with some catchy topic that would be inspirational. Unfortunately, I'm not inspired right now. I'm tired.

I have alot going on, as do we all. I'm busy at work and busy at home. I'm very involved with the Council on Litigation Management Alliance. All these things take my time. In addition to these things, I have a parent we are in the process of moving to an assisted living facility. With so much on my plate, some days I feel I am just going through the motions. I know I can't be the only working mom who feels this way.

I have really started to understand the saying--you can't do everything all the time. I think as working women and mothers we try to do everything all the time. . . at least I do. I have realized that by doing so, I'm not giving my best to anything, at work or at home. My partners, my husband, my child, my parent and my peers deserve better.

On Combining the Things You Have to Make Stuff Work: Negotiating Transitions

Earlier this month I started a new job (successful conclusion to last month’s post!) and it has been a whirlwind.  An exciting and welcome whirlwind to be sure; however, there is one thing about the process of starting a new job that I wanted to share with you all: my salary negotiation.

I’ve only held one legitimately salaried position so far in my life, and as I was eager to end a harrowing job search, the excitement of an offer, any offer, that would more or less pay my bills without worry was enough for me to sign my name and commit.  However, this time around, I had a better idea what my skill set was worth and, since I was accepting another position in a similar field, I also had a good idea of what I might be able to expect from my employer. 

Despite this, when I received my initial offer (I’ll be honest), I was disappointed.  To me, it didn’t reflect how well my skills, experience and personality matched the position.  When I spoke to my mom later that afternoon it took one sentence to push me over the edge and into negotiation mode: “A man would ask for more.”

Out of Practice: TV Edition

Who doesn’t love a good law centered television show? Every lawyer or lawyer in training has watched at least one episode of Law and Order, SVU being my favorite incarnation of the series. There is quite a selection of legal television series available: Suits, The Good Wife and Drop Dead Diva, just to name a few. Shows where at least one major character is an attorney are a plenty as well, such as Marshall from How I Met Your Mother and Mitchell from Modern Family, two of my favorite fictional lawyers. What about a TV show featuring a lawyer in an alternative legal career? Fear not, Out of Practice readers, there is a legal series for us. USA network has an amazing alternative legal career dramedy called Fairly Legal.

The Healthy Lawyer: Perinatal Depression

My Trip to Sacramento

I recently spent a memorable day at the California State Capitol attending a press conference, expert panel discussion, and visit to legislators’ offices on the topic of maternal mental health.  May is National Maternal Mental Health Awareness Month, or as it’s known in my home state of California, Perinatal Mental Health Awareness Month. 

Approximately 15 to 20 percent of all women experience some form of pregnancy-related depression or anxiety. I was surprised to learn that untreated depression is the number one complication of pregnancy, more so than gestational diabetes or pre-eclampsia. In the United States, pregnant women are commonly tested for gestational diabetes, which affects approximately one to two percent of pregnant women.  Unfortunately, there is no uniform screening done for perinatal depression.

What is Perinatal Depression?

Like many people, I had heard of postpartum depression, but I had never heard of perinatal depression. Postpartum depression occurs after delivery whereas perinatal depression can occur during pregnancy and up to 12 months after a mother gives birth.

Perinatal mood disorders can include anxiety, depression, panic disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and in rare instances, postpartum psychosis. Postpartum psychosis occurs in approximately 1 to 2 out of every 1000 deliveries, or about .1 percent and can include delusions and irrational thoughts. 

More common, affecting around 80 percent of mothers, is what’s commonly known as the “baby blues,” which includes temporary feelings of sadness and weepiness during the first few weeks after giving birth.

Passion that Pays: Passion in every profession.

Full disclosure, I originally drafted a post all about summer work, and using that time to explore my interests to figure out what kind of law I’m really passionate about. But, truthfully, it was kind of boring, and pretty generic. But then, today, I visited my friend Nathan’s 4th grade class to read to his students as part of their reading/career week. And with that visit, I decided to take my post in a slightly different direction.

 Aside from reading to them from Wayside Stories from Wayside School (anyone else remember these books from their own childhood?!), I told them a little bit about myself and law school. One student politely asked what “law school” was, and once I told them I was going to school to become a lawyer, their little hands all shot up eagerly with questions. I had no idea 4th graders would be so very interested in lawyers, law school, and the law. Many were curious how much money lawyers make (good question, kid, I’m rather curious about that myself). One student asked me what it meant to “sue” someone.

Women Lawyers Who Rock: Cooking class + female attorneys?

First, I’d like to give a celebratory “happy end of finals!” to all my law school buddies out there. That was a tough couple of weeks, and we are all in need of some well deserved R&R. 

While I wasn’t able to interview one of the many incredible females in the legal profession during finals, I did discover a blog that I’m just now becoming familiar with and enjoying. The Careerist, a lawjobs.com blog, “takes an inside look at how lawyers shape their careers and manage their lives. The blog aims to dissect developments in the profession, provide useful information and advice, and give lawyers a platform to voice their views. The goal is to provide a fresh, provocative take on the state of lawyering.” 

Vivia Chen, The Careerist's chief blogger and former corporate lawyer, really seems to get me. Since I’ve been following, she has written some extremely unique and insightful blogs discussing women in the legal profession. A recent post really grabbed my attention.  

Legally Thrifty: Building Your Nest Egg

Spring is not only about shopping for fabulous new clothes.  It’s time to start thinking about building your nest egg, if you haven’t already. 

Photo Credit: growyournestegg.com

Retirement funds are a key aspect to anyone’s finances, but especially for women who may not be as well informed.  Statistics have traditionally shown that equally qualified women are consistently paid less than their male counterparts for the same positions in the same line of work.  While the gender gap is closing, the fact remains that women need to be able to save just as much money while potentially earning less income.  Moreover, women live longer than men, so you may need a bigger nest egg to support yourself after retirement.  Elderly women are more than twice as likely to be poor than elderly men.

So how to get started gathering the twigs for your nest egg?  We return to the oldie-but-goodie lesson of maintaining a budget, which hopefully you’ve been doing since the first episode of Legally Thrifty.  The recommended breakdown of your budget is as follows. 

Through Feminist Lenses: Ringing up the Bill?

One of my professors loved nothing more than explaining to the class an incredibly tedious bit of lawyering or a particularly epic story of cat-and-mouse attorneys, stopping after his explanation, taking a breath, and saying with a grin, “And that, my friends, is how you’ll pay your bills."

This was always a sure bet for a class-wide chuckle (though admittedly the bar for humor in a law school lecture hall is set at about the barest minimum possible), and it’s true, it was always funny in context.  But something always bothered me about the comment -- was it the cavalier attitude to ringing up someone’s legal bill? Was it the failure to question why an aspect of law was so inefficient? Was it the lack of recognition that these kinds of lawyering games are precisely why legal services are unaffordable for so many people?

On one hand, I think it was all of these things and then some. The professor’s comments clearly were from the view of deep-pocketed corporate counsel, with the ability to pay the billed hours generated by the attorney, not the legal aid attorney who is trying to handle a large number of cases, and even less from the viewpoint of that indigent client him or herself. In these settings, inefficient law is not simply a way for the toiling attorney to earn a nice-sized salary, but a barrier to legal access.