Confused No More

27 Mar 2012 3 Comments

by Domestic Goddess, Esq. in Ponderings Tags: , , ,

I am confused no more.  Well, I’m still confused about many things, but one thing I’ve pondered for a long time has become crystal clear.

Why hasn’t more literature been written on this issue of work/life balance as it relates to mother lawyers?  At least fifty percent of current law-school classes are women, and it is likely that most of them are, or will become, mothers.  Sure, work-life balance columns are included in legal publications, and many bar associations have work-life balance committees.  Books have been written about women balancing careers and family – but few columns, books or articles focus specifically on mother lawyers. I have been asking myself, “Why not?”  And why don’t more mother-lawyers want to connect and discuss these issues, and come up with ways to improve the situation of mother lawyers – or, to steal the title of a book I reviewed – to find their own ‘Good Enough?’

Here’s my stab at the answer.  Mother lawyers just don’t have time.  (Profound, right?)

Mother-lawyers are so busy treading water, that if they stop for just a minute to write about or discuss the ways in which they find their balance (or not) they’re sure to sink.

And this, my friends, is why I have not been maintaining this blawg the way I originally planned.  Oh, sure, my mind has been filled with ideas for posts.  I read a short article, hear a snippet of something on the radio, and think – “Wow, I should look into that.”  Or, “That would be a great topic for a post.”  Or, “Maybe I should host a Twitter chat about that.”  But guess what?  I get busy, other more pressing things come up, kids get sick, and the thoughts never get translated into text for the blawg.

I wonder the same thing about why women lawyers don’t organize around some of the anti-woman rhetoric that we’re hearing in the political realm.  (Not to get too political, but find me a mother-lawyer who has never used birth control, and I’ll sell you a certain bridge at a very good price.)

We just don’t have time.  So, who will advocate for us?  Good question.  I sure wish I were less confused about that one.

Essay on Life After the Law by Kelly Yandell

29 Jan 2012 Leave a Comment

by Domestic Goddess, Esq. in 'Stories in Real Life' - with apoligies to Readers Digest, Other, Ponderings Tags: , , ,

I ran across this essay by mother-lawyer Kelly Yandell via Twitter.  It’s a lovely, inspirational story of one woman’s life as a mother after the law.  Enjoy.

http://kellyyandell.tumblr.com/

Tip #9: Value Your Own Work

27 Jan 2012 Leave a Comment

by Domestic Goddess, Esq. in Moms in Solo Practice Tags: , , , ,

Although the topic is generally taboo,  advice from solo-moms inevitably turns to money – and our propensity as women and mothers to under-value our own work.

Every time I talk to a woman in solo practice about her advice to other solo women and moms, the conversation eventually turns to the fact that, in the beginning, she did not charge enough for her work. (So much for that stereotype – you know, the one about lawyers being money-grubbing scoundrels.)  Every woman I’ve talked to picked her practice area out of a genuine passion for the area, and started her own practice in order to have more control of her schedule.

Of course, they all wanted to make a living, too. Still, several moms mentioned to me their fear that clients would not be willing to pay ‘regular’ rates if the clients knew the lawyer worked at home, or part-time, or was in solo-practice because she wanted to spend time with her children.  This is where Tips #5 -8 come into play.  Remember, clients only know the image you project.  Generally, they don’t know where you work, they don’t know how many hours you work, and they don’t know if your baby is sleeping next to you in her pack-’n'-play while you draft a brief – or even if you’re breast-feeding while taking a phone call.  (Heck, that’s when the baby is quiet at least, right?)  What reason does the client have to expect to pay you less than any other lawyer?

It is true that one reason some clients prefer to work with lawyers in solo practice is because they generally charge less than the partner on the penthouse level of Biglaw.  But clients also know that solo lawyers don’t have the overhead of Biglaw.  (Believe it or not, smart clients also know that marble counter-tops, flat-screen TVs streaming CNN in every waiting room, and bottled water emblazoned with the firm logo do not automatically increase the quality of an attorney’s work.  Really!)  Still, you can charge significantly less than Biglaw, and still charge enough to show that you value your own work – and pay your bills.

 

 

Current Performance Measures Detrimental to Mother-Lawyers

27 Oct 2011 Leave a Comment

by Domestic Goddess, Esq. in Studies Related to Women/Mother Lawyers Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

Shortly after law-school graduation in the year 2000, a friend was randomly selected to participate in the After the JD – The First Ten Years (AJD) study.  Conducted by the American Bar Foundation, AJD is ” is the first and most ambitious effort to gather systematic, detailed data about the careers and experiences of a national cross-section of law graduates.”

Following around 5,000 lawyers and conducting two major surveys in 2002 and 2009, the study has yielded quantifiable results.  After the first phase of the study, the study found that women lawyers’ practice areas and income “were already diverging from that for men.”  Now, after ten years, more detailed trends are emerging.

The first edition of the AJD Newsletter, published this month, contains the summary of a study entitled “Performance Pay, Gender Inequality, and Young Lawyers,” conducted by Ghazala Azmat (Professor of Economics) and Rosa Ferrer (Assistant Professor of Economics), both at the University of Pompeu Fabra and Barcelona GSE, utilizing data from the AJD study.

According to Azmat and Ferrer, half of the gender earnings gap can be attributed to what they call “individual and professional choices”, such as place of employment.  (I personally question whether the ‘choice’ of where to practice law is truly equal for men and women, but I imagine that could be a study in and of itself.)  The other half is due to “measurable performance measures”, such as number of hours billed, and client generation.

Finding that women don’t perform as well as men in the area of billable hours and client generation, Azmat and Ferrer initially posit three possibilities for the discrepancy in performance:  explicit discrimination, child rearing, and differences in preference.  Ultimately, the professors find that having young children has a direct negative effect on female lawyers’ performance – as measured by billable hours or client generation.  (They also find a gender difference in the ‘aspiration’ to make partner, which I personally believe is probably also related to ‘child rearing.’)

On the one hand, the study simply confirms what many of us mother-lawyers already know.  If you have small children, you probably won’t bill 2400 hours/year, unlike some of your child-less colleagues, or your colleagues with a stay-at-home-spouse (regardless of gender).  You also are unlikely to spend your time outside the office wining-and-dining potential clients – unless they care to join you at home for formula (I mean, breast milk!), mashed peas, or mac-’n-cheese (I can tell you from personal experience that Chardonnay pairs well with that last entree).

On the other hand, the study makes glaringly clear to me that law-firms are simply using the wrong criteria to measure acceptable performance.  What about the quality of an attorney’s work?  What about how quickly and accurately she can research a legal issue?  What about how well she interacts with clients?  What about how well she gets along and communicates with her colleagues?  What about her willingness to take on less popular projects?

In the long run, won’t those traits benefit a law practice far more than the number of hours she puts in, or the number of new clients she generates while her children are young?  Won’t those traits enable her to generate new clients later on, or be entrusted with the clients of a retiring attorney later on when her children are older, and more independent? (Yes, I’m finally done with the rhetorical questions.)

Instead of focusing on long-term stability for the firm and its clients, law firm boards of directors focus instead on ‘neutral’  measures of hours worked and new clients – measurements which are quickly discernible, leave no room for interpretation, and are obviously ‘fair’ (wink, wink, nudge, nudge).  It certainly doesn’t hurt that these ‘neutral’ measures also feed into that lofty and most principled goal of a noble profession – the size of its partners’ bonus checks.

So what should mother-lawyers do?  (My advice?  Really?  I’m flattered. . . )  Take that high-quality legal work, your quick and accurate researching skills, your amazing interpersonal skills and your willingness to take on unpopular projects, and invest them with someone who actually values those traits, views your career as the many-decade endeavor that it is, and treats the practice of law as what it should be – a very noble profession, indeed.

Miscarriage Confidential

16 Oct 2011 2 Comments

by Domestic Goddess, Esq. in 'Stories in Real Life' - with apoligies to Readers Digest, In The News Tags: , , , , , , ,

Amazing News!  Woman goes into labor during the bar exam – and passes! 

This story, first reported in the Daily Herald is making the rounds in the legal community.  Given the recent kerfuffle regarding breast-feeding mothers taking the LSAT, and all the other hits mother lawyers take, this story appears at first-blush to be a great, empowering, “You Go Girl!” moment. Anything men can do, we can do better!  Men may pass the bar exam – but can they do it backwards and in heels?  I mean, while giving birth?

Sadly, a very different kind of story is probably more frequent – and more secret.  Years ago, a co-worker told me her bar exam story with a very different ending.  When she took the bar exam, she didn’t go into labor.  It was much too early in her pregnancy for that.  She did, however, have a miscarriage.  During the bar exam.   And, if you must ask -no, she didn’t pass.

When I was pregnant with my first child (long after I had taken the bar exam), I was fortunate enough to be practicing law part-time.  As I told friends and colleagues my happy news, I was shocked at how many women began to confide in me about their miscarriages.  While exchanging the typical pleasantries with a woman judge I met at a wedding (How do you know the bride?  Where do you work?), she congratulated me on my choice to work only part-time, and went on to tell me that she had miscarried while working as a lawyer.  An associate at my law-firm told me of beginning to miscarry at the office.  A senior partner told me she regretted only having one child,  mourned her inability to have a second or third, strongly hinting at miscarriage.  A woman in solo-practice told me of several miscarriages, and her failed attempts to convince her husband to adopt.

Think back to the 1997 study at UC Davis finding that “women lawyers working more than 45 hours a week are . . . three times more likely to experience a miscarriage in the first trimester than women who work less than 35 hours a week.”  The UC Davis researchers further found that “[w]omen working longer than 45 hours a week experienced spontaneous abortion three times as often, even after researchers adjusted for age, smoking, alcohol intake and previous miscarriage.”  The researchers warned that “[w]omen need to be aware of the impact that long hours at work can have on their reproductive health.”

I suggest that, in addition to celebrating the good fortune of the now-famous mother-attorney from the Daily Herald, maybe it is also a good time to think about the more frequent, more unfortunate stories that mother attorneys secretly carry.

The advice of the UC Davis study fourteen years ago? 

“We as a society need to address the issue of women having to choose between having a career and a family.”

Amen to that.

Does discrimination against Mother-Lawyers begin with the LSAT?

05 Oct 2011 Leave a Comment

by Domestic Goddess, Esq. in In The News Tags: , , , , ,

The twitter-and blog-o-sphere has been abuzz with news that the Law School Admissions Council will not accommodate nursing mothers during the LSAT exam.

From the ACLU:

“LSATs should NOT disadvantage nursing mothers!

The Law School Admissions Council, the organization that administers the LSAT, has a blanket policy of denying all requests for accommodation from nursing mothers who need to pump breast milk during the exam. Without the ability to pump, nursing women will be in increasing discomfort and even pain as the test progresses—causing a serious distraction that could impact their test scores. Not pumping when you need to can also pose significant health risks.

Nursing mothers should not have to choose between feeding their babies and applying to law school. And they should not have to subject themselves to distracting pain and potential health risks simply to take a required admissions test.”

Is this complaint justified?

Medically, WebMD confirms that women who “delay or skip breast-feeding or pumping sessions” are more likely to suffer from mastitis (breast inflammation usually caused by infection).

But will taking the LSAT without accommodation delay a woman’s pumping session to the point that she gets mastitis?

According to the Law School Admissions Council, which administers the LSAT, the exam is a half-day event consisting of 5 sections, each of which is 35 minutes long.   The web-site alludes to a break, but does not reveal the length of this break.  (I recall the break being five or ten minutes – probably not long enough to express milk.)  Assuming a ten-minute break, total exam time comes in at 185 minutes.  If we add ten minutes for instruction at the beginning of the exam, our total time is 195 minutes – or three and one-quarter hours.

Will a three and one-quarter hour time-period without expressing milk result in mastitis?

Obviously, the time between feedings/pumping varies by woman, and by the age of her baby.  As someone who nursed three children for over a year each, I personally never suffered pain, or came down with mastitis if I went three and a quarter hours without pumping.  Based on my personal experiences, if I were planning to take the LSAT while nursing, I would arrange to arrive at the test-site far enough in advance that I could pump just prior to the exam.  Then, I would pump again immediately after the exam.  (Assuming I could find a place to do so.  Other than a toilet stall, thank you very much.  Think this isn’t a problem? Next time you enter a public building, I dare you to try and find such a place.)

Still, every woman and every infant is different, and I can imagine that for some women – especially a mother of a very young infant who is nursing every one-and-a-half to two hours, that pain and mastitis could reasonably occur.  Or consider nursing mothers of multiples – I imagine their bodies are producing much more milk more quickly than mine ever did.

The cynic may ask, “Well, if your baby is nursing every one and a half to two hours, the mother is severely sleep-deprived.  Why would she even want to take the LSAT at that point?”  The LSAT is only offered four times per year, and the timing of the test influences the timing of the test-taker’s law-school admission.

And why should we listen to the cynic?  If there’s one thing I’ve learned as a mother-lawyer, it is that every lawyer, every mother, and every child are different.  Each has her own priorities, her own life circumstances, and her own decisions to make based on which is best for that lawyer, that mother and that child at that particular point in time. 

So, while I do not feel that I would have required an accommodation to take the LSAT when I was a nursing mother, I can’t possibly predict or pretend to understand the reasons that another nursing mother may feel that she does require an accommodation.

Further, the LSAC recently settled a law-suit with a student with ADD and a learning disability.  In that settlement, according to the Star Tribune, “the council agreed to double the standard testing time on each section and to allow the complainant breaks between sections, a separate and quiet testing area, permission to use his own computer for the writing section, permission to use scratch paper and use of an alternative answer sheet [emphasis mine].”

Wow.  And all nursing mothers want is one measly half-hour break.  Compared to the ADD accommodation, that doesn’t seem like much.  And how many nursing mothers would the LSAC actually be asked to accommodate anyhow?  One?  Two?

Ultimately, in my mind, it comes down to giving mother-lawyers-to-be exactly the same thing that mother-lawyers throughout the profession are also lacking.  Choice.  The freedom and ability to make the best choice for that particular mother and that particular child at that particular moment in time.

Does this create a little extra work for the LSAC and employers?  Sure it does.  But isn’t the future of our children and the health and wellness of nearly half the population worth it?  I sure think so.

Examining Lawyers in “Glass Ceilings & 100-Hour Couples” – Chs. 1 – 3

22 Sep 2011 Leave a Comment

by Domestic Goddess, Esq. in Book Review Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

One of the newest books to examine the Opt-Out phenomenon among highly-educated women takes an in-depth look at a myriad of factors that push and pull ‘fast-track’ women out of the workforce. [Moe, Karine S. and Dianna Shandy. Glass ceilings and 100-hour couples: what the opt-out phenomenon can teach us about work and family. University of Georgia Press, 2010.]

Early on, Shandy and Moe quote the woman who I believe is the most famous ‘opted-out’ lawyer-mom in America – First Lady Michelle Obama. In response to a question regarding her first job as First Lady, Ms. Obama says, “My first job in all honesty is going to continue to be mom-in-chief, making sure that in this transition, which will be even more of a transition for the girls . . . that they are settled and that they know they will continue to be the center of our universe.”

Prior to ‘opting-out’ during her husband’s run for elected office, Ms. Obama and her husband exemplified what Professors Karine Moe and Dianna Shandy, (an economist and anthropologist, respectively), coin the “100-Hour Couple” – a couple in which both partners are in careers that demand far beyond the typical 40 hours of work per week, for a total of 100+ hours.

Mother-lawyers such as Ms. Obama are not the focus of “1oo-hour couples,” but do figure prominently. In fact, Shandy and Moe introduce their concept of the ‘100-Hour-Couple’ through a lawyer, Valerie. Valerie and her husband, also a lawyer, each regularly work 70 hours per week – making them a ‘140-hour’ couple. In order to accommodate their schedules, Valerie and her husband hired two nannies to care for their children – one live-in, full-time nanny, plus a part-time nanny. Realizing that they needed to hire a third nanny to cover the time they were working nights and weekends, Valerie instead opted-out.

Valerie’s story leads to a discussion of the relatively recent phenomenon of highly educated, high-earning women partnering with highly-educated, high-earning men. While most lawyer couples do not routinely work as many hours as Valerie and her husband, expected work-hours for lawyers and other high-income professionals have risen dramatically in recent years. Most lawyers-couples do work a combined total of 100+ hours per week – a fact not lost on the authors, who aptly name one sub-section of the early chapters “Lawyers in Love.”

Prominence is also given to lawyers in the discussion of the opt-out rates of various professions. An earlier nationally representative study found that, of those women who had left their careers for a period of time, 59% of the female lawyers in that group reported leaving their jobs because “the work was not enjoyable or satisfying.” The authors further report that while 44% of private law-firm associates are female, only 16% of private law firm partners are women (a number frighteningly similar to that cited in the ‘Opt-Out Revolution,’ published seven years earlier.) In trying to adjust for the increased number of women law school graduates in the past fifteen to twenty-five years (classes consisting of 40 – 50% women), the numbers do not look much better. Of law-firm partners who graduated in that time-frame, the authors found that only 20% are women.

As a lawyer with a lawyer-spouse, this early section of Shandy and Moe’s book hit close to home. While I am blessed with a husband who is an active participant in the so-called ‘second-shift,’ the conversation of how to best balance our careers, home-life, children and financial needs has been on-going and ever changing. An additional part of that conversation concerns a burden common to lawyers (and one that should be addressed in future studies of the opt-out phenomenon among mother-lawyers) – the dreaded and insurmountable law-school student loans, times two.

Are you part of a ‘100-hour couple’? More specifically, are you and your partner ‘Lawyers in Love?’ Shandy and Moe’s analysis ring true for you? How do you balance your careers, relationship and children? And what about those student loans?

Depression Resources

01 Sep 2011 1 Comment

by Domestic Goddess, Esq. in Definitions, Resources Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

If mother-lawyers are destined to be depressed if they do, depressed if they don’t (see the prior post) it only seems right to provide mother-lawyers with a few definitions and resources for help along the way.

As I was gently reminded this morning, ‘Affix your own oxygen mask first, then assist other passengers.’  That includes children.  Fortunately, I’ve never been in a plane that has lost cabin pressure, but I know putting the mask on myself first would not be my natural reaction.  It certainly has not been my natural reaction in the day-to-day world of career and kiddos either.  So, in order to train ourselves otherwise, take a look at the following resources – and get help if you need it.

First a few definitions from WebMD:  

 “Depression: What Is It?”

“It’s natural to feel down sometimes, but if that low mood lingers day after day, it could signal depression. Major depression is an episode of sadness or apathy along with other symptoms that lasts at least two consecutive weeks and is severe enough to interrupt daily activities. Depression is not a sign of weakness or a negative personality. It is a major public health problem and a treatable medical condition.”

My favorite thing about this particular site is that it shows a PET scan revealing “hot spots” of increased activity in the brain of a non-depressed person, along with a contrasting “cold” depressed brain.  Depression is a physical illness, and like other physical illnesses, it can be treated.

More from WebMD: 

 “What are symptoms of depression?” 

I thought this could be particularly valuable as the measurement used in Leupp’s study were ‘symptoms of depression.’

“According to the National Institute of Mental Health, symptoms of depression may include the following:

  • difficulty concentrating, remembering details, and making decisions
  • fatigue and decreased energy
  • feelings of guilt, worthlessness, and/or helplessness
  • feelings of hopelessness and/or pessimism
  • insomnia, early-morning wakefulness, or excessive sleeping
  • irritability, restlessness
  • loss of interest in activities or hobbies once pleasurable, including sex
  • overeating or appetite loss
  • persistent aches or pains, headaches, cramps, or digestive problems that do not ease even with treatment
  • persistent sad, anxious, or “empty” feelings
  • thoughts of suicide, suicide attempts”

The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) “has been dedicated to improving the lives of individuals and families affected by mental illness” since 1979.  Their website provides a variety of educational and supportive materials for depressed individuals and their supporters.

 Lastly, geared specifically toward lawyers, the American Bar Association Commission on Lawyer Assistance Programs has some (limited) information and resources available.  A better place to check for lawyer-specific resources is with your local bar association.  Personally, I’d like to see resources specifically geared toward women lawyers, and mother-lawyers in particular.  Sadly, in this area (like most of the world of law)  it’s still a man’s world.

Depressed if You Do (Opt-Out), Depressed if You Don’t?

29 Aug 2011 Leave a Comment

by Domestic Goddess, Esq. in In The News, Studies Related to Women/Mother Lawyers Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

This week the media and the blogosphere have been abuzz over a study examining rates of depression among mothers.

A press release by the American Sociological Association (ASA) details the work of Katrina Leupp, a University of Washington graduate student who led a study examining rates of depression symptoms among stay –at-home-moms and working moms.  (The press release is available in its entirety here .)

The press release doesn’t tell us the professions of the 1,600 forty-year-old women who took part in the study, or their work history prior to having children.  The study divides the women into three categories. The first category consists of Stay At Home Moms, with the second and third categories consisting of working moms – either SuperMoms, or “working moms who expected that they would have to forgo some aspects of their career or parenting to achieve a work-life balance,” what I call ‘Realist Moms.’

All of the women in the study had previously participated in answering a questionnaire.  The age of the women at the time of the questionnaire is not disclosed in the press release, but they are called ‘young adults,’ and presumptively did not yet have children.  The study’s division of the now forty-year-old women into SuperMoms and Realist Moms depended on their answers to the questionnaire at a previous point in their lives.

According to the press release, Stay At Home Moms fared the worst in the study, with the highest rates of depression symptoms.  Leupp gives credence to the saying that Stay At Home Moms have the hardest job in the world, it reports.  “Employment is ultimately beneficial for women’s health, even when differences in marital satisfaction and working full or part time are ruled out,” says Leupp.

Who are the SuperMoms?  They are the women in the study who as young adults consistently agreed with statements that women can combine employment and family care.  They had the second-highest level of depression symptoms.  The Reaslist Moms are the women in the study who expected that work-life balance was going to be hard and were “probably more likely to accept that they can’t do it all.”  Realist Moms had the lowest level of depression symptoms.

What, if anything, does the study mean to mother-lawyers, both working and not?

We know from other recent studies (to be discussed later) that up to twenty-five percent of mother-lawyers ‘opt-out.’  If we believe Leupp’s study applies to ‘opted out’ moms as well as other Stay At Home Moms, those opted out moms are most likely to exhibit depression symptoms.  If that’s the case, why do opted out moms report being so happy -  Lisa Blegen’s book-club moms, or the moms described in 100 Hour Couples (more on that another day.)  Or do moms who have opted out feel like they must appear to be happy?  Opted out moms have given up a lot – status, money, independence, the ability to pee alone.  If they don’t appear happy, would others – or secretly, they themselves – judge them as foolish for having given those things up?  Maybe opted out moms’ previous high-powered careers were so stressful, that they truly are happy staying home – it’s just that there are so few of them, they are mere outliers.

Where do the working mother-lawyers land in Leupp’s study?  My guess is that they are primarily SuperMoms – women who before having children believed that it was possible to combine employment and family care.  Here’s why.  Today’s mother-lawyers have had very few role models in the profession, and have therefore been trail-blazers in this brave new world of combining motherhood and lawyerhood.  As a general rule, trail-blazers of any sort believe that they will be successful.  (If they believed they would fail, would they even attempt to blaze a new trial?)  Add to that the fact that lawyers are trained to be perfectionists.  (It can hardly be otherwise in a profession in which minor errors can have devastating consequences to a client’s life, liberty or livelihood.)   These trail-blazing women with perfectionist predilections tend to have high opinions of their own abilities, believing themselves capable of achieving things impossible to mere mortals.  Such as – apparently – combining employment and family care.  Besides, how many young women who later became lawyers believed they were not capable of doing something?  Especially with no role models to warn them otherwise?  My guess is very few.

Given the well-known high levels of depression in the legal profession at large, and the assumption that Leupp’s study applies to both opted out mother-lawyer, and working mother-lawyers, I have come to the unfortunate conclusion that mother lawyers are destined to be

depressed if they do (opt out), depressed if they don’t.

Unless, of course, Leupp’s study is flawed in grouping opted out moms in the same category as other Stay At Home Moms.  Maybe we need a study measuring depression levels in opted out moms.  Is there one out there?  If so, let me know.  If not, maybe I’ll create one.

Note:  Leupp’s study was presented at the annual conference of the ASA.  It has not yet been published, as publication requires peer review, and acceptance by an academic journal.  I plan on following up on this post when/if the actual study is published, and available for review.

Examining Lawyers in “The Opt-Out Revolution”

25 Aug 2011 Leave a Comment

by Domestic Goddess, Esq. in Article Review Tags: , , , , , , , ,

“The Opt-Out Revolution,” an article which appeared in the New York Times Magazine on October 26, 2003, by Lisa Belken, is generally credited to be the first major article examining the ‘opt-out’ phenomenon.   The article has spawned multiple responsive articles and books, some praising and some lambasting Belken and the ideas presented in her article.  (The article is available in its entirety at http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/26/magazine/26WOMEN.html?pagewanted=1.)

The women Belken interviewed and profiled were Princeton graduates and members of a book club -  admittedly white beneficiaries of top-tier educations (generally with graduate degrees,) married to successful, equally educated men.  (As one might imagine, many of the critiques of the article begin with the limited sample of women, and their highly privileged situations.)   The women’s professional backgrounds were varied, but lumped together by Belken under the umbrella of high-powered fast-track careers.

When the glossy New York Times Magazine arrived on my doorstep, the article struck a particular chord.  At that time, I was a new associate at a large law-firm beginning to wonder how I could possibly manage to balance my career, my marriage, and the children I hoped to have in the next few years.  I was curious about these women who, in my mind, had thrown their careers away.

Looking back, I now find it interesting that three of the Princeton book-club members quoted in Belken’s article are attorneys.  (She never reveals the total number of book-club members, but one can reasonably presume it was a relatively small group.)  Belken did not comment on the (perhaps) disproportionate representation of lawyers profiled in her article, or compare the situation of the attorneys with the women in other professions.  (Belken focused primarily on comparing attitudes of women of differing generations.)

The very first book-club member quoted in Belken’s article is one of those three attorneys.  True to lawyer form, Karen Browkaw is discussing the definition of a particular term:  success.   ”I don’t want to be on the fast track leading to a partnership at a prestigious law firm,” Ms. Brokaw is quoted as saying.  ”Some people define that as success. I don’t.”  While Ms. Brokaw never actually defines success, we learn that she had left the ‘fast-track’ to stay home with her three children.

The tipping point in Ms. Browkaw’s decision to opt-out was a bumped-up trial date which required her to spend three months working fifteen hour days, seven days a week, while simultaneously nursing her baby daughter – who was not yet sleeping through the night.  When Brokaw’s trial date arrived, the judge postponed the case – to go fishing for two weeks.  Later the judge postponed the case indefinitely.

“Finally, when the case was pulled from the calendar, I did a lot of soul-searching,” Ms. Brokaw is quoted as saying.  “My life, my home life and my new family life were at the mercy of other people’s whims. The judge had chosen to go fishing. My partners [at the law firm] had chosen not to place my request [for a part-time schedule] on high-enough priority.”

Eventually, Ms. Brokaw decided that while the ultimate goal of becoming partner would reward her financially, she felt it would actually make her day-to-day life worse.  So, she quit.  Her story ends with Brokaw saying, ”I wish it had been possible to be the kind of parent I want to be and continue with my legal career, but I wore myself out trying to do both jobs well.”

The next lawyer Belken introduces is Vicky McElhaney Benedict.  Ms. Benedict’s career path is described as quite different from that of Ms. Brokaw – practicing law for nine months before leaving her law firm to work in a university development office.  Ms. Benedict then quit that job while on maternity leave with her first child.  While this career path would be disappointing to the majority of women lawyers I know, Belken quotes Ms. Benedict as saying, “Even before I became a mother, I suspected I wouldn’t go back to work.”  She describes her decision to follow her then-boyfriend, now husband, to a different city at the very beginning of her career, “because I knew that the long-term career was going to be his.”

The third and final lawyer introduced by Belken refuses to be identified.  She is a litigator whose firm – unlike Ms. Browkaw’s – actually had granted her request to work ‘part-time.’  We quickly learn that the ‘part-time’ track is not a panacea.  This attorney rhetorically asks, ”How do you litigate part time? It’s supposed to be 10 to 5 — at a law firm, that’s part time — but lately I’ve been working until 4 a.m. because I have a project due. It’s the type of job where if something’s due, you work until it’s done.”

So how do the mother attorneys profiled in Belken’s article feel about their decisions?  Ms. Benedict is quoted saying, ”This is what I was meant to do.  I hate to say that because it sounds like I could have skipped college. But I mean this is what I was meant to do at this time. I know that’s very un-p.c., but I like life’s rhythms when I’m nurturing a child.”

Ms. Brokaw, on the other hand, comes across as a bit more defensive of her decision.  Belken quotes her as saying, ”Don’t make me look like some 1950′s Stepford wife.” She emphasizes that in the years since she had left her law firm, she had helped found the Atlanta Girls’ School, and had also raised a successful challenge to a bridge that was to have spilled its traffic into her residential neighborhood. ”I use my legal skills every day,” Browkaw reportedly states.  For her, using her degree is clearly very important, but her compensation need not be monetary.  Instead, for Ms. Brokaw, adequate compensation consists of living her own definition of ‘success’.

The anonymous attorney doesn’t specifically state her level of job satisfaction at her ‘part-time’ job – for which she presumably receives ‘part-time’ pay – but reading between the lines this reader, at least, assumes that she is not pleased with her situation, yet sees no alternative to remain a practicing lawyer.

So, what conclusions can we draw from Ms. Belken’s now eight-year-old article?  I conclude that in regards to the reasons mother-lawyers ‘opt out,’ things haven’t changed very much.  Some mother-lawyers such as Ms. Benedict (although in my estimate, this is a very small minority of mother-lawyers) enter the field assuming that they may practice law, but knowing that while their children are small, they will stay home. They also assume that staying home is only a phase.  “This is what I was meant to do at this time,”  (emphasis mine.)

Some mother-lawyers such as Ms. Brokaw struggle along, striving perfection in juggling job and kids until they realize that:  the juggling will never, never end;  that their ‘work product’ – both at the office and at home – is suffering in quality; and that the juggling will only get harder as they advance into more responsibility at work, and/or have a second or third child.

Other mother-lawyers, such as Ms. Anonymous, try to cut back, but find that it is impossible, and so they toil along, with fear of negative repercussions at work if their true feelings are revealed and a sense of unhappiness in their day-to-day lives.

Because her article did not address mothers who choose to work full-time in high-powered, fast-track careers, we don’t have an example of why or how those mothers get along, or how ‘happy’ they perceive themselves.  (More on that at a later date.)    Similarly, because her article did not focus specifically on mother-lawyers, we are not presented with suggestions for improving work-life balance in the law.

As for me?  I relate most closely to Ms. Brokaw.  I was plagued by the very real fear that it was only a matter of time before my juggling resulted in dropping a very important ball.  I was either going to (a) commit malpractice, (b) leave a child in a snow-bank, (c) have a nervous break-down, or (d) all of the above.  I was betting on answer (d) – clearly an unsustainable path.

And, like Ms. Anonymous, I’m no longer sure that it is possible for the practice of law to be ‘family friendly’ due to its very nature.  (Again, more on that later).

What about you?

What are your thoughts on Belken’s article?

Over the next weeks, I will examine some of the stand-out books and articles that followed Belken’s initial foray into the world of ‘opting-out,’ hopefully teasing out how they may apply to the legal profession, and to mother-lawyers specifically.  I hope you’ll join me.

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