Weekend Open Thread
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Sales of note for 2/7/25:
- Nordstrom – Winter Sale, up to 60% off! 7850 new markdowns for women
- Ann Taylor – Extra 25% off your $175+ purchase — and $30 of full-price pants and denim
- Banana Republic Factory – Up to 50% off everything + extra 15% off
- Boden – 15% off new season styles
- Eloquii – 60% off 100s of styles
- J.Crew – Extra 50% off all sale styles
- J.Crew Factory – 40% off everything including new arrivals + extra 20% off $125+
- Rothy's – Final Few: Up to 40% off last-chance styles
- Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off
- Talbots – 40% off one item + free shipping on $150+
And some of our latest threadjacks here at Corporette (reader questions and commentary) — see more here!
Some of our latest threadjacks include:
- My workload is vastly exceeding my capability — what should I do?
- Why is there generational resentment regarding housing? (See also)
- What colors should I wear with a deep green sweater dress?
- How do you celebrate milestone birthdays?
- How do you account for one-time expenses in your monthly budget?
- If I'm just starting to feel sick from the flu, do I want Tamilfu?
- when to toss old clothes of a different size
- a list of political actions to take right now
- ways to increase your intelligence
- what to wear when getting sworn in as a judge (congrats, reader!)
- how to break into teaching as a second career
Does anyone here who has kids regret not staying home? Or alternatively regret staying home and having a almost no experience when trying to get back into the workforce?
I graduated from law school in 2014 and got married a month later. We were both studying for the bar exam but I got pregnant right away (somewhat of a birth control failure because we weren’t trying) so the new plan was that I would take the bar exam after our son turned one.
Our son turns one next month. But the honest truth is that I don’t think I want to take the bar or work as a lawyer any more. I love staying home with him and being a homemaker. I have never felt happier and the thought of getting a job and not staying home depresses me. I never thought I would feel this way but now I do. My husband and I thought we always wanted just one child but now I want more.
My husband is supportive of me being a stay at home mom if I want. He is a lawyer and says he makes more than enough money if I want to stay home and it’s no problem. He is also open to having more children if I want.
My only worry is about not having anything to fall back on if something happens to him and he can’t work (or worse). I went to a T14 law school and did my undergraduate degree at an Ivy League school. I had good grades through both. But I’m worried that if I have to return to work years down the road the gap on my resume (re: lack of ever having a job or worked anywhere besides when I was summering) will hinder me.
My husband has life insurance and we are building an emergency fund. We are paying down his student loans really quick and they will be gone by next June. That’s the only debt either of us have. If anyone faced a similar decision or has any experience with this I would really appreciate hearing about it.
What happens in 10-20 years when he gets bored with you and leaves?
You’ll think this is just mean and judgmental, but I watched it happen to a significant portion of my mother’s friends. There’s no point in worrying that your lack of skills, experience, or qualifications (srsly? You’re not even taking the bar) will harm you. That is a 100% certain fact. It’s hard to be 50 and realize that you have to get a job for the first time. Even if you don’t need the money then what? When your whole identity is wife and mother and you’re newly single with adult children, what is your identity?
Yes, this year has been great. Awesome. Suck it up and at least take the bar now. Give yourself options. Look for something part-time.
I’m 50 and there’s some truth to this. Keep your options open, and perhaps get a good post-nup now while you are still both on board with the idea of you being a SAHM.
I personally would never feel comfortable saying “I went to law school but never passed a bar exam”
It just seems like a total waste. You did an Ivy League undergrad, a great law school, got knocked up and decided to drop out. What?!? If you graduated in May, got married in June, and got pregnant immediately, you would have been 8 weeks at the bar exam. What were you thinking not taking it? It worries me. It feels like you’re scared of life and checking out.
Can you elaborate on why you didn’t take the bar exam? It seems like such an easy thing do just go ahead and be done with (and do you have a good answer for what else you were doing / faced with that would have made it impossible)?
This to me is a huge red flag — such huge investments in education and training and dumped so quickly. Maybe there is more to the story?
100% get a post-nup. No judgment, but none of us know for sure how well our seemingly-perfect marriages will hold up over time. If you stay at home, you need to make sure that you can survive a divorce.
I agree. I thought I already p’osted, but it must be in modderation. FOOEY! You are young now, and are bearing him children, but when you are 45, you can be sure you will not be as cute and by then you will have a wide tuchus and your husband will be a partner chasing young 25 year old associate’s with tight bodie’s and smaller tuchusses. Protect your self if you elect NOT to have a fallback. Men like to chase women who make them feel young, and you, by then, will not. FOOEY!
Yay! Open thread’s! I love Open thread’s and this dress, tho I could NEVER wear this one to work. Frank would be poking at my sleeve’s to see what he could see inside. FOOEY!
This post and OP’s say what I have been saying (tho I appear to have been MODERATED). We women of the HIVE need to do all we can to ensure that when we are no longer young and cute, that our husband’s do NOT turn us in for a younger, cuter, woman. Most men want to relieve their YOUTH by getting a HOT woman and a HOT car and drive around with their bald head’s hanging out the top or worse. I say we MUST stick together to prevent our HUSBAND’s from doeing this, both economically as well as sexueally. We must be innovative in the boodoir so that our Husband’s will NOT stray. That mean’s doeing EVERYTHING even if it is NOT what we realy want to do. Girlfreind’s will OFTEN do thing’s we won’t and THAT is what drives our men to leave us. FOOEY!
[In my case, I first have to FIND a guy b/f I can LOOSE him, but that is anoter SAD storey, dad keep’s saying]. Grandma Leyeh is also of the “view” that I need to loosen up in the boodoir, meaning for me to do more stuff. I do NOT think she knows what that mean’s these day’s b/c in her day, showing a man her thigh’s was considered RISKEE unless you were ENGAGED. In any event, I am interested in the HIVE’s view here. HAPPY WEEKEND TO THE HIVE! YAY!!!
Wow. Way harsh. There are plenty of ways to get experience as a stay at home mom. I would 100% encourage you to take the bar, because if anything you could use it it for pro bono stuff. My mother was a stay at home mom and she was on the finance committees of several non profits. Being a stay at home mom doesn’t mean you can’t learn business skills.
Are you kidding me?
Hahaha. That’s too funny.
With a good degree you can always go back.
Take 5 years off and re-enter when your kids are in school. That’s what I did and it was the best decision ever.
I actually took ten years off – I have Ivy League degree and good experience and it wasn’t hard at all to jump back in. And I’m better now than I ever was.
I think the issue is OP has no experience. Would it have been as easy for you without experience?
That’s a good point.
My recommendation is to take the bar and get a job. It isn’t a life sentence. Get a year or two experience and if you still want to be a sahm then quit. Then you at least have some experience.
It’s not an all or none choice here. Just because she doesn’t want to work now doesn’t mean she doesn’t want to work ever. I think taking 5-10 years off to be with kids is a good option.
Is your plan to stay at home forever (i.e. Until your husband retires)? If not, you’ll need to think about what you want to do, and how to start doing it. It may not be law, but it should be something (if that’s what you want).
My mom was a career SAHM, but at age 45 or so, she was out of kids to raise (we were all in college or done) and bored, with no experience. She did fundraising/PTA type stuff so dabbled in that, but she’s pretty stuck.
I would think very hard about not having any work experience at all in a young marriage. You might be happy now, but life is long & you’ll need to make sure you can provide for yourself. You don’t have to get a job in biglaw, but you should get some kind of job, and get some real-world experience. I can’t imagine dropping out before doing anything at all. This is just a recipe for dependency.
How do you know you don’t want to be a lawyer anymore if you have never worked as a lawyer? I would definitely take the bar. Look into opportunities around you that would be more family friendly. No one says you have to work in big law. No one says you have to work forever as a lawyer if you try it and don’t like it. What will you fill your days with once child(ren) are in school?
This. You haven’t even tried law!
I’d take the bar and honestly I’d get a job too. Law is a notoriously unforgiving field – more than most. If you think you can have zero experience and get a job 10 or even 4 yrs after graduation, you are kidding yourself. As for why you’d need a job – things happen. Sure you can financially plan for certain things, but not everything. As the PP says, your husband could leave. But even if he never does that – you do realize that your kid will get older, right? Right now – you’re in a honeymoon phase with your husband and you’re a new mom, so it’s all very fulfilling. By the time this kid is 10, he’ll start to develop his own life and friends and not want mom around all the time. Sure many moms still stay home to drive the carpools and make their home the “hang out” home for their kids – but at 18 this kid leaves. If you’re 25-30 now, will you feel just as fulfilled being home alone from age 45-50 onwards as your husband continues to work? And if you think you’ll be able to get a job then with no experience, it’s unlikely.
I think it’s a personal decision. My mother stayed home after leaving a very high-paying job and still says she doesn’t regret it. On the other hand, my friend’s mother who did the same thing was left in bad shape when her husband died without warning and their savings wasn’t enough to live on. She really struggled to find a job after more than a decade out of the workplace. I think I vote with the suggestion of working part-time as the best compromise, but if you’re comfortable with the risk and have adequate savings in case something goes wrong… Well, then, stay home! It’s your decision, and no one should make you feel bad whatever you decide.
I’d say take the bar now. You don’t want a big gap between law school graduation and bar admission if you decide to look for jobs down the road. You put all that effort into law school — at least pass the bar and have that certification so your options are open later. And FWIW, I loved my babies’ first years also, and cut back to part time to be with them. Now that they are teenagers, I am so glad to have my work.
I think it should go back and look at last week’s open thread about women in their 50s having to look for a job for the first time after their husbands divorced them. You will get your answers there.
God yes. This. +1,000,000
I can’t imagine you’d have an easy time finding legal work in a few years (be that 3, 5, 10, 15) if you continue on this path. Take the bar, get a job. I don’t even know that you can say you’re trying to on ramp if you never got on the road to begin with.
I’m not telling you to get a job in biglaw, but there are definitely happy mediums out there to keep your skill set…. especially because you’re lucky enough to have some financial flexibility. You’ve got tremendous opportunities at your feet and you’re just allowing them to wither… which might be ok if everything works out great for your life, but could be catastrophic if anything goes wrong.
The potentially downsides of working (missing time with your kids, being a little sad) are FAR less than the (perhaps more remote) downsides of never working.
Given the choice of working vs having a husband work while I stay home, of course I vote to stay home. In the OPs case, she had to go to law school to meet her husband, so who cares if she never takes the bar? She’s got her meal ticket–a man willing to support her and their children! With a guy like that, why in the world would she work? She already will be busy with the kids. Law is for those who can’t marry a guy like this. We should all be so lucky!
Snort. Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.
Yes, all well and good, but this is now. She is young and pretty. 20 years from now, she will be heftier and 20 years older. If the husband does well, he will be making a lot of money and will have access to a lot of younger women, who will be very anxious to please. Unless he is a saint (or neutered), there’s a good chance he will stray and sample these younger, nubile women. The wife usually finds out — typically based on a lack of sexual interest at home, late night calls to and from his cell phone, lipstick on his zipper, etc. If a divorce is in order, the wife will get some kind of settlement, but not nearly enough to cover her until she is eligible for social security. Why would she risk it all by not having a skill. Otherwise she will wind up being yet another 55 year old academically overqualified real estate agent who needs to do something to keep busy while her ex now has settled into a second marriage with a 32 year old associate (who will soon get preggers and start the cycle all over again). UGH. Men are the ones who bite!
At least take the bar now, especially if you can get admitted and then go on inactive status and not have to pay dues in your state. It’ll be a lot easier to take the bar when you have some memory of law school rather than X number of years from now, and it givse you options if you need it. Honestly, I’m not sure why getting pregnant prevented you from taking the bar you were already studying for since you’d only have been like 4 months pregnant, tops, if you were scheduled to take the July bar, but water under the bridge at this point.
Also, my mom was a SAHM. She worked/still works very part time (like a couple of hours in the morning) for my dad doing payroll stuff (dad owns a small business), but that’s it. Honestly, ever since my brother and I left home, I don’t think she really knows what to do with herself. She complains she doesn’t have any friends and thinks she should have gotten a job years ago because now she worries about retirement savings, but despite complaining about this, she doesn’t seem to do anything about it (like volunteer for something or trying to get some job, or really anything). Obviously not all SAHM moms are like this after the kids are grown, but just make sure you have something to do other than focus on your kids, because after they’re grown, then what?
I could write pages about staying home or going back to work but here’s the condensed version – yes the gap would hinder you if you tried to “on-ramp” back to a career.
Your husband has life insurance but what neither of you have is “catastrophe” insurance. Of course everyone says that they’re not going to be “the mom who never worked whose husband is leaving her and now she’s broke with no job experience” but it does happen. And it can be devastating to the mom but the kids are, often, worse off. Like going from upper middle-class to food stamps. So maybe you need a post-nuptial agreement or, depending on your state of residence, asset in your name alone such as real estate or stocks.
But even if someone is guaranteed never to get divorced, what if your husband gets MS or a brain tumor or falls off his bike and has a traumatic brain injury? What will you do then?
I had a client whose husband was a big-law attorney and he got MS when he was 35 just after the birth of their first child. She had an inactive CPA license and needed to restart her career while caring for the baby and her husband. That is a steep hill to climb.
So in addition to life insurance, you need disability insurance for him and also for you. My life insurance agent used to tell me that I was more likely to be disabled than dead (early 30s w/kids at the time) and while that might be true disability insurance might just be enough to keep a good standard of living while you “on-ramp” back to the work force in the event of his disability.
I’m not sure why you didn’t take the bar while you were pregnant (unless you really don’t want to work as an attorney). Right now, you’re not really off-ramping because you don’t have a solid career, contacts, references, friends who could help you on-ramp back to the job market. But I would say take the bar. Then you can choose whether or not to keep your license active, complete continuing ed requirements etc. After you pass the bar, you may decide that you want to let your license lapse but at least you’ve proven to yourself that you can pass, and have that on your resume. Or perhaps your state has an “inactive” status that could be reactivated if needed. And then keep in contact with law school friends, do the PTA thing and fundraising events and volunteer, keep your network alive. You may never need to work, you may or may not ever want to work or maybe you’ll decide that something – say photography – is your passion and you’ll be self-employed and start a business of your own that you can do when the kids are in school. Having friends and contacts is invaluable in that event.
A lot of my friends got bored when the kids were in school most of the day and started working at flexible jobs. For example, one started as a part-time placement coordinator for au pairs (via phone and email out of her house) and now is a regional director. Another was an architect, worked on architectural drawings out of her house and then became a yoga instructor and then, after her husband worked overseas, became a travel guide and takes people on guided European tours now that the kids are in college. Another was an attorney and now works at a non-profit affordable housing agency where her legal training is useful for the multi-level agreements that are used to finance affordable units (municipal, state, multiagency financing along with loans and bonds).
So that’s my outlook, having seen friends go through the divorce blow ups and medical issues. Life is unpredictable and there is risk for any course of action but you can work on lowering or at least acknowledging the risks.
I’ll just add – get good long and short term disability insurance, and maybe some long term care insurance if you can afford it!
Other than that, you’ve gotten really good advice.
First, congratulations on being happy! Don’t take that for granted – it’s huge.
Initially I thought “geez everyone is being really harsh on her – lay off!” But after thinking on it for a bit, here’s my two cents:
Suck it up and take the bar now. My husband went to a good law school (while I worked) and we both quickly realized he did not want to be a lawyer. But he took the bar. It can only help you (for one thing it shows discipline).
Since it seems like you love being a SAHM, I wouldn’t obsess over getting a law job ASAP, but maybe think about getting a part time job (doesn’t have to be in law – you can teach piano lessons from your home if you want). Other posters are right in that law is very unforgiving. This may seem harsh but tt would be really sad to find yourself in a difficult position down the road due to not having any work experience.
For the record I have an undergrad degree, zero kids and 8 years of work experience so my life is a lot different than yours. Good luck! You do you.
So relieved to read this– I was starting to think I am some kind of pie-in-the-sky crazy optimist for thinking how lovely it is that the OP is this happy with her life as a SAHM. I agree with all of the advice to have some sort of backup plan. Just like most careers, being a SAHM is not completely secure. Something could happen to your husband’s job, or to his health (or to your marriage, even though I hate how gloomy it is to forecast divorce in general). So think about what you would do if you could, for whatever reason, no longer be a SAHM.
It sounds like law may not be the backup you want. A few have pointed out it’s a little telling that you decided not to take the bar exam even though you could have done that while pregnant. Maybe you didn’t want to be a lawyer– that’s ok. Even so, taking the bar and having an active law license would be helpful even if you decide not to be a lawyer. Are there any other things you are interested in? Maybe something to do with your child? Could you take the bar and then volunteer on a nonprofit board or something similar? Once your kids are in school, you would have more time for something like that; I know it would be hard while you are still home with them all day, every day.
I don’t think the answer is to jump back into full time employment just because you feel like you should. It is absolutely wonderful that you are this happy as a stay at home mom. Congratulations.
Every time I see your screen name I get that song stuck in my head for hours. My dad used to sing it around the house regularly. Makes me smile.
Stay at home Mom is not a “career.” Sorry. It just isn’t.
Eh, I am OK with SAHM/homemaker being a career. It is a lot of work. It creates value, and that stuff needs to be done. Your roles and resposibilities increase and evolve over time. Childcare is a career. Executive/personal assisting is a career. Household management is a career. Why not something that combines them? I remember one adorable lady I saw on Jeopardy! who announced she had recently “retired” from being a SAHM and was now “working part time as a homemaker” after her youngest child graduated college and got his first real job. It was a nice way to think about it, to me.
Take the bar so you don’t have a big gap between law school and the bar. If you want to stay home then do that but at a minimum, get a post-nuptial agreement with independent counsel for each side, and keep up a part time (even if only very part time) job while at home with your kids. Not sure what your undergrad is but doc review/editing/writing etc – something to give you a basis to transition back to the workforce.
I posted earlier this week about deciding to SAHM for a few years – or more – who knows – after my last child was born. I working mom slogged it through my other kids’ baby/toddler years. If I were you I’d buckle down and take the bar exam now in case you want/need the options down the road, then SAHM if you like. If you ever decide to go back, you can always look for something flexible/part time, but you’re going to have a tough time with the bar exam if you let too much time pass. Those fancy degrees will really help (I went to HSY for law school, and I feel like the degree really opens doors and at least gets you in for the interview) if you decide to go back. I, for one, will plan for contingencies, but would not give up the way I want to live my life based on the fear that maybe someday my husband will leave me.
I have a bit of a different take. Your husband is too junior to be the sole breadwinner. A barely second year attorney cannot know if he will be happy in his position long-term or if he will be able to stay in his position long-term. It is unwise to take on the responsibility of providing for a family when the future is so uncertain.
Take the bar and start developing skills and contacts in your industry. In 5-10 years, reevaluate. Maybe you can take a step back if his career is going well. Or maybe you will be need to take on more hours, either because he wants to take a job he loves that pays less, or because he’s getting booted out of his firm. Either way, you will have options.
This is an excellent point. That is also a lot of added pressure for someone who is already just starting out in a highly stressful career.
“I have a bit of a different take. Your husband is too junior to be the sole breadwinner. A barely second year attorney cannot know if he will be happy in his position long-term or if he will be able to stay in his position long-term. It is unwise to take on the responsibility of providing for a family when the future is so uncertain.”
+1,000
So he makes a lot of money and is hanging in there as a junior in his big law firm, but what happens at year 5 when he realizes he can’t/doesn’t want to make partner and he has to start looking for much lower paying jobs at smaller firms/gov’t/in house? Is it still enough to support your family like you want?
What struck me about your comment is that this life plan you have now is so different from what you and your husband seem to have envisioned when you got engaged. Yes, life happens and plans adapt, but for me the most important criteria in choosing a mate was wanting the same things out of life. Yes, life happens and plans change, but from your husband’s perspective, going from “we’ll both be lawyers and have one kid somewhere down the line” to “I’m going to be the sole breadwinner starting at age 27 (obviously I’m guessing here, but assume you’re both young) for a ‘traditional’ family consisting of my homemaker wife and multiple children” is a big shift. Leaving your career prospects out of it entirely, I hope your husband has done some major soul searching to come to the conclusion that this is what he wants, and did not just glibly support you because that’s what good husbands do. It seems to me like a recipe for resentment and marital troubles down the line.
All that said, I think it is a waste of an expensive education to not even pass the bar. My mom gave up a MS-required health career after I was born, and I always used to joke that I also wanted to be a “well educated housewife” when I was in school. The truth of it is, my mom missed having her own identity independent of her family, and I have realized I would miss that too if I totally off-ramped. But you do you — there is nothing wrong with being a SAHM. There’s not even anything wrong with making that decision before you know what it would be like to have a career; tons of women do that (more often not by choice, though). But I’d definitely think long and hard about what it means for your marriage, your sense of self, and your prospects in a worst-case scenario; and whether you’re making that decision because you really think it is best and will make you happiest, or because you’re scared, or comfortable, or [fill in anything else here] right now.
This is the perspective I was considering as well – can you fast forward and see what regrets you might have for any of the possible futures you could have? Map every possibility out and see what’s palatable or not. I don’t think there’s anything wrong about being an educated stay-at-home mom but something about muzzling the potency of that education by not taking the bar exam rubs me the wrong way.
+1 a best advice on this thread, especially paragraph one. I have several friends who divorced as a result of this scenario. As others have pointed out, the wives standard of living changed dramatically.
I say go for it (staying home that is). I’m a lawyer and absolutely miserable at my job, or more accurately, my career, since I’ve had several different jobs since law school. In a couple of years it will probably be financially feasible for us to live comfortably on just my husband’s salary and I plan to quit at that point and stay home (no kids yet, but hopefully soon; I don’t plan to quit until I have a baby). I know there are a lot of people who wouldn’t be fulfilled staying home but if you are, I think it’s wonderful and you shouldn’t force yourself to go into the workforce just because it’s the normal thing to do after getting an undergrad and a law degree. Make sure you have a lot of life and disability insurance on your husband and you’ll be fine in the event something happens to him. Everyone is different, but personally I know I would need an identity outside of homemaker and mom, but for me it would be very easy to maintain that identity through volunteer work and hobbies like food blogging (basically what I would do if I won the lottery and could do whatever I wanted and didn’t have to worry about income). I think it’s crazy to say your identity has to be “lawyer” just because you went to law school. Kids aside, I’d be a much, much happier person if my work identity was animal shelter volunteer/blogger/[unpublished] writer rather than lawyer. So find some stuff that makes you happy, in addition to your little one and your DH, and enjoy your life! I’m so, so jealous and hope I will be in your shoes soon :)
Maybe Babycenter dot com would be a more supportive place for this question
This. Another good place would be the family board on make up alley. Lots of educated women there have chosen to stay home.
Can I go out on a limb and guess that you didn’t pay for your own schooling (if you’re loan-debt free after Ivy League school / T14 law school?) This isn’t intended solely to be mean – if you could get into and succeed at those schools, you’re obviously smart, but if you got out without debt, someone else (school, parents, scholarship) likely footed the bill. And if you went straight through, then got married / pregnant right away, you might have a distorted view (or, at least, a very different view then most women on this board) about both the value and necessity of knowing how to financially support yourself.
Shit happens. Those of us that have worked nights to pay for college, or been divorced, or who went to food shelves during periods of unemployment – we don’t (can’t!) relax about the idea that someone else will always be there to pay the mortgage. Some people are very, very fortunate to be financially supported forever – first parents, then husband, without anything bad ever happening. But that’s luck, not smart planning. Husbands die, cheat, get sick, get fired, and develop addictions that wipe out whatever contingency plans were in place. You’re leaving your kid in a vulnerable spot by assuming that someone other than you will always be able to pay for everything that he needs.
Look, I get it. I have a kid. I miss him when I’m working, and balancing it all is hard. But I spent 10 years scrubbing toilets at night to afford rent while I was in school full time – I just can’t fathom throwing away the opportunity to use that degree. Moreover, I can sleep at night knowing that if – god forbid – something happened to my husband, kid and I aren’t left destitute because the only job I can get with a blank resume doesn’t pay enough to cover his new daycare bill.
I think the responses are skewed here by people who have obviously chosen career over staying home. You need to find other perspectives elsewhere. I chose to take a massive pay cut, leave the law, and work in a peripheral field providing services to lawyers just so I could work from home at most 40 hours per week. No regrets. Do not underestimate putting happiness over career. I support your choice of staying home. It makes you and your family happy. End of story.
Yup, the responses are skewed because you posted on this site. Pick a different site and they will be skewed in a different direction. That is not to say that the points here aren’t valid – I’d say that most of them are valid and worth consideration, but continue to consider your happiness and that of your family too.
Toffee – I am one who thinks the OP shouldn’t go to work now just to get some experience – it will probably make her miserable. But she asked for advice and her strategy is very risky. She may be lucky, she may not be.
You, on the other hand, have passed the bar, are working and have contacts. You can say, yes, I’m a graduate of XYZ law school and passed X State bar exam. If you ever *had* to become the primary-earner, you could leverage your experience, degree, bar license and contacts. The OP has neither license nor experience as a lawyer and would not be able to find a sweet 40-hour a week work-from-home gig such as you have (your job sounds ideal, IMO).
TD;LR For OP – take the Bar, get disability insurance, develop a network and keep your eyes and your options open.
But you took the bar and worked in law before you chose to leave and do something peripheral. The OP will not have that option if she doesn’t even take the bar or get any experience.
OP: Yeah, the responses here are skewed, yeah we’re all over-achieving chicks. But also realistic. Graduating but then not taking the bar maybe for years and not getting any work experience will limit your options in the future, not just a little bit but drastically. You will have a harder time taking the bar in 5 years, or however long it might be. You will have a much hard time looking for entry-level law jobs after that, competing with younger people who are just out of school. And if you wait a lot longer, like until your child/ren is/are in school full days, you will have even fewer options. It’s not unreasonable, or judgey of SAHMs, or dismissive of quality of life and happiness concerns to be realistic about the actual impacts of what you are considering.
Well… our perspectives aren’t just because we are ‘career people.’ Many of us have seen and experienced the shocking changes that can happen overnight. I never NEVER saw divorce coming when I had a newborn and thank heavens I had experience, a legal license, etc. Thank heavens. However, in her case, I personally see getting to stay at home as am amazing luxury for a while, one that I will never have, and think if it can be enjoyed it should. I think there are other options. I left the law years ago for related work. I’d never go back to the law. She doesn’t have to practice. (though I agree TAKE THE BAR). Try starting a small entrepreneurial business. She has wonderful freedom and can do that while baby is sleeping or whatever. Do something interesting to you, that you can grow and make money at, but does not involve the misery of hoofing it out the door in the morning making your kid hurry to get up eat and get dressed while you race down the highway to Another Meeting. My quality of life sucks. There are other ways for her to create value in her professional accomplishments, ensure some financial cushion, spend time with her little one, and not throw in the towel. I wish I’d had creative foresight and done entreprenurial stuff a decade ago. It’s far harder now alone, working with kid. Anyway cheers… hope that offers another perspective.
This. The responses are from people who are both realistic and happen to be able to support themselves too. Don’t discount the realism because of the latter.
Forget marital shocking changes- I had what DH and I considered to be the totally stable job. I was laid off and it shocked me, all my colleagues, DH, and even clients of mine. I had 5 years of rock solid (if not stellar- 3 promotions) performance, on track for another this year. But back office politics happened and all of a sudden my division was folded into another and they cut me a severance check and called it a day.
We are financially fine, but it took me at least 3 weeks to get over the shock. We had always planned to be able to survive on one income, but we’d always assumed it would be DH!
My dad lost his (sole breadwinner) job my freshman year of college after half his clients died in the 9/11 attacks. The business was just gone, and my dad’s company eliminated entire areas to make ends meet.
Stuff like this happens, and with only one income you *really* need a plan/safety net. My parents ended up taking out loans/having me take out loans/getting a special grant from my college for that year, and my dad got another job, but for a very real period of time it was looking like I was going to have to stop going to school so my parents could use my college tuition to live on.
I regularly work with people, mostly women, who chose to rely on someone else for their financial support and are now facing abject poverty and homelessness because of it. Your spouse could die or leave you; one of you could develop an expensive health problem, etc. Take the bar and get at least a few years’ work experience (anything, doesn’t have to be lawyering) so you have something to fall back on.
Also, the longer you wait to take the bar, the more times people are going to assume you failed it the first several times when they see the gap on your resume.
Finally, from the toddlers I know, you might find staying home with a 3 year old WAY less satisfying than with a one year old.
I think you can take care of you kid (or kids) while they are toddlers and then maybe get a part-time job later. Or open your own practice and only take a few cases. I worked part-time as a public defender when my son was little and it was a dream come true.
But you have to actually take the bar to do any of this.
No one is going to hire a sole practitioner who has never held a legal job.
Really? A bunch of my law school classmates hung out a shingle right after law school (graduated in 2010 into the peak of the recession) and some of them seem to be doing ok.
I don’t think this post is real. Why would she decide not to take the bar just because she is 8 weeks pregnant? You have gone to the trouble of going to law school, you are not sure if you will work, but you have nothing else to do, so why would you put off the bar?
Either (1) this is a troll or (2) there are other reasons this person did not want to be a lawyer and she was looking for a way out. otherwise, it makes no sense that she would just not take the bar when she has nothing to do and no reason not to . . .
I agree. Not taking the bar that early makes no sense, esp. Since if she got pregnant at that point she presumably signed up already.
Take the bar asap to get it out of the way for all the reasons already listed
+
Post-nup.
Other than that, if you want to SAH, you can afford to – why the hell not?
And in addition to/as part of the post-nup, make sure you are accumulating assets in your own name during the marriage. Spousal support and child support judgments are only worth what you can actually collect, and it’s far better to have your own assets than to be chasing his in the event of a divorce.
Take the bar! You studied and went to school for it and not taking it would be like running a marathon and deciding to not finish during the last mile.
Also, it will be good to have it under your belt! Even if you don’t work right away. Maybe you want to stay home during the early years and go to work when your child is in school. Or maybe something does happen to your husband and you need to start working yourself. Be prepared for any situation.
I say this because the life plan my husband and I had went sideways. I was supposed to be a stay at home mom and go back to school when the kids did. Plans changed and I had to start working much sooner with not much job experience. We basically had to start over. I’ve been blessed with good job opportunities, networking, and working hard and I am getting where I need to be financially and at a good job but it took time and money has been tight. I finally am at a job that will help pay for school too so I can go back hopefully soon.
It’s good to be prepared and I don’t think you will ever regret taking the bar, even if you ended up not doing anything with it.
Late to the thread, but my two cents: it sounds like you are burned out. You went from high school (where you worked hard enough to get into an Ivy), to college, then straight to law school, and then you grabbed at the first break you saw.
Life is not either SAHM or high-powered academia/career. But not taking the bar plus suggests to me that you are looking for an escape from constant pressure to achieve, rather than thoughtfully making good life choices.
Take the bar in July. Volunteer. Write a few wills and businesss incorporation documents from your living room. Your business plan is: “don’t lose money.” Gain some experience, find a mentor, make contacts, and have a back-up plan in case your husband loses his job or health, or you lose your husband. (This will also help your husband sleep better at night, because he is carrying a large psychological load.)
You need to pass the bar if nothing else. It’s too hard to go back and do that later. Then, you may find something part time or full time for a year or two, but I have seen far too many women dumped by their husbands with no means of supporting themselves. Also, it makes no sense not to get the law license after all your education. That will raise a red flag immediately with any future employers.
A comment about pushing for partner on the morning thread reminded me of a question I have been wanting to ask for a while. I’m a lawyer in Canadian big law and I see these target numbers and they are INSANE. Target at a Canadian big law firm is 1700-1800. Someone hitting 2000 is seen as a really heavy biller. When you “review and respond” to a quick email, what do you docket? Colleagues of mine have suggested that the USA targets are so different from ours because there is a different culture of how to docket. For example, when just responding to a quick email I will usually docket a 0.2. Do you guys really do it differently?
No. 6 minute increments are 6 minute increments. I think it is just a different set of expectations as to how many hours you are expected to bill in day/month/year. To hit those hours, you are either working incredibly efficiently or pulling in some nights and weekends to cover for non-billable time.
I don’t think we bill any differently. At least, I don’t. We just work late into the evenings and on weekends.
I’ve worked at firms in NY and Silicon Valley and Boston. The SV/Boston firms had a culture of not billing .1s, or not billing for quick phone calls, as a matter of course. Some of our venture clients knew this and would have 5 minute phone calls and then say, “Gotta jet.” It was annoying, but I can see from a client relations perspective that you shouldn’t bill .1s (generally, as a junior, you just eat this time). The NY firm billed for everything, but it was largely administrative and not real, because most transactions were fixed-fee anyway.
So you bill .2 (as in 12 min) to respond to a quick email? I would likely be billing 0 for that.
No that’s fair. I phrased it poorly- I also wouldn’t bill if I didn’t actually have to take the file out review something to reply.
It’s pretty insulting that your colleagues assume that American lawyers must be lying about their time. Fwiw, I generally count responding to an email as .1 unless it was pretty involved.
I agree, that’s why I didn’t believe it. If anything this thread has made me realize that I need to be more productive because even though I bring my lunch etc I struggle to bill 7.5 hours a day when I am at work for 10 hours, even though I have plenty of work to do.
I’m the anon you replied to – productivity really depends on what you’re doing. If I’m doing 10 hours of doc review, I’m billing pretty close to 100% of my time. But if I’m working on 5 different matters – particularly if I’m fielding unplanned phone calls and emails – my productivity drops a LOT, to maybe around 70%. I can’t bill the client every time I need to think my way back into whatever I was doing before I got interrupted.
Yep I think that’s my problem. I’m a litigator with a large file load and unless I am at a deposition all day I am touching a lot of files and missing a lot I think. There is also a culture of not billing for .1 so those one word emails and phone calls that interrupt what I’m doing get to me and interrupt my train of thought.
Time is time… expectations are just higher. I was typically in the office from about 9am to 7pm every weekday (generally billing about 8 hours in that 10-hour time, but sometimes less due to non-billable client development type stuff), and would often work an hour or two at home. My hours ranged from 2100/year (typical) to 2400/year (one-year horror story).
Some days you’d be in a lull and bill 2 hours, but that 6-hour balance has to come from somewhere, and it would usually be on a Sunday afternoon because some client, after sitting on a project for 2 months, decides on Friday afternoon that an agreement has to get signed NEXT WEEK before he leaves for vacation.
I wouldn’t bill for less than 0.2 (like, if I had a 5 minute call, I wouldn’t enter a 0.1 entry) but I would later “round up” another entry by the missing 0.1 — yes I kept a little tally going.
Also, seriously, 12 minutes for a quick review and respond? That makes your colleagues’ apparent opinion that Americans are overbilling a bit ironic…
Are you a lawyer? Familiar with retainer agreements? Time is billed by task in most firms and that is clearly disclosed to the client. If a task takes 5 minutes and your smallest increment is .1, you bill .1. If it’s .2, you bill .2. Then the partner decides whether to write it off, but you of course bill it.
I have timers for each of my matters on my computer. I do bill for every single thing I do, because we are instructed to do this (and if something doesn’t take six minutes, it’s a .1, but very few things take less than six minutes). I don’t bill for administrative tasks (explaining to a paralegal how I want docs organized/named, blacklining, printing). Sometimes I’ll respond to two emails in one six minute increment. But I do bill that time (if it’s six minutes to the same matter, .1). I am very serious about billing honestly because you can get called out if tasks are taking you too long. I billed 2700 hours last year (want to make partner).
Thanks for the reply. How many hours per day are you at work vs how many you bill? I need some encouragement to figure out where I am losing time.
On a busy day I will typically stop the timer for : pee breaks, to get lunch, and anything personal I do, like text my husband– so thirty minutes to an hour. I also bill about 30 mins. to the general matter for stuff like giving my time for the day before to my secretary. So if I am in the office 15 hours I will bill 13.5 of that. Things have been slow around here so today I’m going to spend 8 hours in the office and will probably bill six. I had lunch with someone, caught up on a pro bono matter, cleaned off my desk and checked some recipes on the internet, so 6/8 hours today. The key is to make every possible minute spent in the office a billable one so you can GTFO faster. For instance in general if I don’t think I have 4 hours of billable work to do I just work from home.
In my line of work, we are not billing by the hour. We are task based and that usually means making more money because we don’t have to drag things out to get more hours. Even call girls know this. It costs the same and a guy knows it so the quicker he comes the quicker she gets paid and on to the next John.
Bahahhahaha.
If I wrote down a 0.2 for responding to a quick email I assure you I’d hit a 2,000 target by October. Except partners would eventually tell me to *stop padding my time.*
You guys bill so much for an email AND you only have to bill 1,700? Sign me up.
What is your ultimate R&R weekend getaway? Assuming you have a decent chunk of money, but only 3 days to get away.
I love a good cruise! 3 day trips to the Bahamas from Port Canaveral and Miami
Three days? Assuming no travel on the days before and after, I think I’d go to the nicest possible nearby hotel, book spa services and reservations at great restaurants, and read & hang out poolside the rest of the time.
Napa Valley for a gluttonous weekend of wine tasting and dining out.
+1 to Napa
For destinations: Asheville NC for glorious spa treatments, amazing restaurants, and gorgeous mountains. The Bourbon Trail (because, well, bourbon). And I’ll third Napa (or Carmel).
For specific hotels: the Old Edwards Inn (mostly for its amaaaazing spa and phenomenal restaurants) in Highlands, NC. The Ritz Carlton at Lake Oconee (one of my most favoritest places in the world).
I don’t even think I’d travel anywhere. I’d book a luxe hotel in my home city, bring a ton of great books, and just luxuriate in an awesome bed with books and room service.
Introvert R&R for the win!
Does anyone want to do some vicarious shopping for me? I’m looking for something like a clutch/wristlet/wallet in gray that zips all the way around. It would need to hold my iPhone, small metal wallet (the size of a cigar3tte case), and keys. I don’t really need any sort of internal organization since I don’t plan on emptying my wallet.
Under $75 would be great but I’m willing to consider higher if it’s perfect.
A little bit above your price point but http://www.neimanmarcus.com/MICHAEL-Michael-Kors-Jet-Set-Large-Multifunction-Phone-Case-Pearl-Gray/prod182450216/p.prod?ecid=NMAJ84DHJLQkR4&ci_src=14110925&ci_sku=sku160210783
That’s pretty much exactly what I’m looking for. If I can’t find a cheaper one like it I think I’ll go for this. Thanks!
And here’s a cheap option: http://www.kohls.com/product/prd-2242336/apt-9-shelby-smartphone-wristlet.jsp?src=J84DHJLQkR4&utm_campaign=418159&utm_medium=affiliate&utm_source=J84DHJLQkR4&utm_content=1368647678&utm_term=15&siteID=J84DHJLQkR4-GIxhcHMXpe6Li7BbNWB05w
I’m a little concerned that the front flap part wouldn’t be big enough. There doesn’t seem to be a picture of the inside of that part. Thanks for looking for me!
If you find this pls let me know! I spent an hour on Nordstrom’s site but didn’t see anything that fit the bill.
Ok low carbers, I’m on my fourth day of basically south beach 1 and I’m sick sick sick of eggs.
I’m thinking of walking over to the burrito shop and getting a burrito bowl with no rice. Or I could go across the street and get tandoori chicken but I would really miss the naan.
What would you do?
I only ate eggs for breakfast during phase one, not during any other meals. You have to suck it up, I wouldn’t do either. You have to get over the hump. The first few days are easy, then it gets hard, then it gets easy again.
My sympathy! I agree – after 7 days I wanted to puke just from looking at eggs! Go for a burrito bowl with lots of lettuce and pico and guac. The lettuce will fill you up and the guac will give you some satiety. Keep it up! You can do it!
I’m planning on starting this next week!
I don’t like eggs – this is going to be tough for 2 weeks.
This is so stupid. Eat real food and EXERCISE.
South beach largely IS real food. For many of us “just get off your fat lazy @$$ and exercise” isn’t enough, nor is it helpful. I work out and lift weights 5 times a week, I try to make sure I hit 10,000 steps a day so I know I wasn’t a lazy slave to my desk, and I still have to be diligent about tracking my intake or not only do I not lose weight, I gain in.
If you have no experience with this, go away. Geez.
Well I did the Indian food and regretted it. The tandoori chicken was fine (skinless chicken marinated in yogurt seems about as SB as you can get) but the side of spinach they gave me in lieu of rice upset my stomach. It was probably cooked in a ton of ghee.
But while I was sitting there I realized that the Greek joint across the street serves salads with meat, which is perfect, so next time!
Does anyone have any insight or experience with investing through peer-to-peer lending such as Lending Club?
I want to bake a delicious dessert over the weekend. Anyone have any pinterest worthy recipes? Preferences for chocolate or something that makes me think of spring. I may bring it to a bookclub type group meeting to enjoy with the group, so something share-able would be great.
Nytimes Chocolate Clementine Cake
Smitten kitchen my favourite brownies. I have made them probably 50 times. Easy and one bowl. Every single person asks for the recipe.
I am going to attempt Smitten Kitchen’s Blood Orange Ricotta Almond cake this weekend. It looks really pretty.
I don’t have a link to a recipe, but the components of my dessert are all basic and Google-able.
Cream puffs (fairly easy & super impressive). Fill with either high quality ice cream or vanilla pastry cream (home made is awesome) with whipped cream folded in. Top the cream puffs with a chocolate glaze/chocolate ganache. So yummy. One of my favourite things to make if I want to impress a little.
If you want chocolate, holy hell, try this: http://www.jaysbakingmecrazy.com/2015/04/29/ultimate-fudgy-brownies/
My mom’s exact words were “never make that again” because we indulged like CRAZY. So good. And because they’re rich I cut them into super tiny bites so one batch is very shareable!
Beatty’s Chocolate Cake (food network). I usually pair it with America’s Test Kitchen’s caramel cake frosting and it’s always a hit.
I want to make the NY Times cardamom cream cake. So pretty. Or I’d do macarons, which strike me as spring-like. They are not that hard to make, just make sure to stabilize your whites.
These are my favorite super rich and chocolate brownies. http://www.allthosedetails.com/jennifers-triple-chocolate-brownies/#more-440
They aren’t very spring like but definitely get requested at gatherings.
I have made triple layer brownies that have a green mint layer in them. I don’t have the recipe in front of me but they were easy to find on Pinterest.
I have a job interview for what must be a competitive in-house position next week. I have a good firm job, but I don’t see myself as partner material so I am looking at what else is out there. I have 2 young kids and a supportive spouse. Do I studiously avoid mentioning the kids in the interview? I can hardly imagine 3 minutes of small talk where they don’t come up, so it would have to be a conscious decision to avoid it if the interview is at all friendly.
You can’t make 3 min of professional small talk w/o mentioning your kids?? Frankly I’d stay away from mentioning them at least in round 1 of a competitive in house process — esp if it’s in a competitive industry like finance or the like. Many in house counsel dislike the whole tone of — I don’t want to work biglaw hours and I have kids, so I need a work life job; they aren’t always work life and that’ll get you nixed right there. Now some in house gigs are work life. But if you don’t know which yours is going in, err on the side on not mentioning kids right off the bat. People assume that women with kids need flexibility, sick days for kids, leaving early for girl scouts days etc. — I mean some men/women want this too, but when kids are mentioned by a woman right off the bat, assumptions are made and if you’re up against some men/women who aren’t parents, some unconscious biases may lead to you not getting the gig even if you’re equally qualified.
Ummm what? Yes avoid mentioning them!!! You should be able to handle three minutes of professional small talk.
You should be able to manage small talk without mentioning your kids. If you think this will be hard, preplan a couple lines which include a reference to the supportive spouse and a transition to another topic.
I have mentioned my children precisely once during a job application process, when I was negotiating a start date and wanted to push it out by 2 weeks so that it would be after the end of the school year so we could all move together.
To clarify, I *can* engage in small talk without mentioning my kids, but it may have to be a bright line in my own mind. For instance, if someone asked me right now what my weekend plans are, the honest answer is going to the playground and zoo and working during naptime. But how far do I take it? No mention no matter what? I live in the burbs, so they might have already guessed from the address on my resume.
Do people really ask about weekend plans at interviews, even in the small talk breaks? And are there no childless people in the suburbs? More to the point, no one cares what you’re really doing on the weekend: “taking care of errands and/or things around the house” seems like a perfectly acceptable answers
I haven’t interviewed for an in house job, but just about every job I’ve interviewed for asks about my interests outside of work. They want to know that you’re a human being who will be pleasant to work with, not an emotionless robot who can’t talk about anything other than work.
What are your weekend plans? Spending time with friends.
Do you have children? Yes, two.
In other words, don’t lie. But don’t bring it up. This might take some practice. (It would for me, too!)
Technically, I believe they’re not allowed to ask you about your family at all in an interview.
I wouldn’t bring it up unless everyone else is gushing about their own kids (which seems unlikely). Otherwise it’s impossible to gauge how that info would be received; you won’t have enough time to figure out whether it would be a pro or a con in relating to these people and the office culture.
That’s a common misconception – they’re allowed to ask, they just can’t make it the basis of the hiring decision.
“nothing big this weekend, which is sometimes the best plans possible! What about you?”
Yep, this is what I say. “No plans, which are the best kinds of plans!”
I hate when people say this. It’s such a conversation stopper. It’s like in improve comedy, you never say “no,” you say “yes, and…”
Not to mention there are people who find this sad. (I am not one of them; I love doing nothing.)
“Oh, nothing dramatic. Catching up on some work, then spending time with the family.”
I am in house. When we interview prospective new hires, those of us with kids mention our family/kids. We know an interviewee does not need to disclose anything, but we think it’s weird when someone is totally mum on the subject matter but we know or find out they have kids. Life happens and we want to work with well-rounded, reasonable people. No need for them to hide anything, that always makes us wonder… if someone said this weekend they were going to the zoo and catching up on work during naptime, it would go over well with me. Based on my experience, I think most people who are in house have kids.
By that same token, I’ve recently started interviewing here and there myself. I always mention my kids if there’s an appropriate opening. Just once, unless the conversation warrants further discussion. It’s easy and natural because when parents are talking with other parents, family/kids come up. But I also know I don’t want to work anywhere where kids are looked down upon.
I’m going to buck conventional wisdom here. When I was interviewing for in-house positions I always mentioned my kid at some point. It certainly wasn’t the focus of the conversation, but for me, any job that wouldn’t hire me because I had a kid was not any place I wanted to work. I was in the fortunate position of not needing to make a move quickly and was very focused on finding a workplace that was a good fit. For me, this includes co-workers who understand that parents are still capable of doing demanding and interesting work, but who also don’t freak out if you have to take a day to pick up a sick kid or attend a school conference.
There’s a lot of Big Life Changes that may or may not happen in the next 1.5 years, and after a certain point, I simply have no control after whether these things happen or not. Think: career prospects, moving to another city, relationships, basically life.
How do you ladies deal with uncertainty? For some reason, this period of uncertainty is so much worse than previous periods. I’m freaking out and it’s just making me miserable. Any methods to help me focus on today and actually enjoy my life while I’m living it?
I struggle a lot with uncertainty and the tactic I’ve taken lately is to have a gratitude journal. It’s nothing fancy – I write 3 things I’m thankful for every day and try not to repeat the same things for 30 days (sometimes I fudge that rule). But you can make it more elaborate – make a tumblr account or buy a fancy journal or something. Try it out for a week and see if it helps.
Breathe, divide your day up into small increments, and get through one increment at a time focusing on doing/completing what’s in front of you. Sort of like in Kimmy Schmidt: if you can get through the next 10seconds without panicking, you can get through the next 10seconds.
Also, giving myself some forgiveness and kindness — like requesting constant hugs from SO to keep me calm, calling my sister nightly so I can hear my one-yearold nephew babble, little constant things that make you happy when everything is uncertain.
I also like to flow chart and write down all my anxieties to organize them : makes it easier to handle.
I am in a phase of my life where everything is out of my control. I had everything planned out and started executing towards the end of 2014. However everything came crashing down in a week, I was truly miserable. I had to take a job which I didn’t really like just to not go out of my work visa status, I had worked so hard for a couple of years to make a career transition which didn’t happen due to the rush in which I had to take a job, my husband lost his job and had to take a job two hours away from me again just to maintain visa status, wanted to start TTC, we couldn’t do that either. I was depressed all of last year. I just did enough to keep my job and let everything slide. I didn’t beat myself up for not cleaning the house, not working out, not excelling at work, not dressing well and what not. I was just very very sad with the way it felt.
I am pretty career oriented and didn’t mind giving up a lot to achieve my career goals. But everything felt so meaningless. I could be something today and tomorrow, I could be nothing. I felt so out of control. I was constantly worried, all sorts of disturbing thoughts came to my mind (like what is the next thing that can hit me) and I just couldn’t stop my mind from thinking. I couldn’t sleep well because I couldn’t stop thinking. I was always tired. So I wanted to try meditation and started looking for youtube videos, specifically videos by Buddhist monks as I consider them the masters in this area and came across videos by Buddhist Society of Western Australia.
It really gave me new perspective on life. I don’t take life so seriously anymore. I have accepted that life is uncertain and anything can happen at any moment. So appreciate this moment that you have. Because that is the only thing that is real. Just do whatever you have to do at this moment and stop thinking about past and future. I appreciate my life so much more now. I don’t worry much about future at all. I treasure the time I have with my family, because you don’t know what is going to happen tomorrow.
The other thing that I decided was to spend lot of time volunteering. I just felt the only meaningful thing you can do in this life that certainly gives you happiness is to help others. So I spend any time watching TV knitting baby sweaters and hats (I learnt knitting last year just to keep my mind from thinking) so that I can donate them. I also donated quite a bit last year to local food banks, schools etc. I am also planning to volunteer at homeless women’s shelter. Every time I donate something, I am reminded of the privileged life I have for which I am truly grateful.
After one year, my situation is still the same. I am at a job that I didn’t want to take, my husband and I stay together only on the weekends, and no TTC yet. But I am much more at peace and happier.
I swear by meditation and the Buddhist practice of living in the present moment without regard to the past or future. I’ve been meditating for nearly 2 years and it’s my favorite time of day. And like you, I’ve achieved a peace of mind I never had before. I’ve taught my hubby and several other people to meditate and they love it.
I’m late to this, but a couple of years ago when I was going through my divorce, everything was totally up in the air and none of it was in my control, so I decided to find something I could control and make it happen. So I got a tummy tuck! LOL It kept my nice and distracted for several months (and by “distracted,” I mean “ouch!!”), it gave me something to look forward to (flat tummy for the win!), and it helped keep my mind off the legal horribleness with the ex. I’m certainly not recommending you do the same, but maybe taking on some project? Training for a marathon? Writing a novel? Learning a language?
And also, I have to admit, I obsessively did spread sheets and scenarios and made plans for all possible outcomes. None of that was particularly productive but it kept my anxiety at bay a little…
In a city without a Nordstrom, where would you go to get a bra fitting? Things have changed since pregnancy and completing a year of nursing, and I’d like some help. Would rather not spend a ton but open to it for an everyday bra. TIA!
Google specialty fitting stores in your area. If no good options, and if you can swing the short term credit card hit, I would honestly just order a bunch of bras in a variety of sizes and styles online from Nordstrom. That’s what I did with nursing bras – ordered 8 and kept three. Don’t go to VS.
Search for reddit abrathatfits, follow their directions for measuring. Punch those numbers into their calculator and that should provide a good guide for what size (assuming that it’s a new size) you should order. Then order a variety of styles in the recommended sizes.
Am I the only one that finds some of measuring suggestions there to be really weird? I don’t understand the point of measuring your circumference while bending over 90 degrees unless you plan on walking around on all fours all the time. Maybe there is something I’m missing.
Bending forward makes sure that you include in the cup all of the breast tissue (which, if you are large chested, you might write off as armpit fat or some other such thing). It can be the difference of a cup size (or more) and ensures that your band is appropriately tight with the spacer flush against your chest.
Going to a specialty lingerie shop is a helpful experience. Not always fun — I have had my boobs manhandled by a variety of women over time. But particularly for a busty person, the right size bra is more comfortable and takes pounds/inches off your silhouette.
When I’m fitted at Intimacy in NYC (now Rigby & Peller), they always have me lean over while putting the bra on so that everything winds up in the cup.
Anyone else take a bar exam this week? I cannot wait for the weekend, when I can finally enjoy having even a modicum of free time back!!! (I was working full time and studying on nights / weekends.) This weekend, I will be doing two things — sleeping in and watching mindless television. And I’m so very excited about those plans!!!!
congrats on taking the bar, I’m sure you did great! enjoy your weekend.
I did. I think I failed even though I had a few weeks off work to study. I just didn’t have time to study a bunch of the subjects and then of course the essay questions were all those subjects. Oh well, I’m on vacay now and eating and drinking ALL THE THINGS.
Can anyone comment on the quality and comfort of Saks “Made in Italy” brand for shoes? Is it markedly better than their regular Saks brand? Looking to purchase theEmma Leather T-Strap Point Toe Pumps (link to follow)
http://www.saksoff5th.com/emma-leather-t-strap-point-toe-pumps/0400087420332.html
I think that’s their outlet brand.
Speaking of a uncertainty, I’ve just received a job offer to work in a mid-size regional law firm doing med mal (yay!) But it would essentially be a lateral move from my government office (doing interesting general litigation) and many more hours/less time off. My supervisors and bosses were all partners at large firms before they came here. My mentor’s old firm might an opening and if that pans out, that would be ideal. But its so uncertain.
So, what would you do? Would you gamble by staying in your current not-terrible job and apply for better opportunities, or do I take a decent opportunity even that’s not exactly what I want? I’m young, early in my career, have only ever worked in this government office, no kids, and planning to get married in 2 years (fwiw).
Med mal defense or plaintiff? If defense, I’ve done it, I wouldn’t recommend it over a government job. Med mal defense bills are paid by insurance companies. Insurance companies, at least for the most part, are stingy and strict with billing guidelines (though one I worked for was actually pretty great). I did a lot of work essentially for free because they didn’t want to pay more than X time, and yet I needed to spend more time than that to properly defend the doctor, and I spent a lot of time justifying billing that got bounced back by their automatic system (like, “explain why this letter took more than 0.1”). The work was interesting, but it wasn’t worth it (especially for what I got paid).
Med mal defense. It’s supposed to be half business litigation but I suspect that’s just to woo me. What I’m concerned that I’ll be trapped in med mal world once I enter it — I truly dislike the PI work I do now, so I worry that med mal will be similar. But I do want I spend some time in private practice and not stay in this office forever.
What do you dislike about the PI work? I’ve never done PI, so can’t comment on how similar they would be. But I suspect not very similar, honestly.
What’s the compensation difference? I’m a govt lawyer in Canada and here compensation almost always includes a defined benefit pension plan whereas private sector is generally defined contribution at most. There’s a significant value in an indexed defined benefit pension plan. Compare total compensation not just salary dollars.
Firm culture around actually taking vacation is a huge difference that I’ve heard from colleagues who left private practice. Plus no billable hours/business development in govt. YMMV.
The salary itself is higher at the firm. Once you factor in retirement and healthcare, it’s exactly the same. I do want to try out private practice but I’m not sure this is the right offer.
Speaking from experience as a 3rd year associate who just left my mid size law firm that specialized in med mal. I would absolutely not take it, especially because you call it a decent opportunity but not a dream job. Also, you are happy enough with your current job and it isn’t a pay raise.
– More hours (do NOT underestimate this. Billable hours are THE WORST)
– Less vacation
– Same pay
– Not your dream job
= Don’t take it
(by “isn’t a pay raise” I am referencing your point that after healthcare etc. it is the same).
Also, more money for more hours doesn’t equal a pay raise either. In fact, if you are working more for the same net salary after benefits are factored in, you’re getting paid less, no?
I would say no. Also, why do you want to work in private practice? Just because?
Ditto. I just went from a similar defense firm job to a government job and couldn’t be more pleased with the change. Billable hours are literally the worst.
I just had to tell someone without it sounding like bragging – I have been trying to move laterally from my big, management consulting firm (I’m miserable with the work/life balance, location away from my siblings and am convinced it is not for me) to a small, really stable consulting firm in the specific domain I’m interested in and I just got the job!!! I’m SO excited! After signing, the HR person I was speaking let slip that there were over 150 applicants and they picked ME! My pay is going down ~12.5% but my hours are going from 65/week to 40/week and I am thrilled to move from LA to SF. I’m so thrilled.
Congratulations!!
That’s awesome – congratulations!
Congratulations! And welcome home to SF it sounds like!
First – Congrats! Awesome that you found something that will make you happy.
Second – Would you mind sharing more about your experience? How long did you work for this firm? Did your experience differ from your expectations? I’m going into consulting this summer after business school. I know to expect long hours and lots of travel, and I think it’ll mesh well with my personality, but I’d love to hear your thoughts on the job!
Can someone educate me on the post-nup mentioned upthread? My husband and I are planning to start TTC soon and it’s highly likely that I will give up my six-figure job to stay home for a few years while our kids are young. We are happily married now, but I’m the daughter of a SAHM who got burned by a divorce after 20+ years of marriage, so I’d like to avoid being in that situation. My husband and I decided against a prenup because neither of us came into the marriage with significant assets (thanks to school debt), but my husband’s income alone now puts us well into the “1%”.
What’s typically included in a post-nup? Do they hold up in divorce court? What’s the process of drafting one like? FWIW, we are in a community property state.
Talk to a lawyer. I know that’s not the response you were looking for, but no one here can give you accurate advice without knowing what jurisdiction you’re in and the particulars of your situation. You need a lawyer, not the internet.
Any suggestions for how to find a lawyer?
Ask your friends/family/colleagues for a family law or trusts/estates attorney they recommend. Ask a lawyer you know/trust in a different field for who they recommend.
Definitely talk to a lawyer. If you want to be a SAHM and it’s a mutual decision then your post nup should account for that and not require you to go back to work in case of divorce.
Agree you need to see an attorney. I think in many if not all jurisdictions they are invalid unless both sides have their own representation.
What you would essentially be doing is laying out the property settlement in advance.
Do you live in a community property state? If yes, then you are oging to be entitled to half of what he earned during the marriage
Yes but even so, as I mentioned upthread, a postnup can address other issues including having assets put in your name during the marriage, and determining spousal support on the front end, while you still like one another, rather than on the back end while you are fighting.
It will be imperative that you each have counsel, of course.
I would love to hear from some of you that have raised a puppy. DH and I are planning to adopt a in the next few months, and we’re pretty set on getting a young dog. There is a great puppy-specific rescue in our area.
DH works from home and travels alternating weeks, so he’s here half the time. I have a pretty flexible school schedule, but do have usually 1, sometimes 2, days per week that I’m gone 13 hours with no option of coming back during the day. This would mean that there is about one day every 2 weeks the puppy would be alone (in a crate) for a 13-hour period.
Is this OK? We would be crate training anyways, and would obviously have pads for the puppy to go on during those days, and food/water/etc. Just wanted to hear everyone’s thoughts. If it made a difference, I could switch those 13-hour periods to be overnight if necessary.
It is ok. But it will make house training the dog a little bit more difficult. Ideally during house training someone will be available to let the puppy out every 2-3 hours at most. If it’s a high energy breed you may want to spend extra time exercising/stimulating the puppy the day before his long crate day and leave him with toys he can chew on while you’re gone.
Could you hire someone to stop by your house once or twice on the long day every 2 weeks?
You’ll get lots of advice about this, but yes, your puppy will be fine. The fact that you’re concerned and thinking about this indicates you’ll be great puppy parents.
Yikes. 13 hours in a crate is not good. Defecating where it sleeps is something that is psychologically against most puppies’ natures in the first place, so is going to cause it a lot of stress, and the ultimate outcome is that you are going to be training your dog to go potty in its crate, which is going to make housebreaking/crate training really, really hard. Not to mention that 13 hours in a crate without a break is mind-numbingly boring and the lack of exercise or mental stimulation for that long is just harsh.
I don’t know if I would tell you not to do it, necessarily, since it is only every other week, but I would really try to find a neighbor or local kid you could hire to come in during those days and play with your puppy and take it outside on those days. Seems like you should be able to find a trustworthy person you could pay $20 every other week for a puppy play visit! (If you were close to me I’d volunteer, I love puppies!)
Puppies can generally only “hold it” for as many hours +1 as they are old in months (so 2 month old puppy, 3 hours of holding it, 3 month old puppy, 4 hours of holding it). Once they are 7-8 months old, they generally have the same ability as an adult dog to hold it. My concern about the 13 hour thing is that one of the goals of crate-training is to teach the dog not to soil its crate (because that is its home). If you leave a puppy in its crate 13 hours, it will soil it and this will create negative associations and could cause house breaking problems.
Honestly, I don’t even leave my adult (small breed) dog home for 13 hours straight. I think that is a bit long. Overnight, adult dogs are usually good not to go out for 12 hours, but puppies tend not to have their day/night routine figured out yet.
I think you need to get a dog walker/puppy sitter to come at least twice during the 13 hours days. Since its only one day every few weeks, its not a huge cost, and it’ll be worth it so crate training and house training are successful.
Yeah, this is pretty much the opposite of how to handle crate training.
I would look for a neighborhood kid to help out on those days. Also is there any way you could just leave the pup outside in a backyard? That is just an awfully long time to be left in a create. Would he survive? Yes, but paying a neighborhood kid $10 a week to let him out once at play with him would be worth it over time. Especially because then you have someone your dog knows to take care of him for weekend aways and such.
aside from the questionable ethics of crate training, you can’t leave your dog in a box for 13 hours. Please don’t adopt a dog. You don’t have the resources for it (time.) This is so cruel. My heart goes out to your hypothetical dog. :(
I’m sure our future dog appreciates your concern. I asked this question here because I want to avoid doing something cruel, as we would never do so on purpose. I actually think we’ll be great dog owners, and we’ve waiting several years, for the right time, to get one. There are many, many people that already own dogs who I’m sure are actually cruel.
Yea, OP, ignore that nonsense. It is not ideal to keep a puppy in a crate for 13 hours once every two weeks, and I’m sure you’ll consider reasonable and practical options to avoid having to do that. But there are very few pet owners who haven’t had the occasional situation arise where their pet is stuck inside longer than they expected and had an accident. Your dog will not be traumatized for life.
IDK, a puppy that is crated for 13 hours is going to have more than an accident. It’s going to have (depending on age) 3-4 accidents, and have to sit in a dirty space. Having an occasional situation arise where this happens is different than having the plan be to crate a puppy for 13 hours. I wouldn’t crate my adult dog for 13 hours.
Before you get a puppy, I highly recommend reading a few books so you know how to prepare. You’ll get much better advice than asking a website like this. I recommend Before & After Getting Your Puppy by Dr Ian Dunbar or The Puppy Primer by Patricia McConnell, but there are lots of great books and I’m sure your library has some too. If you want to be prepared for your new dog, just read a book written by an expert.
You don’t get that many second chances with a puppy (who may develop fears or bad behaviors because of something you did inadvertently) and those first few months are critical. It’s really hard to correct bad behavior that the dog has learned. This will help you get it right the first time and know what you need to do to handle long days, how to properly crate train, etc.
So many dogs end up in shelters because their owners never properly socialized or trained them. I love my rescue dog to death but deconditioning her fear of other dogs, people, cars, etc., takes an enormous amount of time and effort. She’d be so much happier if she had never developed these fears to begin with.
You need to hire a dogsitter/walker or just not adopt a dog yet, I think. You’re almost there but your lifestyle doesn’t quite work.
Thank you for your (mostly) helpful responses! We can certainly either hire someone to come a few times on those days, or take him/her to daycare. I suspected 13 hours was much too long, but wanted to make sure.
I have not heard about the questionable ethics of crate training, I’ve only heard it spoken of positively from dog owners.
The fact that you’re this close to wanting to get a puppy and still weren’t sure whether leaving it in a crate for 13 hours would be much too long suggests to me that you haven’t done your research or just don’t have the common sense to care for a pet.
Thank you for your (mostly) helpful responses! We can certainly either hire someone to come a few times on those days, or take him/her to daycare. I suspected 13 hours was much too long, but wanted to make sure.
I have not heard about the questionable ethics of crate training, I’ve only heard it spoken of positively from dog owners.
Yes, I’m sure the dog owners are totally fine leaving their animal in a box while they go about their lives, then take it out when it serves their purposes. The dog in a box, on the other hand, probably feels differently. And I’ve heard the “dogs love it!” BS before. Dogs don’t love being in a box. Those are the questionable ethics of crate training.
We create trained our dog as a puppy, and as he grew into an adult we started leaving him out as we found he really never got into anything. He really did like his crate. He often took naps in it, and if there was a lot of activity in the house he would use it to ‘get away’. Why would he go in there for comfort if there were other beds/couches for use if he didn’t find it more pleasing? We eventually got rid of the create because we never used it, but he definitely liked “being in a box”. When he wasn’t in his crate he was under my mom’s chair int he kitchen.
Our dog came to us crate-trained, but we don’t actually use his crate for confinement, and haven’t since around day two when we realized he is not the type to eff things up in our absence. That said, I think he’d be pretty pissed at us if we took his crate away – he sleeps in it (with the door open) every night, and will run in there when there’s a weird noise or too many people in our house. I’ve never encountered any evidence that crate-training is harmful, if the crate is appropriately sized for the dog and it’s not being overused or used as punishment.
My mom has a 3 month old rat terrier, and if she wasn’t crate-training him, she’d never be able to leave her house (or use the restroom without the puppy being present) again, because he’s apparently hard-wired to do the most dangerous thing he can think of when left to his own devices for more than 2.5 seconds, and he has literally chewed on the wall when he couldn’t come up with anything better to do – crating him protects him from his own bad ideas. (And I don’t think there’s a way to “puppy-proof a room” when one of the risks to the puppy is literally the wall itself, but apparently letting a dog eat sheetrock is preferable to leaving him “in a box.”)
Dogs also don’t love when they eat something they shouldn’t that they find (pieces of carpet, bits of house molding, the bottoms of pieces of furniture). They don’t love it when someone breaks in, lets them out, and they get lost on the street. They don’t love it when they knock something over or find something new to be scared of (maybe my dog is the only one that sees a box on a table or a light fixture and thinks it’s a monster). There are a lot of things dogs don’t love. Putting them in a crate for a few hours a day for a few years of their life while they are slowly trusted with more and more time out of the crate alone (so as to confirm that they will not eat the carpet/molding/plastic containers they knock off the counters) is sometimes the best option.
That said, 13 hours is too much for a puppy. The one hour per months old thing stated above is a good benchmark. Hopefully by the time the dog’s bladder can handle being alone that long, the dog can handle being trusted in a larger space.
To Please Don’t get a Dog: Gosh, you must live on a 100 acre farm with unlimited space for your dog to run around but also have unlimited time for you and your dog to have structured and disciplined walks. I bet your dog is a Best in Show, agility winning, bird hunting, seeing-eye, bomb-sniffing dog that can count to 1000!
What an amazing and perfect dog owner you must be to cast judgment on everyone else for approaching dog ownership differently than you!
Actually I am not a dog owner, because I choose to forego the pleasure of owning a dog rather than get a dog I don’t have the resources to care for properly and instead selfishly stuff in a box that I’ve convinced myself the dog ‘likes’ whenever I am not around as though it were chattel. But you keep telling yourself the dog loves being locked in a box for hours at a time.
By your logic, what is the appropriate amount of free time one should have to get a dog? Does someone need to be a SAHP to the dog? And since clearly no one in this thread meets your dog care standards since we have all (I think) admitted to crate training, where should our dogs live instead? Is there a rescue that saves dogs from homes they’re already in because they go in crates and are alone sometimes? The rescues in my area all seem to focus on rescuing strays and abuse/neglect victims and puppy mill and dog fighting cast offs, but perhaps there’s a “save dogs from occasionally being crated and alone in homes where they’re very much wanted and cared for” rescue that I’m missing?
Yeah, something like how the people who are most sure of the correct way to parent are people who don’t have kids….
Drawing on your flawless analogy, anonymama (you are quite the rhetorician!) it’s quite all right to lock your children in a box when you leave them alone for most of your waking hours. They like it, even!
My dog wouldn’t do it. I wish she would, but she wouldn’t. But that’s a bridge you can cross when you come to it. I think we had someone come at least once in the middle of the day until she was 2…
Why are you so set on a puppy? You honestly sound like you’d do better with an adult dog, which you wouldn’t have to crate so strictly on the long days you’re talking about.
We adopted a five year old dog a few months ago, and on the few days per week when we both have to go into the office (total time away is about 10 hours), we are able to leave him in an 8×8 pen instead of a tiny crate, so he has plenty of room for a nice soft bed, wee wee pads, and food and water to be left with him, and half the time when we come home he’s sleeping quietly, having appropriately used his pads in our absence. In contrast, my mom adopted a puppy at the same event where we adopted our guy, and she recently tried leaving him alone in a similar-sized pen for about 2 hours while she went out to dinner, and not only was it chaos upon her return, it set him back about 2 weeks in the housetraining process.
Puppies are worse than newborn babies on the care-required front – they have all the same needs, plus they’re fully mobile. Between seeing how easy it’s been to integrate our adult dog into our house, and watching my mom (who is semi-retired and has tons of time, and has raised half a dozen dogs before this one) struggle with her puppy, I can honestly say I will probably never consider a puppy again. Puppies are adorable, and I get that there’s a certain romance of “OHMYGOSH we RAISED it from a BABY!” but honestly? It takes months or sometimes years, depending on breed, to turn a puppy into a good doggy citizen, and that’s without figuring out logistics around leaving the puppy unsupervised for 13 hour stretches at random intervals.
I was going to suggest something similar. Or perhaps a 6 month old rescue- almost all the benefits of the puppy, but skipping the letting out every 2 hours. We adopted at 5 months when we were out of the house for 10-11 hours/day. DH came home at lunch and we had a dog walker at 3pm. Dog was created in the interim.
Around 6-7 months, once we were confident in his housebroken-ness, he was confined to the kitchen while we were gone, and the dog walker came 1x/day. We sometimes mixed up daycare for dog walker.
I’d caution you esp with a puppy to choose the breed wisely. Ours was a high energy type mutt who really needed a good hour of exercise per day. That’s a lot after working 13 hours and coming home at 6:30pm (which is why we switched to daycare). I ended up switching to working from home which really helped things. Without that, it really wouldn’t have been great for the dog.
If I had a total do-over, I’d have adopted a 4-5 year old dog, which is what we have now :-)
Same – my 5 year old dog is so much better than she was at 4 months when we adopted. I’ll skip straight to a 5 year old next time, but you never could’ve convinced me of that when I was adopting. She also had about $10,000 in medical bills that we could’ve skipped if we adopted a 5 year old.
100% agree with KKH. Don’t get a puppy. You don’t have the lifestyle for one. Adult dogs are wonderful. We adopted a four year old dog and she bonded to us instantly and definitely thinks I’m her “mommy.” But she can hold her bladder for 10 or more hours, doesn’t chew on crap, and doesn’t have endless energy. It’s perfect and my desire to get a puppy is completely gone.
I have had the same experience. If do you insist on getting a puppy, I suggest you get a puppy play pen instead of crating him/her all day. S/he will have enough room to move around that it won’t feel all that confining, and won’t be sitting in its own urine and feces all day. Also definitely get a dog walker.
It will really depend on the dog, but 13 hours is a really long time to leave a dog in a crate and I certainly wouldn’t do it on a weekly basis. And it would be cruel if you’re actually getting a puppy and not an adult dog with a mature bladder and house training. Hire a dog walker (adult dog) or do doggy day care (puppy or adult dog) for the 13 hour days.
Investigate dog training and needs. Are you really prepared to take care of a dog? Dogs need a lot of care and activity. You need to be realistic about the time and energy you’re willing to devote to the dog (daily walks, training, etc.). You can’t just leave them home in a crate for long periods of time. Even low energy dogs will develop problems if they’re left alone in a crate most of the time. Do not set your dog up for failure because you didn’t understand what was necessary to care for it. Most people who work full time or long hours either use doggy day care or dog walkers.
Where do you live? What about dog daycare?
13 hours is much too long for a puppy, or adult dog, to be in a crate. Can you take the puppy to doggie daycare on those days?
You’ve gotten some good advice. 13 hours is waaaay too long for an adult dog to be alone, and worse for a puppy. I am a big fan of crate training and we used it successfully with our puppy (who is now 3.5 years old and an amazing dog). I think it’s great that you and your partner will be around so much except for those 13 hour days. Key things:
1) The days you’re away, and the dog is still a puppy, have someone come in at least twice a day to let the dog out. Ideally more if the puppy is very young. For context – we would be away for 8 hours, and someone came in twice during that time for the first 5-6 months (now once a day for walks). It’s expensive, but the person we got became the dog walker and was really big on training and getting to know the dog when he visited and it was so worth it. IMO, putting in the training and time investment with a puppy results in a super easy adult dog. Once the puppy is a bit older, you could also consider doggy daycare. It’s not that much more expensive than a dog walker, and then your dog would have stimulation all day.
2) Don’t put your puppy in a situation where it will be forced to soil its crate. The crate is safe place, it’s their home, and forcing it to go in the crate will defeat that. YMMV but we kept the puppy in a crate in the kitchen during the day (our room at night), and then slowly progressed to keeping the crate door open (but the kitchen door blocked), then the kitchen to the living room, then the whole main floor etc. We got rid of the crate around 1 year. In the early days, dog walker let the dog in and out of the crate pre-and post walks.
Enjoy! A dog is so.much.work but so incredibly worth it.
No, a puppy absolutely cannot be left alone for 13 hours. If the only solution is having the puppy alone in a crate for 13 hours, your situation is not conducive to having a puppy.
That being said, my husband and I rescued a 10 week old puppy who was born in a shelter when we both had very demanding jobs. Our solutions to this type of issue were: I went in to work at 7 am, DH would go in later at 9:30 so he could take pup out mid morning. I would stop home at lunch at noon (lived around the corner from the office) to play with the puppy and let her out. A dog walker came at 3 to take the puppy out and play with her and then I got home at 6.
Puppies tend to have multiple short bursts of energy throughout the day and then sleep a lot. Our puppy was perfectly happy snoozing in a contained part of the kitchen while we were gone as long as she got multiple 30 minute play times and bathroom breaks during the day. She went to the bathroom and least 4 times during the course of 13 hours when she was a baby.
I don’t mean to get on a soapbox, but really think about whether you’re able/willing to be a responsible dog owner. If you are adopting a puppy, you are going to take its cutest, most likely to adopted months. If you don’t give it the time/attention it deserves, it will have problems being potty trained and will be destructive and anxious. If you return a dog once it is out of the puppy stage because you can’t manage it, chances are high the adult dog will be down. To me, that is inexcusable. I think you can have a demanding schedule and take great care of a dog, but you have to be willing to pay to outsource, especially during the high maintenance puppy months.
Can I ask a really dumb question? I have been reading and commenting on this site for years and I DO NOT KNOW what “DH” stands for. I know it’s usually the significant-other-man, but I have been reading it as “Da Husband” in my head. Enough is enough.
DH = Dear Husband (or at least that’s how I have been using it…)
Dear Husband
I have always found the internet practice of “DH, DB, DS, etc.” to be a bit weird. I love “Da Husband”. I’m going to read it this way from now on.
PS LOL! (what i have titled myself for this comment) means laugh out loud. ;)
Yes, it’s really corny! Though I think it’s better than hubby
Hubby is godawful. It makes my skin crawl.
True story (that totally outs me to anyone I know): I quit a job because among other reasons my supervisor erroneously assumed I would be happy with his decision to bait and switch my role and work location “because you’ll get to work with your hubby there.” Annoying to begin with, but the “hubby” pushed it over the edge. Other things too, but that comment on the first day got things off to a pretty bad start.
I love “da husband” I’m reassigning the acronym in my head now.
“Hubs” is even worse. I HATE “HUBS” / “THE HUBS”. It is so terrible. (Almost as bad as “Nordie’s,” lol).
I’m the one who used DH in the comment thread above, but now I’m going to start referring to him as “da husband”. That’s hilarious.
Da husband is hilarious.
And here’s Kat’s posting on the acronyms and euphemisms you’ll see here (in case you’re also wondering about JSFAMO or LGP).
https://corporette.com/vocabulary-and-acronyms/
Does anyone actually use “JSFAMO”?
Actually, yes; you see in posts pretty frequently, usually but not always relating to relationship advice. And I say it in my head all the time . .
*you see it in posts
JSFAMO is in urban dictionary too
I couldnt figure it out either so for some reason, I’ve been reading it as “Da Hubby” lol
I used to read this bolg* a while ago and there was a woman that was very active in every single thread- TK and a few other letters or something similar was her handle. I remember thinking it was really mean when some people were commenting about how she talked too much or why she had to be in every thread, I mean, plenty of people comment a lot. Is this why she doesn’t comment any more? if so that’s too bad.
TCFKAG. I miss her, and some others, too . . .
TCFKAG is on Tumblr, as are some others who used to be very active (such as Ru and Kanye East).
Also TCFKAG=”The Commenter Formerly Known as Guest,” which is the only way I can remember all those letters.
Same here, I miss these ladies and Ru’s color combo suggestions
How is she doing? (I realize this is such a random thing to ask about an internet stranger, but I liked her and would have no idea how to find her on Tumblr!)
http://tcfkag.tumblr.com/ I think
http://tcfkag.tumblr.com/
Someone had a hate tumblr (a slam tumblr?) about the commenters here, maybe it was one of the tumblr users who left?
Some of the disappearances may be the effect of the Mean Girls syndrome, some of it might be people just get busy, some might be that people find they just don’t care to comment much anymore. I know Ru is still lurking at least – she posted in response to the Uniqlo modesty fashion line. (Hi, Ru!) I know I’ve disappeared for a solid couple of months when work or school got insane. But yes, it feels weird but absolutely true that rando internet strangers go missing and you wonder where they are and miss them.
Hi OP, Gail the Goldfish let me know that people were asking about how I was doing. The very short answer is that I’m okay but that I have felt moved to read or comment here in awhile. Part of the reason is almost certainly my health; I spend 130 days in the hospital this past year including three surgeries, including one that was so urgent that it was done in the middle of the night. I was in the hospital for almost six weeks after that surgery and I missed Christmas and New Years, though having my husband, parents and brother all get together in my hospital room on Christmas to do presents and other traditions that took some of the sting of missing the holiday. My health (or lack there of) also forced me to leave my legal job because I simply couldn’t be as reliable as they needed me to be and when push comes to shove, I at least want the dignity of making the choice rather then making them decide for me. (Though this works mainly because I didn’t qualify for unemployment insurance so there was no reason to wait until I actually got fired so that I could collect unemployment.)
But, leaving all that aside, there was a period where frequent commenters wondered whether there was a target painted on our backs because newer commenters and anons started sniping at older commenters for no apparent reason (though I learned later that older commenters had formed real life friendships which the newer group hadn’t managed so instead they just got upset when commenters mentioned something that happened in real life that involved another person who uses this blog for the discussion rather then the “fashion” but its pretty hard to carry-on a calm discussion when you know that you have to walk on egg shells whenever you say anything because inevitably someone will say something problematic and I don’t want it to be me.
TL;DR? I came out here to have fun and I’m feeling so attack right now. (Lets play “Know your Memes” here.)
Yikes, sorry about your health issues. I miss you and a bunch of other commenters who I feel like I’ve gotten to know over the years.
Hi TCFKAG ~
I’m one of the random internet strangers who misses you. So, so sorry to hear about everything you’ve been going through. Sending you all good wishes for a better 2016.
Yo- good vibes to you from me!
As someone who between myself and my kid spent 9 weeks in the hospital (some of it overlapping!) in 2015, I cannot imagine what you’re going through.
I wish you a solid 2016.
ha this is such a funny interpretation of what happened. that aside, very sorry for the health issues
Thanks, TCFKAG. I haven’t had much time to be here lately (work is nuts) and have stepped back for the same reasons. But you’re also right that I have made some wonderful real life friends here and I wouldn’t give that up. Susedna and I have become such good friends that we text and check in with each other almost every day and have visited each other fairly regularly, although I am in the south and she’s in the northeast. zora has visited me here and we’ve become friends as well. I’ve met Inhouse Europe in Munich, Gail the Goldfish and Deep End in NYC, eek in DC, helped DC Jenny plan her bachelorette party here in NO and saw her again in DC, helped Kathryn find a church to get married here, and just last week had lunch with Senior Attorney and her beau (and they are awesome, as expected). This group has been really good and really bad. My time is limited these days and I’m not as involved, but overall, totally worth it. I hope your health is better. I feel like I know you even though we’ve never met.
I’m so sorry to hear about your health. I hope you’re feeling better and that things are on the mend. Of course you don’t have to comment here or anywhere else, but from one Internet stranger to another, I’m glad to hear from you.
Nice to see you, TCFKAG. So sorry to hear about your health challenges!
(And waving at NOLA — loved meeting you last week and you are awesome, too!!)
I miss Bunkster, too. Her reading tastes were very similar to mine and I got a lot of good book recommendations from her. I hope she’s posting here under another name.
I lurk and occasionally post under a different name. And I’m still reading. I just finished The Swans of 5th Avenue. It’s about Truman Capote and his socialite friends, whose secrets he betrayed in his last unfinished novel.
Let me know if you’d like me to post a new link to my book list…
I would please!
Please post it! Loved your previous book lists and still refer back to them.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/15HuQqL9wxxwu5PxaRQWA7KPsKEACWYol3oW94LOjpSw/edit?usp=sharing
I hate being a lawyer. I’ve been out of law school almost 10 years and have tried different jobs, both in law firms and government positions, and have concluded this is just not the career for me. Thanks to no law school debt and several years in Big Law, I’m in the fortunate financial position of being able to take some time off to figure out what I want to do, but have no real idea what that is. I’m open to going back to school if necessary but want to be pretty confident that this is “it” before I pay for more schooling. I have an undergrad degree in a STEM field, but no desire to be an engineer. I’m definitely not scared of math and quantitative stuff, however. I love reading and writing but don’t think I’d enjoy working in journalism because I’m a shy introvert and feel like any other kind of English degree would just lead to unemployment. If you’ve left law for something else, I’d love to hear what you did and how you like it.
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/07/the-only-job-with-an-industry-devoted-to-helping-people-quit/375199/
I’m about to accept a position as a full-time tutor with a fancy local test prep company. I’m taking about a 20% pay cut for a 50% reduction in hours spent at work, and I figure with all the free time it’ll give me the opportunity to explore other options through reading books, free online courses, other part-time work, or auditing classes at the local college. Maybe instead of looking for your “next career,” you could focus on finding something that will keep the bills paid while leaving you enough time to really reflect and try some things out and figure out your next move?
Any tips on finding a full-time position? The test prep companies I have experience with and the job postings I’ve seen in my area only offer part-time (usually after school and Saturday) hours for tutors. Do you have day time or evening/weekend hours? What subject/age group do you tutor?
I’m doing ACT/SAT prep plus essay editing with high school students, and my hours are going to be afternoons/evenings Monday-Thursday (2pmish to 9pmish, depending on the day), + one weekend day (not sure yet whether it will be Saturday or Sunday, it depends on the demand). I should also note that the 20% pay cut is NOT 20% from Biglaw – I’m leaving a small-ish suburban firm. So, tutoring salary is going to work out to high-five figures, where before I was making (very) low six figures. My total hours, including driving to the students’ homes and require professional development time (which is compensated at a lower rate than tutoring) will be about 35/week.
As far as finding a full(ish)-time position goes, you definitely need to have afternoon/evening/weekend availability, and there’s way more work to be found working with high school students than with adults – unless you can tutor the LSAT, the GRE, AND the GMAT, there’s just not enough of a market for adult test prep to support a lot of full-time tutoring jobs, even in major metros.
STEM major + law degree + not cut out for practice = Regulatory affairs for Medical Device (pharma could work too, or food, cosmetics, dietary supplement). I write, talk to engineers, learn how the products work (without having to make them work), interact and negotiate with regulatory bodies (US and abroad).
Some schools offer a Masters of Science in Reg Affairs, which can be a useful introduction to the field/terminology, but shouldn’t be necessary if you have a JD.
I have found my people, and the hours are generally awesome, unless you are in the midst of writing a submission. If you want to know more, I can give you an email to chat.
Maybe teach? Call up local colleges and ask about openings for adjuncts to see if you like it. I feel like a law degree is the fast way to quality to teach at the university level since it’s basically the only three year doctorate available.
I’m not saying that lawyers can never find adjunct or even tenure-track teaching work, but this comment gives a very misleading impression of the kind of teaching jobs that a law degree qualifies you for. In my humanities field, every search gets 5 lawyers “who’ve always loved to teach” as applicants. We toss their applications immediately – a law degree does not qualify you to teach history, philosophy, etc. It qualifies you to teach law. At a smaller school or community college, “law” might expand to include criminal justics, some basic ethics or constitutional law courses in a political science department, or maybe professional writing. To teach history, though–even legal history!–we hire people with Ph.D.s in history. And given the state of the academic market, we get plenty of applicants who have Ph.D.s in the relevant field for any search.
Yeah, I have friends and family members in academia. It is the most competitive field ever, moreso even than Big Law/consulting/finance, etc. Teaching an adjunct law class is also a highly desired thing among lawyers who are actually practicing. At my local Big 12 university, there is one law class and it is taught by a partner of 40+ years at the most prestigious firm in town. Many lawyers who have 20 or 30 years of experience would kill to teach that class, so there is no way they would hire someone with only 10 years of experience, let alone someone who has left the legal profession.
Of course competitive academia is insanely competitive, and of course you have to be qualified to teach whatever you are teaching, but I know lawyer friends who teach at local community colleges or small regional colleges and did so just by calling and asking, and I also know a ton of lawyers who didn’t realize that it could be as easy as calling up and asking, so I thought it was a worthwhile suggestion to make.
Is this a joke? A law degree is not really a doctorate degree in the conventional sense.
You have worked in government and at firms, but have you tried a different practice area? I switched practice areas twice and firms 3 times in order to settle into my “calling” within the law. Yes, it took a really long time but I am finding that I enjoy what I do and it took all of those practice switches to figure out what tasks and industry really jive with my personality and interests. Several years ago I was exactly in your shoes (10 years out in fact) and was hating life, but I’m so glad I didn’t walk away from the law. Practice areas and settings are extremely varied.
I am looking for a large structured bag (for work) that also has a cross body strap. Any ideas? I can spend up to $500 for the right one but I’d rather spend like $300.
Jfc.
Tory Burch has some great ones, I just purchased the Large Black York Tote, its perfect. No cross body strap on that one, but check out these:
http://www1.bloomingdales.com/shop/product/tory-burch-jessica-satchel?ID=1543744&CategoryID=1002730#fn%3Dspp%3D65
http://www1.bloomingdales.com/shop/product/tory-burch-robinson-large-zip-tote?ID=1580837&CategoryID=1002730#fn%3Dspp%3D84
Yes! The Robinson is perfect. Pricey, but perfect. Thank you.
I got the Coach Stanton Caryall in December and absolutely love it. It might not be big enough for you though. https://www.coach.com/coach-designer-handbags-stanton-carryall-in-crossgrain-leather/37148.html?cgid=women-handbags-satchels&dwvar_color=LIBLK
I like that one a lot. I’m not sure it can hold my lunch and an 8 x 11 notebook.
The notebook could be close but you’re right that it won’t fit your lunch. That’s the only downside for me.
I hate to be the person that does this- but do you really have up to 500 with your cc debt?? many many people go their whole lives not spending over 100 for a bag. don’t let this site skew – with cc debt and a government job, this seems crazy to me. No one I know in government spends that much
I’d rather buy it once and buy it to last, even though I’m paying down debt, than churn and burn cheap bags from target or TJ Max for the next 10 years.
I’d rather not spent $500, but I walk to work (no car to hold stuff) and if can get a job that doubles my salary, I’d like to have a polished professional “I’m here to do business!” bag that can also hold my packed lunches.
Oh! Also – it’s for if I get a new job. I will not be spending that if I keep my current job for another year. If I keep my current job I am planning to buy myself a really really nice $50 yoga mat as a consolation prize. I barter to get my yoga classes for free, which is a perk of my currents situation.
And I appreciate that you hate to be the person that does that.
I get that your last sentence is sarcastic but I meant it sincerely. I also have a government job and reading this site had me thinking about purchases that I really couldn’t/shouldn’t afford. Coach outlet has things I always like for around 200.
Not sarcastic. I hadn’t put all the facts out there. If I get this job that could double my salary I’ll knock my debt out before my next birthday, even with one $300 handbag. For some reason a very thoughtful splurge keeps me from everyday lifestyle inflation that costs a lot more. YMMV.
Traveling for business next week. What are the things you always forget to pack? Please help me make my “don’t forget” list
phone charger and toothbrush (but most hotels can help with both)
I keep in my carry-on suitcase at all times a toilet bag with toothpaste, toothbrush, moisturizer (in a contact lens case), q-tips, hair clips and brush, advil and a sleep aid, mini-pads and tampons, deodorant, and all other basic toiletries and meds, plus thin slippers, socks and a pair of underwear. I also keep disinfectant wipes for hotel doorknobs, etc., an LED nightlight from the dollar store, a small sewing kit and iron-on hem tape for clothes emergencies, a plastic bag for laundry, a mini-lint roller and a very small (empty) spray bottle for ironing. Then I don’t ever have to think about packing those items, just replenishing them now and then; if I’m taking a longer trip, it’s easy to move the items to a bigger suitcase.
What I always seem to forget is appropriate undergarments for whatever I’m wearing — e.g., a slip or half slip if I’ve packed an unlined skirt or dress and tights, a bra in the right color, or a cami if what I’ve packed is (or might turn out to be) too low-cut or too thin. I once had to spend 8 hours in a super-hot conference room with my suit coat on — when everyone else was casual and comfortable — because I discovered in hotel-bathroom fluorescent light that the merino sweater I had packed was see-through and I had no cami with me.
I have a permanent work travel packing list. I’m old school so I print it & check items off with a pen, so nothing forgotten. But if I were to forget something, it would probably be my contact lens case.
I seem to forget something different every trip. The worst things to forget have probably been my contacts and underwear. The most common thing is probably a purse other than my giant carry-on.
I can’t recall how many times I’ve forgotten to pack pjs, but it’s a bit embarrassing the number.
I used to forget my glasses all the time (especially when I was going between parents’ houses in high school) but now I have a pre-packed toiletry kit that includes my previous pair of glasses. I always pack my regular pair, but having the old pair is a precautionary thing. The kit also includes toothbrush, paste, comb, contact case/solution, and some other things I can’t think off hand, but it’s basically to grab, do a quick run through of it and then throw it in the suitcase.
I’ve started making separate lists on my iphone whenever I know I have something I have to pack for coming up. That way, if two weeks before, I go “oh, don’t forget…” I just throw it on the list and then when I’m packing I don’t have to go “what was it I wanted to bring…” I’ve had lists on my phone for my trip to Washington since Christmas I think.
I also make a phone list and check it before I leave. More than anything, I forget a razor and deodorant.
Clearly I didn’t do it well enough for my current trip home because I was 3/4 of the way to my mom’s when I realized I forgot my BC…oops…better make sure that’s on the list for next weekend…
A coat! (on the current trip – almost went to Nordstrom today to get one)
belt, too
toothpaste
hand lotion
Sleep socks. I can’t sleep if my feet are cold.
I travel a lot for business so I keep my toiletries bag packed (basically, I buy two of everything) but sometimes I forget that I’m running low on an item in my toiletry bag.
So now what I do on the last morning of my trip is use the hotel note paper to jot down what I need to refil/replace before I travel again, and put that in my TSA-compliant clear bag so that it’s right there in front of me next time I pack.
I thin right now it says mascara, cleanser, ibuprofen.
This s i t e and the people who post here have helped me so much so wanted to share my good news.
10 years ago I left home when I was 18. I grew up in one of the poorest places in America. We didn’t have indoor plumbing and more than 50 percent of people loved below the poverty. No one in my family went to school past Grade 10, and before 18 it was common for people to have a criminal record and at least one kid.
I bought a bus ticket for as far away as I could get. I had to earn my GED and then I went to night school to earn my degree while I worked 2 jobs during the day. I got my degree last year and recently became a licensed real estate agent.
I just sold my first house and I got my commission today! I wanted to share this because of all the help I got from this s i t e. I never knew anyone who went to college or was a professional. I seriously learned so much from here. Thank you all so much!
That should say lived below the poverty line. I am so excited that I wasn’t paying attention to what I was typing.
CONGRATULATIONS! I’m so thrilled for you.
Congratulations!!
Good for you! You are an inspiration. I hope someone who is where you used to be is reading this.
Congratulations! That is a wonderful accomplishment and an inspiring story.
You’re a rock star. I hope you remember, when you hit an occasional speed bump in life (as we all do), that you have done things that many many people cannot and will not do. Congrats and enjoy your success.
I love stories like these – congratulatons!
Congrats!! I have learnt so much from these amazing ladies here! We do not have to be products of our enviroment if we do not chose to be! Celebrate!!!
environment*
Congratulations! You are truly incredible, and I hope you always remember that.
It is SO HARD to escape that kind of background, and your hard work and determination is truly amazing. You are fantastic.
I’m late to this thread, but HOORAY!!
How do you ladies answer questions from everybody from customer service reps to new co-workers who are obviously getting at whether/why you are single?
I was recently on vacation by myself and the car rental guy on the phone asked me if I was on my honeymoon. Without even thinking I replied “Nope, I’m just a pathetic single 35 year old on vacation alone.”
Today I was in a meeting with a new group and the subject of vacations and working around a school schedule came up. Someone asked me “Are you tied to a school schedule?” I just awkwardly replied no.
Part of the problem is that I am such an outlier I guess. I truly do not know one single woman within 5 years of my age to spend time with. I go out, have hobbies, etc., but never meet anybody my own age. After 3 years of this, it is starting to grate.
I’m 33 and perpetually single. My advice is to get comfortable with it. No need to explain or feel awkward. You sound like a great person with a full life. Own it. Don’t apologize for being single or not having kids. Say no to questions about honeymoons and school schedules with the same tone as saying no to rental insurance. In my experience if you are very matter of fact about it, they’ll follow your lead. If they go on about it, they’re being awkward, not you.
The questions sounded innocent enough and you read too much into it – obviously you are unhappy with your single status and perhaps a little sensitive. The car rental – well that’s just a weird question, but I guess maybe the destination is one that sees mostly honeymooners?
Where did you go!?! I’m also single and love traveling. I need to get more comfortable doing it alone. However, when people ask you if you are single, don’t be afraid to lie and say your BF is in the bathroom or something. If people know there is a woman traveling alone she can be a target.
Last summer I went to Culebra, PR, by myself and it was awesome. I hung out in my little bungalow (rented via AirBnB), at the pool on the property, and, most importantly, on the beaches. I ate out one night and sat at the bar, which is usually what I do when I am dining alone.
I LURVE traveling alone. I want to try to get up to Acadia in ME this fall.
Where do you live? I’m in DC and it’s entirely normal to be 30-45 and single. I’m in my mid-30s, live in the city, recently married, and spend a lot of time with female friends ranging in age from 30 to early 40s, about half of whom are single. Have you ever thought about moving somewhere where you wouldn’t feel like such an outlier? I’ve found that having strong female friendships with people you can regularly spend time with makes a big difference in life.
I think it’s only awkward if you feel awkward about it. I mean, if you were like, oh heck no, I’m here with friends/on a solo adventure/enjoying the quiet I don’t think anyone would think of that as a reason to judge or pity you.
I’m seriously going to punch the next “friend” of mine who gets sucked into a pyramid scheme and starts selling some stupid crap. To the ivy league law school lady who wants to be a SAHM: I don’t care as long as you don’t start selling stupid crap that no one wants. SERIOUSLY. I am so over it. /end soapbox
So with you!! Does anyone here sell this sort of MLM stuff? WHY?? Do you realize you’re alienating a ton of your friends? They may not say anything to you, but believe me, even most of the ones who buy things are super annoyed, and just doing it to be supportive. Please do anything else to earn some extra cash – babysitting, dog walking, tutoring, selling other people’s stuff on ebay, anything!!!
+1,000,000
Money After Graduation just shared an old article she wrote about this (http://www.moneyaftergraduation.com/2015/08/24/gifting-circle-is-a-pyramid-scheme/). Apprently there’s one going around near her called a “gifting circle”.
I just had a friend from college get back in touch and then all of sudden she wants me to watch some video for her “amazing new job” that was definitely some type of MLM. Um, no.
A good friend of mine has a name very similar to the name of a vague HS acquaintance/FB friend. I saw one of those ‘You need my essential oil/scentscy/stupid stuff nobody actually needs and it helps me make my dreams come true’ pictures on my Instagram feed and started getting really ticked that my friend was being sucked into this.
…Took me a solid 90 seconds to realize that it was the HS FB friend. That was 90 seconds of rage. I will say, though, it has been convenient in ‘culling the herd’ of FB friends.
Hi! I’m new to the corporate world but very excited to be entering it!
At my interview for my new job, which I haven’t started yet, the dress was business. I arrived early and was able to observe quite a few people in business attire. However, the dress code I received says it’s business to business casual. While I appreciate that openness to give me time to build up a business wardrobe (I’m coming from retail and I am starting at an entry level position) I have no idea what business to business casual means.
I’ve done a bit of reading on here to find out the difference between the two and it seems roughly large. I’m not really sure where to start my wardrobe. I’m already a bit nervous and now I don’t even know what to wear.
Any advice or input would be helpful! Thanks!
best advice is just start and observe:) do not buy anything in advance.
I would interpret that as (1) some people will wear traditional/formal suits every day, (2) some people will wear “fun” suits every day (i.e., not an interview suit – tweed, interesting color/trim, etc), (3) some people will wear a mismatched jacket or blazer with separates every day, and (4) if you’re in a very non external-facing role, you’d wear what I think of as “regular” business casual – shirts/sweaters without expectation of a jacket.
To start, I’d wear category (1) on your first day or two, and then look around to see which of the other categories is prevalent at your level/one level above you, and plan accordingly.
I agree with Anon. Dress codes vary widely. Your best bet is to wear business until you get a feel for the office. Err on the side of too dressy until you have a firm handle on the dress code. And don’t buy a new wardrobe before you start.
Thank you all for the advice!
Didn’t plan on buying to much to start but I do need more pants. Jeans aren’t allowed and I am coming from VERY casual retail. I only own the one appropriate pair I wore to my interview.
Also, I was going to get a penny loader, a neutral flat (I was unsure on that one), and a 2 inch patent leather heel. Does that all sound appropriate?
I’d skip penny loafers and get black pointed-toe flats. What shoes did you wear to interview? Do you need a second pair of heels yet? If your one existing suit is gray or black, I’d stick to two pairs of black footwear to start.
If you saw most people in formal business attire when you interviewed, I would purchase one additional suit so you can alternate. To get through your first week, I would also purchase a black/white patterned jacket, black or gray pants, and a black or gray pencil skirt (bonus points if the pants and skirt are part of the suit set for optimum mixing and matching).
I wore a low cut, below my ankle but my pants covered my ankle, bootie with a heel. My other heels are not work place appropriate but more going out with your girl friends (Think trendy spikes and espadrille wedges).
Thanks for the suggestions! I will see what I can find!
Also, any suggestions for not a pencil skirt? I’m a size 16-18 and pencil skirts tend to Be extremely unflattering on me but I keep reading A-line skirts aren’t professional enough.
A line is professional in the right fabric. I loved my slight A line skirt in tropical wool.
Talbots has suiting for sz 16-18. But their sizing is weird so sometimes I’m a small and sometimes I’m a 14P, so just try stuff on.
If pencil skirts are not flattering, try suiting dresses with a good blazer/jacket/knit blazer.
Congrats on the job!
Thank you so much!
Glad to know A-line can be ok. I will make sure to be particular about the material to make sure it is right.
I’ve never shopped at Talbot’s before but it is now on my must shop list!
I’m your size and a senior manager. I don’t wear a ton of suits because they are hard to fit.
I agree with others – Talbots is going to be your friend. I also agree that you should get some polished flats or low heeled pumps rather tha loafers so you can also wear them with skirts. You can’t go wrong with black to start.
For a nice suit alternative that still looks business dress, look for knit blazers and sweater jackets.
I don’t know what your shape is but I actually find pencil skirts *more* flattering than a-line. The trick is getting the length of the jacket or topper right. For me that means no “shrunken” jackets but rather something that hits me low hip. More of a traditional to long length. But I am talk, so different proportions might work on you.
That said, there is nothing wrong with an a-line shape. This is a particularly easy shape go find in dresses. You might check out the Target or Lands End dresses lots of commenters here recommend. I can’t personally vouch because that’s not the shape for me, but I know they’re relatively inexpensive and well made.
I terms of color I would start with neutrals (black, grey, navy, tan, whatever works for you) and add colorful pieces as your wardrobe expands.
Thank you for all the input!
Pencil skirts for me are tough. I’m mid height but have been blessed with a big booty, I have hips, and I have a rounder stomach thanks to having kids (and not going to the gym). Pencil skirts tend to pull in the wrong places or being too much attention to my butt. I hope to find the rare gem that does work one day so I won’t give up but I don’t have high hopes either lol.
I will check out Talbots and Land’s End. Thanks again for the input, I appreciate it!!
Penny loafers are on the casual end of business casual. I would look for something else that’s flat that’s a bit dressier (pointy-toe ballet flats, small wedge flats (not tall ones) or perhaps ballet flats.
Thank you!
Penny loafers are my favorite weekend shoe. 100% outing myself to anyone I went to college with, but I used to have a pair of apple green penny loafers I wore so often I was known as The Girl in the Green Shoes. Man, I miss those shoes.
But for work, you should generally go sleeker. It seems like you’re looking for more comfortable flats than heels, so start with almond-toe ballet flats. Black and nude-for-you are good to start with. There are loafers with a sleeker profile that you can wear fairly easily with pants, but again, you want them to look polished and structured. Look at the Everlane loafers for the style I’m referring to. Also good is the ankle boot style – as long as you wear them with pants and they’re not spiked, super clunky (like cowboy or moto style), a bright color, or otherwise attention-grabbing, they’re probably fine.
Belle has good suggestions: http://www.caphillstyle.com/?s=Flats
These were the loafers I was looking at. They are a patent black leather. I think they are sleek (that is my opinion) and I have the shoe care to make sure they stay shiny and clean.
Would love the feedback though!
https://www.ghbass.com/product/diane+original+weejun.do?from=Search&cx=0
Eh, I love Bass loafers despite them being too narrow for my feet, but the pleated stitching and penny insert is what makes them look too casual, IMO. I’d hold off on these until you got a better feel for your office.
Thanks! I appreciate the feedback!
Cried on my way into work this morning (yes, it is Saturday). I’m overworked and not feeling appreciated/acknowledged, with no light at the end of the tunnel. I could never admit this to anyone out loud, but maybe if I type it here I can let it out a bit and focus on work for the rest of the day…
I’m so sorry, Anon. I want to say “get out of there!” But I know that if you could, you would. Get through it as soon as possible and them take tomorrow off to rest and recharge. It will all still be there on Monday.
So sorry! Been there.
(If you want advice continuing reading, if not, know someone has your back.)
My 2 minute, make your world a little better routine: Stop working for just 2 minutes. Deep breaths for a little bit. Take thirty seconds to do some self care thing i.e. drink some water/put on lip balm/put on some hand cream. Think for a second about how you feel slightly better/more comfortable. Think about something simple that makes you happy: is it sunny? a picture of a puppy? a line from a song that makes you smile. Sit up straight, shoulders back and tell yourself you are a rockstar. Keep working. You got this!
Has anyone here “burned out” in Medicine? If so, when was it along your career path, and what did you do?
Was at that point 2 yrs ago, after 5 yrs of practice.
Talk to this guy. First consult is free. Helped me refocus.
http://www.thehappymd.com
Has anyone transitioned out of a job and into self-employment? I’ve got an idea about a product/company I’d like to start but haven’t figured out if it’d be successful. I love my coworkers and my industry but my dream has always been to start a business someday. How did you go about it?
Hi there! I transitioned from PR to self-employment as a writer.
What I did, and would recommend if you’re just dipping your toe in and aren’t sure if you have a successful business model, is start your self-employment as a side gig. I wrote 10-15 hours a week for a while, after work and on weekend, to slowly get into the business, build up clients, and boost my savings.
As I did it more, I really, really loved it. And I started doing it more. Then I started getting more clients than I could handle, so I boosted my rates and culled my client list to only the best. My side business was earning really well-it started out-earning my full-time job- so my husband and I discussed quitting and doing this full-time. To give some security, I saved up a significant emergency fund (8 months) before going off and writing full-time.
Best decision I ever made, but I’m glad I did it slowly and with savings or it could have gone horribly awry when work slows down at certain times of the year.
Thank you so much, KT! This is incredibly helpful. Would you be willing to share how you got clients when you first started your side job? I’m so happy to hear you really like it!! Congratulations :)
Does anyone have a favorite brand of vitamins? Per my doctor, I need to supplement B12, D and Fish oil. D is low (12), B12 is low but within range and fish oil is for cholesterol. He did tell me the amounts to take, there are just so many brands.
Why not eat the vitamins? Mushrooms or ten minutes of sunlight for vit D, more whole grains for vit B12 and tuna or salmon for fish oil?
I would imagine that dosage is easier to track via supplmeents than food. And therefore easier to see if there if a particular dosage has an effect.
I can’t speak to the others but I get more than 10 mins a day of sunshine and my Vit D is really really low (12), supplementation is the only option to get it higher (been through this before, I’ve had positive results with supplementation a.
I live in Florida and have a 15 min walk each way to my car from work plus whatever exposure I get and it doesn’t do a thing. I’m not a sunbather but the recommended amounts of sunlight don’t do it for me for whatever reason.
I would check for recent consumer group reviews of vitamins/dietary supplements. The industry is very un-regulated so there is no real guarantee that the contents of the bottle actually match the content on the label.
Very good idea, that’s my biggest concern is trying to find some idea of which brands are more likely to be what they say they are.
I am late to this, but I recommend UnoCardio for the fish oil/Vitamin D. I like reading LabDoor for tips on this. UnoCardo is expensive, but I just bought a cheaper fish oil (Vitamin Shoppe) because I take a lot, and it showed up with broken capsules and everything smells like a fishy mess :(
I’m hoping to appeal to the wisdom of the group to help me navigate accepting an offer. Please and thank you, in advance!!!
On Tuesday, I got a phone call offering me an absolutely amazing fellowship that I am beyond thrilled about!! I didn’t accept on the spot – basically, because I have a general policy of not accepting offers on the spot unless they are exploding offers (because emotions are running high and I want a second to take a breath). I definitely conveyed how excited I was to receive the offer, and we left it that I could expect to receive a followup letter. I haven’t told anyone yet except my closest friends and immediate family (who I swore to secrecy), because I want something formal in writing first.
1) Was it a huge mistake to not accept the offer on the spot? I definitely made it clear how excited I was about the opportunity, and he never actually asked yes-or-no if I was accepting.
2) I still haven’t received any follow-up communication. I’m on the opposite side of the country, and I’m not sure whether they are sending snail-mail or email. At what point should I follow up? Should I call the guy who called me or the assistant for the department?
3) Am I crazy for not telling anyone else? I’m not sure if it makes me seem paranoid, but I just prefer to have something formal before letting people know. (Plus, I’m slightly terrified that they made a mistake, or this is a dissertation-induced hallucination.)
Any insights you all have would be greatly appreciated!!
Relex! You did everything right. I’d give it until Wednesday and if you don’t receive any materials, check in then to ask about timeline. I’d also wait to share the news more broadly until everything has been finalized, but it’s really up to you.
It’s fine to not accept on the spot. I would have asked how they would be sending the details, by email, by mail, or at all. It’s also very useful to ask how long you have to consider the offer.
I think it would be reasonable to follow up on Monday to clarify how the offer is coming how long you have to decide.
Dear family, future-in laws/family, friends, co-workers, wedding vendors and random strangers; the next person who a) says I can’t be a bride with short hair b) asks when I’m buying a wig c) asks what kind of extensions I’m getting d) or otherwise mentions my short hair in a negative way in regards to me getting married is going to get punched in the face. I have had a pixie cut for 11 years. My fiancé has only known me with short hair and he likes my haircut (and doesn’t police my appearance). A pixie cut makes me look like myself. I would look completely strange with long hair, not to mention that wigs and extensions get hot and heavy and both cost a fortune for good quality ones that don’t look fake. We are on a budget and want our wedding to be calm and simple. I’m 29 years old and no one is forcing me to have long hair like when I was a child. I’m an adult and it’s my hair. The next person who says a word about this will be uninvited to the wedding. Thank you and have a nice day.
Rant over. Just needed to get that off my chest.
Seriously? People comment on that sort of thing? Ridiculous.
Hah, I got married last year and got the same types of comments. Most commonly “oh are you growing out your hair for the wedding”? I’ve also had a pixie cut for over a decade… I just laughed and said “why would I do that?”
This is particularly amusing, since the majority of weddings I see in the news and have been to have the bride putting their hair up, to show off their face/veil/dress etc….
So your pixie is perfect.