“So before we get this meeting going, I just wanted to announce that J will be going part time, effective May. We’ve hired N to take over his role as demand planning manager and they will work in tandem until she gets up to speed.”
Murmurs on the other end of the conference call blared through my husband’s work computer speakers.
“He’s doing it so he can spend more time with his wife.”
Silence.
Interesting… was that a patronizing tone I heard, or did it fall more along the lines of scoffing laughter – like, can you believe this guy?
Sitting in the other room cuddling with my dogs, I waited for J’s response.
“Yes, well, as you know, my wife took on a new job and going part time to more of an analyst role will help our schedules align better. The transition should be seamless and I’ll be at the facility next week to help N get acquainted with our processes.”
More murmuring.
“Congrats… ?”
A lingering questioning tone hung over the speakers. Squeezing the dogs closer, I held my breath until the more typical business jargon restarted. Back to ranch dressing emergencies.
Finally.
“He wants to spend more time with his wife.”
Such a beautiful statement.
Imagine, my husband actually still enjoys my company. Even after being together for 15 and a half years, after 3 weeks of living together in a 60 square foot van while navigating a foreign country, he still wants to spend time with me.
Then why couldn’t I enjoy this? Why did I feel so affronted on my husband’s behalf?
Maybe it’s because you know if the roles were reversed, you would’ve been met with the response, “Of course you’re going to part time. That makes sense.”
The feminazi in me started to chomp at the bit to get all fired up. How many times had it already been insinuated it was time for me to stop ignoring my womanhood? Just a week ago, I was unpleasantly surprised by a question posed by my medical director,
“Any upcoming prolonged leave of absences you think you might anticipate in the next year or so? It will help with planning.”
What wasted effort on his end to finesse his way around such a personal question. Holding his gaze, I wondered if he wondered if I was reading him loud and clear.
Oh, you mean babies, right? Because I’m almost geriatric maternal age?
“What do you mean by prolonged leave of absence? I have a few upcoming trips that are likely going to be less than 2 weeks long.”
Willfully obtuse. Make sure you bookend that with your guileless smile. He doesn’t need to know the depths of your sass just yet.
Slowing my descent into that fury tunnel, I returned to eavesdropping on my husband’s conference call. Now it was a coffee creamer emergency. How exciting.
No need to get all huffy, M. A leave of absence would leave the hospitalists short staffed. There was practical utility to his question.
Sighing, I pushed aside that prior conversation.
That wasn’t the cause of my discomfort.
Maybe it’s because you don’t want to see J struggle going against the traditional grain, to have to explain his decision to everyone, to have to answer the silent question, “So what do you bring to the table in this relationship?”
I recalled the story that came along with the watch he gifted me at my med school graduation,
“When I told the sales guy what the watch was for, he gave me this creepy smile like, ‘Dude, you got it made!’ Like I had found my sugar mama and I’d just live off you forever.”
I could still feel the disgust resonating in his voice 8 years later.
Was he prepared to deal with that constant insinuation in his new role of a part-time husband, full-time doctor wife duo?
That’s not it either, M. J’s always done what he wants to do. He’s never struggled to go his own way.
No, the real question is: Would you do the same for him?
For as long as J and I have been together, my career drove every major life changing decision. I was going to be a doctor, no matter what it took. And he, a willing passenger in my story, was along for the ride. I moved us around the Midwest for school, toured the country from the east coast to the Rockies to look for my first attending job, finally settling in the Pacific Northwest.
All for my career.
Even then, I wasn’t done. Never to be content with having nights, weekends and holidays off in primary care, I willingly took a new hospitalist position knowing full well this would rock our world and its predictable schedule.
And now, J again was making concessions.
For me.
Committing career suicide as he was on track to be in upper management by the time he was 35.
For me.
To make his career decisions based on mine seems preposterous while I’m hanging on to medicine with my final lifeline.
And the rope is fraying.
“Are you sure you want to do this, J? You don’t have to, you know.”
“I don’t want my boss’s life, M. I don’t want to leave for work at 6:30 in the morning and get home at 7, or sit on conference calls about made up emergencies that aren’t even emergencies.
I never wanted to climb the corporate ladder. I just want to live our lives. And if this is what it takes… then that’s what I’m going to do.”
My blue eyed supporter. A constant, steady anchor through all the phases of my life. How many people have come and gone, and yet he’s still here seeing me through?
How many of us even stop to appreciate how much our loved ones sacrifice for us in our valiant quest to go out and “save the world”? To soothe our wounds when we need to retreat? To patch us up and send us out again because we just can’t seem to figure out when to quit?
Do we ever tally up the cost to them?
Are we still worth the price?
***
If you haven’t checked out the Married to Doctors podcast, it is a great resource for those who love and support those of us in medicine.
***
Photo taken of clouds rolling over aquamarine glacier water at Lake Tekapo, New Zealand.
Oh – I could have written something so similar. My DH and I have been together since high school. Yes, high school. We’re both 40 now. He has supported me through law school and a legal career I hated, pre-med classes, med school, and I’m getting ready to drag him nearly 1000 miles away for residency (and no, I didn’t pick something 3 years long and sensible – I chose 5 years and a pretty much required fellowship). So.Much.Guilt. Not because of anything he has ever said – because of what I know he has sacrificed. So many snide comments – from his co-workers, from our friends, from my family (why didn’t he get to go to med school? it was his turn. you’ll wash out anyway). *sigh*
Oh man.. I hear you. J also has never said anything even when I push him to reveal what he’s really thinking. Part of me feels resentful on J’s behalf when I hear the snide comments and undertone because:
1) I truly do believe if it were the other way around, it would just be assumed that as the wife component of that duo, I would of course support him without complaint
2) It’s none of their damn business what we choose to do with our lives
It doesn’t do much for the guilt though. Glad someone else has guilt in spades like I do!
M
I love your response to the snoopy colleague.
I think it’s great that you can recognize his sacrifice, but it sucks that it has to come with all of that guilt. It sounds like J is still making decisions based on his own wants and needs though, even if it is initially spurred by your work. I think it’s great to see an example for once of a man supporting a woman in her high powered career, so good for both of you! I’m following Mr. Mechanic across the country in a couple of months and no one has said anything to me, it’s been assumed that I’ll just follow along. “Spending more time with his wife” is a perfectly legitimate reason that I think we should celebrate!
I totally agree – spending more time with a loved one should always be considered a legitimate reason for celebration!
J actually had a perspective that I hadn’t really considered – he was happy this would allow him the freedom to pursue something he actually wanted to do rather than being another cog in the corporate machine. Often times our guilt is so ego-centric we don’t stop think consider how this looks like to the other people involved.
Anyway, good luck with your cross-country move! Hope you’re able to get that big trip in before July 1st!
Good point about the fact that we can’t decide how the other person should feel, they are adults who can make decisions about what they want and value without us 🙂 Good memory! We’re headed to Colombia soon! I’ll be sharing pics on Instagram.
Love this post M. Nothing is better than being in love after 15+ years (my husband and I celebrate 16 years this month!) This sounds like something a mom would say, but the rest of the world is “just. jealous”.
When I started on staff at age 29, explaining (unnecessarily) that my partner had had a vasectomy and no plans for kids, the chief “jokingly” suggested that I should have a tubal. ?! How inappropriate can you get? In breaking news, today I decided to stop all office OB and go to solely Gyne, ending my relationship with the hospital (and assholes like this…) 100%. Peace out.
Happy “Doctor’s Day”! (Not sure if they have that in the US but today it meant doctors got a free breakfast sandwich at the hospital cafeteria- makes all the abuse worth it!!)
:)Kristina
Congrats on your big career move! That is so exciting that you’ll be able to shift all your focus on the things that bring you joy in your work life!
We do have Doctor’s Day here, but all we got was little pat on the back which was immediately followed up by a quarterly meeting telling us how hospitalists were costing the hospital money. Because you know, it’s all about the money…
ANYWAY.. I’m glad after things like that I have a person to come home to that reminds me there is more to life than work. I love your “just jealous” comment – people have expressed some envy in the past, but what they don’t see is all the hard work it takes to achieve this level of awesome in a marriage 🙂 With that being said, congrats on your 16th anniversary!
You really highlight the double standard in the business world regarding how the genders are treated.
Sounds like you got a great one in your husband for sure. Lot of guys can be intimated by being out earned in a relationship and also traveling all over the country to follow your career path can certainly cause strife but it looks like it didn’t
J has definitely gotten his fair share of comments for not being the primary breadwinner.. it always surprises me how easily he’s been able to shake them off. Quite honestly, I probably get more offended by them than he does. He’s always been one to do things his way without caring what other people think – part of the reason why I married him!
As far as the double standard, sometimes I wonder if I’m seeing things that aren’t necessarily there. You know, millennials are always waiting to be offended 😉 But it has been really highlighted with J’s transition to part time. People don’t even realize what they’re saying, it’s so ingrained in them. Makes for interesting blog posts for sure!
I hear you loud and clear, and I feel for you. My wife hated hearing people whisper about the Mommy track when she cut back.
J’s secret power in all this is that once he’s considered the company eccentric, he has a superpower. He can decline projects. He can make unusual requests. He can have his work life around more of those rewarding aspects of the job.
Once you stop reaching for the shiny brass ring, you get written off, but you also get to fly below the radar. Hopefully he gets to leverage being the company misfit to your collective advantage.
Fondly,
CD
It’s been fascinating to see J maneuver in his career track – he first made himself indispensable, told his boss he was going to quit and then they asked him to stay on part-time. I couldn’t imagine doing that kind of career politicking at my job, but maybe I’ll try when we reach FI.
I can only imagine what your wife felt about the Mommy track whispers.. I probably wouldn’t take too kindly to them myself and would have a VERY difficult time holding my sass back. Could make for an interesting conversation though…
Great post, as always, M!
We have dealt with this, too. My wife works full time and gets flack for that given what I do. God forbid she want to have a career. And I’ve actually thought about bucking the gourds, too. Going part time as the doc seems mind altering to some people, but only if the doc is a guy. Otherwise, it seems natural to people.
The more I realize how little I care about my progress through the ranks, the easier it becomes to care much less about what people think about my career trajectory.
That doesn’t stop people from having opinions, though.
Sorry to hear you and J are having to deal with that. It sounds like he is prioritizing you and your marriage. I’ve got a ton of respect for that, and FWIW think you should both be commended.
Jimmy / TPP
Thanks Jimmy!
We are trying to practice what I preach in regards to a values-driven life (a la Crispy Doc), but nothing really prepares you for the amount of resistance you’ll face when you start to go against the grain.
When you keep forging your own path, eventually you realize you’ll attract people along the way who subscribe to what you believe in. I always have to remind myself of this when I need to drown out other people’s opinions.
As for our careers, I think when you start to find your life and voice have value outside of work, the less you prioritize the accolades from going up the medicine/corporate ladder. I’m sure you’re finding this to be true as your success skyrockets with the blog and the thousands of other things you’re doing!
Congrats to J for chilling out at work and doing what’s right for him (and you).
This story resonated with me. My wife and I changed jobs for similar reasons, wanting to spend more time with each other and our baby boy (we are going on just
My wife turned down a partnership track in a lucrative pain management clinic and I turned down a path towards upper administration via QI to take these jobs. Neither of us want to “climb the ladder” either and made these decisions with each other and our boy in mind.
That is so great – I applaud the both of you!
The argument I encounter is, “But you were meant to make a difference in patient’s lives! How could you want to scale back?” I’m sure you’ve heard that in some form or another. But what is more important than being present in your son and wife’s lives?
I think a lot of people would only see your choices as closing doors to opportunities, but I would argue that you’re building your own path to something more. Something more valuable than all the prestige, titles and money could ever give you. So congrats on doing what’s right for your family. That’s something you’ll never regret.
This post really resonates with me. I made some similar mid-career decisions in the name of putting my wife’s physician career first. Some of my reasons were selfish: I was experiencing career burnout myself, and us moving cities for her sub-specialty fellowship gave me an excuse to step back in my career and reevaluate my path. Some of the reasons were out of necessity: the trajectory of a physician’s career is so different from the majority that there was an absurdity to me adding any friction to that process that I simply couldn’t get over. I have such enormous respect for anyone who takes on the doctor’s life and those that support them through it. Thank you for your wonderful post!
Thank you for reading and for your comment!
It’s wonderful that you were able to support your wife and make it work for you. My husband’s support is definitely something I don’t take for granted – I’ve seen where this doesn’t play out well with other colleagues’ relationships as I’m sure you have. Life’s ups and downs can already be too difficult without having to worry about whether or not your significant other has your back.
I am in the same situation as you as the female doctor in the relationship. We have been together 25 years. If we were men this wouldn’t even be a blog post. Men and society just expect the female to play second fiddle without question. It irritates me. I have had colleagues and friends deliberately try to belittle my partner for being a stay at home Dad. But on the other hand the school mums seem to think he is utterly amazing. A man can care for children, a man can run a house and support his wife. So shocking. My female colleagues think I have struck gold as they know how much of an advantage their male colleagues have from having a stay at home wife. The male doctors never have to think about who is picking up the kids, paying the bills, staying home for the plumber. Society needs to change and it will.
And you and I with our respective life partners are forging the way forward!
J and I haven’t had to encounter the stay at home dad/working mom thing because we don’t have children, but I have absolutely backed people into a corner by asking, “Are you saying he’s incapable of loving and caring for his own child? Or are you really belittling his desire to be a present person in the way he wants in that child’s life?”
I’ve also been known for snarky comments (usually post-call) such as, “It’s amazing how testosterone makes it impossible for guys to do dishes, or laundry or just basic ADLs in general. Isn’t that how it works? Or is that you putting unfair limits on their abilities?” Then pause and wait. When people have to confront the holes in their thinking, they’ll think twice before they make comments in the future.
Now if only I could actually be that blunt with some of my patients 😩