Having It All Vs. Doing It All

“You can have it all but, you can’t do it all.”  As I reminisce about my life, I wish someone had given me this advice when I was in my 20’s.  When I heard Gloria Steinem make this statement on the documentary, Makers: Women Who Make America, I was moved, and her words truly resonated with me. I was a woman who tried to have it all and do it all, at the same time, and realized that it was not possible.

I began my career in the 1980’s just as the “Super Woman” myth was resounding. I remember many dining hall conversations as a Yale undergraduate with women who believed that we could achieve the dream of equality without sacrificing our personal lives. We were determined to work harder and break any glass ceiling that got in our way. Channeling Claire Huxtable of  “The Cosby Show”, I would marry, have an amazing career as well as a wonderful family.

In my real world, I married a surgeon, had 2 beautiful children and continued to push for professional milestones. In 1993, I was promoted to Director of Public Pension Funds. My clients included the State of New York, the City of Atlanta, L.A. Police and Fire, the State of Missouri and the DC Retirement Pension Funds. I traveled 3 days every week and racked up 200,000 miles in one year.

During the calendar year of 1993, however, I hired and fired 11 nannies. One nanny had a drug problem that became obvious when she was unable to sit with my girls for more than 5 minutes before she had to go outside for a cigarette. Who was watching my 5 year old and infant during those smoking breaks? Another nanny had a heart attack while holding my then 6-month old daughter. The nanny fell down the steps and luckily landed on her back with my daughter on her chest. The nanny went to the hospital and eventually recovered. She was too weak, however, to return to work. My daughter survived without a scratch. I felt very blessed that they were both fine.

Also during that year, my husband was in the early stages of his private practice and on-call every other week. His patients always came first, so I could never rely on him to pick up a child from school, let alone do the grocery shopping or prepare a meal. Where was my Dr. Huxtable? Instead of resting on the weekends after working at least 80 hours, I was at the grocery store and preparing meals that could be frozen and reheated later in the week.

Was this my dream or a nightmare?

It was January of 1994. I had taken my daughter to an American Girl Fashion Show, but I still needed to finish a presentation for the State of Missouri. After the show, I went to work. The heat was not on in the building, and it was freezing outside. When I left the office, it was 1 a.m. The next morning I could not get out of bed. When I tried to talk, nothing came out of my mouth. When I finally got up, I passed out from exhaustion. I thought I was dying. My mother called 911, and I was rushed to the hospital. Two weeks later, I came home. My daughter told her kindergarten teacher that at least she knew where her mommy was. She proudly announced that, “My mommy is in the hospital, and I get to see her everyday!” Wow! When I heard that story, I knew that my days of being “Super Woman” were over.

Women can’t do it all. They can try to have it all, but they need a lot of help. Why did women in the '80’s and '90’s believe that we could do it all? I think that both women and men undervalue the job of raising children, maintaining a home and working a full-time job outside the home. Can we change the work hours of consultants who travel 5 days a week? --Probably, not. Can’t we understand that our bodies will not allow us to keep up this ridiculous pace forever? I learned long ago that I can be a good mom, but I also need sleep. I can be a great consultant but not when I have to travel every week with young children at home.

We can have it all but maybe not all at the same time. Certainly, we can’t do it all!

Originally posted on Huffington Post, May 3, 2013

www.huffingtonpost.com/myra-evans

Huffington Post

I am pleased to announce that I have been published on Huffington Post. Please take at look at it!

Thank you for your support over the years.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/myra-evans/you-cant-idoi-it-all_b_3208982.html?view=print&comm_ref=false

Lean In or Lean Out

Depending on whom you ask, Anne-Marie Slaughter and Sheryl Sandberg have started the next women's revolution or the newest mommy war. Regardless, people are talking about where women are in the quest for gender and work equality.  Women are questioning why we have not achieved greater access to the c-suites of the Fortune 500 companies. It has also started a debate between my daughter and me about the future of the women’s movement.

Last weekend, I attended the inaugural Yale Women Conference in Washington. Almost every conversation revolved around Sheryl Sandberg's book, Lean In, and Anne-Marie Slaughter's article, "Why Women Still Can't Have It All", in the July/August 2012 issue of the Atlantic. I tried to convince my daughter to register for the conference, but my recent Yale graduate rebuffed the idea immediately even after I offered to pay her fees.

She did accompany me to Washington, only to see her friends from high school and college. I persuaded her to come to the last event, a cocktail reception. I figured that she would be more easily persuaded with free food and drinks rather than PBS NewsHour correspondent Margaret Warner’s interview of Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, both Yale alumnae. Upon leaving the hotel to meet her friends, my daughter ran into Arianna Huffington of Huffington Post. Even then, my daughter chose brunch and a tour of The Phillips Collection over attending this conference.

At the end of the weekend, I bravely asked her, "Why did you not want to attend the conference? Why are you so disenchanted from attending a star-studded women's conference hosted by your alma mater? What have we done as women and mothers to make our millennial daughters want to lean out?" Her response to my questions has shaken me to my core. 

She said that our generation of mothers and women was sending out too many mixed messages. She referred to Susan Patton, who told young women at Princeton to find a husband while in college; Sheryl Sandberg, who has advocated leaning in, working hard and picking the right husband as the keys to success; Ann-Marie Slaughter, who described her personal journey about "Why Women Still Can't Have It All"; and Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who confessed that one of the reasons her marriage failed was because she worked too many 15-hour days.

My daughter described how all of these conflicting messages discouraged her from listening to any one of the pioneers in the women's movement. Wow! I leaned back and watched her somber expression. I realized that even I had been giving her conflicting messages. In my effort to give her more advice than my mother could ever give me, I had given her too many directions and not enough freedom to find her own path. While she was a student at Yale, I told her to work hard and play hard. I told her to get a boyfriend and get straight A's.  I told her to apply to law school, because I felt she had all the right skills for that profession.  

Why do Type A women and mothers feel the need to control others’ actions? Why do women think there can be only one answer to a problem? Why do mothers passionately disagree about everything: breastfeeding or formula, staying at home versus working outside of the home? Why can't we just accept that every woman has the right to choose her own path? The real questions should be: "Do you want to lean in or lean out? What are your goals?” Though not every woman pursues the field of upper management, those who want to be business executives should be able. Women have to stop fighting each other, but we also need to change the rules of engagement so that more women can get to the corner offices.

I was really surprised about the backlash against Sheryl Sandberg's book. How could women judge the book before it had been released? I decided to buy the book. She has written a great book about how to navigate your way to the corner office.  Her argument is persuasive with documented evidence to show how women sabotage themselves. She also discusses how men need to change in order to let talented women sit at the table. Women have been her worst critics, and yet, men have been very quiet about her observations and experiences.

Likewise, Anne-Marie Slaughter has been criticized for admitting that she was unable to continue her career and have a child that needed her at home. I can relate to the trials of being a primary caregiver for my family while traveling 200,000 miles a year for work. I was responsible for 15 staff members, and yet, I could not get my daughter to sleep through the night. When I tried to work from home, my 5 year old would scream and bang on the walls until I had to open the door to my office. I questioned if I was smart or stern enough to "have it all". 

My daughter is right. Women have to accept the respective choices that each woman may make in the course of her own life. Justice Sotomayor, for example, does not have children. She bravely acknowledged that this decision was based on her personal health and her approach to work. Sheryl Sandberg seems to have found a spouse who shares enough of the onerous burden of parenting to give her the chance to have a corner office. Anne-Marie Slaughter explained how her career path was not conducive to a manageable work-life balance. A number of Ivy League women choose not to pursue a career at all and focus on their families instead.

Kamala Lopez, Yale Class of '85, was right to beat the drum to finally pass the Equal Rights Amendment. If women had equal rights and equal pay, some of these arguments would go away. Unfortunately, women cannot even agree on that goal. In addition to the Equal Rights Amendment, the corporate culture needs to be more family friendly. We need better childcare for all parents not just the ones who can afford nannies and private jets. All women should have the right to choose the life they want to live, and we need to give them the tools to be successful. I am now telling my daughter to define her goals and to follow her own path. My mission will be to support her as much as I can.

Lean in or lean out? It is your choice. 

The next debate should be the quest to "have it all".

Hooded

My first winter in New Haven was cold,really cold. There were record breaking snowfalls levels, and low temperatures were put in the history books during the winter of 1977-78. There was so much snow that students took the dining hall trays and used them as sleds to go down Science Hill.

All of the athletes wore hooded sweatshirts. After showering at Payne Whitney Gymnasium, they would put on their hooded sweatshirts to return to their residential colleges on those very cold days in New Haven.

I hate cold weather. I was born in the Midwest and was raised in a town that is cold and gray for at least six months every year. I should be accustomed to the cold but I still hate it. So when it got very cold in New Haven, I went to the Yale Co-op and bought a grey hooded sweatshirt with Yale printed on the front.

Today, hooded sweatshirts are sterotypically worn by criminals to hide their identity from security cameras. When I bought my first hooded sweatshirt over 30 years ago, I would have never suspected a member of the Yale football team to be a criminal. I feel sad that my son may be targeted as a criminal just because he chooses to wear a hooded sweatshirt.

One day--- I hope that a person's choice of clothing does not lead to them getting killed. To make an assumption about the content of a person's character, based on what a person is wearing, is wrong.

In memory of Trayvon Martin.

Corporal Punishment

Earlier this week in the news there was a story about a teacher who had told her class to line up and hit the "class bully". I was appalled and immediately thought that the teacher was the real bully. She was training future generations of children to use corporal punishment to solve their problems.

I was relieved to hear that the teacher was fired and being prosecuted for reckless endangerment of the children in her class. What would have happened if the "Bully" had been injured by the repetitive hitting? Is it really the right answer to punish someone who teases, taunts and even hits his or her classmates by using the same bad behavior.

During slavery, owners would beat their property if they misbehaved or tried to run away. Slavery was outlawed. Parents should know that in some states if you use any object other than an open hand to spank your child, you will be arrested and may go to jail. I think that all people should follow a simple rule that I instilled in my children at a very young age:

"No biting, no fighting, no hitting nor scratching."

These are very simple rules but they also teach children how to solve their problems without using violence. Why do parents think it is fine to teach children not to hit but then turn around and use corporal punishment on their children when they misbehave or make a mistake? I do not understand this logic.

I was raised as a Baptist. You were considered a good parent if you spanked your child. When I was very young, my mother would make me get my own switch from a tree outside our house to beat me. My father only spanked me once with his hand. I learned from him that corporal punishment was not needed to discipline a child. "Spare the rod, spoil the child", does not give a parent the right to beat their children. If you believe every passage in the Bible, you would kill a person at the same time you turn the other cheek.

How many studies have been published about the detrimental impact of spanking a child? In movies such as "Roots" and "Amistad", the depiction of humans being beaten by their owners is enough to make you questions ever hitting any person. Why would a parent want to hit their child?

If you were raised by a parent who hit you, you will be more likely to use this form of punishment on your children. Does it make it right? If you were raised by a sexual molester, would you molest your own children? Does it make it right? The answer to both questions is a sharp, "NO!"

We are living in the 21st century. We should be able to say that humans have evolved beyond violence. Sadly, as a species I feel as if we are returning to the Stone Ages. Should clubbing and hitting be our only form of communication?

I never hit my children. They knew when they had misbehaved or had not obeyed a rule. They knew there would be consequences for bad behavior and I would enforce my punishments. Sometimes parents want to be friends with their children. Make friends with other adults and parent your children so that they grow up to be self sufficient and functional adults.

Parenting is hard and it takes discipline. If you are too tired to hand out a punishment without resorting to beating your child, then take a parent time out and deliver the punishment when you are in control of your emotions. If you can't set an example for your children about how to control your own emotions, how can you expect them to control theirs?

Why I Quit

My friends and family told me to read the article that is the cover story of the Atlantic magazine in the July/August 2012 issue. I am sharing this article with all of my friends because it summarizes what I could never articulate so succinctly.

YOU MUST READ IT.

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/07/why-women-still-can-8217-t-have-it-all/9020/

WE MUST CHANGE THE WORKPLACE FOR OUR DAUGHTERS AND SONS. NOW.

DAYM

The Best Dad

I had an amazing father. He was my best friend. He taught me so much about life and how to be the parent that I am today. He was giving and loving and shared all that he had with my brother and myself. I hope there are lots of other sons and daughters that feel the same way about their dads.

My father taught me how to read and encouraged me to be a life-long learner. When I was accepted at Yale, he was very proud of me. After my first semester, I wanted to transfer to a local college. He made me stay and said that he did not raise quitters. I was very homesick and wanted to be closer to home. He told me to call him whenever I wanted or needed to talk. One month during my first year I had a $500.00 phone bill.

By the time I finished my freshman year, I was happy that I stayed at Yale. Sometimes parents need to practice tough love in order for their children to be successful in life. He had high expectations for me and wanted to make sure that I achieved my goals; Yet, he was gentle and firm all at the same time.

After graduation I worked at Goldman Sachs as a financial analyst. He had never heard of an investment bank. I don't think he understood what I did but encouraged me to work hard. He was a child of the Depression and did not trust the Stock Market. He had invested in real assets and was able to send me to Yale without any scholarships or financial aid.

During WWII, my father was a Buffalo Soldier in the last mounted calvary before the troop was disbanded. He got to see the world as a soldier and encouraged me to travel, even when he was too busy to accompany me. He believed that seeing the world would give me a better appreciation for my own country. He was so right.

He was not the traditional father figure. He did the grocery shopping, cooked all the meals, cleaned the house, did the laundry and was also a great provider. I look at other men today and wonder why they can't assume a few more tasks at home. It is possible to work outside the home and wash a few loads of laundry. I saw my father do so many things around the house. It is kind of funny when I think about it now; I thought all dads did these chores.

He loved the Earth and each year planted an award winning vegetable garden with corn, squash, tomatoes, beans and broccoli. He fostered my passion for gardening and how to care for all living things.

He showed me, by example, how to love my children unconditionally. If I made a mistake, he would talk to me about what I did wrong in a way that I never questioned his love. He also showed me what it means to sacrifice one's dreams and desires to make sure that the next generation has the opportunity to excel.

I love my father, and even though he passed away 15 years ago, my love for him never fades. I was blessed to be loved by someone so special.