Can we put an end to secret parenting?

Recently, one of my colleagues at BBN shared an article about "secret parenting," and the concept really struck a chord with me.  The basic idea is that people often feel that they will be judged for choosing parenting over putting in more hours at the office, and so they end up hiding these choices, making excuses, and generally having their work-life balance (or lack thereof) degraded further.

It's unfortunately easy to simply brush away one's parenting, to pretend that it's not happening, to pretend it's not important. And it's not just parenting, of course: people have all sorts of other things outside of work. Parenting, however, is something that's particularly strong and gendered in its impact in American society, at least.

In my group at BBN, I think we do pretty well on not hiding our parenting. The group mailing list is always abuzz with notifications of people saying they're going to be out or working from home for personal or family reasons: taking the kids to the doctor, dealing with child-care failure, going to see a kid's baseball game, helping out with the grand-kids, fixing an air conditioner, keeping their new dog company, etc. Also, importantly, I see it coming very much from both men and women.  I think that this visibility on the mailing list is really important, because it makes it much more comfortable to make those choices oneself, and to feel less pressure to engage in secret parenting. I definitely know that it matters for me.

With other colleagues outside of my home organization, however, I often do not feel such comfort. Whenever I make a choice that's driven by my desire to be a present and responsible parent (or other personal things, though parenting dominates in my life right now), I feel that I have to worry about things like:

• Will this person think less of me professionally?
• Will they worry I'm not sufficiently committed?
• Will they feel like I'm putting them at a lower priority?

This shows up in lots of little micro choices.  Like, do I tell people I can't make it because I'm volunteering to drive for a field-trip at my daughter's school, or just say that I have a conflict?  Do I say that I'm heading for the airport early because I want to see my kids in the morning, or just blame it on flight combinations to Iowa?

As I get to know somebody better, the barriers can come down, but in the world of science there are always new collaborators, new potential competitors, new program managers. I don't feel secure enough to expose myself in that way with people that I do not know well. And if I don't, as somebody who should probably be considered well established at this point in my career, how much more vulnerable my younger colleagues, my colleagues who are female or minorities?

On this blog, on my online persona, you get to see the highlights of my life. You don't get to see my times of burnout and depression. You don't get to see me struggle with imposter syndrome. I'm still not going to post these here, in full public record, for all to see, because I do not want to make myself that vulnerable to judgement. But dear reader, I would encourage you to count the posts that are not there.

Writing posts like these is a good sign, for me, because it's showing that I'm finding time enough to sit down and reflect and find the things I want to share.  Posts show me operating at peak functionality in my life, and if I'm operating at Peak Jake, I'd probably post just about once a week.  Thus, if you don't see a post, it doesn't necessarily mean that things are bad in my life---but it means that I don't feel I have the luxury to indulge in these delightful pseudo-conversations. Not without neglecting things that are more important to me, at least, like parenting and career.

But I do think that in my professional interactions, I'm going to try to shift my boundaries a bit more, indulge my trust a bit more freely in my outside-of-BBN colleagues. I don't like hiding my life from my work, parenting or otherwise, and since I am indeed in a somewhat secure and privileged position in my career, I think that one of my responsibilities is to help to shape my professional environment to be more of the sort in which I would like to live and work.

And with that, dear reader, let me sign off by informing you that this post appears in the midst of a two week vacation. My older daughter is between school and camp, and I've decided that I should spend that time with her, prioritizing parenting over work for at least a little while. I just hope that I don't pay too much for this choice in the state of my email and my projects at the time when I return.