The Imposter

There is a term that many graduate students throw around called Imposter Syndrome. Yet I think, for the most part, we use this term incorrectly (kind of like "intersectionality" but I won't go there right now). Basically, when we talk about imposter syndrome, we usually mean we feel like we don't belong, like we're going to be exposed as frauds, that actually we aren't smart enough to be in grad school. Yet there is an important component to imposter syndrome, which is the inability to internalize our accomplishments. Because to feel like an imposter also means one has to be incredibly accomplished because for some stupid reason she can't believe she is really that amazing.

I've written about this before, and this little syndrome monster rears its head every once in a while. However a couple of weeks ago this little monster came on strong and unforgiving. I am working on applying for some dissertation fellowships, and as I was working through writing the narrative for one of them I just started freaking out. I've been working in a vacuum for the entire summer, and not talking to really anybody. Talking with Miriam about my ideas is great, yes, but she doesn't give me much in the way of intellectual conversation (although her smiles are darn encouraging). So I've been working away, alone, and re-writing large portions of my dissertation proposal, and also cutting it down to 10 pages that makes a coherent argument for why I deserve a bunch of money, and I just flipped. The slow creep of the imposter monster was upon me, and I got up from the cafe table I was at and walked around the parking lot breathing heavily. Then I phoned a friend. Then I sent an email to my advisor telling him I was freaking out.

I don't want to make light of this, because it is very real. I often feel that I have to work harder to prove myself, this could be my own doing, or it could be that there are few women in academia so any number of us has to be better than someone else. (I saw a perfect headline this morning that said, "Uber's search for a women CEO gets narrowed down to 3 men.") So I look and compare myself to my peers, men and women, and I flail. And I don't believe those around me who tell me I'm doing good work, important work.

So that was a couple of weeks ago. I'm still dealing. But I have at least made some good progress on my fellowship applications as well as gained more confidence in what I'm writing about. It's hard. It's hard to write about women in academia (why did I choose this topic for my dissertation?!?!?) and this all gets squeezed by my sleep deprivation.

So here it all is. Imposter Monster, Sleep Deprivation, Grad School Stressing. For now I've got some good water wings, and soon I'll be swimming again on my own. But darn that Imposter Monster, it's the worst.

It's 8:23pm on a Tuesday

Well, here I am. Four months after my last blog post. Its 8:23pm on a Tuesday and the dishwasher is humming, the drying is going, and Kevin is... in the bedroom with a 3 and a 1/2 month old baby.

I won't go into the details, except to say that life is different. I'll save the sobs about how newborns can't do anything. Like really CAN'T DO ANYTHING (eat, poop, pee, burp, digest, sleep, smile, etc). Oh wait, I take that back, they can cry. And they can root around for milk. But other than that, really, uh, nothing else comes to mind. And I'm not harshing on my little baby, because she's absolutely the most beautiful, wonderful, amazing, smiley, crying, fussy, over-tired sometimes, bright-eyed, curious infant I have every known. (I won't divulge my sample size on knowing infants). But seriously, she's amazing and I mean that totally objectively of course (can you hear my whispering "she's advanced for her age"?). But having a baby is hard. Turning 40 two months after you have a baby is hard. Trying to make revisions on a dissertation proposal with a baby after turning 40 is hard. But it's also one of the most miraculous events in my life. I'll spare the gritty details, and just post a bunch of baby pictures for now*. Later I'll write about my meltdown with imposter syndrome and my revisions to my dissertation (fun times!)

*This post is for you, Bev.

Here's my chunky monkey at 3 months!

First time with a cloth diaper (and mesmerized by the ceiling fan)

Visiting with her NEW BEST FRIEND Petra who came to see us from Seattle

An Almost Finished Kitchen

We are closing in on the kitchen. So close. There are a few more things left to finish, and most of them do not impact the functionality of the kitchen. Well, there is the backsplash against one wall that has yet to be grouted, and that does really need to happen soon. Oh, and the trim under the cabinets would help with function so that things don't get lost in the underbelly of cabinets. But the painting, it's okay if that doesn't happen. And the hood that goes over the stove, does one really need a stove vent? We have the vent, it's just in a box in the basement. Because we literally, as of today, LITERALLY have 3 and a half weeks until Baby B arrives. And frankly, she could come any day, really, she decides. So, yeah, just trying to put the finishing touches on.

Now let me gush about what we have done in the kitchen, because we've done a lot. We knocked a wall down, we put new flooring in, we rehabilitated the wood floors that had been trapped under cheap floor tile, we got all new cabinets, we put new tile in for a backsplash, we got a dishwasher (which I say almost every day that I love and am so thankful for), we put in lights over the sink area, we finally removed all the eighties chandeliers, we up-cycled a bookcase into what we call a shelf and shoe, and we increased the storage in the kitchen even though we removed a wall of cabinets. Woohoo! Here are some pics.

Backsplash, and a view into the kitchen from the living room.

This is our "shelf and shoe." It's from an old bookcase we've had and we put it on the backside of
the cabinets by the front door so we can put our shoes there, and also any other random things
that get dumped when you come into the house. Perhaps a stroller will find a new home near here.

Our Rev-A-Shelf on the other side of the fridge is our pantry, and our new floors! Just click and go
on the install. Easy-peasy.

Welcome to Candidacy

Sorry blog, it's been a while. It's not that I haven't had things to share, it's just that the end of the semester and trying to pull everything together combined with my low energy and wanting to just watch Netflix all day has been winning out over writing. I have a big accomplishment to share, however, and I really can't let this one slide from being a blog post.

Yesterday I successfully defended my dissertation proposal! I am now officially a PhD Candidate, no longer just a student. This means I've finished all of my coursework, and can now say I'm "ABD" which is "all but dissertation." So what is a proposal? A proposal for my program is the first three chapters of my dissertation. These chapters consist of the hardest chapter to write, the first chapter, a literature review, the second chapter, and a description of how I will perform my study, or the methods chapter, the third chapter. The first chapter is the most difficult because it is essentially describing what the dissertation will be, and what the problem is that I will be addressing. You might not believe how hard it is to write a problem statement, but it is. Very hard. If there is anything I've learned from being in grad school like this, it is how to write so precisely that no one has a question about what I'm writing. The funny thing about writing with clarity and precision is that it takes three times as many words that then get removed. It's quite amazing. I've gotten used to tossing pages of words out the window during my writing process, but writing this proposal has brought it to a whole new level. I've probably tossed about 5-6,000 words, maybe more. That's about 20 double-spaced pages. My entire proposal is almost 80 pages. Ah, the process of writing. Especially chapter 1.

And this morning when I woke up I felt this great accomplishment. The sky was blue, and little Baby B was moving around like she was really excited too. There are some minor revisions I have to make with my proposal, but my entire committee signed off on it and now I can look ahead to a phase of my study where I am entirely focused on dissertation writing. I am sure that somewhere in my dissertation acknowledgements I will write that I defended my proposal at 36 weeks pregnant.

Showering Baby B

Over the past weekend we were given a most wonderful baby shower. Now, I've only been to three baby showers in my life until I went to my own. The first one was for a good friend, well, actually, it was for his girlfriend, and he wasn't there (long story) and it ended up being very weird and awkward and near the end of it the guitar started to get passed around and if you know me, you know how much I hate it when a guitar gets passed around. Because there is tremendous expectation for me to become a jukebox for people, and I really don't dig that. Needless to say, when the guitar came out, I promptly left. The second baby shower I went to was for one of my closest friends. She was the first in our tight knit group to have a baby, and she decided that she'd have her shower at a bar. Because, hey, just because she wasn't drinking didn't mean all of us couldn't raise a glass. So, yes, a bar baby shower, with men and women in attendance. The third baby shower was for my sister-in-law, and I helped plan it but I didn't know at ALL what I was doing. Her mother-in-law and I worked together to make a baby shower afternoon happen, and I think it was pretty nice, except I forgot to bring some gifts from her mom, who was living overseas at the time. It was highly embarrassing. But while we planned the shower, I did do some research and found out about some obnoxious games people play at these things and swiftly decided there would be no games of this kind.

Now, I have a wonderful little community here in Lansing, and several people offered to throw me a baby shower. The culmination of their generosity was on Saturday, and it really was a lovely afternoon. There were no games. No guitar passing. But there was wonderful company, amazing cake, lots of laughter, and a big booty to help us get ready for Baby B's arrival into the world!

The Baby B(ee) cake, my friendly shower attendees, Kevin looking 7 months pregnant, and
blocks with little messages for Baby B.

The Shower Planners, Side view of my giant belly, Kevin trying on the chicken towel.

Half Speed

As I walked up the stairs today in the College of Education to get to my office, a voice behind me said, "You're walking up the stairs like you're pregnant or something." Fortunately it was someone I knew and we laughed. I replied, "At least I'm still taking the stairs!" I'm at half speed these days. And it really blows. The last two weeks I have been trying to come to terms with the fact that I have to slow down. It is hard to intentionally do this. My body just won't let me bustle around like I used to, and if I try, oh, pain starts to come. (I won't go into the details except to say that when another human is growing inside you, a lot of your muscles and ligaments bend and stretch in peculiar ways making it hard to swiftly get from one end of a room to another). As a way to help combat some of this pain, I've started to do some more yoga to keep things limber, keep my back strong, and also strengthen my legs since I can't really do any exercise. My best girlfriend said I shouldn't feel bad about not exercising because, in her words, "being pregnant is like walking up hill all the time." And this is true, but I do still feel like I should be moving my body, doing something. Except then I walk too fast. And then the pain.

Physically slowing down, as difficult as it is, has been an interesting practice in trying to slow other things down as well. Like taking more time to relax and rest. To accept I may not defend this semester (although I spoke with my advisor yesterday and there may still be hope!). To feel okay about not writing all day, and stopping after three hours because my pregnancy brain has limited my ability to think clearly. To make many slow walking trips in the morning to put things in my backpack for school. And to remember to just lighten the load in every way I can. This is hard for me, much harder than I thought it would be. Because I'm the type to just plow through even when I'm exhausted. Because I hate asking for help. Yet I know now, and into the near future and much further beyond I'll need all the help I can get and ask for as this little one enters the world. And yes, I ask her for help too sometimes, so we can make this journey together.

Not Defending

The last week or so I've been thinking about the possibility that I will not be defending my dissertation proposal before Baby B arrives. This possibility became more of a reality when I met with my advisor yesterday and brought up again that "I'd really like to defend before the end of the semester" and he slowly nodded his head "no." So we chatted about it. He said certainly there may be a chance, but we need to revisit that chance at the end of the month. I came home last night accepting that there is a now a 90% chance that I will not be defending. This is not because I can't get the work done. It's because I may not get the work done in the way it needs to get done.

As someone on the "faculty-track" I need to produce a dissertation that 1) is worth reading and 2) can produce more research. My dissertation is not simply an exercise in getting my PhD, or the ultimate work I will do as an academic. It is, for me, a representation of my work as a grad student, and how that work can continue to grow. So it must be comprehensive, well-written, and display that I have an agenda I can publish from in the future. Doing all of this takes time. If I were just interested in banging out a dissertation to get my PhD and call it good, then I wouldn't take so much care with this (or... to my thinking, my advisor wouldn't be so difficult about this. He has said as much. I think is exact words were "All of this work you're doing is 'just fine' and would make an 'okay, just fine' dissertation if you didn't want to be a faculty member. But you can't be 'just fine' because of your aspirations. So I'm going to be a pain in your ass").

Thus, I'm coming to terms with how much more work I need to do. Like combing through each tiny letter and word and sentence in what I've got so far (about 50 pages) and cleaning it all up. Sure, it makes sense. It's well-written, but it's not WELL-WRITTEN. I'm also coming to terms with how much literature I haven't included in my literature review. And even if I don't include it, I need to know about it to defend why I didn't include it. My advisor said to me earlier this year that I need to stop reading and start writing, but I also know where the gaps are in my knowledge so I need to brush up. Thus, more reading. (Most people who know me know I spend a lot of time reading, maybe too much. I can't help myself, there's so much to learn and know!!) Anyway, I can see all the pieces that need to be taken care of, and the work that will need to go into it, and frankly, it's kind of starting to stress me out. And everything in my life is slowing down right now, literally. I have to be cognizant of the fact that I can't rush around because my body won't let me, or rather, Baby B won't let me. I can't think very quickly either, I've got pregnancy brain - oh yeah, that's a totally real thing. I am having to force myself to sit down and rest. It's really hard, but I know it's better for me if I do. Accepting these things is difficult, but it also makes sense, so I'll continue to work through my proposal. If I don't defend, it's not the end of the world. I've given myself two years to write my dissertation. If I do defend, that's great! For now, small slow steps with care and thoughtfulness. And complete well-written sentences.