Women’s happiness is measurably lower than it was 20 years ago. But there are steps that can improve your life significantly
In 2017, I gave birth to my son, and also a midlife crisis. Suddenly, my two-hour commute from our home in New York City to my job as an economist at the University of Pennsylvania went from inconvenient but sustainable to the bane of my existence. And my marriage, which had seemed flawed but in a cute, work-in-progress kind of way, suddenly seemed to be falling apart at the seams. At the same time, in my academic career, rejections were stacking up, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that my male colleagues, some of whom were going up for tenure years before I was, simply had more time in their days. Nor did I feel as if I was at the top of my game in other domains, constantly observing how much nicer other people’s houses looked, how much better dressed their little bundles of joy were, how much more time they seemed to have to juggle motherhood, work, and coordinate everything therein.
Perhaps the nadir of this period was when track repairs were taking place on my train line, and I spent a total of six hours commuting, only to work in my office for four. I pumped breast milk in the Amtrak bathroom, crying, because I wouldn’t make it home in time to put my son to bed. I not only felt as though I didn’t “have it all”; I felt as if I didn’t have anything. Not the successful career I wanted, not the thriving family and home life I wanted, and I wasn’t even the fun person I used to be, who travelled and laughed and enjoyed things. Most of all, I was So. Darn. Tired. All the time. Continue reading…
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