“That Was Fun, But Now It's Done”

August 2021: Netarts, OR

I did something pretty big really huge last week...

I quit my job.

I submitted my formal resignation to my dean and as of June 2022 I will no longer be an assistant professor. To be honest with you, it feels like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders.

When I applied to PhD programs, my goal was never to become a professor. Somewhere between then and now, I found it increasingly difficult to voice my desire for following a different path post-graduation. What I wanted got lost in what others wanted for me.

Instead, I doubled down on doing all the things I was supposed to do. I checked all the boxes, said all the right things, went on the job market, and landed myself a pretty great faculty position. I thought that once I was officially an assistant professor, I’d learn to love the job and all that came with it. I’d just keep plugging along, doing all the things I was supposed to and one day I’d wake up and magically fall in love with my job.

But as each year has passed, it’s become increasingly harder to fake it. I remember my first day teaching, the overwhelming feeling of dread that washed over me as I made my way to the classroom, telling myself, “I can’t do this for the rest of my career.” And while that feeling subsided the closer I got to summer, it has come right back at the start of every new school year. With it comes the exhaustion of pretending that all is well. [I will also add that throughout my time as an assistant professor and grad student I’ve had some pretty significant undiagnosed anxiety, that I’ve become a master at masking, which has also contributed to that feeling of dread.]

My dad’s death was a major turning point in my journey to quitting my job. About a year prior to his death, I started this blog as a way to help myself cope with the fact I was in a role that wasn’t for me. Up until his death, it worked, the blog made the job more enjoyable and gave me a way to process/explore things I liked/didn’t like about the work. When my dad died, and I was forced to take a harder look at my own mortality and that of my loved ones, I asked myself why I was investing so much of my time into something I knew wasn’t for me. I didn’t have an answer.

My dad’s death and then my mom’s subsequent hospitalizations also made us seriously reconsider our living situation. Could we really live across the country from family, especially as our parents were getting older? That answer was a resounding no.

We contemplated moving during the summer of 2020... and I’m sure you can guess how that went! Before we could make any sort of headway on plans, the pandemic hit. We knew we wanted to have another kid, so instead of moving we had a baby. And here we are, 2 years later, still a plane ride away from family.

The pandemic has further compounded the difficulties of living far from family (as I’m sure you’ve likely experienced in some way, shape, or form). It’s been 2 years with minimal socialization and zero help or visits (minus a quick trip back east in November 2021 for my dad’s service). Two years at home with Ellie and now 8 months with Hannah has left us depleted.

There are so many things that we love about the life we’ve built in Oregon, but that life looks almost unrecognizable now. The things that we love, we aren’t really doing. We rarely see people socially because of the virus and having a baby, we don’t do much travel because of the virus and because parenting a baby is exhausting, especially when there’s no one waiting in the wings to lend a hand. So... right now is hard. We realize it’ll get better, but in the meantime we’d like to raise our kids closer to where our families are so we don’t have to get on a plane to see them.

In June 2022 we’ll say goodbye to Oregon and pack up for Richmond, VA. It’s about a 1.5 hour drive from where my family is and about 4 hours from Mike’s family. Much more manageable than a ~5 hour flight (at best!) with two young kids. It’ll make for easy weekend trips for all involved.

My decision to pause my tenure clock was heavily influenced by all the above. If this was a career path I wanted to pursue, I probably would have tried to go ahead and submit my packet on schedule. However, knowing that I didn’t want to stay or find another faculty position made pausing seem like the best decision. It gave me time to really make sure I was making the “right” decision for me in the moment.

What’s next for me job-wise? That is still to be decided. The plan right now is that Mike will step back into full-time work and I’ll stay home with Hannah while I reconnect with what I actually want to do with my career. I have some ideas and I don’t want to rush into something new without some more processing and decompressing. I’m taking this massive decision one day at a time.

As they say in Daniel Tiger, “that was fun, but now it’s done.”