Fernanda Foertter

( What a year it has been. I promise this post is related to Women in STEM but it needs some personal context first. Hang with me.)

I should have expected that 2019 would bring major changes. 
— 1989 my family moved to America. 
— 1999 I had my first child. 
— 2009 I got my first job post grad school and met my father and bonus family for the first time.

Seems the 9’s bring major life changes for me.

In Feb 2019 I decided to end a 22 year relationship. I frankly never thought I’d be here but we gave it a good try and in the end we just couldn’t fix it. Hubs was such an important part of my career development. Everyone I knew professionally waited to have kids, but I wanted them early so I had mine while still in an undergraduate. This went against everyone’s advice, but he was supportive. It actually turned out pretty convenient for me since with flexible semesters, I could tend to the early chaotic child care years. By the time I started my first job we realized it made more sense if he, school teacher and retired military man, stayed home. As my career flourished, this gave me the flexibility to travel, but also came with the responsibility to be “the bread winner,” with all the implications that go with being a married woman in STEM.

“You’re so lucky he stays home” was one of many I heard. And it was true, I was lucky. But this was often said in the context that it was unexpected. No one turns to a guy at the office and says “you’re so lucky to have a stay at home spouse.” A decade in, as bigger problems began to surface I thought Marriage has ups and downs and you shouldn’t quit something everyone wishes they had, you’re lucky.

In 2015 my father passed away and in the year it took for me to heal from losing the father I had just met 6 years prior, I began to feel how short life is. 2017 I turned 40, my oldest graduate HS, elections happened, MeToo, mass shootings… Then I lost a friend to cancer and this year a friend lost his boy to suicide. Life was moving just so fast that by the end of 2017 I was ready for change, any change. Mid-life crisis in full effect.

As luck would have it a new professional opportunity came up. But how does one leave a marriage when they just started a new job? So I sucked it up, gave it one more sincere try and we made it to 20 years. Our lack of enthusiasm for celebrating this milestone probably cemented the inevitable.

Speaking only in regards to career here, it’s tough making a decision that can impact your support system; It only adds to the other important reasons for not quitting like kids, history, loyalty, commitment etc. I’m not speaking about career being a deciding factor, it’s just yet-another-reason career women have to consider. And it’s not that we can’t make it on our own, but that systems in place are hard enough to navigate. For example: you want to stay put for the kids’ sake which can limit an already limited list of career opportunities available to women.

It’s weird quitting a secular marriage in this day and age: I somehow still feel an immense amount of guilt for ending it, guilt for our mutual friends who may find it all awkward, for our kids who will need to navigate this new two-house reality. I was so lucky to have married someone so supportive of my career and he’s an excellent father to our kids. But what we needed in a relationship neither of us could give one another. I hope we can find it in the next phase of our lives.

Turns out I am indeed lucky. Some folks say to keep your work and personal life separate, but I couldn’t have made it this year without my professional friends. I’ve had invitations to beach house weekends, surfing lessons, home stays so I didn’t have to be in a hotel, so many coffee/pubs/lunches/dinners just to cheer me up, messages from folks checking in on me from far and wide. I’ve had innumerable instances of people, that I didn’t realize cared that much for me, go out of their way to share so much love and compassion.

One example- I’ve never been much to celebrate my birthday and this year at a professional conference I did something unprecedented for me and scheduled a dinner party. The insecure part of me thought everyone would be too busy but to my utter amazement (I say this in the most authentically pathetic way) just about everyone I invited came. We laughed so hard my abs hurt the next day. The celebrations continued all week until the last evening of the conference (my actual birth day), I made some really nice new friends.

Why am I sharing all this? Because I discovered in the last two years of conversations that I’m not alone in this struggle. So many friends confided they too have been struggling to stay/go in their less-than-happy marriages, and that career consequences are part of the equation, even if “it’s not supposed to be.” My point is being a woman in STEM, especially an academic field that requires travel and late nights, means needing a support system that is difficult to find because 1) men are not as likely to choose a less demanding career or stay at home, and 2) there aren’t that many of us women in our STEM fields that we can lean on. And we should lean on each other, even if you’re “not supposed to” mix personal and professional life. I’ve been lucky to have both.

Whether you’re a man or woman, childless or not, in STEM, I hope you’ll seek and find these types of people in your lives. People who help you thrive both personally and professionally, even if these relationships don’t remain the same in the long run. I’m looking forward to 2020, except I’m not looking forward to dating. Because the last time I dated, Google didn’t exist yet. But that’s a blog post for another day.

Wishing you and your family a thriving, healthy and happy 2020.