I told my children, specifically, not to throttle back. My advice was to pick whatever career they wanted and expect their future spouses to compromise so they can both achieve satisfying careers. For my daughter, that means not giving up her job if/when she has kids. It means choosing a spouse who understands that running the home is the responsibility of everyone who lives there. For my son, it means taking on an equal share of responsibilities at home from the beginning and encouraging his wife to not give up her career if/when they have children. For both it means realizing that sometimes, they’re going to give much more than 50%, which is okay if their spouse is willing to pick up the slack when they can’t give 50%.
I have a bachelor’s degree in broadcasting and I had every intention of keeping my network job and homeschooling my children. I lined up a 2nd shift job while they were little and got a well paying job in a larger market before they were school age. But my youngest is dyslexic, dyscalculic, and dysgraphic, so working and homeschooling was too much because I homeschooled during the day and created curriculum at night. That meant everyone in our house had to pitch in with everything it takes to run a household – cooking, cleaning, laundry, yard maintenance – all of it. I don’t regret it, but we’d be in a better financial position if I’d continued working and paid for private school. We didn’t realize that was an option until it was too late.
In August, when my daughter starts her last year of high school, I’ll be returning to college to change careers and my husband and children will all pitch in to make sure things run smoothly at home. I’ve been lucky; I’ve got a great husband who is my financial backup in case my future plans don’t work out the way I want, and a few siblings who will be financial backups on the remote chance my spouse ever wants a divorce. If my husband had decided he wanted a divorce when my children were younger, it would be an entirely different story. I have too many women friends who didn’t have a plan for supporting themselves, so when they were suddenly divorced and jobless at ~50, they had a problem. I don’t ever want my children to be in that position, which means they have to take steps to be financially independent and stay that way.
I don’t know how some people get an impression it was me that want my daughter to become a neurologist and how it was my idea to talk about it. It’s purely her questions and her intention to discuss it. It was some of her peers who are the smartest in class and teachers questioning her for becoming a vet because they see more in her. They told her it would be a waste. I am neural on this and I don’t have enough knowledge to help her process the thought. That’s why I asked people on CC.
I thank for all the advice and constructive criticism from the people who are understanding and encouraging. I think I am fine with my parenting skills for now because my daughter has shown me the positive outcome and we have a really good relationship. I don’t need tips on that. I was asking for ideas about becoming a neurologist from people who have knowledge or have heard stories about it. It was just a casual discussion. Oh well…
There has been a lot of great advice here but I’ll offer my perspective as well to reinforce some points.
Where I’m coming from: not a physician but both parents are surgeons, and mother chairs the admissions committee for a top med school.
Only go into medicine if you love doing the work.
Take organic chemistry. This course weeds out a lot of people because they either find the work too difficult, or do not find it interesting.
Grades are important, but demonstrating real interest is as well. Try to spend time in a medical environment, shadowing a neurologist may not be simple to arrange, but you can determine if you truly enjoy working in medicine by spending time working at a care facility or hospital in another role.
Schools get a ton of candidates with strong grades, and strong grades are important but they are spending an increasing amount of effort looking for functional adults. So, be who you are, and take the time to have other interests. A lot of the most interesting candidates are people who came to medicine from a non-traditional background and who have some perspective on life.
It is really early in the whole process to decide to be a specific speciality, the whole point of university, and med school and a residency is to establish interest and aptitude so it’s good to stay flexible.
It is hard to balance everything. My mom went back to work very quickly after I was born and was lucky that my dad was willing and able to take time off work to take care of me while she finished her fellowship.
Vets are cool too. And there aren’t nearly enough large animal vets, or vets trained in surgery. If your daughter loves animals setting up a veterinary practice could be fulfilling, challenging, a good source of income, and a good path to work/life balance as well.