Jen Fulwiler used to post about the saying that every baby comes with a loaf of bread under his arm -- the idea that when God sends a baby, he also provides for that baby's family in unexpected ways. This week I've been thinking about the career version of that saying.
Many of you have been reading here for a long, long time (thanks for that!) and you might remember that I was a little worried about what baby Stella's arrival might mean for my hopes to finish a PhD. I was torn between two dissertation topics: either I would analyze someone else's data from a large longitudinal study for question #1, or I would collect my own data for question #2. I was leaning toward question #2, but once I found out I was pregnant there was no question: I would analyze someone else's data in the quiet of my house with my baby in my lap. I would not go tromping around the community and leave a tiny baby at home. But it felt a little like cheating-- like I was taking a shortcut.
But you guys, I am so glad I took that shortcut! I couldn't imagine then the effects that choosing question #1 would have on my career. The choice to study question #1 meant that my dissertation wound up in my field's flagship journal, where it was followed by another closely related paper a few years later. The third paper in that series was published last week. I spun off part of my dissertation into another paper, which turned into a collaboration with a different colleague; our second paper was published in January. My familiarity with the big dataset also meant that I was invited to be a co-author on another paper in the flagship journal, and that when I said to the PI in January, "Hey, what if we wrote a paper about XYZ?" he said, "Sure, let's do that!"
Question #2 would have resulted in a serviceable dissertation, but it is extremely unlikely that it would have had comparable results in terms of publications and possibilities. And being ahead of the game on publications made it so much easier to navigate the pre-tenure phase of my career with a big family.
I am remembering the regret I felt at closing the door on question #2. It's a little strange to think about all the opportunities that have come my way as a direct result of that closed door. I was worried that tiny Stella might mean the end of my nascent academic career, but instead she nudged it in a far more fruitful direction.
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