My Dream Job Landed Me In The ER — 'The Thought Of Taking Time Off Was Nightmare-Inducing'
Chasing your dream career can be exhilarating until it pushes you past your breaking point.
Natee Meepian's Images | Canva I was on an amazing career trajectory. Twelve months after returning from maternity leave, I was promoted to my dream job.
15 years of hard work, long hours, and going back to school part-time for my MBA had paid off. After years of being passed over for promotions and told I was too young and inexperienced for leadership, I had finally been given the chance to lead a team of my own. At last, I was in a position of authority to make impactful decisions and use my expertise to drive change in my organization.
My boss was mentoring me to take his place in executive leadership as the head of global operations and supply chain. I earned a role where I could impact my company’s strategy; a seat at the table.
I had it all: a beautiful 18-month-old daughter, an incredible marriage with my supportive husband, and my dream job at a company I loved. I was also miserable.
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Last year, I found myself in the emergency room after being referred by an urgent care doctor for chest pain that I had been enduring for five months. Five months.
The only reason I ultimately consulted a doctor at all was because the anxiety of not knowing if there was something medically wrong with me or not was putting my baseline stress level even higher. An irregularity in my EKG landed me in the ER that night.
After undergoing hours of tests, the irregularity was determined to be something I was likely born with, and I was in no immediate danger. The doctors said the pain I was experiencing was likely stress-related.
“What a relief,” I thought, dressing myself behind the privacy curtains at 4 a.m. on a Wednesday, careful not to disturb the bandage where the IV had been placed. “It’s only stress.”
It was only stress that made me double over at my desk from chest pain several times per day, gasping for air. It was only stress that decreased my appetite so significantly that I lost 10 pounds.
It was only stress that caused me to grind my teeth so forcefully that I chipped a molar. It was only stress that left me sleepless every night, feelings of guilt spiraling through my mind while I tossed and turned.
A surprise visit to the ER for stress-related chest pain still was not the wake-up call that I needed to rethink my career trajectory and work-life balance.
I continued to grind away at my job and my teeth for another five months before I broke down and gave my notice. My body was screaming at me every single day for the better part of a year. I was so overwhelmed with my new roles, both at work and in my home as a mother, and I felt like a failure at both.
When I was at work, guilt tortured me; I was missing precious time with my daughter that I could never get back. When I was at home, I couldn’t be present and enjoy time with my daughter and husband; Late projects and unfinished tasks haunted me.
The thought of taking time off from work was nightmare-inducing. I couldn’t bear to imagine the amount of work that would collect in my absence and bury me further.
And it wasn’t the job’s fault. This was a far cry from a toxic workplace. The leadership at my company was immensely understanding, and my boss and team were incredibly flexible and supportive of me. I know the old me could have kept it all together, but I was different in motherhood, and I simply could not commit the same level of focus to my career while being the mother I wanted to be for my daughter.
I probably could have gotten away with contributing less at work, earning a “meets expectations” instead of my normal “exceeds expectations” rating on my annual review, but even if my boss could accept that from me, I could not accept it from myself.
Why did I ignore my body’s emergency signals for so long? Now that I have had some time to reset, I can begin to peel back this onion.
When I quit my job, I had no plan and absolutely zero prospects.
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Being a stay-at-home mom is something I am neither interested in nor cut out for (I barely made it through three months of unpaid maternity leave with my sanity.) The immense privilege I have to be able to take this risk financially is not lost on me.
I am well aware that there are so many women who share my same feelings but do not have the option to pause their careers to figure out a new path.
Surveys indicate that although 98% of women want to continue working after having children, less than 25% continue full-time work after having a baby. I vowed never to be someone who gave up or downgraded their career. I love working, and since my goal was always to be financially independent, I had to.
Financial independence enabled my mom to purchase her house from her ex-husband after they divorced at a time when women were unable to obtain a mortgage without a man cosigning. She rented out rooms in that house as a second source of income to keep herself afloat as a newly single woman.
My mom’s story embedded in me an aspiration to always maintain my financial independence and never rely on a man for my livelihood. Except, now that is precisely what I am doing. Or, at least, that’s what it feels like I am doing.
Over the last 15 years, I have been able to amass my financial safety net for just such an occasion, but I also cannot deny how much safer it feels and how much easier this decision is knowing my daughter has at least one gainfully employed parent.
I feel immensely fortunate to have support from my husband at this time. However, relying on his income, even as a safety net, is extremely uncomfortable and an enormous blow to my ego.
I feel a tremendous amount of guilt for quitting my director-level position.
I feel like I am single-handedly proving the male chauvinist pigs right when they won’t hire or promote women into leadership positions because they will inevitably quit to start a family.
My guilt and unwillingness to fit into a stereotype drove me to keep busting my behind and assuring my boss that I wanted and could handle more. Isn’t this what I wanted? Isn’t this why I worked so hard?
I would show the world that women were the same before and after having children. We deserve to be plugged directly back into the same role we had been in pre-pregnancy. I would be the living proof that women can have it all.
But I was different. I was a completely different size and shape, mentally and physically. No matter how hard I pushed, there was no fitting me back into the executive-level ideal I had once envisioned for myself.
But that’s just me. I know there are women (I am friends with many of them) who are doing the same level and quality of work that they were doing pre-partum. Better, even.
They rely on their village for expertise with childcare and can maintain a strong focus on their careers. As hard as I tried and pushed myself and lied to myself and lied to my boss and lied to my team, I could not be one of those women.
This is my reminder to myself that I do not need to carry the bad deeds of the patriarchy on my shoulders.
Just because my choices fit the stereotype does not mean I am responsible for the perpetuation of the stereotype. I am not the reason deserving women are routinely passed over at work. Fathers routinely quit jobs without guilt for any number of reasons. I desire to allow myself to do the same.
Tiffany Judge is a writer and essayist whose contributions can be found on Medium. After spending 15 years in the corporate world, she has recently turned her focus to writing. She is a lifelong learner and brings a sharp analytical eye and deep personal insight to her work.
