11: Balancing Family and Academia

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

Hi, everyone. Happy holidays. Today I want to spend a little bit of time to talk about balancing family and academia. In other words, how do you harmonize between your family expectations, and your academic work? I really wanted to talk about this at this moment because the holidays are right around the corner. Right now, a lot of you are probably back home with family or loved ones. And if you're a student, or if you are someone who's applying to graduate school, or you're someone who's thinking about applying to graduate school, aside from spending time with family, you may be thinking about academic expectations at this time, which can be a distraction, and not always a positive distraction. Sometimes it can be a stressor.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

And so I wanted to just talk to you a little bit more about some of the ways that I've been able to, "balance family and academia." I use air quotes when I say "balancing" because this idea of ever truly being in balance is a fallacy. It's not something that you can ever truly achieve. I also prefer the word harmony or harmonizing, because with the word harmony, there's this idea that there's no expectation for balance. So I want to start out with allowing you to understand that there will be times when you're going to put your family first, or you're going to put your academics first. You're going to feel like a better mom, if you have kids, or a better student, if you are a student, a better academic. There's no one time when you are a perfect X role, whatever that role is. But there are different moments that you can kind of ride the waves of whatever it is that you have to prioritize at the time.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

And so I guess I should start with talking about prioritizing. Whenever you're doing work, whenever you're thinking about family expectations- and sometimes there are moments when it feels like everything is happening all at once. You have finals, and someone's sick in the family, or you know, there's a family emergency. What do you do? How do you prioritize? Obviously, when it comes to family emergencies, those things come first. But there are times when things aren't as obvious, and prioritizing isn't as easy. In those cases, one of the things that I do is I make a lot of to do lists. I used to write them down before. I used to write them down on my planner, and on sticky notes. And now I actually write them down on- I use this app and website called Kanban flow.com. I can make as many lists as I need to, and I can label them, color code them based on: is it a personal to-do task, or is it work related? Amongst the work related ones, I also have subcategories: is it related to students? Is it related to finances? Is it related to the grant, the McNair grant? Is it related to anything else, administrative tasks, things like that? Why do I make to-do lists? I know that sometimes when you make to- do lists, you realize it's getting longer and longer and it only stresses you out more. But for me, it helps to visually see what I have going on so that it's not stuck in my head. Then I worry and stress about what if I forget about it. And also, once I put it in the list form, then I can start to rearrange it based on priorities, and based on how much time I have. So that's my first tip is to consider making more to-do lists, whether that's on paper, or on your phone the way that I do it. Then from there, prioritizing. After you prioritize, then you decide, okay, what things do I need to do today? What things can I put on the side?

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

So, for instance, for me right now, I'm still technically on break. I'm on a medical break. I'm taking some of my sick and vacation time because I had nose surgery a week ago. Thankfully, everything went well and I'm feeling much better. But I'm technically in break. So what did I do is I had to prioritize what things I needed to get done before I had my surgery, and what things that could hold off until January. And this is my first time, I think the first time since undergrad, since my undergrad days, that I've taken nearly a month off without doing any work. Technically, I'm doing this. I'm recording a podcast, and still involved in some other projects. But for my nine to five, I'm not doing any work. So how did I do that? I had to, again, what needed to be done now what was urgent? And what could wait? That's what I want you to kind of think about right now is, if you're trying to spend time with family, and you're stressed out over things that you feel you need to do right now. Maybe make a list and think twice about whether or not you really need to do it now? And if so when can you make the time to get it done? Then what can you actually put to the side, so that you can have a good time; you can relax and have fun with loved ones or do what you need to do for the holidays. So I guess that's the number one thing: to-do lists and prioritizing.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

The next thing I want to talk about related to this has to do with boundaries and time management. Setting boundaries was really hard for me to learn because when I was an undergrad- I mean, I'm still very much type A and have workaholic tendencies. And what's the word? What's the word for: I was formerly a perfectionist? Recovering perfectionist, I guess you can call me that. But so boundaries, I had no boundaries. I was work, work, work, work. Anytime you asked me to do anything, I could never say no. And I worked myself sick. I worked myself to the point where I developed a chronic illness that I to this day still have. Obviously, it's chronic. But boundaries, how do I set boundaries now? How am I doing that in a healthy way? Well, I have very strict work hours. My work hours are eight to four-thirty, every single day. My students know this, if you send me an email before 8am, after 4:30pm, you're not going to hear from me unless it's an emergency. Same goes with weekends. I typically don't work on weekends. Every once in a while maybe you know, once in a blue moon, I will. But that's not my- that's my policy is, I don't work on weekends. I have exceptions, like when I go to academic conferences, but for the most part, I don't work on weekends.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

This also has to do with time management, because if you are a student and you don't have an office job like I do, it's much harder to set those boundaries. It's much harder to work eight to five when you feel like you have all day to do the same work. And then you wait and then you realize it's 5pm and you haven't done enough work. Then what do you do? So you really have to try to be as strict as possible with yourself about what your boundaries are. Your boundaries and your limits don't have to be the same as mine. They don't have to be, you know, eight to four- thirty. They don't have to be: I don't work weekends. Maybe you just say: I don't work Sundays. Or maybe I work weekends, but only from eight am to noon, and then the rest of the my day is to myself. Whatever it is for you, figure that out. And then see that time management is key here, because time management and also learning to say no is also key. Whenever someone asks you about something, whether or not they're asking for a request, it's really easy to feel like oh my gosh, this is such a great opportunity. I don't want to look bad. If I say no, then these opportunities are not going to come anymore. But in actuality, think about it. If someone's offering you something, and you're not sure about whether or not to say yes or no, think about how am I getting compensated for this? Is it something that I need? Is it something that will look good on the CV? Is it something that's going to fulfill me? Is it something that maybe is your passion or makes you feel good about yourself and you know you're gonna really enjoy it and then you're getting compensated that way? Or are you actually financially getting paid for this and you need to pay the bills? Then I understand. You say yes for anything that compensates you, in some way, shape or form. If it doesn't compensate you, and you're saying yes because you feel bad saying no, you need to learn to start saying no, because you can't say yes to everything. As you advance in your career, you're gonna get more and more requests, and you physically can't be in a million places at once. If you try, you're gonna work yourself sick, like I did. So, boundaries and time management are very important.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

Another thing I want to mention related to "balancing or harmonizing your family with your academic expectations" has to do with two things: therapy and/or exercise. I have found that some of the folks that are doing well and seemingly the healthiest and seem to be doing something right, do one of these two things religiously. They either go to therapy regularly, or they exercise regularly. And it's ideal if you can do both. For me, it's always been therapy. I am on and off; even when I stop, I end up going back. Therapy has been so great for me, both individual and group therapy, so I'm a huge advocate of that. Exercise- I've never been that great at it, so I'm not the one to talk to about it. But I I know a lot of runners. I know a lot of folks that exercise is the way that they maintain their mental health. So figure out what that is for you. But choose one or the other. Either go to therapy, or figure out an exercise routine that works for you because your self- care is important.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

That brings me to the topic of self care, which is the next thing I was going to talk about. So aside from therapy and exercise, which are already forms of self care, I also recommend finding forms of self care that work for you. And finding those things that you can do for one minute, for ten minutes, for half an hour, for an hour, for a full day, for a weekend, having multiple things that you know that you can do to help you de-stress. This is so important, because if you're a student, if you're an academic, if you have a family, whether it's taking care of your elderly parents, or you have kids of your own, or you're helping out a sibling, whatever; you have to sacrifice, you have responsibilities that are related to having family. Self- care is critical for you. It's the way that you sustain yourself. For me, I have my own little self care tool box. It's not literally a toolbox, but it's things that I know that I can do that helped me when I get really stressed out. The first thing that I do that I know that I can do for a minute is breathe. So I have apps on my phone for breathing, and that have guided meditations. That helps me when I know I only have a minute or two or five minutes. If I have twenty, thirty minutes, I will listen to a podcast. I have so many podcasts that I listen to, and it just makes my day to start it off- and usually I do it in the mornings as I'm getting ready for work, I listen to a podcast as I'm getting ready. And it makes me feel really good to learn something new as I'm getting ready, and to have that time to myself away from my family, away from my work expectations.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

So what else do I have for self care? I do yoga every now and then, not regularly. I wish. But I do that, and I know that whenever I struggle, I can always kind of revert back to that. I have friends that I can call. So those are just a couple of examples of things that are part of my toolkit. What are other things that I know folks do? Some people, their thing is, every day they make themselves coffee and they drink their coffee by themselves and that's their thing. Or every day, going back to the runners, they run or they swim, you know, two times a week, four times a week, whatever that is. Or they take walks; they'll walk their dog. Or what else? Some people like to just drive, drive and listen to an audiobook on their commute to and from campus. What else do people do for self care? A lot of people here where I live in Santa Barbara, they go to the beach. They just go to the beach and walk on the beach, and that is their therapy. So find those things that destress you, those things that bring you joy, and write them down if you need to, if you can't remember every day. What I do actually is, I have this vision board that I created. I know this is gonna sound very silly, but I created it. I try to create one in the new year, just some goals and some things to do. But on the vision board, it also has some ideas for things to do for self care. I have it in my room, and I have it there next to my drawer. I opened my drawers everyday because my clothes are in there. So I'm forced to look at it every day to remind myself: oh, yeah, I'm supposed to do self care. I'm supposed to do X, Y, and Z. So if you need to, and if you need a visual reminder, I recommend doing that too. But self care is critical. It's so hard to prioritize when it feels like everything else is more important, but you are important too. You gotta find - even if it's one or five minutes a day to yourself, you need to do it because you don't want to deplete yourself. You don't want to burn out.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

Okay, two more things that I want to focus on when it comes down to this idea of balancing family and academia. The next is developing a support system or developing multiple forms of support. Whether that is having a certain set of friends that you can go to to vent when shit hits the fan, or family members- maybe it's a parent or a sibling or a cousin, someone you're close to, again, who you can call and vent to even if they don't understand what you're going through, but just someone to listen. Probably even more helpful than that is establishing writing groups. If you're a student, maybe that could be a study group as well. Finding study buddies, writing buddies, that's really, really useful. But I can't emphasize enough, this whole idea of establishing a support system, because that's what's gonna get you through undergrad, that's gonna get you through graduate school, and it's going to continue to get you through your different professional and career goals.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

The last thing I want to focus on has to do with mindfulness and really, truly being in the moment. If you have a family, or if you've got a lot of responsibilities, and you are also struggling with a lot of academic work, it's really hard to be in the moment, because you might be having a lot of racing thoughts of all the things that you need to do that you haven't gotten done. So it's really hard to really focus on what you're doing in the present. But that is actually really critical to helping you both be more joyful, and make better connections with people, and do better work. So for me, when I'm at work, I'm at work. If a student comes into my office and I was previously working on a spreadsheet, and they want to talk to me, and it's something important, I tell them to sit down. I close the door, and I focus on them. I forget about the spreadsheet. I forget about my son. I forget about my husband. I forget about my boss. I forget about everybody. I just focus on them, and what they're telling me and what I can do to help them out. Sometimes it's just listening. Sometimes it's offering advice. Sometimes it means advocating for them. But that's really important to be able to be in the moment. With my son, when he wants to do arts and crafts, I try my best to be in the moment, and to not think about all the different emails I have to respond to, or all the different errands I have to run and chores I have to do and bills I have to pay. Because I know this time for him is precious. I just can't stress that enough. I know it's really easy to be thinking about all these other things and to not be present. That's why for me, I go back to the to-do list. If I start to see that my thoughts are starting to linger and I start to get out of the moment and think about these other things that are stressing me out, I pull out my phone and pull out my to do list and just quickly jot those things down that are in my head and then put the phone away and go back to focusing on what I was doing.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

I'm not sure if these are the best tips. They're certainly not the only tips that I have to offer, but these are definitely the things that come to the top of my mind that have allowed me to, again do my best with continuing to balance family and academia. Continuing to harmonize between them is not easy. Sometimes you gotta try to be a little bit more organized and set more firm boundaries. Find out what your policies are. Create your own policies, and try to stick to them. You are worth it. You deserve to make time for yourself. You deserve to make time for your family. You deserve to have fun, guilt-free. You deserve to value yourself outside of any productivity that you do. You deserve to sometimes just do nothing. I know that's really hard to do nowadays because we live in a society that values overwork, values exhaustion, busyness, but you deserve to be free. You deserve the time, so implement some of the strategies, whatever you think that you find helpful and let me know how it goes. All right, enjoy the time with your family. See you next time.