One of the songs that makes me cry the most is Vienna by Billy Joel. I feel like that song has directly looked into my soul and summed me up in 3 minutes with more insight than any therapist has ever managed. All to a beautiful melody. What a song writer.

Take a moment out of your day to listen to it. Really listen to the words. Then come back while I explore them a little.

Slow down, you crazy child
You’re so ambitious for a juvenile
But then if you’re so smart
Tell me why are you still so afraid? 

I’ve had several people ask me recently how I manage to ‘do it all’. I have an important job that I love. I have two small children who I adore. I am writing research and scholarship that I’m proud of. I have high levels of recognition and respect within my field. From the outside it probably looks like I have got it all together, and that might seem either impressive or even intimidating to others.

But that is the 10% of the iceberg you see from the surface. This blog is to give the counter narrative. The 90% you don’t see below the water line. Some of these are quite small scale, others are substantive. All are important. Some I justify and explain. Others I simply state for the record.

You’ve got so much to do
And only so many hours in a day. Hey.

My house is a right mess. Even paying a cleaner, I can’t keep up with the amount of laundry and cleaning required. My career is only possible because my husband is happy to be the primary at-home parent.

I’m not reading enough with my five year old.

I don’t look after my health enough. Food is the first thing I turn to when stressed. And it shows.

I process so many words in a days work that I am barely able to read for pleasure any more.

The amount of money we spend on nursery and after-school care is frightening. And that’s with both of us in the very privileged situation of having well paid full-time jobs. How anyone on average salaries makes this work I don’t know, let alone those in financial hardship.

Some days I’m so tired I just have to go and have a sleep during the day. But then I end up staying up late to catch up on work…

You’re so ahead of yourself, that you forgot what you need

I’ve had multiple major mental health crises. These have been genuinely frightening for me and the people that love me. I am on long term medication to manage my mental health. Even then sometimes I am not well, and have had to take extended periods of sick leave to recover.

I’m not entirely sure I’m capable of properly relaxing.

The mental overwhelm of a full time job and two small children is sometimes more than my brain can deal with.

I struggle to maintain a social life. I’m often more lonely than I’d like to admit.

I’ve moved city multiple times for work. I don’t see my family enough, and don’t really know where ‘home’ is.

Slow down, you’re doing fine
You can’t be everything you wanna be before your time

I’ve been turned down for academic promotion. It hurt.

I almost left academia. I spent years on exploitative fixed-term contracts before I found a way to build a teaching focussed career in HE. I could barely pay the bills at that point, despite teaching a stupid number of contact hours during term time in order to see me through the vacation period.

I’m jealous of parents who seem able to keep on top of the ‘child admin’. Birthday party invites, themed non-uniform days, parent-teacher meetings, money for tuck-shop, play-dates …..

I struggle to enjoy my own success. I’m always looking for ‘what’s next’. Is that ambition, or an unhealthy inability to recognise achievement?

Though you can see when you’re wrong
You know you can’t always see when you’re right. You’re right.

I could go on and on, but I’ve probably already been too self-indulgent. A lot of these are very definitely the problems of a middle class, well educated white woman, and I fully acknowledge the privilege that I have both professionally and in society. For those who are dealing with structural inequity, marginalisation and the reality of being psychologically or even physically unsafe, I can only look at you in awe as you navigate your worlds.

However I do think it was important for me to write this. If you only see professionally successful me, you might see something that looks unobtainable. Looking at the whole of it, you might well decide that the trade-offs aren’t worth it! Or it might just help you to calibrate where you are at, and realise you are doing better than you think.

One of the most important pieces of work-life balance wisdom I have ever heard is that ‘you can have it all across the course of a career, but you can’t realistically have it all at the same time’. There will be ebb and flow. Sometimes you will be in a professionally successful phase. Sometimes the job is just the job. Sometimes your family or your health has to take priority, and you may need to step away from work. I’m pretty terrible at recognising this in my own life, and I need to get better at it. Perhaps I need some life coaching, a new mentor, or maybe some focussed therapy. In the meantime, I think I could do a lot worse than listen to the wisdom of Billy Joel.

Slow down, you crazy child
And take the phone off the hook and disappear for a while
It’s alright, you can afford to lose a day or two, ooh
When will you realize Vienna waits for you?