Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Wow I have a reader!

Today was a good day and so was yesterday. I had logged onto write about why yesterday was a good day, and discovered that I have at least one reader! Welcome melanie! Thank you for introducing yourself and for your words of encouragement. I hope that I provide you some enjoyment. Thank you for helping to make today a good day. The other reason today was a good day was because I ran an analytical gel to determine the quality of DNA I had purified earlier in the week and it was great DNA. Yeah me!

Yesterday, I remembered why I thought having a baby while in grad school was a good thing - you can stay home just because. I decided to stay home since the monkey was being a bit out of sorts as he didn't sleep well all weekend, and neither did I. When the boy wakes up in the middle of the night I am too damn tired to sit with him. Which means he comes into our bed, irritating Mr.SM to no end as neither Mr. SM nor I get any rest. Why you ask? Because the monkey sleeps perpendicular to us, kicking Mr. SM in the head while hammering his head into my spine (and we have a king size bed!!!)t. But eh, if I have to suffer, so does Mr. SM :). So I stayed home and had a chit chat with a labmate of mine, we'll call her M3 as she is a mom to 3. M3 is the head technician in our lab and is definitely a mother hen to us all. I think, one of the reasons I am struggling right now is that she is off on sick leave and is not around to let me know that it is OK that I can not do everything right now. She also tends to protect us grad students from our supervisor (henceforth referred to as PI). PI is a great supervisor, very very supportive but he sometimes forgets that the quick little experiment that is going to lead to a wicked paper is not all that quick and is actually unlikely to lead to a paper. But I digress - the point is the boys molars are coming in, he has a bit of a cold and is being sensitive. I kept him home in the morning to keep and eye on him while having a wonderful chat with M3. M3 listened to me rant about the horribly unproductive lab meeting that I presented at last week (that would be the lab meeting that precipitated the beginning of this blog) and tried to remind me that it was not personal. I disagree with her. However after chatting with her and another member of the lab that was present, I have come to the conclusion that although the meeting was unproductive and it was a bit of a personal attack I can not care. I also can not show to the individuals responsible that their behaviour has affected me nor can I let it dissuade me from continuing or alter my belief in myself. I can only work hard and demonstrate progress. I am learning not to care. Again the point is that I was able to stay home and take a 'mental health' day. I didn't have to call in sick or explain where I was because as a PhD student I am in a way responsible for my own progress and my own research. After having the boy all morning and having a wonderful, supportive tea, I sent the boy to daycare and chilled all afteroon. Mr. SM doesn't get to do that. I only get to do that because I don't have "real" job like everyone else. The flexibility of being a grad student is excellent when you have little one(s) that get sick, injured or when you need to recover from a crazy busy weekend. Recommend reading mom101 today and motherhooduncensored

2 comments:

Melanie said...

Glad I helped make your day a good one!

I do DNA stuff too, by the way. I can get high quality DNA out of a stone, I swear. And I am also well familiar with the "But it's a quick project, it'll be a good paper," syndrome. A year later, you're still finnicking out the last little bits and looking like you'll be lucky to get it accepted in a journal, right? LOL. Glad you've got a good lead tech who can protect you a bit, though.

Aaand, also I'm quite acquainted with meetings like you described. Keep in mind, guys, even science guys, often don't mean personal attacks when to our estrogen-laden eyes and ears it's clear they did. And if they do, it's because they feel threatened in some way. Now, it it's women who seemed to attack you ... they probably did. But you're quite right. Either way, you've got to keep your hurt to yourself.

Yay for personal/mental health days!

Anonymous said...

Whups - your link on the right side column to motherhood uncensored doesn't work :)

And if you're interested, I finally did it too. I'm blogging!

http://onein36million.wordpress.com/