It’s Official: Mom, Ph.D.

The other day I arrived in my Depart­ment, after feel­ing that my nerves were going to push me over the edge. That edge where you fall into an abyss of ran­dom def­i­n­i­tions and infor­ma­tion float­ing around your head but none of it makes ANY SENSE AT ALL!! ALL morn­ing long & by all morn­ing I mean ALL MORNING. Because “the time” had arrived. It was time to defend my dis­ser­ta­tion, the long road was ending.

I met with my adviser before the big event started. My adviser gave me great advice, remind­ing me that I wouldn’t have made it to this point if I wasn’t ready. Darn log­i­cal rea­son­ing. Of course my hus­band had told me the same thing. In fact, he told me about a MILLION times that morn­ing alone. But what does he know? He has to tell me those things, it was in our vows. I believe right after the line that went some­thing to the affect of “And always tell you that your butt looks great in those pants.”

Then it was time to make my way around the hall and into the room. Oh, “the room” that sounds omi­nous doesn’t it? Like I was on a walk toward the exe­cu­tion cham­ber, you know “the room.” But it wasn’t that intense. Unless power point is like a slow death.

Then the rest of the com­mit­tee arrived & there were actu­ally audi­ence mem­bers. Which I have to admit was SO WONDERFUL!! To have peo­ple from my Depart­ment, fel­low stu­dents, show up to sup­port me was just amaz­ing. Def­i­nitely helped put my nerves at ease.

The process itself took about an hour & 1/2. It was pretty smooth. I didn’t throw up, ran­domly fall over into an abyss of ran­dom def­i­n­i­tions or infor­ma­tion and I didn’t pass out from the sheer mag­ni­tude of hav­ing to actu­ally sound coher­ent after not sleep­ing for the last 2 nights. Thank good­ness for kids who decide to NOT sleep right before a big moment like your dis­ser­ta­tion defense, eh? What would I have done with­out that lack of sleep?

My com­mit­tee did ask chal­leng­ing ques­tions, but they were fair ques­tions. I was pre­pared for them, I know my research back & forth, noth­ing was asked that was too left field even if they did chal­lenge me to push myself fur­ther. I can hon­estly write that I respect my com­mit­tee immensely & I appre­ci­ate the sup­port they gave me through­out the dis­ser­ta­tion process.

Except I’m going to admit it was a lit­tle anti-climatic when all was said & done. Yea, I fin­ished & it’s offi­cial but still I was hop­ing for some­thing a lit­tle bit more. Really, when I think about it a lit­tle more, I blame the 80s for the let-down.

See, I was hop­ing that at some point I would have been forced to show who I was in a dance off. I even thought it out ahead of time. It would start with me being told “You don’t belong here. This place isn’t made to accept peo­ple like you.” Then, I’d have to prove them wrong. You know, like Elec­tric Booga­loo style, prove to the world I DO belong. I then would rip off the sleeves of my shirt or my shirt would mag­i­cally go all off shoul­der ala Jen­nifer Beal in Flash­Dance & then off stage music would play. As the music starts & my sassy style was front & cen­ter I’d express myself in street meets ivory tower dance moves.

But alas that never hap­pened. Instead every­one was nice, I knew my work (I mean after all it’s MY work), and I passed. When I got home I received a bal­loon & a very lovely card at the front door from my hus­band and kids, along with lots of hugs & kisses. That did kind of make up for the lack of a dance off. It’s a really nice bal­loon after all.

What can I say? Except thanks for the love & sup­port, now feel free to call me Dr. Mommy.

Tagged as: defense, dissertation, dr, me, PhD, school, work