Summer Bukeavich
BIO
I’m a business professor, Ed.D candidate, mother of a 4-year-old, and agoraphobe in recovery.
Twitter: @summerberetsky
Instagram: @summerbukeavich
Summer Bukeavich
“Some colleagues noted they were surprised to see me back after having my daughter.”
I’m one of those nontraditional unicorns who started her career in academia with industry experience, a Master’s degree, and an adjunct contract. My part-time teaching turned full time after two years, and I had just finished my first year when the pee stick finally displayed that double pink line.
Two weeks later, I got my doctoral program acceptance letter.
To better understand the gravity of these situations, it might help you to know that I was diagnosed with panic disorder with agoraphobia back in undergrad.
Crippling anxiety stole most of my early 20s, and my mental health took a big hit when I was living alone in a new state, hundreds of miles away from home, after I was accepted into a competitive Master’s program. The more anxious I got, the more the agoraphobia developed.
My self-esteem took another big hit when I graduated just as the recession was starting. I grabbed a retail job and then a call centre job while my undergrad classmates were moving into supervisory-level positions, feeling like all the time and effort I had put into my Master’s degree was wasted. Eventually, I found myself working in client services and marketing – a tolerable gig – and then everything fell apart: I had a complete relapse of my agoraphobia and couldn’t physically drive the 45 minutes to work each morning.
Then, I made my lemonade: I blogged for a few years on mental health, anxiety, and panic attacks. My writing got noticed, I gave myself time to heal, and my self-esteem slowly rose.
And then, I started teaching.
So, back to those two key moments: the pee stick and the doctoral acceptance letter. Now perhaps you’ll understand how floored I was about these two dramatically life-changing events suddenly overlapping one another when just a few short years earlier I couldn’t drive to the store to buy breakfast cereal.
I remember sitting in a conference room, when an older male colleague congratulated me on getting into my Ed.D. program. I thanked him and expressed some concern about balancing an accelerated 3-year doctoral program with a full-time teaching job. “Don’t worry, you’ll be fine,” he said. “So long as you don’t have kids you should be able to manage it.”
I was 10 weeks pregnant at the time, and no one at work knew yet.
I was terrified to tell my dean – but once I did, she was phenomenally helpful. Together, we worked with HR to figure out all the ins and outs of taking my doctor’s recommended leave time and maximising the use of the (very few) sick and personal days I’d accumulated. I helped to hire an adjunct to cover one of my more specialised courses.
Thankfully, my doctoral program was 100% online, but this alone was not enough to help me survive. I spent most of my first trimester nauseously navigating long days of teaching followed by long evenings of reading and coursework.
When I realised that I wouldn’t be able to keep up with classes while taking care of a newborn, I asked the graduate college for permission to take two quarters off to accommodate for the delivery and care of my soon-to-be infant. They gave me a hard time about it, finally relenting with a snide comment about how they’ll make a “one-time” exception.
Baby came 4.5 weeks early after only one week of spring-semester teaching. Despite horrific anxiety in the delivery room (and a lot of meds), I managed to give birth to a beautiful and healthy daughter. I took twelve weeks off to recover and stay home with my baby while my husband continued to work, and I returned at the end of the spring semester to work on some projects.
When I returned, some colleagues noted they were surprised to see me back - and had assumed that I would stop working after having my daughter.
The “mom guilt” of spending all day at work and all evening working on doctoral courses and proposal writing was pervasive, but I fought against the one-two punch of anxiety and depression with therapy and meds. I’m now an Ed.D. candidate with four more months to write the last two chapters of her dissertation.
I’m researching ways in which undergraduate business students experience and use mindfulness in their lives, and how mindfulness might play a role in developing a workforce of successful employees, leaders, and managers. My delightful and quirky daughter will be four next month and loves spending the occasional day with mommy at work.