Over the past year, I have had the privilege of adding a number of professional achievements to my curriculum vitae, including becoming the student editor for AJPH. There is no place on my curriculum vitae, however, for the most important and life-changing new role I have taken on this year: mother.
I approached the process of becoming a mother in the same way that I would approach any new “project” I conjured up as a doctoral student—I naturally fell into the researcher mentality whereby I began analyzing, studying, asking questions, and preparing for everything I could possibly think of regarding babies and becoming a new mother. I conducted informal interviews with friends and family members, created excel files to assess daycare centers, reviewed the pros and cons of different strollers, attended classes on breast feeding, read scientific literature about infant sleep, and made an infographic of my birth plan for hospital staff. Even after my son arrived, I continued to use this scientific process—convinced that I could “research” my way through anything that arose as part of new motherhood. Phone apps made it possible to collect data about my son’s feedings, bowel movements, nap times, and growth, just to name a few. With these data I developed hypotheses about almost everything. Most notably, I focused on what might be causing baby to be colicky at night and worked to ensure that all possible confounding variables were controlled for to guarantee that the baby would sleep through the night.
Turns out, approaching motherhood from a purely scientific mindset was unsustainable. The approach I had chosen (one in which I was in complete control) had failed me. The rigid expectations of what my motherhood experience should be like—from labor and delivery to how quickly my body and mind would “bounce back”—were dismantled. I sought to maintain control of the “researcher” mentality whereby I was able to identify causal pathways and test interventions to manipulate the predictors related to my “participant’s” (son’s) outcomes of interest. Slowly, I realized that it was unachievable and downright miserable to try to hold on to control in this way. The reality was that motherhood, especially during a pandemic, required adaptation or would lead very quickly to burnout. And so, I gradually shifted from the comfortable role I had always held as an outside observer and inquisitive problem solver to an active participant of a live and ever-changing experiment. The reality was that in this motherhood role, I had to be “both . . . and”: both the prepared and thoughtful investigator and the present and active participant.
So, how has this new role, which is completely unaccounted for as part of my professional identity but simultaneously the most life-changing and long-term position I will ever hold, changed my approach to public health and research? At the core, I think it has provided an important gateway for me to be open, honest, and vulnerable, even in professional settings, which in turn gives others permission to do the same. It also encourages me to advocate institutionalized systems that support and nurture the balance between the two roles successfully. The messy nature of early motherhood has helped me appreciate the complex aspects of research, challenging me to maintain high standards in my research while also becoming more accepting of the uncertainty that comes with studying human behaviors. I have learned to ask new and better questions, to think about things from both the scientific and the practical side. I now understand that it is possible to be ambitious and flexible, determined and gentle, dedicated to my career and my family. In short, a mother and a researcher.
10 Years Ago
Impact of Business Cycles on US Suicide Rates
Our findings suggest the importance of population-level suicide-prevention strategies, particularly during recessions. For example, during recessions importance must be placed on providing social support and counseling services to those who lose jobs or home; promoting individual, family, and community connectedness; and providing adequate resources to crisis call centers and other community services. . . . We found that people in prime working ages (25-64 years) were more vulnerable to recession than were others. This may be partly explained by the fact that many of those people were breadwinners in their homes, and their jobs supported mortgage payments, health insurance, children’s education, and other expenses. . . . The multifaceted nature of suicide indicates the need to develop prevention efforts that use multiple settings where vulnerable people and individuals may be found.
From AJPH, June 2011, pp. 1143–1145 passim
50 Years Ago
Economic Changes and Heart Disease Mortality
Among the major social stresses that may be involved in heart disease incidence or mortality are those which originate in adverse changes in the economic status of individuals. . . . Periods of instability, particularly periods of economic recession, force a sizable portion of the population either out of the economy . . . or into a situation of decreased income. . . . It is . . . a reasonable speculation that heart disease mortality might increase during an economic downturn as a result of the decreased availability, in economic terms, of medical care services. . . . The findings of the present study clearly indicate that economic downturns are associated with increased mortality from heart disease and that, conversely, heart disease mortality decreases during economic upturns.
From AJPH, March 1971, pp. 606, 609 passim
Biography
