Tech Hates Moms
Moms got the message loud and clear — tuck away your motherhood to succeed in corporate tech.
Disclaimer:
If you’re a mom in tech and this hasn’t been your experience, I am genuinely happy for you, and your experience is valid. My observation has been that, By FAR, the majority of moms who find success, fulfillment and belonging in the tech industry have a number of key traits in common: (1) a full-time nanny or au pair outside of working hours; (2) a partner who’s either also in the industry, or a high earner in another industry; and (3) the personal ability and desire to take on more than a 40-hour/week workload. There’s nothing wrong with fitting into all or some of the above categories. If you’re a mom in tech who finds acceptance, authenticity and alignment at work, I’m truly happy for you. But, I want this industry to work for every mom, not some moms.
In early 2013, I found myself looking for full-time work to support a fledgling food business I’d started with my partner at the time; the tech industry was booming. It’s an industry that tends to draw in talent from a lot of other sectors, so it isn’t unheard of to apply without prior tech experience. You just need a good story.
So I took a 10-week programming course, honed my “story”, and got my first tech job 3 months pregnant with my first child in the fall of 2013. When I first received the offer, I was terrified that it would be yanked back when they learned of my “compromised” health status. To their credit, when I shared my news they graciously congratulated me and let me know I would be eligible for their standard 12-week maternity leave. Twelve weeks! It sounded like so much time to me. That was before I knew.
The Pretty Packages
I was excited to start working in technology because I saw it as somewhat of a renegade industry, as far as corporate-ish workplaces go. There was no dress code, and oh, the perks! I’m pretty sure my benefits package alone was worth more than I made in a year at a nonprofit. Medical, dental AND vision! Plus paid time off! A fitness stipend! And super nice offices, with free *really* good coffee and even better food!!
These perks were like water in a drought. As a grad student, I purposely hadn’t had a job so that I could focus on my studies, which meant living on an extremely limited fixed income based on savings. After grad school, we were underemployed and working on part-time contracts and limited wages. Every bill had to be timed and negotiated. Our parents were both helping us out financially when we really needed it, because they cared and they could. I craved financial independence — so, finally being employed full-time with a salary, benefits and equity was like a dream come true. Especially with a baby on the way.
Getting Started in Tech, Pregnant
I loved the job when I first started. Employees worked when it made sense for them on flexible schedules. It was normal to see people in the office at all hours of the day and night. The promise of building one’s reputation while also building equity was, I’m sure, alluring to many early employees.
The engineers were probably an average of 10 years younger than me — some of them still teenagers!-- and there was maybe a handful of other parents. A couple were older engineers; the rest were executives. The kind with nannies, homes in fancy zip codes, and spouses whose jobs were as “important” (read: well-paid) as theirs. Of course, the founders did not have children, nor did parenthood ever factor into their many philosophical meanderings on core values or life aspirations. They were young, with far more “important” conquests than having their own families: they were “growing the GDP of the internet.” Motherhood doesn’t exist there. (As if mothers aren’t the main driver of consumer goods, the foundation of the US economy… lol.)
I took a week off before my due date, so I would return at 11 weeks postpartum — not quite past that stage now termed the “fourth trimester.” It’s a time when a baby is still more like a larva than a person. Barely opening their eyes for more than a few minutes at a time, they suckle and sleep and snuggle; poop, cry, repeat. Our baby was like a tiny astronaut, floating through uncharted territory while his tiny arms reached and retracted, fists opening and closing, head lolling, mewling in that milk-drunk state of pure existence.
Eleven weeks with a newborn felt like one reeeeeeeally long day. Not nearly enough time to get to know who he was, who we were as parents, or how we would cope with this new life. I didn’t even feel like a mom yet, not really. (Which makes it even more disconcerting that, the moment your baby comes out, everyone just starts calling you “mom”. Like, you just became everyone’s mom the minute you gave birth? SO WEIRD.) It’s a uniquely American, and unacceptable requirement of mothers here, to birth, recover, learn to parent, and bond with your baby in the blink of an eye before returning from an embarrassingly insufficient number of weeks on maternity leave.
Back to Work
Then suddenly, it was time to return to work. I felt like an alien. Everyone I worked with had watched me grow larger and larger. Everyone knew I had sprouted a new life from inside my uterus. It all felt so incredibly personal. I didn’t feel comfortable sharing that part of my life with my coworkers. In hindsight, I think that’s because of how alone I felt. I certainly didn’t want to share pumping and lactating with my coworkers, but unfortunately I had to.
The small startup had designated one of their “nap rooms” as my lactation room. They’d put a lock on the door and given me a key; I’d commute on public transit with my breast pump, ice packs and empty bottles every morning. Twice daily, I’d bring my supplies into the room (sometimes having to kick out a napper who disregarded the handwritten pumping schedule I’d taped to the door), pump milk for my son, then walk awkwardly walk back through the office holding the precious warm bottles. Don’t make eye contact, don’t drop your bottles. I felt like a “deer in headlights” gone wild, just striding across the open-plan parkway with a dairy delivery from my human headlights…
I’d shove the bottles to the back of the small shared fridge among my coworkers’ yogurts, bottles of kombucha, and pamplemousse La Croix. No one ever said a word to me about it. Not that I would’ve wanted them to — I was already feeling singled out as the only employee in our US offices to have become a parent during my employment there — but some kindness would have gone a long way for me at that time.
I felt so alone. And this was a “progressive” environment.
Separation
As the startup grew faster, it became more corporate, and the demands of the job became a lot more intense. Those who could double down on their work productivity, did.
For me, work changed radically after becoming a parent. It could no longer be a top priority. I couldn’t wrap up my tasks for the day and then linger over a communal dinner table and board games until 10 pm. I couldn’t put in extra hours on weekends or holidays when everyone else was rallying around their computers for some urgent project or sprint. I worked slower, and came into the office less, as we were “allowed” to have some flexibility with working from home, and I took every opportunity I could to put my baby down for his (MANY) naps, and be there when he woke up.
I craved the touch and smell of my baby when I was away from him for more than a few minutes. He was the most beautiful, most precious, most fascinating part of my life. Occasionally my then-husband, who was home with our son, would bring him into the office to visit during lunch. Some coworkers would come say hi; a couple would coo and sigh when he smiled at them. But mostly, there was that alien feeling. No other women here have babies. No one knows how much it hurts to leave him all day. The most “valuable” employees are here all day and night, long after I leave.
In the evenings when I got home, I would bring the baby into my bedroom and lay on the bed, nursing him with tears running down my face. When would it get easier? When would I feel that relief of “I get to” go to a job, rather than “I have to”? When would I get to rest and relax with my family?
Changing the Rules
I had a new boss, who went from offering me the flexibility to work from home when I returned mid-summer, to implementing strict rules and metrics for me to achieve by the end of the calendar year. I was part of the 76% of high performing women who receive negative feedback on our performances compared to just 2% of men; disproportionately driving women, and mothers, to quit.
I became a manager in hopes of finding a bit more autonomy over my work, but that vaulted me into a different echelon of responsibilities and expectations.
While my peers were relentless in their hunger for spreadsheets, powerpoints, and ever greater “impact” (a term whose popularity rages in tech, yet can scarcely be defined), my son was struggling. His daycare provider observed that he had fairly significant motor delays.
I felt like the worst mom ever. I hadn’t been there enough. Or maybe when I was, I hadn’t paid enough attention. Yes, I had noticed some of his delays and gotten him support services. But that nasty voice in my head said I had failed my family by being gone so often, by working in such a demanding industry, and by being so depleted from work when I was home, that I needed to tune out and rest.
At work, I was compared to my colleagues and found lacking. I cared too much about the 13+ people I was managing; I spent too much time on managing them and not enough time leading major projects; I wasn’t having enough impact. Two years after I returned to work from maternity leave, I was given an ultimatum: transform my performance to mirror the top performers within two weeks, or leave. I accepted a severance package and left.
What I’d Been Missing
In the following months, I spent as much time with my 2-year-old as possible. I drank in the moments we spent together. We grew closer as I attuned to his daily routines, moods, and whims. I hadn’t known how close we could be until then. He made so much progress with his milestones. My heart was constantly full. I wanted more babies, I wanted more time with them. But I also felt compelled to continue building a career in tech -- it was the only thing supporting our family.
Several weeks after leaving the startup, I was recruited for a managerial role at a well-known social media company. I was skeptical; the commute would be harrowing, the hours demanding, the work nebulous. Still, I went in for interviews, and was drawn in by the benefits and salary. That job ate up the majority of my life for the following five years.
Tuck Your Motherhood Away
Companies will say things like, “Bring your whole self to work,” but they aren’t thinking about the people with invisible disabilities, with parents who’ve never been able to pay their own bills, with kids who have special medical needs, siblings in and out of prison, cousins who need to stay with them for a bit, kids PERIOD, spouses with mental health disorders, to say nothing of our own personal challenges. And we don’t get to leave those responsibilities behind when we go to work. That is a hard reality to grapple with.
No one at work in corporate America actually wants to know anything about how being a mom affects your work life. They don’t want to know or care if you have a life outside of work. They want to see fit, well-dressed women -- no crumbs of motherhood on them -- LEANING IN, never complaining, on top of their commitments, crushing their goals, never having yucky body things happening to them, and absolutely never talking about them if they do. Certainly, never having their bladder prolapse in a board meeting, or a clogged milk duct explode with pus during a team offsite.
Work Is King
There’s no badge of honor in destroying your body to achieve “success”, and there’s no success to be found in a body so wrecked from stress and instability that it can no longer function.
American moms are burnt out. We have endured mental health crises. We have birthed and raised children while working at extremely demanding jobs; sometimes two or three or more of them. Moms in tech are part of this cohort. We ALL deserve a break, but moms in tech actually have the opportunity to get one, and get paid while taking it.
Take your fucking leave, moms in tech!!! You deserve it. Work will break you if you let it, and rest is your way of resisting.
And — if you’re a mom in tech who’s feeling burnt out by work, I would love to hear from you and offer support. Feel free to reach out and share your story.
