It's not impossible - but it's tough.

Look, here's the truth. There are just not enough hours in the day to get everything done that you would like. You really have to be honest with yourself about what your priorities are and focus on those.

For me, my priorities are my marriage, my fitness, and my art career. I have chosen not to have children, and I've also chosen a profession that gives me a lot of flexibility. I have no desire to have children, and if I did it would lead to a lot of unhappiness. I doubt my husband and I could make the finances work with children and one person doing art for a living.

Life is about choices. And in the end, you are the choices you make.

Agreed. Like SKG said it's not impossible but it's very, very tough. Being a mother is a full-time job in itself so I can imagine how difficult it would be to raised children whilst working a full job, or even part-time. However, I plan to do it one day. I don't know if I can get it all but I certainly will try.

I do know what she means though; I feel like a bit of a failure already just worrying if I'll lack in one department or the other, but hey, that's the modern woman.

I know lots of women who have been successful - very successful - at both. It is possible. It takes work. But they tell me it's worth it!

"Women, just like men, can..." I think there's a flaw in this logic. The sociological group "male" has never had primary responsibility for child-rearing. "Female" has, but hasn't had an true responsibility for earning money until recently. The guys need to meet us halfway. Until men are fully able and willing to understand what a REAL 50/50 split of responsibilities means (housework [not just yardwork], cooking, shopping, taking care of sick kids, a full-time job, playdates, and every other responsibility everyone forgets), women won't be able to be "just like men" without overwork and more stress than they deserve. "It's tough" shouldn't be our fallback position on this issue. With those words we sentence ourselves to more inequality than we ever faced as housewives.

Something DOES have to give - either the expectation that a thoroughly modern woman has both children and a full-time career at the expense of her mental comfort OR the socially constructed roles the two genders play in raising children.

Here's a reality check:

In September I began a PhD science program at an Ivy League school. At orientation, there was a female-only session where we were told that under no circumstances should we get married or have children during the 6 year program. Then, the female PhD professors told us their struggles balancing a career and family life, and how some of them wished they hadn't had children, because they just did not have the time to devote to them.

Not sure how applicable this is to other careers, but I know that in science academia it is almost impossible for a woman to "have it all". As a result, women are drastically underrepresented in this field (2 female faculty to 10 male faculty at my school)

Ha after reading my comment I just became totally depressed

Wow, JJAsinsk. One day, I really hope to get a PhD like my husband. Grad school is definitely in my cards in the next year or so - do you really think it would be so tough to balance that and a marriage? Are your evenings just never free?

No one can. I feel everyone is too busy trying to get what someone else has that they aren't focusing on themselves; thus, causing higher stress levels.

Enjoy what you have. Live a little. If it's meant to be, it'll come.

Taking care of your career, your family, your health and your social life? Not possible. Something's gotta give. Men can't have it all either.

"At orientation, there was a female-only session where we were told that under no circumstances should we get married or have children during the 6 year program. "

jjaninsk - wow. if the professors/orientation committee didn't take the men aside and tell them the same thing, that is some insane gender-based discrimination going on right there. i wonder what ivy league school would be so stupid as to do this? that's beyond the pale. shocking, frankly.

Wow I think I'm depressed now too.. I hope to get a PhD in psychology someday. I think with enough support it can definitely be done, but then I suppose not everyone has a big family (within reach) like I do.

"Having it all" is a matter of perception. If you think you have it all then you do, everyone has a different definition of what "having it all" is. That being said, I answered yes in the poll.

I agree with anonymous #4.

In most cases the work (housework, taking care of children) at home, isn't shared equally. Women still have to do a higher percentage of all that work. And yeah, the "just like men" comment is flawed, b/c again, like anonymous said, men have never had that responsibility for children that women still do. Men "have it all" b/c they have women doing more than half the work for them so they can get it all.
I think women and men could both have it all and be happy if 100% of the work was shared totally equally. Both parents can have a job and still equally share childcare.

I also agree with Anonymous #10 that wow, I hope that school told the same thing to the men also, or that is SO sexist.

I don't think men are solely to blame is women carrying most of the childcare duties. Most women I know want to be the super mom and spend as much time with their kids as possible. Most women I know are control freaks and want things done their way. And I don't know about other kids, but I didn't want my dad taking care of me when I was little, I wanted my mom. There's a video of me saying, "No, mama come home, mama give me baba (bottle)." Over and over and over.

When I was growing up, both of my parents worked and I spent the majority of the day with my grandma. My dad worked fewer hours than my mom too. I loved my dad, I loved my grandma, possibly more than my mom, but I wanted my mom to feed me and read to me and take me to the zoo. I don't know why. My dad was more fun than my mom. I was just more attached to her.

Who says you need to "have it all" to lead a happy, fulfilling life? I agree with Kimpossible... I could have a family and have it all, a successful career and have it all. Maybe all I need is not much at all.

No human being can "have it all" ... it's not humanly possible to do everything ... but it is possible to find a happy balance.

I definitely think it's possible to do it all, but to do it all perfectly? Nope, and women shouldn't be made to feel bad about it. Why SHOULD we have it all: the childcare, housework, social life and glittering career? The general perception of 'having it all' seems to be that you must do everything expected of a stay-at-home mum and have a great career, 'just like a man'. If that's having it all, no thanks.

I don't know what planet Anonymous and Muirnea live on, but it isn't Earth. Grad school isn't a walk in the park. It takes real work, dedication, and perseverance, even for guys. I know, I'm one of them. Grad school for me cost me the marriage to my first wife, as she wasn't willing to let me have the time to finish a Masters Degree and remain my wife. Yes, we did talk about time together, and getting a house, and having parties, and buying lots of cool stuff, and having kids, and being faithful. We insisted on the fidelity, and even did buy a house, but I had to defer everything else until the degree was done. But she couldn't do it; she stepped out on me (with her boss at work who was 20+ years older than her, no less), and piled up a bunch of debt. I was lucky she didn't have a child by him, as she quit taking birth control for a few weeks in the middle of it. So jjasinsk, I think your school was being realistic and doing you a favor by telling you up front the sacrifices you will have to make if you really want that degree. Perhaps some people (men and women) will have the brilliance to slide through a PhD program with little effort, but there aren't very many.

Mind you, this doesn't mean you can't have it all. There can be time for everything else after the degree program is finished, and the career path is set. All the rest of you are dreamers if you think you can have it all simultaneously simply because you are female. That's where the REAL gender discrimination comes in today. Life is all about choices & sacrifice, and it is just as true for men as it is for women. Both parties have to be realistic.

Women can have it all and this teacher has it all wrong. The only way it can work though is if her chosen partner is supportive. Household chores need to be split more fairly and family leave should be encouraged for both men and women so a balance can be achieved.

spacekatgal- As an answer to your question I think it would be difficult but definitely possible to balance grad school and a marriage. Many of my professors in undergrad were already married (and stayed married) in grad school. In terms of the time, I rarely had free time and often worked 10+ hours on Sat and Sun. I eventually decided to defer for a year to see if come September I'm still interested in the sacrifice Part of the reason was because I got engaged and was not comfortable joining a grad group that obviously did not support my decision

You can certainly have a successful career and marriage at the same time, but throw children into the mix and it all changes...My husband and I both had demanding, high pressure careers where 12 hour days were the norm...when we decided to have children the only way we could have both continued in our professions would have been to hire a full time, live in nanny..to say that i could have continued with 12 hour work days and raised my children successfully without live in help is simply naive, and really if both my husband and i were gone during their entire waking days..well we would have only been part-time parents......i chose to give up my career and raise my kids while my husband worked...a decision i have never regretted, something has to give...and yes men have been able to have both because as other commenters have mentioned they are not typically responsible for child rearing and household chores to the same degree as women...

jjasinsk and Kevin J. Weise pointed out what is essentially, stark reality. I know very few women with doctorates in science; of the ones I do know, most of them got married and had kids quite late. When I look at the faculty in the engineering department of my alma mater, I can count exactly two female professors (one of whom also happens to be the chair of my department, woohoo!)

To be fair though, the percentages are quite different in the College of Arts, College of Business & Management, and that of Architecture & Design. You find a lot more female professors, especially in the language and communication departments.

Note: I'm not sure if this applies everywhere, or just to my school, but all professors are required to be PhD graduates.

I agree with Kimpossible, too. The definition of "having it all" is individual-based.

To clarify, I think the poll should be re-worded as "Can a woman have all that she wants?" My answer -- absolutely.

jjasinsk, wow I can't believe how sexist that meeting was! Yes I can understand the difficulty in having children during a PhD program, but to outright tell women what they SHOULDN'T do...just wow.

I hope to eventually get a PhD myself (going to get a BA and MA soon), along with getting married and having kids. I don't intend for any of those things to prevent me from achieving the other.

I agree with GlowingMoon entirely. You need to make your own definition, and not society's and you can have everything you want!

I also don't see why some people think JJasinsk's meeting was sexist. This is a science program in the ivy leagues. I've been with someone in the process of getting a science PhD, and it was pure hell for them. It's not realistic to think you could have kids in the process of that - it's just not. This was nothing more that female professors giving some personal advice about how not to flunk out.

Oh, and JJasinsk - I think I can make it work. Since my husband has gone through the process, I know he'd be understanding. If it came down to it, my marriage is honestly more important to me than any degree.

Woman can absolutely have it all. It just requires a supportive family and community. Availability of affordable day care, reasonable maternity leave and understanding employers help shoulder the burdens on women place on themselves.

And @KadBunny my mother has a PhD in psychology, is the head of her department, and raised three happy, healthy and high-functioning kids without sacrificing her career. You can do it!

I agree with a lot of the other posters. I am a lawyer who wants to get married and have kids. But I constantly struggle with the reality that having it all in the conventional sense will be very hard to achieve. So I've come to terms with it by realizing that when the time comes, I will figure out what I can do and what I can't do and what makes me happy.

I do understand that whole PhD speech though. Top law firms often tell you that if you want to be partner, you can't have kids. So all of the female partners at large firms are single. It sucks because male partners aren't. On the other hand, a lot of my female classmates from law school are married with kids now, and they're quite happy and chose not to work in mega firms. And my boyfriend is doing his postdoc, and a lot of the women in his phd program had kids and it worked out fine. But it does take work and compromise from both spouses

I cannot speak for anyone else, but for ME, life is about thoughtful, considered choices, and most of the time when a choice is made, some doors will close. I knew this when I made the decision to stay home, and I have no regrets. I could certainly choose to have a full time job in addition to the full time job I already have, raising my children - my husband would support me completely, no matter what, but no matter how frantically I tried, I know that someone would lose, and why would I want to do that to myself? I can give my all to a job or I can give my all to my kids, but I can't do both right now. I recognize the reality of that, and that's okay with me. I don't like the idea of someone else raising my children for me - I genuinely WANT to do it myself, and doing for them is more important TO ME than any other career I might choose. Again - this is only speaking for myself, but I cannot picture myself desiring the immense amount of stress I would be putting on myself and those around me by trying to prove something and "have it all". In the end, I know I would feel that I had only part of one thing and part of another.

its so unfair because men can have it all. since men are not considered the primary caregivers of children, they can work full time and get a Ph.D and be successful. i think if men realized that being a father is more than just being present and involved more in housekeeping women would have an easier time having it all.
studies show that when men and women do equal housework, marriages are happier.
our society doesn't find fatherhood that important and if it was, men would have more responsibility so a woman wouldn't have to take years off of work to raise children.

No one can have it all. Life is about compromising, you'll always have to make choices...

But a woman can have as much as a man does, as long as she's willing to make it so. But the sad truth is that in most cases (at least based on women I know) the husband is not the jackass who doesn't want to do housework or take care of the children, it's the wife who wants things done her way, and believes it's her duty to be more involved in those things than the man. Being a modern woman to most is insisting the man "helps". How about the man does half? I honestly don't get it...

Obviously this is not the same as one choosing to be a stay at home parent, or choosing to reduce the hours at work. I'm talking about women who work as much as their husbands, and are miserable at work and home because of all the stress. I doesn't come with being a woman, it comes with being tied to the idea that it's your responsibility to do more. It's not.

While I am no fan of Sarah Palin, she actually made a good point on Oprah yesterday: it is possible for women to have it all, just not all at the same time. As your life progresses, certain areas will be overshadowed by others,and it's not realistic to think that you can always give 100% to every aspect of your life. I think this is a healthy view to have.

@Anonymous

It's so unfair, whine whine. Men can successfully be, and have successfully been, the primary caregiver of children. And they've had to do it sometimes at the expense of their career. I have done more primary caregiving of our children than my wife. I've been the one to cook meals, take them to daycare, school, after school activities, doctor visits, important social events, etc FAR MORE than my wife. I have a friend who raised his children all by himself because his wife left him for another woman, and he just couldn't bear to bring another person into the relationship for quite a while. We are not alone, and we are becoming increasingly frustrated by the gender politics of the day that label men as stupid, uncaring slackers.

Perhaps if certain women stop with the "It's MY baby" attitude and ALLOW their men more access to the children, talk about it with their significant others and make agreements & arrangements, they will have more time and there will be less whining. In the meantime, if you have to open that business to compete against Walmart while pursuing your PhD and decorating your perfect H&G home in the historic district, perhaps you should wait a little while before having children to add to your oh so unfair burden.

My apologies to others who don't have the "I'm entitled because I'm female" attitude, I meant no offense. I, like you, do understand the amount of work it takes to set and achieve one's goals in life, and to work with someone to make it happen. It really is all about choices, responsibility, and sacrifices. And about understanding the amount of effort required to accomplish them.

Yeah, but men don't really do it all. Most men I know work and come home to "parent" for a few hours and maybe play the loving husband that night. That's it. They're not the ones actually making dinner, washing the clothes, going to school functions. Women still need to do so much more than men, so it's really not fair to say that we can balance it all just like men. They're not balancing anything.

Its still the real world people, no one has everything they desire, it doesnt work that way, but what you want may not necessarily be what you need so maybe there is a purpose for some things not working out for people. Still i believe that making certain choices for yourself can give you a content if not happy life, also, life is never completely "happy" or fullfilling for everybody maybe your lovelife is harmonious but professionally you are not fulfilled, fulfillment is subjective.

ask any of your friends who were latch-key. there's your answer.

I think it's possible to have it all, just maybe not at the same time.

Beautifully said, Glowing Moon.

Could I work 90+ hours a week in a big law firm, making $160K/ year as a first year associate, and have a family that I saw often and a full social life? Probably not... that's a lot to juggle, especially with that kind of workload.

But: I work as a government attorney in a job that I adore and have a husband that love. We are planning on having children soon and while it will be a change in juggling time and priorities, I am confident we can do it.

telling a young girl that she can reach the top of the career ladder and raise a family is passing on nothing more than a fairy tale.

So what SHOULD we tell young girls?
1. Get a job and climb climb to the top of the career ladder, no family, no social life, OR
2. Marry a rich man, have babies, stay at home, don't think about a career.

Ridiculous. "Having it all" is a personal decision. For some women "having it all" might mean a high powered career and a collection of art. For another it might mean a part time job and one kid. For another it might mean a loving husband and no children ... who travels a lot.

It's personal, and to be told that I can't have it all is insulting. I can and I will have what I believe is what I want in life.

Kevin J Weise - you make an excellent point. Because I chose to stay home with our son, I felt it was my responsibility to do EVERYTHING. I finally realized that in doing so (my attempt to avoid overloading my husband, who works very hard at his job and is SO supportive of my staying home) I was depriving my husband of a deeper involvement and understanding of his son and my son of real, focused time with his dad. When I made myself back off, their relationship blossomed. I know it sounds silly, but it really was hard for me at first. Now, I see the wonderful benefits for them both and realize my mistake. I'm pregnant now with our second child and will certainly "allow" my husband to take part more and to help me out more from the very beginning this time, rather than insisting that I can do it all myself. He's perfectly willing to do so - I just need to be willing to step out of the way a little bit.

I don't think so, I think we all have our own version of 100%...and for things to be done very well we need to give them more than just 50% of our 100. Splitting them equally will make both mediocre, average, or not as great as it could be (perhaps great compared to people who don't have as much power in the 100 as you do in yours) or else you must choose one or the other.

Basically, life for women with families and careers is a zero-sum game.

I'm an engineer and I don't think in my profession women can be successful while having children or at least being a good devoted parent. It is assumed that I will work a minimum of 50-60 hours a week, just like my bosses do. I work with almost no female engineers that are in high positions and the one that I do know told me she knew if she wanted to move up in the engineering field that she had to make the decision to not have kids. The few female engineers I know who have kids eventually quit because they couldn't handle the stress and hours of engineering combined with being the one to take care of the kids. I am astonished at how my current coworkers (all male) have children and never see them. Most of them are here 12-14 hours a day during the week and show up for 4-8 hours each weekend day.I'm looked down upon because sometimes I get cramps with my period that causes me to throw up and miss work for a day.

And grad school sucks - you don't have free time. I am surprised my husband (then boyfriend) stuck it out. I was on campus from 7 am until 10-11 pm every day. I'd be in the lab on weekends running tests. If my S.O. wanted to see me, he had to swing by my grad office in between classes or stop in and talk to me while I was running lab tests. Grad school doesn't stop for holidays - if tests have to be run on Christmas day, well you can't sacrifice the research. My advisors preferred to take on male grad students because they thought women would miss too much time due to our monthly female issues. They also preferred to take on international students because they wouldn't have a problem working on Christmas day since they may not celebrate our holidays and even if they did, they had too far to travel to justify going home on holidays. A fellow student going for her PhD had not seen her husband and duaghter in 4 years - not since she came to the U.S. to begin her research because the department wouldn't allow her off long enough for her to fly home to Taiwan. It was so demanding, I look back on it and think thank god I wasn't married and had bills, a family to support, a household to maintain because it just wouldn't have happened.

Both my parents work full-time, but I never felt deprived of a mother or father. And it makes me really angry when people suggest that my mom is incompetent for having a career. (And also, why can fathers have a career if mothers can't?)