It’s the time of year that I would typically be writing a long list of resolutions for the coming year. And then I would add those items to my very long to do list.

Not this year. I’m not doing it. According to the Internet, a quarter of all New Year’s resolutions fail within a week. But that’s not why I am opting out of participating this year. I am not doing it because I am embracing my present self, today. I am acknowledging that it’s okay for once to not add another task or item to my neverending “to do” list.  I am going to stop looking onward and upward for once, at least for this moment.  The last week and a half off of work with my family has made me realize this even more. Can we all just stop for a moment and appreciate what we have, right now? It may not be here forever.

And do we ever pause and think about what our resolutions were last year, and whether or not we accomplished them or not anyway? Last year I had academic goals (e.g., write more, read more, get tenure), and I also had a few personal goals (exercise more, be a better mom, better wife, and spend more time with kids, etc).  But that’s a lot. How exactly was I going to write and read more and also spend more time with my family AND exercise more?  I would have had to clone myself. I certainly was one of the 25% who did NOT meet my resolutions within the first week.

So rather than think about all the resolutions I would typically make right now that would sound a lot like last year’s and be basically insurmountable and utterly impossible, I am going to reminisce and appreciate 2017, and hope it gives me pause to better appreciate the moments of 2018.

Here are my top highlights, both personally and academically. I’m including the highs and the lows, because they all make me appreciate the life I have, right now.

-          My children made it to ages 2 and 4, respectively, and they are STILL ALIVE.  Total miracle. 

-          My 2 year old son is now out of a crib, weaned of a pacifier (not an easy feat!!), and potty trained, after literally 6 months of trying and countless times of pooping in his underwear. THAT WAS THE WORST AND I WANT TO STOP REMINISCING ABOUT IT.

-          But speaking of my son, I have endured the last 6 months of the worst toddler tantrums imaginable and unexpected lack of sleep for half the year.  Here’s what it looks like: wake up sometime between 1-2am and try to put a cute kid who says “Mama, I just wanna cuddle with ya for a minute because I love ya” back to bed, succumb to cuddling in bed, i.e. kicking everywhere for 30-45 mins until I can’t handle it anymore and put him back to his own bed, then 4:30 and 5am wake up with him SCREAMING “I’m hungry!! I really want to go downstairs!!  I want ‘eat-meal!’ AHHHHHHHHHH!  You’re not nice mama! <punch, kick bite>” And that screaming continues as he wakes up his sister and until 6am when I allow him to go downstairs at a reasonable hour and then I ponder what I might have done wrong with this one and why can’t I just sleep ever and really will I ever sleep again???   

-          My daughter started pre-K, learned how to swim, scored a bunch of soccer goals (!!), and is the absolute sweetest and most well behaved kid in the world. She frequently gets the “best manners" star in her class. I obviously take ALL the credit for her early life success. 

-          My academic mentor – the person who encouraged me to even get my doctoral degree in the first place - passed away this year.  While he was always my mentor, as I progressed throughout my career he also became my colleague and my friend. He was the most incredible and giving person and I will never be the same because of him. I think in part due to him, I am much more reflective this year. I think of the influence I have on my own students and trainees, and how I can pay it all forward to them.

-          I traveled to 7 cities this year, including 2 international trips. While fantastic for me professionally, I want to note that this amounted to 24 total days away from my kids. I just added it up and by # of days in the year, I missed 6.7% of the year traveling. But to put it into perspective, I miss a whole lot more on a daily basis by sending them to daycare and going to work instead of staying home with them…but after spending the last week and a half at home with them over the holiday I'm pretty sure that's not even an option (considering my sanity).

-          To make up for it, I took vacations with the kids.  We took a 2 week vacation to Hawaii and it was amazing. I brought them to Disney for the first time because I had to be in Orlando for a work trip. Perks of academic motherhood!  I took off a day of work for each of them on their birthdays (a tradition I hope will continue for their life). Overall, total vacation time > total work travel time.  While vacation isn't quite the 'vacation' I remembered it being before kids, that’s a WIN in my book.

-          My children continued to have every illness in 2017 (#daycarechildren).  We had impetigo (times two, of course), stomach flu (times two), and strep (times two) this year. Of course it wasn't all at the same time and was staggered. Total missed days of work in 2017 due to illness = 8.

-          I applied for 4 grants this year.  I got none of them.  I should be thankful for the grants I got last year that will last several years, but the 0/4 statistics remind me that I cannot stop working hard at this if I want to keep my research team.

-          One the other hand, I had a record number of publications—24 this year, including 3 first authored and 11 last authored publications. Thank you post-docs and graduate students for all that you do!!  I have to spend so much time writing grants I have less time to write the actual papers, but I reviewed and edited so many papers this year...

-          I actually DID exercise more in 2017, per my New Year's resolutions – I did my first Olympic triathlon (at a snail pace) and ran my first marathon, with my daughter there to cheer me on.  In order to exercise more though, I got a babysitter at least once a week and sometimes twice to let me run.  There goes another 52+ hours more away from my kids...

-          Despite this, I don’t think I did the best at work life balance. I frequently worked while at home, and I frequently got distracted/felt guilty about home while I was at work. I am going to embrace the fact that this will probably always happen, and I should just stop feeling so guilty about it all. [NON-RESOLUTION for 2018?!!?!?!]

2017 was a mixed bag. Life is a mixed bag. It would have been hard to plan for any of it.  My non-resolutions for this year: embrace life, enjoy the moment, forget about the “to do” list, and ignore the feeling of never being good enough at being a wife, mother, or academic. Though perfection is unattainable, the journey of life is such a good ride. And I want to appreciate every single day of it. 

To all the other academic mamas out there - you are doing great RIGHT NOW! Keep it up, and happy new year!