PT-LawMom

Lisa Belkin’s latest Washington Post/New York Times crossover article proposes that law firms are getting downright cuddly in response to the work/life movement. They’re doing it at a snail’s pace, but they’re doing it. Maybe by the time I get out of law school in 2011, there will be daily group hug sessions before we all walk out the door at 6 p.m.? Although if Zuska’s January hour’s are any indication, we may all be out of luck.

The Weekly MILS (Moms In Law School) Roundup** is the brainchild of Saramel (retired). It is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom and A Little Fish in Law School blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday morning. Next week’s MILS Roundup will be hosted by Butterflyfish.

Does the BigLaw salary eliminate your say in the balance debate? — Magic Cookie
Swamped, and the semester’s just started — Frequent Citations
Slacking, and the semester’s just started — Starting to Melt
Torturing the professors — A Little Fish in Law School
Household budgeting during law school — Diary of a Law School Mom
Everyone’s Got a Cold! — 2L Wannabe and Mommy on the Floor
Oh, the weirder joys of pregnancy — A New Duck
And the obnoxious post-partum treats — Knocked Up (and in Law School) and Peanut Butter Burrito
Never too cold for outdoor fun — Adventures of Law School Mama
Celebrating some much-needed good news — LagLiv
The newest (to us), cutest six-month-old MILS child — Law School Sucks (and So Do Lawyers)
The newest, cutest sleeping burrito baby — Peanut Butter Burrito
The newest, cutest, MILS hairstyle — Merits of the Case

If you’d like to have your blog added to the MILS blogroll for weekly review or would like us to consider a specific post, drop the hostess(es) an email or leave a comment at their respective sites.

**Hat tip to the “original” Roundup — Evan Schaeffer’s Legal Underground and Divine Angst

That’s what we’re going to have to call January at this point in blog terms. I will do the Roundup today, but then you may not hear from me again until the crap stops hitting the fan and I can get back on track (i.e., hopefully by the time it’s my turn to do the the next Roundup). Forget school, I can barely get life together right now!

I dragged myself out of bed yesterday, got Pumpkinhead dressed and off to school and then headed off in the icy cold rain to the post office and grocery store to run errands for my still-incapacitated family member. Then I called in sick to work for the first time this week and crashed in bed. At 3 p.m., I went over to the doctor’s office to find out that Monday’s “nasty cold” had developed into “bronchitis, a left inner ear infection and a sinus infection” with a $100 list of prescriptions on top of the $25 co-pay for the visit. Lovely. The doctor told me to sleep and drink a lot more liquids. I already felt like I was drinking a ton but she said I’m really dehydrated. Okay. Fortunately she gave me some lovely cough medication with codeine and said it was all right to mix with the Topamax so I took some last night after Chapin got home and slept from 7 p.m. until 8 a.m.! I feel quite a bit better just from that.

Unfortunately the blood-suckers at Quest Diagnostics called to tell me they “forgot” to take one of the blood levels (only the most important one) last Saturday so they have to re-draw it. Yes, this is the same thing that happened a few months back with LabCorp when they took my Thiamin level and accidentally exposed it to light. Obviously I have bad luck with blood draws. The bad news is that they have to stick me again. The good news is that they said they will come to my house today to do it so I don’t have to go anywhere. That makes it a bit better. Still no news on the biopsy or the other blood levels.

School-wise, I talked to the appropriate office on Thursday and I do have an accommodations form waiting for me to pick up whenever I can get down there and take to my teachers. I’m not sure what the provisions are, but they should include what we had discussed and may go as far as extended testing time. I’m hoping it will get me out of oral questioning in class. You probably can’t tell from my written blog posts, but I really am quite confused and out of it in person and having a hard time processing things orally from all the medication. It just takes me a bit longer to crank it out. I was also able to switch sections for one of my classes so that I can consolidate the number of evenings I’m on campus to three instead of four. That should hopefully be very helpful in terms of stress load.

I have come down with a nasty cold this weekend. There’s a $265 speeding ticket in my purse that I got last week on my way back home after 72 hours straight at the ICU with a family member. I was supposed to meet with Pumpkinhead’s teacher for parent/teacher conference today but, bad Mommy that I am, I canceled and we spent the morning instead cuddling on the couch watching “Hercules.” This afternoon Chapin and I have to drive an hour across town to meet with his immigration attorney who, four months after filing his $4,600 five-page appeal brief (for denial of citizenship), has yet to give us a copy of that brief or proof of filing. I’m soooooo not up for it and I’ve told him he MUST talk because he is the client and she is his attorney. I will not do this for him anymore.

School, only in session one week, is already in high gear. We have group projects in both classes and I’ve already been dragged into groups (thank goodness because otherwise I probably would have found myself in serious trouble down the road). But they want to meet right away (like this week after class!) and I just cannot get motivated in the least. I was also supposed to meet with my co-representative for a school organization today but she didn’t get in touch so I’m going to let that slide. I’m going to try to have a low-key week and do only as much as I need to do to get through it. It’s frustrating because I had so hoped to start this semester off with a bang and instead it’s been one thing after another after another. I wanted to spend this weekend getting a lot done and recovering from last week’s events and instead I’ve gone through a half gallon of chicken noodle soup and two boxes of tissues.

This week I should hear back from the school’s accommodations committee regarding my neurologists’ requests that I not be grilled orally in class (my brain just can’t process quickly enough to get the answers to my mouth), that I be allowed to use a laptop in one (already know the answer is no for one professor, but I can use a tape recorder) and other helpful things. I should also be meeting with my supervisor about her meeting with my boss. He was extra nice after she met with him so maybe whatever she said got through. I don’t know. One of my coworker suggested floating but I was hired because of some specific technical skills that the desk requires so I’m not certain they would let me go that easily. I’ll just keep praying that a paralegal position opens up soon.

Butterflyfish kindly stepped up to help me out by taking over MILS duties this week. MILS Roundup 29 is up at A Little Fish in Law School.

The Weekly MILS (Moms In Law School) Roundup is the brainchild of Saramel (retired). It is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom and A Little Fish in Law School blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday morning. The next MILS Roundup will be back here next week.

MILS Roundup 28 was at A Little Fish in Law School two weeks ago. I’m posting two weeks late because so that people who are looking for all the Roundups can find them.

The Weekly MILS (Moms In Law School) Roundup is the brainchild of Saramel (retired). It is hosted on a rotating basis at the PT-LawMom and A Little Fish in Law School blogs and is usually posted no later than Monday morning. The next MILS Roundup will be back here next week.

Okay, that last post was a bit melodramatic (yep, if you didn’t know it by now, my true calling is to be a soap opera writer). It really has been a sucky ass, crappy, horrible, can’t-even-tell-you-how-bad week. But I’m going to think positive and believe that things can only get better from here on out. There is a lot to be thankful for. First, the crisis has passed. Second, I may be well on my way to health answers (this new neurologist is awesome!) Third, there are some things getting ironed out at school that may make my life a lot easier. Fourth, these accommodations (assuming the school’s medical review team approves them), will really help me out a lot. Fifth, after my boss sank to an all-time low this week, I went to my supervisor and she talked to him and I believe that things are going to be a bit better (at least until the paralegal hiring freeze ends and I can move up!) So here’s my better post, trying to focus on the positive.

I was hit with a major, earth-tilting crisis with a family member this week that brought me to my knees and almost broke me. When I was literally at the point when I did not think I could take another stressful issue piled on top of work, school, Pumpkinhead, Chapin, and my crappy health, life dealt my family a major blow we could not have imagined. It made me put everything immediately on hold, including canceling a contract cite-checking project with almost no notice other than a hastily typed e-mail, 72 hours away from Pumpkinhead (hasn’t happened since he was born), missing the first few days of the semester, and taking a few days off work without even checking e-mail or calling in once. When I did call Pumpkinhead, he mercifully didn’t even seem to realize that I wasn’t at home because he was having too much fun playing with his Daddy or with my cousins. Work didn’t have as oblivious of a reaction….

Fortunately the crisis has passed (I hope) and things are looking up. My tears aren’t as close to the surface as they have been the past few days and the knots in my shoulders are starting to untwist. At the tail end of the 72 hours, I did still have to undergo the torturous three-hole skin biopsy I had scheduled (”Mother F&^&er!!!!”) and am off for some very nasty multiple-hour procedures tomorrow morning). However, my perspective has changed a lot in the past week, or maybe my tolerance level has just decreased. I’m not sure what it is but I think I’m going to start saying no a bit more to the things I don’t want to do and the people I don’t wish to deal with so that I can reduce my stress level. I started this week by meeting with the Dean to ask for accommodations at school while I’m dealing with the pain during this diagnosis phase. Amazingly enough, it looks like they’ll be able to do a lot for me. More on that later when my brain is up to higher-level thinking.

Thanks to Butterflyfish who has stepped up to take care of the roundup for me this week. You’re the best, lady.

Can’t sleep. I’m totally exhausted but this new medication is working on my brain and i can almost feel it tingling so I got back out of bed, took a shower and came downstairs to watch TV. Anyway, I was thinking and here’s the thing. I’ve only taken four classes so far. We’re ranked against the 2008 entering class so our competition hasn’t even arrived yet! I just need to try to get this illness under control so I can buckle down and do well during this spring, summer and fall so that by the time rankings come out next spring, I am in a much better spot than I am right now. And I found out that there are at least two journals with no grade minimums for the write on competition so I can bust my ass to try to win a spot on those (and kill myself trying to keep the spot if I get it!). Thanks for listening. I’m a “sweat the small stuff”, control freak kind of girl so you’ll probably see the prior post repeated again several times before I graduate.

Everyone likes to say, “Don’t worry, you’ll get a job when you’re done with school,” but the people who say that all graduated very high in their classes and got great jobs. They seem to assume I’ll do well. Since that hasn’t happened after this last semester brought my grades way down, what now? At what point do I start to worry? What kinds of things do I do to make it more likely that I really will have gainful employment pain at or more than what I currently make? Sure, I’d love to be able to say I could take a large hit and take one of the many $40k public interest or government positions, but the reality is that not only will I still have a mortgage to pay a few years from now, but also student loans that will hit the instant I stop attending school. I need to face reality and plan accordingly. I see smart people like Certifiable who graduated from a top 50-ranked school with honors and a local clerkship and still didn’t find work until after she passed the bar, even then only on a contract basis. So what tips the scales? How do you not panic completely? Is it worth it when you aren’t in the top 10% (or, to be blunt, even the top 50% at this point)?

EDITED TO ADD: I don’t mean to be a whiny-pants here. My question is really for those of you out there (are you out there?!?) who weren’t at the top of your class, how did you make up for it? What did you do to distinguish yourselves?