Code like a…mom?
When I first told my coworkers that I was pregnant, one of them said something that stopped me dead in my tracks.
She said: “I’ve never actually known a developer who was pregnant”
As soon as it was out of her mouth I realized I hadn’t either. 7 years of development experience, and not a single pregnant woman among my technical coworkers.
Literally four days after I found out I was pregnant I got pulled into a new project. They were going to let me lead a team of my own; something I had wanted for ages. I was excited, but also incredibly nervous about the timing. My husband and I had decided to have a baby because things were pretty stable at work, with both of us being developers in relatively sane agile teams. Now I was going to go to a completely different team and lead it? While being pregnant for the first time?
The moment after I was told I was leaving my current team I actually asked my boss (a woman I thankfully trusted completely) “Are you sure you want me to do this? I just found out I’m 5 weeks pregnant and I don’t know how this is going to go.”
She told me I’d be fine. And I really was. I wasn’t overly moody or emotional, I really just felt like a slowing swelling, very nauseous, version of my normal self. Most people didn’t actually realize I was pregnant until it became very obvious.
But the guilt was real from the beginning.
I tried to make sure that people knew I was still capable of doing everything I usually did while I was pregnant. It was a struggle because as a tech lead, I was used to being in the middle of everything and leading my team, but I felt that I had to prepare them for not having me around for three months. I kept up with all of my side projects and tried to slowly “wean” them off of me while still keeping up with my work.
I even participated in the yearly company 24 hour hackathon at 7 months pregnant. I was super proud to only take a short nap at around 3am on the floor of a conference room (and of course, no energy drinks were allowed for my poor pregnant self). Did I feel like I had something to prove? Yes.
I took a three day in-person architecture class 9 days before my due date. The running joke was that I would pop before the final slide was presented. I kept going despite the constant need for bathroom breaks and Zantac. There was no way I was missing this class.
I felt like I was abandoning my team. I felt like I was letting my department down by taking three months off for bonding with my baby. I felt like everything was going to go to shit without me there to help. I was worried that my best developer quit two weeks before my due date cause his commute was too long. I wasn’t sure how it was going to be having to go back and pump three times a day. I wasn’t sure how it was going to be having to care for an infant and do version calls at 4am when I went back. I talked about how maybe I would get some time on my leave to learn a new language or two.
I tried my hardest to prove that being pregnant didn’t affect my ability to be an effective employee. I have always considered my work ethic and career success to be a integral part of my identity, but I never really realized it. Until of course my life was shaken up by my rapidly changing body and circumstances.
I was extremely lucky. I had a very supportive boss while I was pregnant and it made a huge difference. I did not feel all of the guilt because of anything my boss or my coworkers said. I didn’t need them to, I conjured it all on my own. I understand why many women in my position don’t have kids or leave development before they get to having them. It is not easy.
My pregnancy went fine, my dept threw me a wonderful baby shower, and I went off and did that whole “get this tiny human out of me” thing. I came back and found out that everything did go to shit, and I now had to clean it up. I did.
I am very, very lucky to have an extremely supportive husband who helps with everything and made the transition as easier. Did I cry a little bit the first time I left my baby girl at daycare? Yes. Was I frustrated when we both had versions at the same time and we had to keep passing her back and forth between us to keep her from yelling into a conference line at 5am? Yes. Soon my team began to enjoy when I was willing to turn on the video chat and let them watch the baby try to press my keyboard keys while we waited for business sign-off.
Soon we finished the project we started before I was out on leave. Did I stress like crazy my first five months back at work about how much time I was spending pumping in the lactation room? Hard yes. Did I feel like everything was out of control at times while releasing three new assets and a major update to an existing one at the same time? Of course. I still feel that my team knocked it out of the park and was successful. I can’t claim all the credit; I work with some amazing developers, but it certainly made me feel like coding like a mom was something I was capable of.
I can’t say the guilt has stopped, but along the way I’ve learned to live with it. Keeping track of small successes at work helps a lot. (Children have their own milestones for success which look a lot different!) Having vocally supportive coworkers and bosses is critical. They are there to remind me that I am meeting or exceeding expectations when I am feeling inadequate or behind. I still feel sometimes like I have something to prove, but that feeling is slowly diminishing as I come to understand my changed self better.
