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[donkey]

I am a doctoral student at a European university and a mother of an 8-month-old baby. I am doing pretty well, doing my research (and some additional stuff), teaching at our university, and taking care of the baby. My supervisor accepted, at time, my pregnancy and was happy for me.

But not all is rosey, as title may suggest. I have been recently diagnosed with cancer, which is bad enough on its own, without having baby + doctorate to think about. I might have to slow down, whoch makes me think: when I'll graduate and look for a job, the committee will ask:
- where have you been in winter 2005? (I was having a baby)
- And in winter 2006, why didn't you teach then? (well. I had cancer).

[anthroid]

donkey, first of all, how awful for you.  I hope the prognosis is at least a little hopeful.  It sounds as though it might be, if you're anticipating applying for jobs.

Second, I have to say that cancer is a pretty darn good excuse for not teaching a little.  As a chair, I certainly would take this into account in considering someone for hiring.  When I was completing my dissertation, my mother was dying, and I was one of her primary caretakers (my father was the other).  I was upfront about that in job interviews and it didn't seem to get in the way.

I find folks to be more compassionate than we sometimes think they will be.

Good luck, donkey. 

[biochemchick]

I agree with anthroid, people are more understanding then you may think. Your situation is quite different from the grad student who just decides they don't want to work and slack off. Just from the few postdoc job interviews I've been on, it has been obvious that employers remember that you are also a human and not just a workhorse.

My advice to you would be to run the other way if you encounter a potential employer who is not sensitive to your situation. I assure you, they are not the norm, but the unfortunate minority.

Best of luck with your recovery and your life. :)

[crazybatlady]

Congrats on the baby, donkey!  But I'm so sorry to hear that you are struggling with cancer.  I don't think it should be anyone's business on the job market, though. 

Are you completing coursework?  Is that how they would know?  Because your CV doesn't have to reflect term-length gaps if you don't list the courses taught by year. 

Just list what you've taught, and write "multiple sections" for those you've taught more than once.

The other thing: if there's no way to minimize the appearance of your missed terms, you might consider asking your adviser to comment about your perseverance and dedication in your reference letter.  Being a mother to a little one while completing a doctorate is hard enough, and says a lot about you and your abilities.  Having cancer on top of that?  Wow.

But maybe I'm wrong.  I just know that when I discover what people have gone through while still achieving their goals, I am impressed with them, not concerned that they missed some classes.

[sheepdog_working]

My sympathies for your situation, and best wishes for a full and speedy recovery.

A couple thoughts: First, a committee probably will not notice the gap, which may be more visible to you than to anyone else.  Second, if they do notice and bring it up, you might just say, with a light tone of voice, "I had a serious medical problem that is, thank goodness, completely behind me."  I would not recommend giving any details because a) it's no one's business and b) it opens you up to discrimination (including discrimination from people who would never consciously or deliberately discriminate against anyone).  So I'd just answer lightly and vaguely.  If pressed for details (which is illegal), you could just say, "Oh, there's nothing more boring than hearing about someone's medical adventures.  The important thing is that now I'm healthy and eager to work for your university."

Good luck!

[keystonegal]

May your health improve and my you dance at your child's wedding!

Though I didn't have cancer, I did have a serious medical condition in grad school that was eventually "cured" following 5 surgeries.
The graduate coordinator at the time wanted me to stop my clock toward my dissertation, but my advisor said it would highlight the gaps, so I didn't.

I was so concerned about the interview as I didn't want to get into the problems I faced and how I could be certain it was cured, and why I just didn't cut to the chase and fix the problem from day one. I practiced statements and every time it sounded like I had a mental illness or something, or it became too personal.

When the time came to interviewed... not one question on my gaps. I thought the gaps were obvious ... they were to me. No one asked why did it take so long for me to obtain my Ph.D. No one cared.

I later asked why they didn't ask, some didn't notice, others thought I had just burned out temporarily, something they felt many grad students do, others assumed I had given birth. I have only shared my situation with a fellow faculty member facing a similar health situation.

For me, finding a place to work where they recognize "life happens" and we can't all be super stars 24/7/365 ... was one of the better gifts of my illness.

Good luck!

[lucilla]

Dear Donkey,
I would be sure to do whatever you can to make life easier. To wit, when I was having chemo, I finally asked my doctor to sign the temporary disabled parking permit form. Wish I'd done it sooner. There was no need to add the fatigue of walking a mile to my car to everything else.

Also, if you have chemo, get into the habit of rinsing your mouth with salt water several times a day. it forestalls some of the most unpleasant side effects. Also, if you have time, get to a dentist before you start chemo (if you do chemo) as you can't once it starts. I ended up with some yucky dental work because no one told me this immediately!

All the best to you and your baby!

[post_functional]

(I realize this is an old thread.)

I had to leave a one-year teaching appointment at a charter school a month early because of a form of laryngitis that had the potential to become throat cancer.  My ENT specialist told me to stop teaching in this open classroom environment because it was exacerbating my throat problem.  I followed doctor's orders and left the job immediately, knowing the school had a policy of floating substitutes who could take over at a moment's notice.  

I have often dreaded whether this would adversely affect my chances in an interview situation, particularly if someone noticed the gap and asked why I left the job prematurely.  But no one has yet noticed or asked.  I would like to think they would be understanding.

It is possible I could have sucked it up and stuck out another month, but my doctor seemed pretty serious and I was very alarmed to be told I had pre-cancer.  I also have never found out what my supervisors at that job thought of my leaving abruptly and I've never asked for or used them as a reference.

[oldadjunct]

(I realize this is an old thread.)

I had to leave a one-year teaching appointment at a charter school a month early because of a form of laryngitis that had the potential to become throat cancer.  My ENT specialist told me to stop teaching in this open classroom environment because it was exacerbating my throat problem.  I followed doctor's orders and left the job immediately, knowing the school had a policy of floating substitutes who could take over at a moment's notice.  

I have often dreaded whether this would adversely affect my chances in an interview situation, particularly if someone noticed the gap and asked why I left the job prematurely.  But no one has yet noticed or asked.  I would like to think they would be understanding.

It is possible I could have sucked it up and stuck out another month, but my doctor seemed pretty serious and I was very alarmed to be told I had pre-cancer.  I also have never found out what my supervisors at that job thought of my leaving abruptly and I've never asked for or used them as a reference.

I hope you are well.  I sincerely do.

But what would have caused you to leave a month early without explaining to the school your reason?

Unless you just disappeared, under what circumstances would you not know how your former employer felt?   If you did just disappear, yes you are f***ed. You could post the same question on Monster.com, same answer.

If you offered a reasonable explanation, perhaps documentation, you are fine.  But then you would have nothing to dread.

Either you were seriously ill and you notified your employer, or you weren't and you didn't.

You say, "It is more complicated than that."  No, it isn't.

I am really sorry, my first sentence is true.  But for the love of all things holy, I really am sick of timorous academics.  Get it though your head colleges/universities are businesses and you are an employee.  Hell, even stars are employees, you just happen not to be one.


 

[post_functional]

I did explain to the school the reason.  They said they were fine with it.  They had the floating substitutes to cover my classes.  Didn't I say that?

What I don't know is if they were really fine with it, just because they said they were.  My point is that I don't always take people at their word.

[post_functional]

I should add that even after leaving the job, I was invited to attend the year-end party, and I also attended the year-end school performance, and I was greeted well by my former employers.  I just don't trust my former employers.  And the reason I don't trust my former employers is that I don't trust them not to say, "he was a fine teacher, but, sigh... alas... he committed that most unforgivable crime.  He got sick."  I don't know if you've noticed, oldadjunct, that this is a rather common concern for many on the "Health Issues on the Job" thread.

But I am happy to report that after a year and a half of treatment, invasive examinations and chugging lovely steins of barium, not to mention about five or six panic attacks after reading on the internet how inevitably my condition would become a fatal form of throat cancer, my throat problem did indeed resolve, although I need to have it examined yearly.  Thanks for your best wishes.

[noof_]

Donkey, I hope you are doing better than anticipated. Just posting to agree with pp.

When I was diagnosed I decided not to sit out as recommended. I ended up not teaching and taking an incomplete. It also took me an additional two years to complete my degree thanks to a number of urgeries, treatments and setbacks. Although I had to jump through a few hoops with the graduate school, no one on a hiring committee asked me about the gap or the amount of time it took me to finish.

[post_functional]

I respect your choice.  I do think it's sad whenever we're forced into these choices.

[post_functional]

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"Ohhhh, I see.  That explains it, then.

When you said 'left abruptly,' I assumed you just meant 'disappeared altogether without any notification' even though only an idiot would do that.  I come on these boards and assume the people I'm talking to are idiots.  I should work on that.

Instead you mean 'left abruptly while still following the normal protocols.'  

Okay, I guess I jumped on my high horse without having all the facts!  Heh heh, that's one on me!

That sure makes me regret sort of intimating that I really believe you faculty members who get sick ought to just realize that you're employees first and human beings second, cowboy up, and prioritize the job over your doctors' orders.  I haven't read much of the Coping With Chronic Illness threads.  I didn't realize how crazy that drives some of you who have chronic illnesses, even though this is an all-too-prevalent attitude in American society where we 'live to work instead of work to live'.

I didn't understand that the thrust of your comment was your wariness to include references from an institution where you got sick.  I see now that the broader comment you were making was that one is often reluctant to trust references from institutions where an illness occurred because there is often very little compassion or sympathy for the plight of people who get sick; American society still has vaguely puritanical, completely irrational and often subconscious attitudes that people who get sick must have somehow brought it upon themselves through some moral failing.  Sort of like the demonstrated 'judge first, ask clarifying questions later' lack of sympathy I demonstrated in my comment.  Oops.

Also, sorry to hear about the invasive procedures, barium swallows and panic attacks.  That sort of makes me also regret that crack about "either you have documentation or you don't" where I sort of intimated that I didn't really believe you.  Not having read much of the Coping With Chronic Illness threads, I didn't realize that another negative but all-too-prevalent attitude in society is the liberty with which people feel they can openly profess their skepticism of other people's 'invisible conditions,'--- e.g., fibromyalgia, Crohn's disease, or, heh heh, aheam, pre-cancer of the throat.  I realize now how crazy that drives people with invisible chronic illnesses.  Sorry about that.

Oh, and one more thing.  Sorry about that crack about 'timorous' colleagues.  I see that was sort of a cheap shot on an anonymous forum, where, because we're all a little timorous, we all have something to protect.  I'm now going to include my real name and where I teach in my profile."
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[crickets] chirp chirp chirp [/crickets]

[noof_]

OMG! This thread is from July 2006, not July 2009.

Note to self: pay closer attention to the date.