Podcast – Careers & Cradles: Balancing Motherhood & Dementia Research

Voice Over:

The Dementia Researcher Podcast, talking careers, research, conference highlights, and so much more.

Emily Spencer:

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Dementia Researcher Podcast. In this show, we are exploring the unique challenges and triumphs of juggling a demanding career in academia with the equally demanding role of motherhood. But rather than the usual discussion around school runs, runny noses, and late-night working, in this show, we're backing up a bit and we're going to be talking about working during pregnancy, about maternity leave and about returning to work. And I'd like to think that this isn't just a message for the ladies, so men don't switch off just yet. So, if this resonates with you, stay tuned.

Hello, I am Emily Spencer. I'm a PhD student at University College London, and on the 10th of November I went on maternity leave. And yes, I am still on maternity leave, but I am somehow convincing myself that hosting today's podcast doesn't actually count as work. One of the reasons I agreed to host this show is that today’s incredible guests and I are uniquely qualified to discuss this important topic because whilst my child is now 11 weeks old, my guests are only a few months behind me and will themselves be going on maternity leave very soon. But that's enough from me. Let's meet the guests and get the news from them. So, I'd like to welcome Dr Laura Prato and Dr. Aisling McFall. Hi guys.

Dr Aisling McFall:

Hi.

Dr Laura Prato:

Hello.

Dr Aisling McFall:

Hi.

Emily Spencer:

And let's do some proper introductions. So, Aisling, why don't we start with you. So why don't you tell us a bit about where you work, what you do, and a little bit about your family situation.

Dr Aisling McFall:

Thanks very much for having me today. So, as you said, my name is Aisling McFall. I'm a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Glasgow. I currently work on Ischemic Stroke Project. I've only been in the post for about three months, but my PhD was actually in preclinical stroke. And before this I spent two and a half years researching neurodegeneration and [inaudible 00:02:18] before coming back to stroke.

In terms of my family, so I have a daughter and she is three and a half years old. She was born in 2020 and right now I am 35 weeks pregnant with baby number two. So baby is due in the middle of March and I'm on the countdown. I think I have 20 days that I have to work for, I finish the last day of February.

Emily Spencer:

Do you know what you're having for your second baby?

Dr Aisling McFall:

I don't know actually. I didn't know with the first, so I decided to try and keep it the same. So resisted the strong, strong temptation and didn't find out what it is.

Emily Spencer:

Excellent. And Laura, it's great to meet you as well. Could you tell me a bit about yourself as well?

Dr Laura Prato:

Great to meet you as well, Emily and Aisling and lovely to be here today. So, my name's Laura Prato. I work at the University of Liverpool and I'm a post-doctoral research fellow funded by the NIHR and the Alzheimer's Society. And my main research at the minute is looking at dementia care navigation services in the community and looking at whether they help people access further services, whether they improve wellbeing and what kind of populations they're reaching. And I've been there about 18 months now, but I've worked on a variety of different projects in that time, and I have a four-and-a-half-year-old little boy and I'm currently 24 weeks pregnant with my second baby. And I also don't know what I'm having, but I'm due at the end of May.

Emily Spencer:

You both have amazing self-control there. There was absolutely no way I was not going to find out, I just felt like don't double your workload. I wasn't going to plan names for boys and girls, there was no way. But yeah, thank you guys so much. I don't know if you know each other, I haven't met either of you before, so it's good to meet you both and to share a little about me.

So, as I said earlier, I'm a PhD student based at UCL in London. So, I've actually been at UCL for around three years now. So, I started firstly as a research assistant on an Alzheimer's Society Project looking at post diagnostic care. And my PhD is looking at communication between GPs, people with dementia and their carers around advanced care planning and planning for the end of life in general. I am a new parent, so my son arrived on his due date, which I was very appreciative of back in November, so he's 11 weeks old. So yeah, it's all very new for me I would say. And yes, I did not have the self-control, I had to find out, 20-week scan, first question, what we're looking at here? So that's the introductions done and let's get on with the show.

So to help set the scene a little, previous shows have talked about the practicalities of managing family life and a research career, whereas today we're going to come at this from a bit of a different angle and consider how you actually get through working during pregnancy, the effects on your career life after maternity leave as well as the eventual return to work or not as the case may be. So what we hope to do is bring to the surface some of those seldom discussed issues in the hope that that will help others realise that they're not alone and maybe even provide some advice for those who are about to go through the same thing, who might be planning on going through the same thing at some point in the future.

So, to start with, I would love to hear about what you experiences have been of working while pregnant. So maybe starting right at the beginning, how did you decide when to tell your team or your supervisor or how did they react when you told them? I don't know if either of you want to go first. Maybe Aisling?

Dr Aisling McFall:

I suppose first time around was a little different as I was three days into a new post. So, I was writing up my PhD thesis at the time and I'd secured a research assistant post, and I started it on the Monday, and I think I had my 12-week scan on the Wednesday. And so, after I did that scan, I thought, okay, I think I need to tell this new boss. So that was a little bit scary, but I knew I needed to tell her for health and safety reasons, and she was fantastic about it. She was so supportive of it even though she'd only known me a few days and she actually even extended my short-term post to give me a bit more maternity pay, which was great. This time around I had a little of a different situation in that I was working in one job about to leave to then go to a new job.

So, I had two bosses basically to go and tell. So, I needed to tell my current boss. I told him really early for again health and safety reasons and there are lots of things when... I work in a lab and so there's certain risks, so it's important that the manager knows early on. But I was due to start a new position in November and so I felt I needed to go and inform my new PI so that we could make plans for how we would want to manage that, manage only coming to the job for a short period of time before stopping. And what was great was then we organised a meeting with the collaborators on the project and so everybody knew what was going on and we had a plan for realistically what can you achieve in three or four months before you go. I suppose both occasions were not exactly textbook in terms of me trying to tell, having to tell my employer.

Emily Spencer:

How about for you Laura? Was it a bit more straightforward or a similar situation?

Dr Laura Prato:

So, the first time around I was about four months into the PhD, so I just had to tell my supervisors really and that's fine. The PhD programme that I was on paid enhanced maternity leave as part of the programme. So, all that happened was I had to apply to have my submission data, it was called end date extended by the time I took off. And there were no problems around that. So that was really good, and everybody was really supportive, and it was fine. I mean what happened to was in the middle of, well the very end of that maternity leave coincided with when COVID started, and we went into lockdown. So, I returned to work in May 2020, and I think the COVID lockdown was March 2020. So, it was a very strange time to be returning from maternity leave because it was a case of everybody was working from home and everybody was kind of adjusting to that new schedule.

And so that was quite unusual. And then this time around, I told my line manager after my 12-week scan and I'm very lucky that my contract end date has been extended since then and I think it's going to be extended again from what they were saying. So that's quite lucky in that the [inaudible 00:09:58] fell out, so there's funding there available for me to be able to take maternity leave and then return and continue with the project. So, I've been very lucky in that sense. So, there's been an impact on my work and since it's been delayed, but they've extended the term again so that I can finish the work when I return. So yeah, that's quite lucky.

Emily Spencer:

No, that's good. I was just thinking about how I told my line manager as well, obviously last year. I was terrible when I was pregnant, I just didn't tell people for as long as I could get away with it, not necessarily at work, but in my personal life. So, there are friends that I have who don't live nearby who possibly don't know that I have a child because I just never mentioned that I was pregnant. It seems a bit too late now to mention it, which is terrible. I think there's something wrong with me. And I was wondering how long I could get away without telling work. Because I was just like, oh, this is such an awkward conversation for some reason.

And then I found out that I had an abstract accepted for a conference for the Alzheimer Europe Conference in Helsinki and that would've been when I was 35 weeks pregnant, but I really wanted to go and it was literally like we found out, well I had my 12-week scan and then it was like the next day I had the abstract accepted and I was like, oh, I'm going to have to say because I can't be like, oh yeah, I'm booking on and then find out later you are heavily pregnant. But it was fine.

Both of you touched on something there that I think is really important to talk about, which is the research environment I think is quite a unique environment when it comes to having a family and taking time off because of the nature of contracts being quite short term or doing a PhD or what have you. And I wonder, I mean this might be a bit of a personal question, but to what extent or did it to any extent, the nature of those short-term contract’s kind of impact at all on your decision to start a family or on timing of those things, for example? Aisling, I see your kind of nodding.

Dr Aisling McFall:

Yeah, it definitely did. I mean, me and my husband both, we knew we wanted to have kids and we both actually did PhDs quite close together in terms of time and we knew it was going to be a challenge to try and work out a good time. So, first time around we thought that a really good time to have a baby was just after you finished your thesis or while you're writing your thesis. In hindsight, probably not such a good idea because it meant that my mat leave was spent having to do thesis corrections, which I didn't have time to do because baby came sooner than I thought. And then job hunted to get a job, didn't have much.

And then second time around, by the time I felt ready, so by the time my daughter was old enough for me to think, "Yeah, okay, I could do this again." I think at that point I had a year and a half or so left on my contract, maybe a year left on my contract and I thought it just won't work because I promised myself after having to spend a lot of the first mat leave job hunting and the stress that that, it was really, really stressful. I was like, I promised myself that I wouldn't do that again and so I would make sure that I had a job to come back to. So, I definitely think that at least second time around it caused a delay that wouldn't necessarily have happened if I had been in a different kind of career where it just is a permanent contract.

So yeah, I definitely do think it played a big role in terms of getting the timing and I think I was incredibly lucky to have secured a position just as that previous post finished. And now here I am, about to go on maternity leave and I'm coming back to nearly two years of a post. So, it's a huge, huge weight off my shoulders and it just makes it much easier. But I do find it almost quite frustrating that I had to think of that, I couldn't just... You maybe have friends who decided to have family and they just go, yeah, I want to have family. And they just do it, and they don't really have to think about it. I mean, you could, and you always work things out and things pan out eventually, but I just feel like with this kind of job, there needs to be a lot of planning for something that is difficult to plan.

Emily Spencer:

Definitely. And I mean there's the idea of timing, you can plan for when you want things to happen that doesn't necessarily mean that they will happen then. So, you might think, "Oh, I've got two years left on this contract." And two years can easily become, I don't know, a year or five months or-

Dr Aisling McFall:

Precisely. Precisely.

Emily Spencer:

Is there anything you want to say about that, Laura?

Dr Laura Prato:

Yeah, I mean I agree with Aisling. So there'll be five years by the time this baby's born between my son and baby and it wouldn't have been so long if I hadn't have been on a PhD because I wanted to get the [inaudible 00:15:30] out of the way before getting pregnant because I'd already, as I said, I was in the very beginning of the first year, really, when I got pregnant. In fact, I must have been about a month into my PhD when I got pregnant first time around. So, I basically spent the entirety of the PhD either pregnant or with a very small baby. And that's obviously very challenging, especially around writing your thesis and things like that.

And then this is obviously only related to the UK context, but once your child reaches three, you're entitled to funded childcare but not if you're a PhD student. So that adds another level of complexity where you've got to be in a funded position by the time, you're through to get that childcare. So, I definitely didn't want to have a second child before I was in a position that was a PAYE, as in a job so that I wouldn't have to go through that again. And I wanted the [inaudible 00:16:36] out of the way without having to be pregnant during the [inaudible 00:16:41] or anything like that. So, it definitely does have an impact because you do have to think around those practicalities and how that's going to work for you.

And I think I was fairly lucky first time around to be a PhD student so early on because I wasn't into the thick of the research. I was still basically carrying out the [inaudible 00:17:02] review, so it was very flexible work, and it was desk-based work and I think I was applying for ethical approvals and things like that and then there was kind of a natural stop for me. So, I had submitted the application and then I went on maternity leave, so I wasn't stopping a project in the middle or anything like that. And I think I've been quite lucky again this time in the sense it's a similar scenario in that again, I'm currently applied for ethical approvals and hopefully those will be in place when I take maternity leave and then when I return I can stop the data collection part of the project.

But it is complicated because it's about trying to get that balance in the timing and like you said, it's not that straightforward because you're not really in control of your own fertility. So, you try and plan as much as possible, but what happens, and you just have to react as best you can.

Emily Spencer:

It is just such a unique kind of environment to work in I think and does add this extra pressure. So, as I mentioned, I'm a PhD student. I've done one year, so I've got to that stage where I'm kind of finishing up my systematic review, I've got my ethical approval in place so when I go back, I'll be data collecting. But something that you kind of mentioned as well, Laura, about, so in the UK context, the government have announced extending that free childcare. So, by the time my child is nine months old, there will be 15 hours of free childcare for nine-month-old babies as long as you're working. And so, there's provision for people who are working, there's provision for undergraduate students and then there's this gaping hole for PhD students, which man, when you're already on a low income, it is just this horrible thing to think about. It so outraged me this week that I sent just an email of anger to [inaudible 00:19:09] as my local MP to tell him what I thought about it.

So that's been on my mind. My next blog post, anyone who's been following those will each of that. So that's something to look forward to. And then going back to something you were saying earlier, Aisling, as well, so thinking about working during pregnancy, you mentioned both times telling your employees in terms of a health and safety thing or health and safety perspective and obviously your work very much being lab-based and there being implications there. So, I wondered in what way being pregnant has kind of changed your day-to-day working life in terms of what you're actually doing.

Dr Aisling McFall:

So, there's just a few chemicals and things that I can't really, I shouldn't be around. And so, there's just a few processes where I can't do. One of the main things in my current role is I can't be near anaesthetic. So, if you're doing any animal procedures that involve anaesthetic, I can't do them. So that entire part portion of my project has just had to be put on hold until I return back. But other than that, the changes are just quite subtle. For example, asking a PhD student, could you do this particular process for me because I'm not touching it? And actually, what's quite interesting this time is, so the last time when I was pregnant, my little girl was born in July 2020, so most of my pregnancy was lockdown. I think I had 12 weeks in the lab before going into lockdown. So, I didn't really know what it was like to work in a lab pregnant because at that point I must have reached my 20 weeks or something at that point, and you don't have a big belly or anything, so you're not hindered.

Whereas this time, I very much and so I'm noticing why I can't quite get to the lab bench completely. If you think about when you're trying to wash dishes and your belly gets in the way, well now that's a lab bench and I can't quite reach it and thankfully the students in the lab are really kind and that if something goes on the floor or goes underneath something and I'm like, "Guys, please, this can fell." They'll help me out with that. And I had to get a massive lab coat as well because my lab coat started to not fit and obviously it's there for a reason, it's a health and safety thing and there's no point in you walking around with a lab coat with a belly stick [inaudible 00:21:46]. So, I got this giant lab coat to try and accommodate the bump.

But it is definitely quite interesting to be in the lab now that I'm pregnant this time and just realise just how, I don't know, how agile you almost need to be to work in the lab or how agile I would work in my lab, darting bite and now I am a little bit slower and I need a bit more space.

Emily Spencer:

Has there been any differences for you Laura? Because obviously the type of research you do is quite different to Aisling. Has it had any implications for how you do your job or any things that you'd usually be doing and not now?

Dr Laura Prato:

Not really in the attempts that I'm largely still a qualitative researcher. So the biggest challenges I suppose are around things like, if you have nausea during the early stages and you have events or presentations to give or that's obviously complicated, but I suppose that's true of anybody when you're in a, it's difficult to perform when you're not feeling very well. I think probably more something that you touched on Emily, about conferences and about having restrictions around travel.

So, because I'll be on maternity leave over the summer, which is obviously when quite a few conferences were organised, I won't be able to travel to present my research findings and that's quite frustrating. And I think last time I think I did present when I was on maternity leave, but they became more hybrid during the pandemic and now a lot of conferences have gone back to more face-to-face formats because they're recognising the value of networking and of not watching remote presentations, which is understandable and people being there for questions. So, I think that's probably the biggest impact that I've seen in that I'm not able to attend those conferences and that is a limiting factor because I'll have to wait until I return from maternity leave, so I'll be a year behind.

Emily Spencer:

Yeah, I definitely see that as, I mean it is quite difficult, isn't it? I mean I was very fortunate I think that the conference was just literally just within that window of opportunity for me. I think the original due date they'd given me; it would've been a week over and then at my first scan they were like, "Oh no, we think that your due date's out by two weeks." And I was like, "Thank goodness. I really wanted to go to Helsinki." But then all my colleagues were like, "Are you sure that you're going to want to go when you're 35 weeks?" And I being me was just like, "How dare you limit me. I definitely want to go." And I was completely fine. So that's good. But I appreciate that not everyone is feeling absolutely fine at 35 weeks.

Moving forward a bit I guess to thinking about actually preparing for your maternity leave. So, Aisling, you are obviously really close to going on two going on. So how have you planned for your leave in terms of handing over responsibilities or do you feel like you've been able to wind down a bit? How's that planning going for you at the moment?

Dr Aisling McFall:

What's winding down? No. So every time I take any leave be it like a holiday or whatever, there's always, always chaos. So, as I mentioned earlier on, we had a meeting with the collaborators on the project before I started, and we did plan of these are the things to achieve before I finish up. So, I've been working through getting those parts done. So basically, I'm banking up sales and things that I've freeze down that are then going to be ready for me coming back and things like that. So, in terms of preparing the project for me finishing, that was sort of planned before I actually started, which was good.

But of course, things don't always go to plan. So, I've got my own sort of deadlines, my own things that I want to have achieved before I finished that are just going to probably make this month a little bit chaotic. But in terms of other things, so other responsibilities. So, I had a student that I was supervising for a dissertation that she was writing up and I'm supposed to give feedback, formal feedback to it in March or I think this mission date for is the end of March. And I really wanted to take on the student and have that experience that was at supervision, and I wasn't sure if I could because this was a hard deadline, I couldn't change it. So thankfully I was able to arrange with my PI and she's happy to support me. So even though I'll be off, I'll be able to potentially either still do the marking or chat to her on the phone about getting through the marking and stuff.

So that's another sort of handover responsibility that I've done. I think I'm still supposed to try and arrange, I'm an ECR rep for our Alzheimer's research UK Scotland network. I think I'm supposed to try and find somebody to cover me with my [inaudible 00:27:32], but that bit I was kind of falling behind so I might just have to dip back into that instead of finding somebody else. But no, I think I'm pretty well-prepared. It is kind of strange this time to know I'm coming back to something, whereas last time I felt very much, I mean obviously it was a research system post, it was fixed term, and it would've ended when I was on mat leave and things. So, it was very much clear your decks, everything needs to be done. Whereas this time I feel like, oh, anything that isn't finished, that's 2025's problem.

Emily Spencer:

So obviously the three of us are all based in the UK where maternity policies are relatively generous compared to a lot of other places in the world, especially places like the states where you're lucky to get more than a few weeks I know in a lot of jobs. So how long are each of you planning on taking in terms of maternity leave, I guess in terms of your entitlement but also what you have decided on and whether that's kind of a movable feast as well. So, Laura, how about you?

Dr Laura Prato:

So those time I took nine months and I think I'm going to take nine months again. Large part of that is to do with finance and that's what's funded. So that's what I'm able to take. And it worked quite well for me last time because by nine months obviously the baby's approaching one, they're a bit lots stable in terms of the sleep, their sleep patterns are a little bit more predictable and halfway through [inaudible 00:29:17] out, so it's not that younger baby. And that worked quite well for me because it gave me nine months to kind of enjoy being a mom, going to baby classes, that kind of thing.

I didn't feel like it was too big of a gap for the research. I didn't feel like I was parking the research project for too long. It felt like a good time to come back. It was complicated for me by the fact that COVID happened right in the middle. So, when I did come back, I had to make a lot of adjustments to my work around the impact of lockdowns and things like that. But for me that was about the right amount time.

Emily Spencer:

And how about you Aisling?

Dr Aisling McFall:

Yeah, so I took nine months the last time for the exact same reason as Laura and that is what you're paid for in the UK. The statute [inaudible 00:30:12] to pay only goes to 39 weeks. This time around I'm quite keen to take a little bit longer, but most of that is going to be driven by finance I suppose because although you can get the payment up to nine months of statutory pay, statutory pay is not very much money at all. So, what's quite nice in my university at least is that while I'm off, I'm going to accrue all of my holidays and all the bank holidays and all these things. So, it actually means that on the back end of mat leave I can take a bit of time off on full pay because it'll be holidays if I try and use all of [inaudible 00:30:59] up.

So, my current plan which could change is to have nine months fully off and then start dipping my toe back in. So maybe one day a week until I've said go back full-time once baby's born, that's my goal. But whether that remains full time or whether I drop down to four days or something, my line manager and I have already openly discussed that. Just, let's see how things go at that point because that only we once, so I might end up reduce my work time just so I get a bit more time with [inaudible 00:31:41].

Emily Spencer:

I've ended up being really fortunate actually in some ways because when I started my PhD, I was still working on the project I was on before and that project finished at the end of September after which I went full-time on the PhD. But it meant that even though I'd left that job, it was so close to my due date that I still got statutory maternity pay for the entire nine-month period. And then with my PhD I get a full stipend for six months. So actually, that nine months of statutory that I'm accruing pays for a full extra three months for me. So, I can take nine months without any concerns, which is literally like man, from heaven, when you're on a PhD's stipend.

But yeah, knowing some of my friends for example, who live in the states and seeing, I mean one of my friends, I remember with her first, she was entitled to two months from her employer and just think, man, the idea that I would be back at work already seems really hard. So, I guess to some extent I need to be grateful for the provision we do have here, but it's easier said than done, perhaps. In terms of your maternity leave, I don't know how much you've thought about what you plan on doing with that time other than maybe the baby gloss and that sort of thing, but how much are you guys planning on still being involved to any extent with work, engaging with that? I don't know if you've got keeping in touch days or whether you want kind of a clean break for a while. I don't know if either of you want to talk about that a bit, what your plans are.

Dr Aisling McFall:

So, I'm trying to have the big things finished. So, papers and things, hopefully they will only be revisions and I maybe need to dip back in and look at. I'm ignoring any grant deadlines that I see right now and saying no, have a look at this again in January and start paying attention to those emails again. So, I'm mostly going to try to not work and enjoy time with the baby, also time with my daughter and not being in lockdown and actually being able to go out and do things. But my university of likes to have 10 keeping in touch days and I'm very much going to make use of those I think near the tail end of the year just to pick up on some things like some teaching and just starting to get, getting things organised. But I say that, I don't know what might happen in the summer.

I definitely remember the last time getting very set up of babies, but maybe it was because I was just in lockdown on my own in the house with the baby all day. I think I spent four months rolling out the floor trying to teach my daughter how to roll because she just would not do it. And my husband's buying me books, going maybe you want to read to try and keep your brain alive. So, I don't know, I've got all these good intentions of saying, no, no work, but I imagine I'm not going to be able to resist and I'm going to end up dipping back in in the summer or just after.

Emily Spencer:

I think before I went on maternity leave, I'd said, because this project that I was working had come to an end, but obviously the end of a project doesn't mean the end of dissemination. It means the beginning of dissemination a lot of the time. And so, we were kind of getting into that phase of writing papers. So remember on my last day before mat leave, I submitted to a journal one paper I've been working on and then a first draught of another and my colleagues were like, you're not going to want to look at this, you're going to want time with your baby, and I was like, I know myself, I know that I need to keep my brain going in a different way.

So, I mean I'm only three months into mat leave and I'm already just, I mean I've been into the office twice with baby in tow, everyone likes a baby, so that's fine. People will hold it for you while you do some work, but not that this is a model that other people should necessarily be following. But for me, I really enjoy work. I like going in and seeing people. I like feeling like I'm contributing to life in a way that's not just the life of this one tiny human. So yeah, I understand the draw to work. How about you Laura? Oh, sorry.

Dr Aisling McFall:

When you love your job, I think it is hard to completely detach yourself that way.

Dr Laura Prato:

Sorry, I think I checked my emails once a month. Last time I was on maternity leave, I didn't work at all. I thought I would. And I think I was lucky though in that my maternity was pre lockdown or at least the bulk of it was. And I spent quite a lot of time building networks for when I'd be off, I'd have other people with babies the same age. So, I spent a lot of time attending baby classes and socialising with my NCT circle. And I was also just very tired. For the first six months, my son didn't really nap other than contact napping. And he also, he did sleep, but he would wake every three hours and I exclusively breastfed. So, I spent a lot of time just doing that really and spending time with other mums and kind of, I suppose just getting to know him, which was a surprise to me because I expected to be more interested in work than I would be.

But I don't know, I think this time I'm going to try and stick to a similar model as much as possible. Although possibly because I've had the experience before, I think I'll probably spend, I'll probably be more open to maybe looking at a bit more work when baby's gone to sleep. Whereas last time I spent a lot of it either googling various habits that they were developing and trying to work out whether they were developing it the way that they should. And then later on I spent a lot of it doing things like baking homemade pinwheels for weaning and making homemade purees and that kind of thing whenever he was asleep. Yeah, so I don't know, I think I might be more open this time.

Emily Spencer:

You are putting me to shame, Laura. I feel like that's what I'm meant to do or be like. So, I went to one of these, it was like a baby music class thing a couple of weeks ago. Never again, I just can't, I couldn't cope with it, it was too much. And then I concluded I'm an adult, I'm actually an adult. I don't have to do things that I don't want to do. And so, the one thing I do every single week, the one routine I have, which I would highly recommend to everyone is baby cinema. So good. I've gone and seen all of the Oscar best picture nominees, cinema down the road, five pounds, just so low hassle. You're there with a bunch of other parents and babies. Love it.

Alas, the baby sensory classes, I don't know, for me it's just not the one, but there's so much of it and people get so much from it. So, I think I am the anomaly, which is how I end up doing work, which is quite sad. But then I think my baby is quite good. The minute I put him in his pram, he will immediately fall asleep. So, there's like a coffee shop down the road. If I just wheel him that five minutes, then I know that I can get an hour and a half at my laptop, which is very sad. But I don't know, we're all different.

So, I know that we don't have that much time left, so I thought we'd move on to returning to work. And so, I know that in a previous podcast on this platform, Gemma Lace talked about how other moms sometimes judged her or she felt judged for going back to work. So, what are your thoughts on returning to work? I know Aisling, you said that you are going to go in a stepped way perhaps, or what will returning to work look like for you? Or how do you feel about it?

Dr Aisling McFall:

Since I've already done it once, I know a bit more what to expect. So, I think the biggest shock for me, I don't know Laura if this was the same for you. The biggest shock for me when I went back to work was that I put my child into childcare and then she could never go to childcare because she was sick. She would go into childcare and get sick and then spend all her time at home and me having to be at home and my husband having to be at home because she was sick. So, I guess maybe that's my reason for thinking about going back and sort of phase one day a week or something. Let her get all the bad illnesses, I say her, might be he, I don't know, let them get all the illnesses out of their system and then I'll be going full time in summertime maybe when they're not so sick. But that didn't quite pan out the last time.

But yeah, you kind of touched on the, I suppose the mom guilt. Are people judging you for working? And I certainly never feel like anybody in my workplace, so anybody within academia, within the university or anything would put any judgement to me working. But I definitely feel just more general society, I definitely get that kind of vibe that I shouldn't be working, or I shouldn't be as invested in my career. Or for example, when I work late and things, maybe people are thinking, why is she working late? I'm doing it because I love it. Like, give me a break. But then the mom guilt also was like, "Oh, should I be doing this? Should I not be at home?"

But I know that my little girl absolutely adores her nursery. Our nursery's been fantastic. She's been in the same nursery since she's been nine months old. And the experiences that she's had in there have been just amazing and she's developed into this amazing little person. And I know that that's not just me and my husband doing that. I know that the nursery is also contributing to this amazing love personality that she's developing. So that helps get rid of the mom guilt for sure. And yeah, just got to ignore society I suppose. Don't listen to them.

Emily Spencer:

And because there's not the dad guilt, right? No one's being like, why is this dad gone back full time? What is he doing? Whereas the expectation is so much, your primary responsibility or your primary role now is a mom. I was chatting to a friend recently who doesn't work in our field, but she was saying when her daughter was in, I think she was in reception year one or something, and then there was a school trip and all of the parents were invited, "We need volunteers. If you want to come on the school trip, you can." And she loves her job. She was like, "I'm not going to take a day of annual leave to go on the school trip, it's fine."

She went to pick up her daughter at the end of the day and out of the 30 kids, 28 moms had gone. And so, it was only hers and one other child who didn't have their mom with them. And she was like, oh my gosh, I just felt so judged for being at work and coming to pick her up. So yeah, there is a special societal place for that judgement, I'm sure.

Dr Aisling McFall:

When she went on a school trip the last year, me and my husband were fighting over who got to go actually. He was like, "Yeah, so I'm just going to go." And I went, "Hey, [inaudible 00:44:14], why do you get to go? Why don't I get to go." We were like, "Should we both go?" And then that seemed about the [inaudible 00:44:19], first to both take a day off and go. So, in the end I won. I got to go.

Emily Spencer:

I was going to say it probably depends on where the trips to. I think this friend, it was like a trip to the local village, and she was just like, I don't need to that, I don't need to take a day off to walk to the co-op and look at the local church. Do you have any thoughts, Laura, about how you're planning on going back or is that still open-ended at the moment?

Dr Laura Prato:

No, I've chosen the nursery that we're going to use this time. I think I'm quite lucky in that I don't know anybody who doesn't work, who has kids. So, it would be far more unusual where I lived that somebody didn't work and go back to work. And I think one of the things I've found really great about working from home is that because we can work flexibly, what I have been able to do is if there's been a nativity production, which they try and put at nine in the morning, I can attend that till 10 and then just work till six at night.

So, I'm still working the hours, but more flexible, so that's been really good. And I think, Aisling was kind of talking about those illnesses as well in the early days when you first, they start attending nursery. Again, I had a bit of a strange experience because it was the beginning of lockdown. It was very strict bubbles at nurseries. So, my son was actually really well for a really long time because nobody mixed with each other. And then it sorts of all happened later on when they sort of started being a bit more flexible about people mixing and children mixing a bit more. But the specific nursery that we had was actually really strict for quite a long time for probably a good two years. So, I think it delayed some of those illnesses and they're kind of happening now. But yeah, like I said, last time was a very odd experience because at the beginning of the lockdown periods, nobody, as you were saying yesterday about the labs not being open and people weren't working in that way anyway.

So, I think it's going to be a bit of a different experience for me this time around because it's more business as usual when I'm returning. But yeah, I think probably because I've had the experience of balancing the two previously, I think it is fine and I still haven't really thought through whether I'm going to go back full time or whether I'm going to go back four days. But I think as you're saying, going to nursery can be a very positive experience and can really help developmentally. So, it's about making sure that you're balancing your needs as a mom with the needs of the child and getting that balance right and what works for you works for them.

Emily Spencer:

No, that's so true. Yeah, I think we're kind of coming to an end now, so I'll just summarise what we've talked about. So I mean, I think we're all agreed that there are unique challenges with becoming a mom when you're working in a research environment, particularly when it comes to the nature of the shorter term contracts or trying to plan when you're going on leave and not really being in control of that as much as we'd like to be. And the fact that being moms is associated with this kind of societal guilt and that can factor into how you go back to work. But I guess academia does afford some flexibility as well in terms of going back and it sounds like people who have got some really good teams behind them who are willing to support that return and be it a direct return back into five days or four days or a phased return. So yeah, it seems like people have got some good plans and some exciting times coming up.

So, before we go, I just have one last question. Well, it's kind of a two-part question. So firstly, I'd like to ask both of you, what changes would you like to see in the academic community to better support pregnant academics and those on maternity leave in the future? And then also what advice do you have for anyone listening who is planning to start a family but who might not want to compromise their career? So, if I go to you first, Laura.

Dr Laura Prato:

I think it's difficult to say so much what the academic community can do because it's, as we sort of mentioned earlier, academia does tend to be structured around projects, project deadlines and dissemination work. And it's difficult for that to shift, especially with the funders and the way various pieces of researchers. I think for me it's more about governments within countries providing the correct support so that academic context can do things like extend your contact that bit further so that you're able to meet the needs of the project. I'm not sure that that's necessarily something that academia itself can do because it has got those structures around funding.

And I think I'm very lucky, the university that I'm at, I think it is really supportive around academics taking maternity leave and does provide quite a good, enhanced package. And I think in terms of returning to work and making sure that you're able to support your own career, I think some of that is around planning what works best for you. So, looking at what would you like to do? And it might be that while you have small children, you decide to focus on one aspect of your career over another. Maybe an aspect that is more family friendly, that is more flexible if that's something you need or looking at childcare provision so that you can take on that next PI role that you really want. And just about being pragmatic around what will work for you and what will work for your children and your family.

Emily Spencer:

And how about you, Aisling?

Dr Aisling McFall:

Yeah, so I feel like as you've sort of said, the UK maternity provisions are obviously a lot better than maybe in other countries, but I guess it's more just in agreement with what Laura said in terms of the funding of subcontracts. My particular funder has agreed to pause my grant so that there's no time lost on it. So, the entire period of mat leave will just be paused and start again after. But I know that not every funder does that. So that's definitely a change that I think it's ridiculous that some funders don't pause the grant, but they just continue to run, and you lose nine months or a whole year of your job. I guess the key thing would be, I suppose to end all big term contracts. Wouldn't that be great?

Because then you wouldn't have to worry about trying to plan and make sure that you've got enough time left on your contract and all those kinds of things. But that's a work in progress, that's something that we've all wanted for years and years and probably not quite sure if that's ever going to pan out. But one key thing that I think would really be helpful would be to provide childcare conferences. So, there's been a few conferences I've went to and there's been, people have had their children there or there's been an option at registration, [inaudible 00:52:16] if you'd want to have childcare. But any of the conferences, that only seemed to be conferences that were actually in Glasgow. So, I was like, don't need you. And then the conferences where I was going away to, they didn't have that option. So, for a couple of us, I was going down to England, it wasn't even a choice. So, I think that could be a change that could be brought.

And then your second part of your question, was what was it just advice for people who didn't want to stall their career? So, I guess if you just look around the number of people who are in this career who have children, so there's absolutely no reason why you should feel that you're going to lose your career. But I think what's really important, and I think Emily, you actually wrote up a blog post on this, it's like the importance of not losing yourself. I think most academics do feel very much that their career is part of them, they're very passionate. Some days you say, oh yeah, it's just a job, but it is actually a career and it's a passion and that's how you get there. So, I guess it's a benefit almost like can you have that career to drive you forward that you don't lose yourself because you still have that bit?

And then also just embrace it. It's like chaos at the beginning between sleepless nights or not being able to take the baby off you or then going back to work and trying to juggle everything and sicknesses here, there and everywhere. But I think you can make yourself a better researcher because of it. I've had more senior academics tell me that they find mothers that worked for them were much more efficient than the staff that they had that were not mothers. And you definitely do, you find a way to, you start to rearrange your priorities and do the things that are important, and you do become more efficient. So just embrace the lovely chaos of it all and just go for it.

Emily Spencer:

That's awesome. Yeah, I was just thinking about what you were saying there as well about kind of the childcare provision at conferences. I think the same could be said for in terms of how universities could support people coming back as helping with that provision themselves. I know some universities will provide or subsidise childcare within their own nurseries for students. Some don't. It would be great if that was more of a universal thing, particularly when all of these in the UK, these government policies are working their way down the ages now so that more people are going to have access to free childcare hours. And when that isn't relevant to students, it'll be good for universities to maybe have an equivalent provision or an equivalent discount or something is what I selfishly would love to see in the academic world. But no, it has been really great to hear a bit about you experiences and just for me as well to see that actually you can go on maternity leave on your PhD and still get your PhD at the end of it, which is great.

I believe that. I've seen it for myself and that it doesn't mean having to shift everything of who you are, but actually you can still go back into that research world, still have that passion for that and kind of work things out as you go along. So, I am afraid that is all we have time for today, but if you can't get enough of this topic, you can visit the Dementia Researcher website where you'll find a full transcript, biographies on our guest, blogs and other podcasts that are on this important topic as well. And as I've already shamelessly plugged, you can also read my blogs where I'm kind of talking more about my own experiences of becoming a parent in real time. So, there'll be monthly over the coming months.

And just to let you know as well, so if you have had a career gap to start a family and would like to get back into research, and if you're based in the UK, sorry for our international listeners, the Daphne Jackson Alzheimer's Society Fellowships a really great way to return. And they're currently accepting applications, which I believe close on the 8th of May. And so, details of that call and an online seminar with all of the information are going to be included in the show notes. So do check that out. So, I would love to thank our incredible guests, Dr Laura Prato, and Dr Aisling McFall. And I'm Emily Spencer, and you have been listening to the Dementia Researcher Podcast. Bye.

Voice Over:

The Dementia Researcher Podcast was brought to you by University College London with generous funding from the UK National Institute for Health Research, Alzheimer's Research UK, Alzheimer's Society, Alzheimer's Association, and Race Against Dementia. Please subscribe, leave us a review, and register on our website for full access to all our great resources. Dementiaresearcher.nihr.ac.uk.

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