Baby and school. Grad students should not have babies.
Actually, I resend that because I've seen people pull it off in a sense. Academia (at least science) is not for the sane or those who want lives not dominated by their work if they want to be any good. This deep in I see the place is littered with broken families, barely put together geniuses, stressed out folks being forced to choose between their work and outside lives, and folks who chose the former and missed their kids growing up. Of course exceptions exist, but I think they're the exception filled by generally super extraordinary people. If I make it through this there is no way in hell I'm going to continue the straight out academic path; I'm just not committed enough and my priorities are squarely outside of figuring out interesting but super academic questions. I can still see myself being involved involved in academia either by working in research labs as more of a manager, instrumentation specialist, or straight out teacher outside research institutions. I will not pursue anything resembling a professor or total researcher. Of course, I doubt those options are even open to me anymore given my meager progress. Top level positions are hard to come by and I'm hardly top tier material.
Other than that stuff, I've figured out my shit way more in the past year than I thought possible. I just want a job that's good enough. Then I can care about the family, the cats, and fun stuff.
