Where does the “student mom” phenomenon actually come from?
Nobody is born knowing how to do this — me included (who would’ve guessed, right?). Where did I get this mindset from — to keep pushing even when I hit a wall, to get back up when I fall and keep going, to never give up, to fight, to finish my degree and still be a present mom at the same time?
Well, the idea that it’s not just possible, but somewhere deep down completely normal, to successfully finish your studies and fulfill yourself as a mother at the same time — that was planted in me a long time ago, by the example I had right in front of me.
Back when Ana and I were still little, my mom decided to expand her knowledge in medicine, because she felt that her high school education simply wasn’t enough for her.
She knew she could do more, and she stepped forward, bravely.
Yes, I grew up with a mom who was always there for us — who worked, but who also chased her own dreams.
As many times as I’ve asked myself — how did she manage all of it, how did she actually feel through all of it, how did she find the balance between her obligations and her own peace of mind — I never once asked her that question out loud. Until now.
This conversation should have happened a long time ago. But it’s never too late, right?
But enough about me — this is a text about the person who’s motivated me my entire life. The person who taught me to follow my dreams, and that we’re the only ones allowed to set our own limits, if we even want any — no one else gets to do that for us.
Yes, I am S-Mama — but I wasn’t the first Student Mom in our family.
My mom is Mom, with a capital M.
Today I’m introducing you to my mom and S-Grandma — Sofka’s Grandma, Student Grandma, and Super Grandma.
1. What did your path between motherhood and academic ambition look like?
I started my studies fairly late, for a number of family and personal reasons. I was 34 or 35, though personally, I don’t think it’s ever too late to start.
I was married and had already become a mother twice. My older daughter was in school, and my younger one was two years old when I started my studies.
I always wanted to study, but family circumstances didn’t allow it.
Personally, I always believed it’s never too late for a person to better themselves.
Since I like doing different kinds of work, this was a clear goal I set for myself in my career.
What really pushed me was the fact that nurses, because of how the work is organized, very often end up working night shifts — and that was always hard on me. With just a high school diploma, there’s not much chance of getting out of night shifts. That was one reason. The other two, much more important reasons were career advancement — because I always felt I could achieve so much more — and the difference in salary.
At first it was a higher vocational medical school, and I started my studies in Belgrade, even though I lived in Niš, because at the time that school only existed in Belgrade. So I traveled for every lecture, every practical session, every exam. My program there involved a lot of hands-on training, which meant I very often had to travel and stay in Belgrade for several days at a time.
2. In your case, what did balancing family and ambition look like?
Balancing family and ambition is pretty hard. I had to completely reorganize myself.
Family comes first, of course. But there’s also my regular job. So once I’d finished all the daily obligations around family and work, I’d dedicate the nights to studying.
I also had a lot of help and support from my husband, first and foremost. And his parents lived with us too, so they really stepped up to help with the kids while I was traveling and he was at work.
3. Every mother, the moment her child is born, also gives birth to a little worm of guilt in her head — one that gnaws at you whether it’s warranted or not. How did you deal with that?
Ugh. I always missed my kids.
I knew they felt my absence — both of us did, them and me. But at every moment, I tried to give them everything I had first, and only then everything else.
That’s how I compensated, somehow — at the cost of sleep, at the cost of going anywhere else, I tried to spend as much time with my kids as I possibly could.
Fighting with yourself in moments like that is very hard.
For me, for example, I always held onto the thought: the sooner I finish, the sooner I get to go back and see them.
That was my motivation. There you go — I’m going home now, now I get to be with the kids and the family.
4. How did you find the motivation to keep going, back then?
I never gave up.
Although there were moments when I wavered — what do I even need this for, how much do I really need it, could I live without it… There were moments when I talked myself through it, alone. But reason always won out, and so did the reason why I was doing it in the first place.
On the other hand, I’m someone who never gives up. And no matter what difficulties come my way, I don’t back down.
Even when I fall, I lie down, I rest, and I get back up and keep going.
5. Looking back now, would you change anything?
Looking back now, maybe I would have started studying earlier, before I had a family. Maybe then I wouldn’t have carried that constant stress about not spending enough time with them because I had to study.
But on the other hand, that was extra motivation for me.
It’s only then that you see the win actually proves you’re capable of so much more, even things you never knew you could carry. That win tastes even sweeter, because you realize you have far more strength and drive in you than you thought, enough to see something through.
So I didn’t stop there with my education — after all that, I even enrolled in a third year of vocational studies, which I also completed successfully.
6. In your view, what’s the key thing needed to reach a goal — in this case, to successfully finish your studies?
None of it is scary.
The whole thing comes down to wanting it yourself — and then organizing your life differently around it. Nobody forces this on you; you choose it yourself.
You have a choice — to stay where you are, or to educate yourself and reach some new goals.
7. Let’s shift the conversation a little, to something more current. So, I’m curious — how and in what ways does the role of mother differ from the role of grandmother, given that you’ve had a pretty successful “career” in both?
The whole approach to raising children today, how you treat them, is much more liberal. We applied different standards raising our own kids. They were stricter.
And our attitude toward our granddaughter is, in many ways, much more liberal than it was toward our own children.
Why is that? I couldn’t tell you the exact answer.
Maybe it’s because we already went through that parenting experience, and fear followed us through all of it — will we manage, will we succeed at all of it, will we raise them to be healthy, decent, good people.
Since we obviously succeeded in that role, now comes the role of grandparents, where the parents take on the main responsibility for raising and caring for the child, and grandma and grandpa are now just the people who help out with raising the child.
The parents have the main role, and the greatest responsibility rests on them.
As grandparents, we have so much more time to devote to our grandchildren.
And maybe that’s one of the reasons we’re more lenient with them than we were with our own children.
And we also have a lot more experience behind us now.
Now we can see where we went wrong raising and educating our own children, so in a way we’ve gotten the chance to “fix” that, if it’s even possible, with our grandchild.
Warmly,
S-Mama and S-Grandma
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