I have a similar story. When I was very young, my mother was the primary breadwinner of the household, and put both herself and my father through law school. Growing up, it was always just kind of assumed that my sister would have to get a real job making actual money, same as my brother and I; a degree in underwater basket weaving would have required some serious justification. (She ended up going to dental school and also getting a PhD working with epigenomic data.)
I didn’t realize on a gut level that this wasn’t the norm until shortly after high school. I was hanging out with two female friends and one of them said “man, I really need more money”. I replied “sounds like you need to get a job”. The friend laughed and said “oh, I was thinking I need to get a boyfriend”, and then the other friend also laughed and said she was also thinking the boyfriend thing.
I have a similar story. When I was very young, my mother was the primary breadwinner of the household, and put both herself and my father through law school. Growing up, it was always just kind of assumed that my sister would have to get a real job making actual money, same as my brother and I; a degree in underwater basket weaving would have required some serious justification. (She ended up going to dental school and also getting a PhD working with epigenomic data.)
I didn’t realize on a gut level that this wasn’t the norm until shortly after high school. I was hanging out with two female friends and one of them said “man, I really need more money”. I replied “sounds like you need to get a job”. The friend laughed and said “oh, I was thinking I need to get a boyfriend”, and then the other friend also laughed and said she was also thinking the boyfriend thing.
… so that was quite a shock to my worldview.