How to be a perio mum

I recall that I really wanted to attend the EFP Perio Workshop 2019 at La Granja de San Ildefonso in Spain, when my second child was only two months old. So, my husband came with me and was with the two kids while I was attending the workshop, and every three hours I had to come out of the workshop to breastfeed Elliot. I was really happy to be able to combine my professional commitments with those of being a mum.

Is there a perfect balance between the two roles? I don’t think there is a single definition of the perfect balance. So, the perfect balance is the one you feel comfortable with, and this can be different for different mums.

I had to become a little bit stricter with myself and with my schedules, as I need to be home not too late to be able spend a few hours with my children before they go to bed. That was one change, and another was the weekend. I decided to close the door of work at the weekend and really dedicate these two days to my family and to my kids. Of course, there are sometimes exceptions when it is impossible to do this. But when I am invited to lecture abroad, I ask to be able to do it during the week and if it’s on a Friday I want to be back home by Friday evening. I think it is right to ask for this.

Support at home and at work

The key aspect to be successful in being a mum and a professional is to be properly supported both at work and at home. My husband plays his role — he’s a modern dad. But I also have my parents around and we have an au pair.

Since the beginning, since our first child was born, we decided to have an au pair at home. Every year we have a new one, because this is the law in Belgium. This is also a wonderful cultural exchange and it’s like having a big sister for my kids.

And at work, you need to have support from your team. I am lucky to have wonderful collaborators I can trust and rely on. And for me, it is quite important to delegate and to share the responsibilities within the team. I think this is also quite rewarding for them to get some responsibilities.

And I think the experience of being a mum makes it easier for me to understand the needs of the other women in my team. Although I think being a dad is also a big responsibility. In general, the experience has made me understand the needs of all the parents in my team – we can understand something better once we have lived it.

In today’s world, it is quite usual for both partners to have jobs and to be professionally involved, so if we want to be parents, we have to share our parental responsibilities. That’s how it is with my marriage. My husband works in international environmental politics, for institutions like the United Nations and the European Commission. He is very much involved in his work, but he’s also very involved in the way we raise and take care of our kids. And I would say that we really have shared responsibilities and that without him, I definitely could not be as involved as I am in my work.