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Incoming BL first-year in lit. I've heard a lot about how crazy the hours are and how you really need to be on call all the time, but's pretty important to me that I be able to go to therapy for an hour most weeks. Is there a particular time that tends to work well for appointments? Any particular way to handle it with partners etc. so they leave you alone?

Also, lol, I get that this is sort of an insane question in the grand scheme of things and that BL is possibly evil. But here we are.

I would schedule it for the middle of the afternoon on weekdays. I know it sounds paradoxical, but weirdly this time worked out the best. There was just a block of red on my calendar and people assumed I was unavailable because of some other case or matter I was on. I originally tried scheduling it in the weekday evenings but weirdly that was worse because there was always some work thing going on and people on the case in question *knew* I was supposed to still be in the office working on *that case*. When I said I couldn't be available for something, people would ask why, and I would have to make the choice to either lie or disclose that I was going to therapy, which I was reluctant to do -- not because I'm ashamed or whatever but more because it felt self-indulgent and like I wasn't sufficiently committed to the case. But if you're busy or non-responsive in the middle of the day, people will frequently just assume you're in a meeting for another case or matter or something like that.

6:30 pm on Tuesdays, have never had any issue at either of the firms I've been at.

Whenever I want to. I don’t let this job interfere with my health. It’s not that serious.

Generally, though, I try to schedule appointments in the morning so that I can avoid overlap with other calls that are scheduled.

just hold firm on it and lie if you have to. unless it's an easy to see coming all hands on deck fire drill like a signing/closing or trial, I don't think it will be an issue to have a blocked off time. people will just assume you have a call.

I only go once every four weeks, but when I do it is Friday morning from 8:30 am to 9:30 am and no one ever schedules things then. At first it was 9:00-10:00 but some people started scheduling meetings starting at 10, so I convinced my therapist to take me 30 minutes earlier on Friday and he was ok with it.

Friday morning at 8 AM, remotely.

Anonymous User wrote: ↑

Fri Jun 24, 2022 8:30 am

Friday morning at 8 AM, remotely.

Is your therapist in the same time zone? If so, how did you convince them to do that early?

Anonymous User wrote: ↑

Fri Jun 24, 2022 8:51 am

Anonymous User wrote: ↑

Fri Jun 24, 2022 8:30 am

Friday morning at 8 AM, remotely.

Is your therapist in the same time zone? If so, how did you convince them to do that early?

8 am is the start of the workday for a lot of people.

Genuinely curious - do people often get pushback when there is something blocked off on your calendar? At my V25, I've never had a colleague ask "what for?" when I say I have a scheduling conflict. I just calendar all of my personal appointments, and everybody assumes it's work related and leaves it at that. Sometimes they ask if it's moveable, but I can just say yes if I want to move my appointment or no if I don't. Simple. Re: urgent email traffic, if it's on my calendar I show up as red, so everybody assumes I'm in a meeting.

Is my experience unique? I'm in lit and often have long AF calls with experts, colleagues, clients, etc. (not to mention depos/hearings) that require my full attention, so maybe expectations are different there?

Anonymous User wrote: ↑

Fri Jun 24, 2022 9:14 am

Genuinely curious - do people often get pushback when there is something blocked off on your calendar? At my V25, I've never had a colleague ask "what for?" when I say I have a scheduling conflict. I just calendar all of my personal appointments, and everybody assumes it's work related and leaves it at that. Sometimes they ask if it's moveable, but I can just say yes if I want to move my appointment or no if I don't. Simple. Re: urgent email traffic, if it's on my calendar I show up as red, so everybody assumes I'm in a meeting.

Is my experience unique? I'm in lit and often have long AF calls with experts, colleagues, clients, etc. (not to mention depos/hearings) that require my full attention, so maybe expectations are different there?

I do the same, and it works just fine. One firm I worked at though showed you the name of others' appointments... That was not pleasant.

Anonymous User wrote: ↑

Fri Jun 24, 2022 8:51 am

Anonymous User wrote: ↑

Fri Jun 24, 2022 8:30 am

Friday morning at 8 AM, remotely.

Is your therapist in the same time zone? If so, how did you convince them to do that early?

She was just willing to do it, knowing it was the most convenient time given my job. It’s not that early.

Sackboy wrote: ↑

Fri Jun 24, 2022 10:45 am

Anonymous User wrote: ↑

Fri Jun 24, 2022 9:14 am

Genuinely curious - do people often get pushback when there is something blocked off on your calendar? At my V25, I've never had a colleague ask "what for?" when I say I have a scheduling conflict. I just calendar all of my personal appointments, and everybody assumes it's work related and leaves it at that. Sometimes they ask if it's moveable, but I can just say yes if I want to move my appointment or no if I don't. Simple. Re: urgent email traffic, if it's on my calendar I show up as red, so everybody assumes I'm in a meeting.

Is my experience unique? I'm in lit and often have long AF calls with experts, colleagues, clients, etc. (not to mention depos/hearings) that require my full attention, so maybe expectations are different there?

I do the same, and it works just fine. One firm I worked at though showed you the name of others' appointments... That was not pleasant.

I use fake project names for my personal appointments so that if anyone checks, no one knows what I'm doing. So, for example, if I'm seeing a doctor, perhaps my code name is Project Grey. I'm sure this is overkill (especially since I'm pretty sure only my assistant can see my calendar) but it's also fun to come up with fake code names and you have to find small joys somewhere in order to do this job long term.