I met my future wife at law school. She was divorced and had a four-year-old child for whom she had primary custody. We lived and studied together for the bar exam.
We both had jobs at law firms that required us to work full time from June 1 until two weeks before the exam. We both took the prep course at night. She had a cooperative neighbor with a four-year-old who watched both children during the day, and we rotated on attending bar prep—this was prior to online or video courses.
Somehow, we survived, passed the bar, and got married (after scores came out) in November. Her child survived and has no memory of this period.
Three years later, we moved to another state and prepared to take another bar exam. Now we had a seven-year-old and a one-year-old. Bar prep was still live and in person. Our firms again required full-time work up to mid-July.
We convinced my wife’s niece, a college freshman, to join us for June and July to watch the children. It was a hot June, and the air conditioning failed soon after we moved in. The older boy mistakenly ran through a glass door and went to the ER, and the younger one stepped on a black widow spider.
How did we manage? It was largely a function of discipline.
Congratulations to you if you were highly disciplined in law school, made law review, graduated with honors, and landed a prestigious job. However, if you were in the group that drank a little too much on the weekends, skipped the boring classes, and attended concerts and ball games, the rest of this article is for your close reading.
How did we successfully prep for the bar with two small children? We worked together to cover the household chores. It’s important to set out who does what and stick to it. We scheduled time with our children for the hour after dinner before racing off to the bar prep. That could be pool activities, bike riding, playing catch, or, when it rained, board games.
The activities weren’t ones the children only tolerated and didn’t really enjoy, like piano lessons, voice lessons, acting auditions, and other adult-mandated “fun” adventures. If you try this technique, make it a quality hour, and you’ll get as much enjoyment out of it as your children.
We also kept up our own exercise regimes, usually early in the morning, very early. My wife was an occasional smoker, and that was a stress reliever for her. I’d quit smoking after I left the US Army and before starting law school, but I convinced myself it would be OK to take up the habit again for the bar prep.
Mistake.
Seek stress relief in exercise, certainly not in nicotine and probably not in alcohol or drugs. My suggestion is that, for the bar prep, you give up any vices that require time or mental energy.
You and your partner or spouse should limit your need for excessive emotional support. It’s OK to become strangers to your friends and family, to forget Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and all your streaming services. Your family and friends will forgive you.
Don’t plan any outings or activities that take time away from study.
Bottom Line: If you can’t forego fun and social interaction for the six to eight weeks leading up to the exam, you may find practicing law unpleasant. If you’re looking for work-life balance during the bar prep period, you won’t find it.
Be stoic, and push away outside distractions and influences. You have one job; do it right. Be disciplined.
We passed that second bar exam, and our children proved resilient and seemingly unfazed by our prolonged disregard for their need for parental attention. Both children are happy, employed, and educated adults who have yet to mention any break in parental supervision.
Oh, yeah, neither became lawyers.
