Law school is big and scary. Grad school is big and scary. Like another commenter, I'm in grad school, slogging through a PhD, and sometimes I desperately want to quit. But in those moments of desperately wanting to quit, I think about how much I love the subject matter, the opportunities and life experiences that grad school has already given me, and even if I don't get a great job as a professor (my field is very competitive and the jobs are few), I can still write and travel, because those letters after my name will continue to open up doors.

Lawyers as a group are NOT all unhappy people, as some commenters have said. I know plenty of lawyers - friends and family - who live sane, happy lives complete with family and vacation. A couple of them are fabulously wealthy, a couple of them are struggling financially, and the rest are comfortable but not rich. The ones who are happiest are following their passions - they get to defend people they believe are being taken advantage of in some way, or to prosecute people who are doing terrible things in the world, from fraud to full-scale genocide.

The ones who are unhappy are in it for the money, not because they have any interest in law or helping people.

If having a law degree will help you do something meaningful in the world (meaning, meaningful to you, not necessarily to anyone else), then by all means, go for it. Examine if your fear is really just reactionary - a fear of failure, a fear of becoming something you hate, etc. - because with self-awareness you can keep those fears from coming true. They're just there as road blocks to make sure you really want to do this.

If not, if law really just puts a sour taste in your mouth, if you hate the idea of practicing law, then do something else.

There's new federal loan repayment options this month that make it much easier to pay things back, and it's income-contingent. Look into it and decide if this is what you'd rather do.

But what you absolutely should NOT do is quit lawschool because you're afraid of it. Because that is how you wake up when you're 40 and regret never exploring that dream, that potential.

As they say, nothing to fear, but fear itself.

...I say all of the above being a person who decided not to go to law school, despite the objection of my family. For all the right reasons! I'm getting a PhD in something totally unrelated to law, instead. :)

I also love being married. My husband is awesomely awesome. He's my best friend. We are total nerds together. We laugh at things that nobody else finds funny (usually each other's jokes). We haven't had kids (don't know if we will), but if we do I know that he'll be a good and active, engaged father who shares the caregiving load.

What I think is important about this piece (and what I think Mr. Traister may catch flak for) is the admission that marriage isn't a fairy tale where we stop having desires and whatnot. Sure, marriage is work, but if you love the person you're with, and are loved, it's the best work there is. Because if you're lucky, if you've chosen your partner well, you continuously learn about yourself and have the benefit of sharing that with your best friend, who when you've had a bad week, will sit up at 1 a.m. with you, on the couch, in underwear, eating ice cream and watching an old Humphrey Bogart flick, and laughing at each other's really and truly awful Bogart impressions.

Or maybe that's just us.

Nevermind that it has been proven again and again in recent years that skinny != healthy and fat != unhealthy. There are plenty of healthy fat people. Just like there are plenty of skinny people who are unhealthy.

And nevermind the whole thing about the BMI being a ridiculous measure of health. It was never meant to measure an individual's health, and the inventor of the BMI himself said that it would be inaccurate if applied to an individual

Our culture isn't obsessed with health, it's obsessed with image, and a fat woman just doesn't fit into the perfect image, so she's shamed. Then health is used as an excuse. And the thing is, it's worse for you to feel fat (that is, to have a poor body image) than it is to be fat (that is, to be healthy and overweight), as a Columbia University study showed last year. The bad health effects of obesity are more likely due to the shaming effect and poor self-image, than the actual fatness itself. I know a few fat people who have participated in (and finished with a good time) triathalons and other sporting events. You can't do that if you're not fit. They just happened to also be fat.

Sigh.