How do you go on with such a piece without beginning with a proper yet formal ‘what the fuck’ introduction. Let’s not sugarcoat it, the struggle is real for each one of us, but particularly for those who need to fight to make things happen. Since March 2020, our lives have been on pause. Not only are we battling with the time to deliver a safe and efficient remedy to the pandemic, but also to follow the path we aspired to take for so long. Now more than ever, the clock has become women’s worst enemy.

If we all have been compelled to give up on two years of our lives, we are surely not equal when it comes to sacrifices. For young adults in their twenties like me, this was supposed to be our moment, the one where the race for our career should have begun. This was our chance to prove that we were worth getting hired as much as our male counterparts, while fighting against the odds. For women and especially those of color, every step, every opportunity to make a difference matters. This idea had been highlighted by McKinsey & Company and LeanIn.Org 6th edition of the American ‘Women in the workplace’ survey in 2020 where it became pretty obvious that all the efforts that were made over the past few years could not and should not be taken for granted.

For every 100 men promoted to a manager title in the States, only 85 women were promoted. For minorities, this gap was even more significant as they are traditionally less represented at the highest positions. Only 58 Black women and 71 Latinas made it to the next level of their career. Once again, “women were outnumbered in entry-level management at the beginning of 2020 — they held just 38% of manager-level positions, while men held 62%” as observed below in this representation of corporate pipeline for gender and race graphic offered by McKinsey & Company and LeanIn.Org.

Reinforcing a Long-lasting Gender Gap in the Workplace

This, this was a pre-apocalyptic picture. A pandemic year in and lots of damage has been observed: unemployment at its peak, uncertainty in our tomorrow, the rise of anxiety in-n-out of work and a normalization of humans’ isolation. For the designated weaker sex, the negative impact of Covid-19 knows no limit. Out of 20.5 million workers laid off in April 2020 in America, 55% of them were women. They have been more impacted than their male peers mostly because the industries that hire them the most (tertiary sector of the economy) were those who were the most affected by the crisis according to The Bureau of Labor Statistics. The thing is, there is so much more to understand than these numbers and figures. When one of us loses her job, we are not only losing financial security, but also our ability to be independent and taken seriously. Our one and only chance to step-out from the pre-defined role that Mother Nature has given us is being annihilated — and just like that, our definition of worth is being questioned in its entity.

Keep your expectations low and your dreams even lower

All around the world, employees are forced to redefine their work expectations and settle down for something they never thought they will deal with: a toxic work balance with little boundaries, accomplishments and challenges, no benefits and perspective of evolution. If it is a generic statement that could be applied to all of us, male or female, it is particularly true for women who still have difficulties to adapt themselves to the hostility of most workplaces. It is a man’s world, especially when times are tough. But if you dare to complain about your situation, you could easily pass for an ungrateful individual blindsided by his own privileges. Obviously, there’s worse than being employed and having a certain financial security when many are struggling. Yes, you should feel guilty for wanting more and dreaming of being treated equally when humanity is falling apart. There are some bigger priorities at the moment. If you are doubting it, let me set the record straight for you, ambition isn’t a fuel anymore but more of a hallucinogen for those who can’t face the reality of the world. That’s what COVID-19 has done to us. No dreamers left, only survivors who need to pick their fights. Sometimes, we forget how heavy it can become when there’s more than just yourself to mind. The list of sacrifices and challenges can go on particularly if the education of your loved ones depends on it.

Working-Mom, Girl Bossing in the dark

With schools closing and countries locking themselves up, the education of the future generations has been relying on parents who became out of nowhere fortuitous teachers. Depending on the household, the number of kids and their age, some of them started to double shift, mixing their schedules and going from a work duty to a parental one without taking a break. This is a lot of pressure and this has caused anxiety to many individuals who have the feeling that they are constantly failing at what they are doing due to a lack of time. As they can’t focus on one particular task, they are never reaching their fullest potential. No surprise here, numerous women are suffering from it and their offspring’s needs. On top of being devoured by guilt, they are also losing their ability to self-identify and exceed individually. For those who were once known for having it all, things got a bit messy.

These days, being a working-mom is often assimilated to a feeling of frustration and the inability of setting boundaries. As highlighted by McKinsey & Company and LeanIn.Org’s American ‘Women in the workplace’ survey, “Mothers are more than three times as likely as fathers to be responsible for most of the housework and caregiving.”

When lacking support, these working-moms might have to reduce their double-title to one, prioritizing their personal life over their professional one.

Give me your expiration date, I will tell you mine

As part of the top sacrifices made by these dedicated mothers, downshifting or resigning appear to be the next career moves. Many of them decided to do what could jeopardize their entire future for the sake of their family. If encouraged by the pandemic, motherhood is once again pushing women out of the workforce. Not valuable and wealthy enough to change the rules. In a traditional two-income picture dominated by testosterone, men are expected to make more money than their partner and not only for their own ego, but to get validation from the rest of the society. So whenever the “one of us has to quit” conversation is being raised in a heterosexual couple, most of the time women are naturally being evinced.

None of us could mentally afford to be mum-shamed and castrate their other half just by having the audacity to think we could be viable.

“The place of a woman is at home” says patriarchy, but your boss might too. When surveyed by McKinsey & Company and LeanIn.Org, these new stay-at-home mothers are often holding their employers accountable for scaling back by not creating an appropriate environment for them. “The following factors are predictive of whether an employee considers downshifting or leaving: lack of flexibility at work, feeling like they need to be available at all hours, worry that their performance is being negatively judged because of caregiving responsibilities during the pandemic — and last but not least — feeling discomfort in sharing the challenges they are facing with teammates or managers”.

The factors listed above could also be explained by the lack of strong female role-models in the workplace who are known for having it all. As a result, we do feel even more isolated and less driven. But for those who still dare to hustle from their living room, their leadership has started within themselves the day they understood they had to become their own mentor. Covid-19 or not, women will always be their own greatest ally.

The struggle of being a young female professional during the pandemic was originally published in The Startup on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Two years ago, I moved to the US full of hopes. I had my version of the American dream, like any migrants making it to the promised land. Mine was pretty basic: a fresh new start overseas where everything could be possible. For many non-Americans, this immigrant ideal has been weakened by Donald Trump’s election. The 45th President of the United States never hidden his disdain for foreigners, including Europeans. However, the most destructive parts of Trump’s mandate — including the Muslim Ban and the now questioned future of the DACA program — have been directed at people who don’t look like me. Why did I get to feel so different than other immigrants?

As a French citizen in the Bay Area, I never really saw myself as a migrant. I always felt that I belonged exactly where I was, in the heart of Silicon Valley. My whiteness helped me to fit in with the crowd, and nobody — from law enforcement to coworkers — ever questioned my presence in the US. I have been incredibly welcomed and even envied for where I came from. Many Americans liked me for my Frenchness, as if it was something empowering and “trendy.” I once dated a guy who always introduced me as “The French Girl.”

But somehow, I always felt ashamed of my accent — it immediately revealed something very intimate to me: my real identity — even though it was apparently appealing and charming to my peers. My differences became my most significant assets, and that’s what being a golden immigrant does to you. People are not valuing you for who you are, but for what your citizenship inspires. In my case, a romantic country, a poetic language and the Parisian cliché, et voilà!

However, I certainly wasn’t one of a kind in the foggy city. Like me, more than 60,000 French citizens chose the Bay Area as their new home according to the French Consulate, but that’s just a drop in the ocean though compared to the 44.4 million foreign-born people in the country. Others include Mexicans (11.2 million), Chinese (2.9 million), Indians (2.6 million), and so many more. We all have something in common: we weren’t born in the United States of America.

My experience as a white immigrant isn’t replicated by others, particularly if they were visible minorities. I reached out to some other immigrants to get their takes on moving to America.

Daphne (21 years old) arrived in the US when she was two, leaving behind her her home country, Singapore. Even though she grew up as an American, she always felt labeled and stigmatized by her roots. Sadly, she couldn’t help herself but wondered if all the Asian-fetish jokes she heard were reflecting the reality. “Growing up, I wondered a couple of times if people liked me for me or because I was a foreigner. This fear followed me for years and impacted my personal life, affecting my relationships.”

With time, I realized that we all have a very unique experience when it comes to settling in America. Each one of us has been treated differently, following a kind of silent rule established to evaluate our worth on the American market. If you’re “fortunate” enough, you will be considered a golden immigrant, a term I came up with when I tried to explain my own acculturation process. As a foreigner, you want to be a part of the best of this country, but to get there so much depends on the way you were born.

Most of those who enjoy the benefits of being in this category are coming from western, highly-developed mostly-white countries: England, Australia, Italy or Germany. There can be down sides to this treatment too. The goodwill people have demonstrated to me blinded me from the immigration crisis and my immigration issues. They put me in a very comfortable bubble that made me forget that things were easier for me due to where I was born. I was still struggling to get a new visa, and whenever I shared my worries with my relatives, they never really understood and never took it seriously. “Joanna, you’re French. You want to stay, just get married. Everybody will be lucky to marry you. It’s not like you’re coming from Sudan.”

Ariana A. (29 years old), a former DACA participant and Harvard student, told me how it feels to not be one of the “good immigrants.” She arrived in the US when she was four. Her parents left Mexico to offer her a brighter future. She spent most of her life being undocumented and scared of what could happen. While immensely proud of her family heritage, it often put her in a dangerous situation. “I am never going to be able to be a “golden immigrant”, not that I want to be. I have European friends who may fall under that category and are perceived as good immigrants because they are not “brown” and “dirty.”

After spending more than 25 years in the US, she learned to ignore what should define her. “I feel American because I have lived the majority of my life in the US. It has nothing to do with how people make me feel but rather how I’ve learned to carry myself. I have learned to code-switch depending on the setting that I am in, and the people who surround me. People can have opinions about who I am and what I represent, but only I know my truth and what that means.”

Eventually, being American is a social-construct, a title that includes undocumented and documented immigrants from all over the world — something that this nation that so many dream of moving to, was built on.

“Ghosting” and “having the talk” are very much American concepts

On the last date I had in Paris, we spent the day strolling along the Seine on a sunny summer day. The man I was seeing, a 26-year-old business student, was a typical caricature of a French man: elegant and a bit shy, but constantly smiling. We began the morning with a visit to the Louvre before stopping for ice cream and continuing to wander the city for hours, talking without interruption.

Cliché, yes, but that’s how it goes a lot of the time in my home country — the country of passion and romance, where “La Vie en Rose” basically replaced the national anthem a few decades ago, and where pursuing love still means something to most people. Don’t get me wrong—it’s not that hooking up isn’t a thing in France, but in general, once we find ourselves seeing someone multiple times, we’re both giving it our best shot to be in a relationship with commitments and sacrifices from the beginning.

It’s within this quite conservative yet forever romantic vision of love that I moved to the US in 2017 at the age of 23, leaving behind my Camembert diet and safe place to pursue my own version of the American dream. Once settled in my single room in Silicon Valley, I decided that I was ready to meet some American men. To my own surprise, I downloaded Tinder, after getting the sense that this was how it’s done around here.

In France, if you do try out a dating website or app, it’s not something you brag about to friends or share with your relatives.

Meeting people in France generally goes by the old-school method: dating friends of your friends, my dear! Most of the guys I’ve dated have already been part of my circle somehow — former classmates, roommates of a coworker, soccer teammates of a cousin, etc. That being said, if you’re in a big city, people aren’t afraid to stop somebody on the street or in a bar to get a number.

And yes, for those not comfortable enough to make the first move in public, dating apps are an option, but definitely not our favorite. In France, if you do try out a dating website or app, it’s not something you brag about to friends or share with your relatives. It’s definitely not the accepted norm in the way that it is here — just one of the many differences I’ve noticed between French and American people’s dating lives.

Almost instantly after hitting Create, I was thrown into the Bay Area dating jungle. Dickxhibitionists and lame pickup lines were coming at me fast. “You’re a hot baguette,” one dude said.

So creating a profile on Tinder was a first for me. I quickly decided that I wouldn’t include pictures of myself pointing at the Eiffel Tower, no marinière and beret, only a faithful caption in my bio that said a lot about me—“Best French-accent imitator.” Not too revealing, and mysterious enough to hide any evidence of being French, which I had a feeling would be bait for some guys trying to tick a box. And believe it or not, I’m more than my nationality.

Almost instantly after hitting Create, I was thrown into the Bay Area dating jungle. Dickxhibitionists and lame pickup lines were coming at me fast. “You’re a hot baguette,” one dude said. “Can I be your marmalade?” another messaged. “You’re hot enough to melt fire and burn Satan,” some man wrote, leaving me genuinely confused. These interactions were completely new to me. I’ve been exposed to the same type of gross comments in person in France when taking the subway or walking on the street, but they never popped up on my phone during the middle of day.

Once my identity as a French woman revealed itself in conversation, I experienced the most stereotypical exchanges of my life. “Yes, we love crêpes.” “No, we don’t eat bread every morning.” “Nope, you won’t die if you eat some snails.” No matter whom I was matching with, the conversation became pretty identical, and I had to field questions like I was a second-grade teacher. It was like having the same nightmare over and over again, and turns out, it was just the petits fours.

Then, “cultured” men started to appear, eager to share all their knowledge about France with me. “I know a few words of French: ‘bonjour,’ ‘madame,’ ‘oui.’” Congratulations, you have Google. Another enlightened me on his intentions in my own language: “Oh…I never thought that I would use this, but ‘Voulez-vous coucher avec moi?’”—which is actually the sentence I’ve heard the most since I moved to the US. It’s amazing how the moment a man finds out I’m French, he becomes so eager to relay what he learned from that fateful 2001 song. Somehow, 18 years later, it’s still not a turn-on.

For a (long) minute, I regretted downloading Tinder. This unashamed sexual pressure was completely new and weird. In France, sex and intimacy aren’t so easily insinuated or discussed so early on.

After swiping left and right for about two months, I had my first date with Andre, a 27-year-old engineer who “has 22 country stamps on his passport.” I thought that my English would be the toughest part of the rendezvous, but I was wrong — that fell to agreeing on the spot at which to meet. He suggested we go to his place. I was unclear if this was normal for a first date in America, but in my gut, I knew it was purely an invitation to have sex. To avoid an awkward situation, I simply told him that I wasn’t feeling it. In response, I got the reassuring “No worries—I’m not a rapist” and a sarcastic “You’re such a nun.”

For a (long) minute, I regretted downloading Tinder. This unashamed sexual pressure was completely new and weird. In France, sex and intimacy aren’t so easily insinuated or discussed so early on—and a woman holds a lot of the power in deciding if she’s interested in the man pursuing her. In general, once you kiss someone, that generally is the first true sign you’re actually interested in them and marks the start of an exclusive relationship.

For whatever reason, I went forward with the date with Andre. We decided to meet at a bar in Mountain View. Once I got there, I started to feel really nervous, and when I’m nervous, my accent becomes even stronger. I had to repeat what I was saying a couple of times, every time I spoke. If it was torture for me, but my date seemed to enjoy it. “Mmmmh, this accent…,” he said in a voice that can only be described as pervy.

While we were talking, we ran into a few misunderstandings. As I went to order a beer, he stopped me and said, “Wait, shorty.” To me, this sounded like the worst insult. I looked at him and yelled, “I’m not that short. I’m 5'6”. That’s taller than most of the women in France.” Imagine my surprise when I found out that it meant “baby” and not “You’re a dwarf.”

Obviously, the date wasn’t a huge success. Thank you—next.

I’ve never felt as much emotionally insecure as I have since I moved here.

After trying on a couple of shoes, as we say, a couple of men fit better, but things didn’t necessarily become less challenging. I couldn’t help myself from overthinking and panicking a bit after a few months of dating someone here—something I never did in France. At home, I always knew where I stood with someone. Here I’m afraid of discovering that after six months of seeing someone, we aren’t actually dating but just messing around.

This is a reputation American men hold overseas that turns out to often be true—that they ghost, date many women at the same time and have commitment issues. I experienced it first hand with someone who kept telling me every day how much he loved me and cherished me until I found out on somebody’s else Twitter that he was a cheater.

I’ve never felt as much emotionally insecure as I have since I moved here. In France, you don’t ask someone to be your girlfriend or boyfriend unless you’re in kindergarten. We generally don’t have “the conversation” to make things official — instead, we’ll talk casually about our expectations during the flirt game so we always know what we’re signing up for to in order avoid a surprise later on.

During the two years I’ve been here, I’m learning to adjust to the dating norms and expectations in America. And I still believe that I can find the right person in this chaos — the same hope I’m sure American women try to maintain. But a piece of advice for American men: be honest with what you want, and stop wasting our time.

A French Woman’s Impressions of Dating in SF was originally published in The Bold Italic on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.