It can be done. Here are the specific practices that made it possible.
I finished a Master’s of Science in Software Engineering at DePaul University with a 3.95 GPA. Later, I finished my PhD coursework in Organizational Psychology at Liberty University with a 3.97. Both while working full-time as a software engineer. Both while raising a family.
This isn’t a story about talent or grinding through on willpower. It’s about a system. Ten specific practices that made it possible to sustain a multi-year academic commitment without sacrificing my career or disappearing from my family’s life.
It was the spring of 2008. I was in the third year of a contract stint with a great team and in the 13th year of my professional career developing software. Great people, interesting work, new technologies. And this overwhelming feeling: I was in a rut.
My wife and two young daughters had already gone overseas to spend the summer in Europe. I was going to join them in a few weeks. All I could think about was how my work had become mechanical.
I called a trusted colleague to ask if he’d ever been through a low point. He turned me on to a friend of his who was becoming a career coach. So I had a conversation with her that didn’t go as either of us had imagined. I thought she was going to give me advice that would help me reboot my career. She thought she would be getting a new client. Instead, after our conversation, I began searching for graduate programs.
I attended an open house at a local school and saw that they offered an evening program that would fit well with my job. I could earn a Master’s in Software Engineering while working as a software engineer. And graduate in as little as two years. I did some basic budgeting math, then talked with my wife. And together we decided that this was something to pursue.
Here’s exactly how we did it.
Twice.
1. I knew why I was doing this.
A rut is a signal. It means you’ve outgrown where you are, and you haven’t yet found where you’re going.
Graduate school wasn’t a career move. At least not initially. It was a way to turn the learning back on. It gave me new material every week that I could connect to the work I was already doing. That tight loop of learning something new and immediately applying it had gone quiet, and I needed that back.
If you’re going to sustain a multi-year commitment on top of a full-time job and a family, you need a reason that runs deeper than “it’ll look good on my resume.” When the semester gets hard, and it will, shallow reasons won’t hold.
My most difficult times were during the warm parts of the year. My wife would be outside playing with our children, while I was inside watching lectures and completing assignments. Knowing that I was learning for a better future kept me going. It also gave me the focus I needed to finish the tasks for that day, so that I could spend some time with my family.
2. I brought my wife into the commitment.
This was not a solo decision. It couldn’t be.
Graduate school while working full-time doesn’t just cost you time. It costs your family time. Evenings spent studying instead of being present. Weekends with a textbook instead of at the park. Going it alone means your spouse will pick up a lot they didn’t sign up for.
My wife and I sat down, and we both laid it out honestly. Here’s what this will take. Here’s the weekly time commitment, and the little left over for family time. Here’s how long it will last. And here’s why we both think it’s worth it.
She didn’t just agree. She committed. When your partner is committed, they’re not tolerating your absence, they’re actively holding the line with you. That distinction matters.
Towards the end of my master’s program, my wife got pregnant. The first few months were full days of “morning” sickness. One night, when I had an exam scheduled, my wife was getting so dehydrated that she could not stop dry heaving. I called her and suggested that I skip the exam and come home to take care of her. She insisted she would be fine and that I should go take the exam. So I called my sister-in-law to drive my wife to the ER, and I caught up with them after I finished.
That was her commitment in action. She wasn’t just tolerating the plan. She was protecting it, even when she was the one who needed help.
My wife’s commitment really shined over those two years. She took the full load of spending time with our kids and managing the household. She cheered me on along the way. Together, we counted down the months until we could spend more time as a family.
3. I did a time audit.
Money was one constraint. Time was the harder one.
I tracked how I spent my hours for a full week. Not a rough sense of it, but a detailed list of what I was doing. Work. Commute. Family time. Meals. TV. Sleep. All of it.
What I found was what most people find. There was more recoverable time than I expected. Not huge blocks. But small pockets I’d been filling with things that weren’t moving me forward.
I cut TV completely. That one stuck, and I haven’t gone back to watching TV since. I limited how much news I was reading. And I eliminated side projects. I wasn’t going to make up extra hours. Each day was still 24 hours long. But I could be more deliberate about how I used them.
The time audit didn’t give me more time. It gave me a clear understanding about where my time was already going and permission to redirect it.
Here’s how that worked out:
- Work and commute: 50 hours per week
- Class time: 12 hours per week
- Study time: 24 hours per week
When I factored in sleep, that left 2–3 hours per day of unaccounted time.
4. We audited our budget to buy back family time.
We looked at what we were spending, and where our money was going. We figured out where we could pull back. No new cars or home improvements during this period. Less eating out.
Then we made the move that most people skip. Instead of pocketing the savings, we used them to buy back time.
For those two years, we hired help. Lawn service for $40 per week. A maid to clean the house for $80 per week. For $120 per week, we got 6 hours of collective time back. This was well worth it.
The goal was simple: my family should feel my presence, not my absence. Graduate school was going to take evenings and large chunks of our weekends. So I had to protect the time that remained and make it count. I couldn’t be everywhere. But I could make sure that when I was with my family, I was actually with them. Counting chores as “family time” would have been a lie.
5. I built a flexible schedule.
Rigid schedules break. Life with a family and a full-time job doesn’t follow a perfect calendar. Kids get sick. Work emergencies happen. You get sick yourself.
I built a weekly rhythm instead of a daily routine. I knew how many hours I needed for coursework each week. I had preferred blocks: early mornings, late evenings after the kids were in bed, and big chunks of the weekend. But I kept them flexible.
The key was having a target number of weekly hours, not a rigid daily schedule. Flexibility didn’t mean I had no plan. It meant I had a plan that could absorb the surprises of real life without falling apart.
If Tuesday night blew up because of a work deadline, I shifted study time to Thursday. If a Saturday opened up because plans changed, I used it.
6. I was honest about what I could prioritize.
I could not give 100% to everything at the same time. I tried to tell myself I could. It didn’t work out.
My general order of priorities in life is: Family. Health. Work. Learning. But during those two years, the real order was: Work. School. Family. I ignored my personal health. I put on weight because I stopped exercising. I didn’t go to after-work events. My wife represented our family at kids’ birthday parties and extended family gatherings when I couldn’t be there.
That was the trade-off. I didn’t like it, but I was honest about it. Pretending I could do everything equally well would have just meant doing everything poorly.
And then there were the disruptions I didn’t plan for. I started my master’s program in 2008, and in 2009 my employer cut the team citing the recession. I started my PhD in 2023, and my employer downsized due to budget issues a week after I started classes. I was looking for new work during both programs.
Both times, my wife and I evaluated together. When I was looking for work a week into my PhD, we decided to finish the semester. I had already paid for it. We would reassess at the end of the semester. I found a new job before the semester was over.
The system held. But it held because I was honest about what had to give and what couldn’t.
What you choose to sacrifice will be different from what I chose. But you will choose something. Be honest about it up front. It should align with your primary values.
7. I ramped up into the program.
I didn’t start at full speed. That would have been a shock to both me and my family.
My first semester, I took one class. Just one. I wanted to feel the weight of it. How much reading. How much writing. How much of my evening it would take. How it would affect my energy at work the next day.
By the second semester, I knew the rhythm. I added a second class. By the third semester, I had a system. I knew exactly how to read a syllabus on day one and map out the entire semester’s workload before the first assignment was due.
Ramping up gradually let me build the habit without breaking the system. By the time I was at full load, it felt sustainable, not survivable.
8. I kept my timeline front and center.
Two years. That was the window. Not “someday.” Not “as long as it takes.” Two years.
I printed out the program timeline and kept it nearby so I’d see it every day. Every completed course was a visible step forward. Every semester was a countdown.
At the end of each semester, I would pull out the schedule, and put a checkmark and a line through the completed courses. Seeing the timeline made it real. Checking off each class made the progress visible.
When you’re grinding through a Tuesday night reading assignment after a full day of work, “two years” can feel infinite. But a timeline that shows you’re 40% done, then 60%, then 80% changes your psychology. You stop asking “is this worth it?” and start thinking “I’m almost there.”
I used the same approach for my PhD coursework. It worked both times. The timeline turned endurance into momentum.
9. I did the work every day.
There’s no shortcut section in this article. No life hack. No secret.
But there is a method. Keeping up each week was the key to having a good semester. The structure stayed the same: reading, engaging with my notes, and staying on schedule with the lectures. A little each day built towards the week. Each completed week built towards the semester.
I read the material. I did the assignments. I wrote the papers. I studied for the exams. I showed up to every class, even when I was running on four hours of sleep.
Some weeks were smooth. Some weeks, I was writing a paper at midnight after putting the kids to bed, knowing I had a 9am standup the next morning. The schedule bent but didn’t break because the systems I’d built in steps 1 through 8 were holding.
The GPA wasn’t the goal. The goal was to learn as much as I could from every class. The GPA was a side effect of engaging with the material daily instead of cramming before exams.
10. We celebrated each step.
Not just graduation. Every semester.
One evening we came home late after visiting my parents. I had an exam the day before, and grades were supposed to be posted that evening. I went to my office while my family was still settling in, saw my grade, and let out a big “Woohoo!!!”
As I came out from my home office, I saw my wife and kids standing still, not sure of what was going on. I explained that I got a better grade than I thought, and that I was happy with the test result. And then they joined into the celebration, too.
This matters more than you would think. A multi-year commitment without milestones feels like a death march. But when you stop every few months to look back and say “we did that” together, it recharges you for the next stretch.
I said “we” because it was never just me. My wife carried the weight of the household so I could carry my course load. The celebration belonged to both of us.
When I finally got my diploma, it wasn’t just a degree. It was proof that a deliberate, daily commitment to something bigger than yourself actually works. Not talent. Not luck.
A system. Ten practices. Applied consistently. Over months and years.
It can be done. I did it twice.