A reluctant lawyer at first, Ken Lee finally found the type of practice that meant something to him. But other needs around him were greater and he made a choice to change. Little did he know, an even bigger change was to be thrust on him. Find out how handling what comes at you is sometimes all there is to do.
Guest Ken Lee had not really thought he would be a lawyer; he went to law school as a means for kicking life’s decision-making down the road. After a summer job at the Attorney General’s office in Boston and a course of study that pointed him to litigation, he had a couple of views of paths he could take. He started in litigation at a number of firms but found, over time, that he didn’t find much joy in it. He figured that if a partner position came, he would continue the toil. The partner job did not materialize and, instead, he was let go. He took that as an opportunity to try out the public side and took a job back in the Attorney General’s office, where he felt much more connected to the work.
As he found his footing again professionally, his family of four got news that they would soon be five. Their surprise addition made Ken rethink how he wanted to be spending his time and what the optimal job-household divide was for their family. He made the decision to quit his job after the baby came so that his wife could spend more time pursuing her medical career.//The challenges of stay-at-home parenting loomed large but an even greater challenge loomed silently. A chance visit to the optometrist led to the discovery of a brain tumor.
In this episode, find out from Ken how handling what comes at you is sometimes all there is to do…on ROADS TAKEN...with Leslie Jennings Rowley.
About This Episode's Guest
Ken Lee is former Assistant Attorney General in the Massachusetts Attorney General's Office and worked previsouly at both Eckert Seamans Cherin & Mellott and Goodwin Procter LLP. He is now a stay-at-home dad in the the Boston area, where he lives with his wife and three children.
Executive Producer/Host: Leslie Jennings Rowley
Music: Brian Burrows
Find more episodes at https://roadstakenshow.com
Email the show at RoadsTakenShow@gmail.com
Ken Lee: I thought I was fine. You know, I even thought like I bounced back pretty quickly. I feel like I could go back to the office and work; I could appear in court. And I remember trying to read to my son like a junior version of Green Eggs and Ham, and I couldn't read it. The whole thing. It was just bizarre.
Leslie Jennings Rowley: A reluctant lawyer at first, Ken Lee finally found the type of practice that meant something to him. But other needs around him were greater and he made a choice to change. Little did he know, an even bigger change was to be thrust on him. Find out how handling what comes at you is sometimes all there is to do...on today's Roads Taken, with me, Leslie Jennings Rowley.
I'm here today with Ken Lee and we are going to talk about things we make happen and things that happen. So it's lovely to see you here. Thanks so much for being with us.
KL: Oh, Thank you, Leslie, it's a real honor.
LJR: Okay. So you've been listening you told me, so you know we start this the same way each episode with two questions and they are: When we were in college, who were you? And when we were getting ready to leave, who did you think you would become?
KL: So, while we were in college, I felt a little, I wouldn't say lost, but without direction. I think that really only changed towards the end of senior year, probably because, you know, we were going to graduate and, you know, I think I had to make some decisions about what I was going to do, you know, once we left Hanover.
So that added some clarity and in terms of who, where I am now or who I am now, I don't know if I'm all that different. I think there are certainly times where I feel like I could choose a little more direction, but it's been a winding road I've gone through, you know, professionally some interesting things that might seem a little dull, but were revelatory to me and I've gone through some kind of weird things in life from a family and health perspective, I guess.
LJR: Yeah. And we'll get to that. Yeah. And I don't think it's dull. I've told you that already. But when we were leaving, it's interesting to me that you said that you were lost, because I would look at you and your career and think, oh, he always knew he wanted to be a lawyer. That's not the case.
KL: Oh, no, no, no. I think like most freshmen, I thought I wanted to be a doctor and I think my mom certainly had wanted me to be a doctor. And then I took a chemistry class and a biology class freshman year. And it was very, very painfully clear to me that I was not suited to be a doctor. That kind of sent me on a, I wouldn't say a tailspin, but it definitely kind of made me rethink what I actually wanted to do and what classes I wanted to take. And I think I didn't really do…handle that all that. Well, I think I took a lot of classes that seemed like they would be interesting. They fit the right time period that I wanted. But ultimately, I don't know if I really felt connected to the material or the subject, but, you know, I just needed a class or classes.
LJR: Yeah. So you said that end of the senior year, you were like, oh, I have to have a plan. Really you had to have had a plan earlier if you were going to go straight to law school. So what was the idea? And when did law come into play in your mind.
KL: Probably senior fall or junior spring. And this is a cliche, but I went to law school simply to delay the process of having to decide what I want to do. I, you know, I didn't really know anyone who was a lawyer. I didn't have any grand vision, like, oh, I want to become a lawyer because I want to, you know, do X or Y or it's been like a life's passion of mine. No, no. I mean, I think I'd watched a lot of law shows like LA Law. So I think it seemed like, you know, just another step, another chance to sort of figure it out at some point.
LJR: Yeah. Which you did. And you've already mentioned that other people might think the things that you learned professionally were dull, but they were revelatory for you. So talk us through that and the various stages of your career, because you had a couple of different roles in the law.
KL: Yeah. So I went to law school right after graduation. You know, when classes started, I thought, you know, maybe I wanted to pursue family law. That seemed like it would be interesting, never dull. You're dealing with interesting clients. And it became pretty clear to me that I had…that wasn't for me, that I never, I've never represented any clients that had anything to do with family law. And I've never spent a minute doing anything sort of family-law related. But when you're, when you're in law school, you kind of go through the process where you learn through the basics and they kind of steer you towards litigation because you're talking about, you know, obviously conflicts within cases and whatnot. And so I think I sort of naturally moved in that direction. And then in my first summer, after my first year law school, I worked at the US Attorney's office in Boston, where I worked with this one assistant U.S. attorney who was also a Dartmouth grad and was just like a really impressive guy. He was, you know, very smart, very, you know, hardworking. And it…he was a bit of a role model that, you know, he worked in Boston so that some of that rubbed off on me. Then in the second year, I accepted a position at a big law firm in Boston. And then I worked almost exclusively in litigation, so it was sort of a natural fit. And it did seem that like I had sort of found what I was looking for, where the work was interesting. I felt that I was pretty good at it. It felt like the right fit for me.
LJR: And you practiced that for quite a while. And then there was maybe a back pivot, I don't know, with the U.S. Attorney's office, but talk to me about kind of public service or law in the public service.
KL: That was always in the back of my mind that I would want to do that. At my first firm. I'd worked with some people who had done that, and it really seemed rewarding both from a, I think, from a personal and professional perspective. So that was always in the back of my mind. But like most things, it kind of fell by the wayside a little bit. And then I had switched firms and so that got delayed a little bit, a little bit longer. And then I really, really started disliking my job.
LJR: Was that the revelatory part?
KL: Yeah. And it was like, it was a point where I thought I was up for partner. And so I thought, well, I, you know, I've walked down this road. It’d been such a long period of time that I thought that if partnership did become available, you know, it would make sense for me just to take it and continue and just sort of toil away in unpleasantness.
And then frankly, they let me go and it was a bit of a…it was a stunner. And then there was a period where I was like, was, you know, not in private practice anymore. And that kind of kicked me into gear. I was like, well, you know, I've always been thinking about working in the public sector that kind of thrust me forward. And then I did. I looked into the Massachusetts Attorney General's office. And that was a great place to work. And it was sort of…refueled me, I guess, because it had been rough at the end, working as a lawyer in private practice. And it was really, really rewarding to work on tough cases with good people for the right reasons.
LJR: Yeah. And then that theme actually carried into your next pivot, the being with good people for the right reasons.
KL: Yeah. So, I had been at the attorney general’s office for about four years. And in some ways it was just like working at a big law firm. It was a lot of hours. Not as much pay, but you know, I guess you got more out of the work. But my wife, who is a doctor, was really bearing the brunt of not only her work, but also for our kids. Because, you know, I worked in Boston, but we lived in the suburbs and my wife, her office was in closer to where we live. So it was on her to not only work, but also if the kids got sick at school, you know, she was closer. It took her less time to get home, you know, dinner and do all those sorts of things. But it was just the reality is I worked in Boston and we didn't live there. And we'd had two children who were, you know, nearing teenage years. And then, unexpectedly we found out that my wife was…that we were going to have another, and it was a, it was quite a surprise, quite a surprise.
LJR: You weren’t good in medical stuff early on.
KL: No, no. The funny thing is my wife, who's also a Dartmouth grad—she was a class of ’98—before I told her, like, I think two, two daughters is enough. You know, we're at the age now where, you know, I think that's it for our family and she kind of resisted it, kinda thought, well, maybe we'd have a third, but finally she had come around, said yeah, I think two is right. And then of course, very shortly after that we found we were having a third.
LJR: And what's the age gap between?
KL: So right now our oldest is 17. She's a senior in high school. Our youngest daughter is a sophomore in high school and our son is five and he's in kindergarten.
LJR: Oh my gosh.
KL: I know. So it was, it was a lot to deal with, but, I had promised my wife that once the baby was born, I would leave the office and I would stay at home when she went back to work. And I'd said that. I never wavered from that. I thought as it was getting closer and closer, my wife is getting a little nervous. She thought that I just wouldn't be able to pull the trigger, that something would happen, or I would get assigned a case or something would happen at work and at the last minute I would say, I just, I just can't. And so she was very nervous. And I hadn't told my boss yet that I was leaving. So she felt that was deliberate on my part, that I was, you know, half in half out.
And so, then no, no, no. So finally I cut the cord. I told my boss, you know, I'm leaving the office. It's, I'm not going to someplace else. I'm not going back to private practice. It's not because of anything work-related it's just because I'm going to make the decision to stay at home and watch our kids.
And they were, they were great about it. I think they were a little, maybe a little surprised, but because traditionally it's typically the woman who stays at home or leaves professional positions to stay at home. And I certainly had seen that before. But, you know, I think, I feel like I kind of owed it to my wife.
She was a much better doctor than I was a lawyer, so…and she certainly got more out of her work than I got out of mine. So it just made sense for us.
LJR: So at that point you had young teens, tweens, a baby. And I'm sure you'd been a hands-on dad the first time around, but it's different, like, when it's all on you.
KL: I was not, I would say, good at anything in the house. I was, you know, didn't really cook that much. Didn't really clean that much. I would not say I was like the best teacher of our children. So I, you know, it makes you really wonder, like, why did my wife even agree to this? Because it wasn't like I had some kind of apparent talent at any of these things.
It was tough in the beginning. So I think every morning or every, every dinner was basically stuff I cooked in college and I didn't cook, I did not cook much. It was like pasta, you know, with sauce out of the jar every day or who wants frozen pizza every day. And it was, that was not great.
LJR: Well, they thought it was great.
KL: Ah, yeah. But at some point you're like, ah, geez, dad, you gotta, you gotta get better at this. And so gradually I did. I would not pretend to say that I’m like Eric Ripert or anything like that. But I certainly have gotten better at like cooking. I enjoy it more. Iit's kind of creative, so that, that part is good. But it has been an adjustment to a completely different skill set. But rewarding certainly in its own way.
LJR: Yeah. Yeah. And so this was 2016 and you're chugging along and you're finding your way in this very new world. And then you alluded to health things. What happened?
KL: Yeah. So I’ll back up a bit. So my sister, who was also at Dartmouth, she was class of ’07. She had gone through a very, very bad disease called glioblastoma. And so for a period of time, you know, she lived in our house and, you know, my mom came from Michigan. So people were just kind of coming to our house while my sister was undergoing treatment and care, and ultimately she passed away.
She was diagnosed in June of 2009, and then she passed away January 4th, 2010. So it was a very short period. Her condition went very quick. So it, that was tough. But then you know, after I had left the office in 2016 was watching our son. You know, at some point I had to go to the eye doctor to get my prescription for my contacts because they had expired. I needed to get new ones. So I went to the eye doctor. I know, I don't know if you go to the eye doctor, but you have to do all these kind of weird tests where they, you know, flash things and you're supposed to press the button when you see a light. And the eye doctor told me, oh, you need to come back; I think something was wrong with the machine. You got to come back the next day. So I did that, did the exact same test. And you can…you just press a button when you see a light. And then she pulled me aside and said like, I think you need to see a neurosurgeon because I think you might've had a stroke. I…that's my memory…he, she mentioned the word stroke. I'm like, this is crazy. Like I just came in here for
LJR/KL: Eyeglasses!!
KL: …which I have done frequently. So I called my wife. I said, this is crazy that the eye doctor thinks I might've had a stroke. I was feeling fine. You know, I'd been a little more active after I'd stopped working. And my wife said, well, you know, go get an MRI. So, that she had scheduled, gotten me an appointment for an MRI. I think later that day. So I went to the hospital and I was just, I was going to go by myself. At the last minute, my wife thought like, well, you know, she'll come visit me, you know, while I get this thing done. We all, we didn't think much of it.
And so I had an MRI, which I had never had before. And when I got out of the machine, I asked the technician like, so how'd it go? And he…he could see that it was not good. So he said, well, the doctor will talk to you. And so basically, you know…
LJR: That wasn’t the answer I wanted.
KL: No, no, not at all. Meanwhile, I had, again, I was a failed student of science. Yeah. I just, I don't think I really appreciate what was going on, but it turns out there was a massive tumor in my brain, you know, I think size-wise it was larger than a golf ball, smaller than a tennis ball. And of course, my wife, who is a doctor, saw the scan and knew like, this is, this is not good.
This is not good. So we rushed down to MGH that night. You know, we were sent to the ER and again, throughout all of this I felt fine. To this day. I don't think I had any symptoms or anything like that.
LJR: It probably wasn't a stroke.
KL: No, no, no. I don't think it was. For some reason I thought the doctor said it was a stroke, but I, in hindsight, I don't, I think…I just maybe just created that as a memory, but I don't…But I remember the nurses come up like, so, so what's, what's the issue. Like I don't really know. I feel fine. And I remember watching, we were waiting for the surgeon to come in. And so I was just laying in one of those, you know, patient beds where I was all kind of stretched out. I had the remote in my hand. I remember watching the Celtics play that night. Meanwhile, my wife was just, just crumbling. Cause I think she knew what was going on and she knew how large the tumor was. And I think in her mind she thought like, oh, it may be too large to operate on. And that didn't cross my mind. I just thought like, man, we're here. And then the surgeon came in and he was a very calm, he said, you know, I think you have this thing. They didn't quite know what it was at the point, but like, oh, it's this massive tumor, you know, it's going to be taken out. And at the very end, he said, oh yeah, so we'll schedule surgery, but it won't be today. It'll be later. So I think that those are the words my wife was waiting on. Like, so, so you can operate on it and he's like, oh yeah, yeah, no, I, we can be quick. We can do that. And so that was a Friday and the surgery was scheduled for Tuesday and it was all a blur to be honest. Because again, I, I really, I don't think I really appreciate that it was, it was a very precarious situation that in, and again, there were still a lot of the experience of going through what my sister had gone through and knew they were kind of related. I didn't, I, she had a glioblastoma, I had a glioma.
LJR: But at the time you didn't know what it was.
KL: We didn't really know that.
LJR: But was…You were watching basketball. And was that even going through your mind? Your sister?
KL: No. No, I think I was just maybe in just sort of disbelief of like this can, it can't be happening because literally I just went to the eye doctor like a couple hours ago just to get contacts. I don't quite understand. Well, why is this situation exploding the way that it was. [LJR: Yeah.] And it was odd. And so I spent the night at the hospital, my wife was there with me, you know, my sister-in-law and my brother-in-law had watched the kids. And then we had to go through the process of explaining to them that I had this thing in my head that, you know, we need to…dad needed to be at the hospital for a while. And, you know, things, it looked a little thorny, but you know, we had…everyone hoped for the best. And oh, the, the ironic thing is that weekend we were supposed to go skiing. And so I had bought these non-refundable tickets. And I remember complaining to the doctor. I think I had even brought it up with the surgeon. I'm like, do I really need to be here? You know, I've got these non-refundable tickets; we kind of looked forward to skiing. Is it, can I like leave the hospital and go skiing and come back? And they're like, no, you gotta, you gotta stay here. And then in hindsight, like I think I realized like, you know, this weird scenario, if I hadn't gone to the eye doctor, if I hadn't found out what I'd had in my head, and if I had gone skiing and fallen, I mean, you know, you go into these dark places. I could have, I don't, I, you know, it's a worst case scenario that, where that might've happened, but it didn’t.
LJR: And so he was able to remove it and it was like, it was no big deal? Is that what…
KL: No, it was, it was rough. I mean, you know, I felt like I was absolutely at the best place to be at for something that I was going. I was at MGH, you know, the best doctors, the surgeon who performed the surgery, my wife had sort of asked her boss, like, who is the best guy to do this? Oh, it's this guy. So, you know, I felt calm in a sense, because at this point there's really nothing else I can do from a health perspective. So I'm just gonna, you know, try to be calm.
But then you start thinking like, well with every surgery there's a risk. And again, I, I kept thinking about what my sister went through and so it was tough. And I remember the night before the surgery, you know, I pulled aside my daughters and I said, you know, I was thinking, I might not recover from this. I could, you know, worst case scenario. I might not wake up from the surgery. So I did talk to them and I said, you know—it's…you're never as articulate as you would like to be at moments like this. But, you know, I think I tried to tell them, like—it was the privilege of my life to be their father. And you know, it was, you know. It was, it was tough.
And then, you know, my family had come out like my brother and his sister [sic]. They live in Brooklyn. I think the second they found out that I was going through something, they just dropped everything. They drove down or up to see us. And they stayed at the hotel near MGH and it was, it was rough. It was rough, but the surgery was fine, but it was all a blur to be honest, you know, I was in the hospital for 10 days.
I don't remember a lot of it. There was one point where, you know, I met with one of the doctors and he asked me all these questions and I just kept on saying, okay, which I thought was the normal answer. He was like, well, we're going to do this. Okay. I mean, we're going to, if we want you to do. Okay. I mean, that's, you know, and then I looked around and I could see a lot of people just sort of that their faces kind of drained. Like I should be saying something more than just, okay. And then it kind of dawned on me like, oh, this is not going well. You know, I found out afterwards that the surgeon was concerned that he would need to go back and do another surgery if I didn't sort of respond quickly.
Thankfully I did. But the whole thing was just a blur. Like I didn't realize that I hadn't, I didn't eat for several days. I remember my mother had come up from Michigan and she said she had told me like the next time anyone comes in here, you got to tell them your name. I'm like, mom, I think they know who I am. It's written on the board what my name is. No, no. They want to hear it from you. So she said, next time anyone comes in, just say I'm Ken Lee. And it was just bizarre, but gradually, you know, I got, I was able to speak a little bit more clearly. I have better understanding what was going on. But it was, yeah, it was, it was a trip for this 10 day period.
Then after I left the hospital, yeah. I had to go through speech therapy, which was crazy because I thought I was fine. You know, I even thought like I bounced back pretty quickly. I feel like I could go back to the office and work. I could appear in court. And I remember trying to read to my son who was eight months. And I remember this vividly, I was reading like a junior version of Green Eggs and Ham. And I couldn't read it, the whole thing. And my, my youngest daughter who was 11 was like nearby. And I was like trying to read it very carefully. And then I would look up at her and she's like, no, that's, that's the right word. You said that the right way. And it was just, it was just, it was bizarre.
LJR: You speak as though it's no big deal. It was weird. I was doing one thing and now I'm doing this other, and there was this recovery period, but you had that moment where you were talking to your daughters and saying, I might not make it. But now you've made it. And do you go back to being the father of like crazy teenage girls and you want to kill them, or this is that privileged to be your father kind of manifests differently?
KL: I wish I could say I emerged from this as like a much more enlightened kind of Zen guy who like you know, kisses birds and all that kind of stuff. Unfortunately I kinda, for good or ill, I did kind of reverted back to basically who I was before. Yeah. I…maybe there was an opportunity there I missed to sort of be this, you know, life guru or something. And that, that just didn't happen for me. I just came back to being relatively my same old self. For good or bad.
LJR: And you've probably had a very short window where they were particularly happy to have you around.
KL: Yeah. I mean, it's, it's rough for them. I mean, in hindsight, I think it was, it was tough. It was tough, obviously for them. They didn't quite know what was happening. And I think they had also gone through the experience of seeing what my sister had gone through and the recovery process for me, it seems like it didn't take that long, but it, it really, it was tough and it was, it was hard for me to get back to the place where, you know, I felt like I was as, maybe as nimble as I thought I was. And I think that's, there's still part of that. Whereas, you know, when I was, when I was a lawyer, you know, I was in court a lot, you know, I did hearings, depositions, all that kind of stuff, where you have to be facile. You have to be very quick witted and be able to remember a lot of different things, you know, all at once, juggle a lot of a plates, so to speak and, you know, it was tough. It was tough in the beginning to really kind of, you know, tap that well, that I felt like for a long time was…just wasn't there after the procedure.
Yeah. Well, it seems as though you have these pockets of experience that are, you know, you had decided you needed to leave just for the family. The family, thank goodness, had you around and you were able to go get your own prescription looked at again. I'm glad you weren't kind of hard charging at that point. So it seems as though some of these things happened when they were supposed to.
KL: I guess. Yeah. Yeah. And, but I really can't, I can't praise my wife enough because, you know, we've been together since, you know, senior year, our senior year—like I said, she was a 98. It was just a lot for her to deal with. And you know, thank God I had her with me. The kids had her, it was just a terrible situation. And you know, it's just, it's sometimes it's hard to appreciate what you have until you go through something like that. And you know, it's every now and then it's been almost five years since I'd had my brain surgery. And it's weird to think about that. Cause you know, a lot has changed since then. It's always nice to pause and just remember where you're at, where you come from.
LJR: Yeah. Well, I'm so glad that you're on the other side of that and really appreciate your sharing the story. And we wish you all the best for continued recovery, renewal, all of those good things.
KL: Yeah. Yeah. I wish I had some kind of. Mr. Rogers kind of you know, sentiment I could share with people, but I think that's just beyond my capabilities.
LJR: I think you did fine.
KL: I also think I'm still just incredibly boring. [LJR: Oh my gosh.] ‘cause I come from a pretty good family and I just, I still have, you know, I'm just the dullard, I guess, of the group.
LJR: I'm sure all your friends think that. All right. Well, thank you Ken, for being here and sharing with us.
KL: No, it's been a real honor and it's been a real privilege.
LJR: That was Ken Lee, who is a former assistant attorney general at the office of the Massachusetts attorney general and a stay-at-home dad to three children in the Boston area. Just as Ken has been pleased to be in those children's lives, I've been pleased over these many months to be in your lives and to connect you with the life stories of other amazing individuals. At this holiday season, we'd love it if you would give your favorite people the gift of our show. Please let them know they can find us at RoadsTakenShow.com or wherever they get their podcasts. We'll be happy to continue to supply them with tons of great stories with me, Leslie Jennings Rowley, on future episodes of Roads Taken.