Miyoung Lee By Kelly S. Thompson | Photographed by Jumping Monkeys Photography
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hen I call to interview CBC News and News Now reporter Miyoung Lee, 37, it is early morning but she is busy preparing dinner for her family, which they will eat without her later that evening while she’s at work. “My husband can’t cook at all, but he does all the laundry. He’s Mister Mom,” she says with a laugh. Although she works long hours, which occasionally prevent her from being with her family, Miyoung ensures she is present in the lives of her husband and children, no matter the time of day.
But Miyoung didn’t always believe she would be a full time working mom. “I always imagined I would be home with my kids until they went to Kindergarten,” she says of her previous weekend news position. However, CBC was willing to coordinate Miyoung’s schedule to manage her growing family, allowing her to only work four days a week and have Fridays with her family. “It gives me one day a week to make sure I focus on my family so on my weekends, I’m not spending family time getting errands done.”
Miyoung is married to Bill, a teacher, and nine years later, they have two daughters, Lucy, four, and Ella, six. Bill and Miyoung both work full time jobs, taking equal share of the parenting duties in order to make their family function like a fine oiled machine. From Monday to Thursday, Miyoung goes to work at 12:30 and returns home 12 hours later, reporting the news four times daily on CBC. “I typically get four to five hours sleep a night,” she says, while sounding positively perky, “I’m usually pretty tired.” Meanwhile, Bill provides endless support in raising their children and making their house a home.
Although Bill and Miyoung maintain a busy schedule, Miyoung realized that help was necessary in moving forward both professionally and in spending quality time with her children. “My family has been supportive of my career from the get go, because they know I really love my job. It’s a blessing to say I love what I do.” With the support of both sets of grandparents, Miyoung says she manages to maintain a happy career and family life. Both her and Bill’s parents often come over to provide relief childcare and also engage and spend time with Lucy and Ella. “As a woman, it’s hard to say, I can’t do everything. But I can’t,” Miyoung says, “I’m slowly starting to admit that, although it’s been difficult for me to do.”
A South Korean immigrant who arrived in East Vancouver with her parents and brother just weeks before starting kindergarten, Miyoung credits her hardworking parents for encouraging and supporting her to strive towards her professional career. Their hard work in raising their daughter has paid off, as Miyoung is a BCIT graduate with a Broadcast Journalism Degree, and a B.H.A. Honours degree from UBC. A segue into a job at CBC was the next step and she began to report news on the weekends.
Although she’s a high profile news reporter, Miyoung insists life is finally reaching a point of balance. She Skypes with her daughters from work and although she claims to have intense mommy guilt over not being with them constantly, Miyoung also recognizes that she is an important role model for her children. “I’ve never been a content person, I always looked ahead. What I’ve learned in the last year is that it’s about living in the present moment and being happy with what you have because that reflects on your children.” May May 2014 2014 33 33