Post-Tenure Life, Entry 2 - Getting Tenure Wasn’t as Orgasmic as I Expected

Getting tenure wasn’t as orgasmic as I expected. No fireworks. No confetti. No champagne-soaked dance party with Beyoncé and Mariah Carey cheering me on in the background (rude, honestly).

Don’t get me wrong—I’m deeply grateful. I’m proud. I know how many folks never get the chance, how many brilliant minds are lost in the pipeline, how many burn out before reaching this elusive milestone. But after years of dreaming about this moment—through caffeine-fueled grad school nights, through awkward interactions in conferences, through reviewer 2's constructive suggestions—I think I had built up tenure to be... something else.

I imagined a kind of academic orgasm—intellectual, emotional, spiritual release. Maybe I’d float out of my office, carried by a cloud of published articles and teaching evaluations whispering “exceeds expectations.”

Instead, I got an email. “Congratulations, your tenure has been approved.” No marching band. No parade. Just me, in my office, staring at my phone and thinking: huh.

Was I expecting too much? Probably. But when you’ve spent years chasing something that controls your every move—your writing pace, your bedtime, your sense of self—it’s strange when it just... ends. Quietly.

And here’s the kicker: the world didn’t change, but I did. Not all at once, but little by little. I started saying no more. I began reclaiming joy—reading for fun, writing weird things, letting my brain wander again. And I’m realizing: maybe the real post-tenure climax isn’t one big explosion. Maybe it’s the slow, sweet burn of rediscovering why I started all this in the first place.

Also, I still want my Beyoncé parade.