CNN’s Laura Coates on Sacrificing Financial Independence for a Career Move

In 2015, Laura Coates traded courtroom drama for newsroom deadlines, leaving her job as a Justice Department prosecutor to dive into a journalism career. She was a new mom with no media experience or contacts, but knew she’d regret it if she never tried. Fast forward to today – Laura is CNN’s Chief Legal Analyst, a Sirius XM host, and a trusted voice on today’s most pressing legal stories. Despite her success, it didn’t come without sacrifice. Listen as Laura gets real about the hard conversations she had with her husband – and herself – about prioritizing her professional ambitions over financial security. 

In this episode of 9 to 5ish, Laura shares: 

• How she charmed her husband when they first met, despite having a waxed off eyebrow

• Why she found it difficult to financially depend on her husband while figuring out her career 

• How she got her foot in the door in media with no connections, and why getting the second foot in is more important

• Why she never shuts down her kids’ curiosity around current events

• How she’s dealt with big personalities in the courtroom, and on television 

On Her Anxiety About a Career Shift

Laura: I was coming from a federal employee salary. By no means was I rolling in the big bucks at all. I had to balance the idea of what it would be like to have to sacrifice, based on my own ambition for our whole household. When we sat down, we made a budget and figured out what we could cut back on, what we could not cut back on, how long could the kids be in daycare at all? Possibly, could they be away from me while I tried to dig my heels in? And also what it would be like for me as a woman to have to be financially reliant in some part on my husband even though I did well for myself to have savings I still didn't want the mental or personal stigma in my own mind that said, wait, will there be a power dynamic that will change if I'm not going somewhere every single day and my work is not immediately visible and tangible? And I had to have some, some really difficult talks with myself as well about what that would feel like, and also with my husband about how I was feeling about the concerns and the anxiety. I am an independent woman and did not want to feel like I was going to be relegated to our shared household tasks.

On How Her Parents Raised Her to be Confident

Laura: My parents allowed us to just lean into our strengths. They were not people who would shy away from uplifting young women and making sure that they did not dim their light or have others do it. We would have this thing called the Coates Corporation, where we would be invited into family business decisions, decisions about our lives. [My parents] would actually ask us at very young ages and we'd have to defend why we thought that way in an environment that was always very encouraging. And so that, I think, was why we all have confidence in that way.

On Why She Prioritizes Self-Care

Laura: I made a choice to just try to do what I could with life and that nothing would be guaranteed, including, persistent happiness. Things change on the dime all the time. We're like one decision away from our whole life changing. So why not have those decisions be the things that make our life better? I had to think about that, but I had to balance that with mom guilt.  Because me trying to do things that made me feel like a whole person still, and that my name wasn’t just “mom”, it just wasn't just “wife”, it was still “Laura”. I needed things that made me feel like a whole person. I do the massages, I do the facial, I do the bath, whatever. But for me, self-care is caring enough to prioritize the things that make me feel like a person.

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