School Drop-Offs, Coppélia, and Other Final Acts for Retiring Ballerina Megan Fairchild

Forget 9-to-5. Mothering knows no schedule—often it feels more like 5-to-9 and everything in between. In this series, we look at the hectic, messy, sometimes beautiful, often frustrating enterprise of being a mother—and maintaining a life of your own. Consider it a “day in the life” for the forgotten hours.

Today, we’re following Megan Fairchild at a particularly poignant moment: she is in the final days of her nearly 25-year career with New York City Ballet. Long celebrated for her crystalline technique and steadfast presence in the Balanchine repertory, Fairchild is preparing to take her final bow in Coppélia before retiring from the stage and relocating with her husband and three daughters to Bordeaux, France.

But offstage, Fairchild’s days look less like a prima ballerina’s and more like that of any mother juggling school drop-offs, mismatched socks, lunchbox demands, and physical exhaustion. “My kids are the best part of my life,” she writes. “Nothing tops my time with them.”

Across these images and diary entries, Fairchild reflects on pointe shoes, Pilates, French lessons, cold plunges, and the realities of being what she calls “a performing working mom”—all while savoring the final stretch of a career she says she’s ready, and even excited, to leave behind.

7:00 a.m.

I wake up at 6:30 a.m., usually without an alarm, to sneak in a peaceful cup of coffee before the chaos of kids. I prop a heating pad upright in my bed and check in on the world on my phone while I wait for the coffee to kick in. From 7 to 7:45 a.m., we kind of race to get ready for school. I make breakfast for the girls and, while they’re eating, pack their lunches. I have one twin with these ridiculous lunch requests that I accommodate because it makes her so happy. The other two take bento boxes with sandwiches and little bites, while she insists on a hot lunch in a thermos, just like her friend from school.

7:15 a.m.

For breakfast we have brioche, eggs, and fruit. Harlow also requests a bowl of Froot Loops every day. I tried to get healthier versions, and no one would touch them—so again, I give in. She always drinks the milk after, so I figure it’s a wash. We are moving to France this summer and I’ve tried to prepare her for the lack of Froot Loops there, ha!

I never thought I would have three kids, but when you have twins, you just go with it, and as soon as they all arrived, I was just so happy. My kids are the best part of my life, and that is saying something, as I have a lot of amazing things I get to experience. Still, nothing tops my time with them and I cherish the silly things they say in the morning. Sometimes they call me Megan for a laugh, and it never gets old.

7:30 a.m.

I’ve tried to put all my girls in ballet but it hasn’t really been of much interest. My oldest, Tullie, has loved acro and jazz this year, and this is the first year we have made it through the whole school year with an activity. She would always start something and then say after three months, “I’m done! I know it all already.” And I’m not one to force anything on them. Showing off her backbends is her favorite party trick. We are looking forward to her first recital for her jazz class next month!

7:45 a.m.

All three just wander in different directions each morning and our job is to keep tabs on whether they did everything they needed to before we leave. Harlow still needs to brush her teeth, Gemma doesn’t like her socks, Tullie can’t find her agenda…. I feel completely split in three and my mind is somehow trying to solve all three requests at the same time.

I am the classic ragged mom at drop-off—usually in my PJs with my hair unbrushed. I’m very hell-bent on getting to school on time and we have a long commute. If we aren’t out the door by 7:45, I have to experience the shame of ringing the bell and signing them in tardy. We’ve probably only been late twice this year.

8:25 a.m.

We have a 25-minute drive to school because we wanted a bilingual education for them, as my husband is French. It’s a pretty long drive, especially considering that many mornings I do it after coming home late from a show the night before. It’s not just the lack of sleep but the physical exhaustion I experience, but I don’t get to give in to.

Still, making the effort to give them a bilingual education is one of the best choices we’ve made as parents. It’s afforded us the opportunity to relocate to France this summer, for a number of years—at least five! I am so slow in learning French, and so I have great respect for how important it is to learn a second language young. When we move, at the very least I will have three little translators.

I love drop-off because I feel it is a group of other adults who just had the same difficult morning as I did. At the beginning of the year, we are all literally exhaling after the kids go inside. So I just feel really seen. I’m always in my glasses with unbrushed hair, but I don’t mind this walk of shame.

9:00 a.m.

After a total drive of about 60 minutes round-trip, I have a little time to get the house back in shape and, hopefully, squeeze in an Epsom salt bath while I order groceries on my phone. When I have an evening show and know I won’t be able to help that evening, I want my husband and the girls to come home to an orderly house. So, particularly on days when I won’t beat them home, I race to get everything back in its place.

The amount of cleaning and straightening as a parent is bananas. It’s nonstop. I honestly haven’t needed to do any cardio since having kids—I always tell people that I’m constantly walking and doing squats at my house to pick up all the toys. That’s been my cross-training for the last seven years.

10:15 a.m.

I love company class; it’s the one time we get to all be together and socialize. After that,
we are separated into different rehearsals and different ballets. I don’t think I would have
made it through this career without the laughter and the people I’ve gotten to share it
with. It would be miserable without the bond we have all created in this intense
environment.

KJ here is a young soloist, and we have a fun friendship. I try to get him to crack a smile; he can be really serious. I wear it as a badge of honor, getting him to chuckle. We did Coppélia last year at The Kennedy Center and it was a really big part for him. I really enjoyed kind of holding his hand through that. Those kinds of moments bond you for sure.

11:20 a.m.

Last week, I hurt my left calf and had to scale back in my rehearsals. All I am laser-focused on is making it to my final show. I have so many people coming into town and I just want to make sure I get to enjoy it and not hobble through it. Luckily, my calf has calmed down, and I still feel prepared for all the dancing that needs to be done.

11:40 a.m.

So, I’m retiring from the company this Sunday after almost 25 years—and literally the only sad moment I’ve recently had about it all is that I won’t have this beautiful Pilates space to work out in every day. I love being on the reformer; I love Gyrotonic too. We have it all here. When I retire, I am treating myself to an at-home Pilates reformer and will be doing it every day. It is the most cleansing feeling to stretch your body and strengthen it against that resistance.

12:00 p.m.

I go through two brand-new pairs of pointe shoes for a full-length ballet like Coppélia. We customize our ribbons and elastics, so it takes about 15 minutes to properly prepare each shoe. I’ll be happy to stop this task when I retire. Usually I just watch TV on my phone while I sew.

Making sure your shoes feel good is 50% of having a good performance. You want the toe box to be very flat so you can stand on pointe and find your balance easily, but you also need a shoe that will last and support you through the entire show. The company pays for our shoes and we go through a lot of them, but it’s part of putting a good product onstage. I save my very best pairs for special performances.

12:30 p.m.

I can’t wait to chop my hair off the day after I retire. I’ve been planning it for a year! Between changing diapers and years of dancing, there has really been no reason to have my hair down for the last seven years—and I know if I chop it, I will have to wear it down! I’m going to go for a Leslie Bibb bob; I’ve been planning this since that season of The White Lotus came out last year.

1:00 p.m.

Because of my calf strain last week, I really hadn’t touched the first act for over a week. I was a little nervous to get to punch out all three acts, but my calf responded well and it all worked out! This costume is my favorite of the three I wear. I love the low hair, the teal bodice, the pink skirt, and the peasant top. It helps you find the character, putting on a costume like that.

2:00 p.m.

A lot of colleagues have been asking me how it feels to be almost done with something we have all been doing since we were four or five years old. I have so much peace about moving into a new chapter where I’ll have more time with my children. Being a working mom is one thing, but being a performing working mom is a whole different struggle. You aren’t available evenings and weekends like most moms, and that’s quality time when your kids aren’t in school.

I’m looking forward to making up for lost time. So no, I’m not sad, if that’s what you’re thinking. I’m happy to wrap up a career I’ve been really proud of.

4:30 p.m.

This dress is my third-act wedding dress. I’m completely exhausted at this point, but I’m
very “on my leg” because of how much I’ve been dancing. So I just kind of chill and float
through the third act. It works well because the pas de deux is very quiet and slow. You
could get nervous, but I have no energy left to be shaky.

5:00 p.m.

This was the last “complete” rehearsal of my career. It’s what we call the final dress rehearsal before a show, where you have the corps de ballet and principals all coming together. You have to like the attention of everyone watching you, and over time I’ve really come to crave these moments. I guess I’m just so used to performing at this point that the time where we do it for ourselves as a company is something I treasure. There is nothing like dancing in front of your colleagues who know how hard it is to do what you are doing.

5:30 p.m.

Now, after running the whole ballet, I have been dancing for a period of four hours. The total run time of the ballet is two and a half hours in real time, but rehearsals obviously take longer, and we need breaks in between acts. At the end of this, I am walking incredibly slowly, and my legs feel like I just ran a marathon—something I never intend to do, by the way.

This is me at the finish line of my marathon. I’m happy I executed well, I’m relieved my body got through it, and I’m focused on taking care of my body so it feels good tomorrow when I wake up.

These men just danced in the third act of War and Discord; it is this campy section of the ballet where they’re dressed as Vikings and doing Aida jumps around the stage with huge hats and spears. It’s the last thing I see before I come out for the pas de deux. Here we are in the elevator. They are heading up to their dressing room and I am headed up to the cold plunge.

6:00 p.m.

In the hopes of having fresher legs tomorrow, I cold plunge for two minutes after I dance. It’s achingly painful, but my legs feel really good afterward. I used to have to sing to get through it. Now I can just kind of close my eyes and breathe. I’m really hoping when I wake up tomorrow that my calf isn’t any worse. Proud of myself and looking forward to tackling these last shows!

7:00 p.m.

Sewing a new pair of shoes for every show…they start to pile up. The next day, post-show, the sweat has dried, they have re-hardened, and I will add some glue on the inside of the box and along the shank, inside and outside, to make sure they keep supporting my foot. Eventually, I will go through and check my shoe piles, and cut the ribbons and elastics off the ones that are no longer wearable. I will have probably over 200 brand-new shoes left in the shoe room the day I retire, and they are all technically mine. I am not sure what I want to do with them yet, so we are going to let the dust settle before I decide. At this point I’m not planning on putting pointe shoes on again after I retire. I love swimming and Pilates and I’m looking forward to leaving the shoes behind.