With all due respect, fuck the advice that astro gave you.
There are levels of importance in life. The very most important thing is being alive. The second is your health. Without those two (especially the first one) everything else is pretty trivial.
When my drinking an depression got totally out of control I lost my job. It was my dream job. I thought it was the end of the fucking world. It wasn’t. I had to get back up on my feet but it wasn’t the impossible task I made it out to be in my mind.
One of the things that I had to deal with when I was first dealing with depression and alcoholism was the shame involved. Guess what? Depression is a disease and you have no control over having it. You do have control over what to do now that you know what your problem is. You should do whatever it is that you need to so that you can deal with this problem. If it interrupts your studies, well, that is what you gotta do. There is no shame in having a disease or in taking the steps you need to so that you can treat that disease.
On a related note, contrary to what Astro said, it is possible that if you tell your advisor what is going on it may help. If he understands what is going on the situation may be clearer to him. If he knows there is a medical problem it changes the way he is going to look at the situation. He may understand why you are doing what you are doing instead of making up reasons for what is going
on.
Statsman, don’t listen to astro. You have nothing to lose by telling your advisor that you are suffering from depression, are stressed and anxious and seeking his advice and reassurance.
Depression is understood by all educated people to be a disease, not a personal failing. Don’t listen to astro.
What you decide to do is of course up to you. Maybe your advisor can reassure you that you can make it to and beyond graduation and find a great job - or maybe you should take a leave of absence first. But telling him what is going on is important. Everyone will understand if you take a leave of absence for medical reasons. No one will understand if you just up and leave one day without an explanation to anybody. You don’t have to tell everyone what the medical reasons are, but you should definitely tell him. Don’t listen to astro.
Make it clear when you start the conversation that you expect what you tell him to be kept in confidence. He is your advisor. This is his job. He will understand. If he doesn’t, he’s an asshole and it’s not your fault and you did the best you could. Don’t listen to astro.
My guess is that you’re not fooling anybody re: your mental state, and your advisor will be happy you finally told him what was up. He has probably known for some time that you are going through a bad time, but assumed that you didn’t want to talk about it. Not being warm and fuzzy doesn’t mean that he won’t understand or that he won’t do whatever he can to help you. Don’t listen to astro.
This will not the first time your advisor has had to deal with something like this, whether personally or professionally. Depression is not uncommon. The absolute worst course of action you can take is to do nothing - continue to agonize over this and let your depression affect your work without giving anyone an explanation of what’s going on. DON’T LISTEN TO ASTRO.
You have received about 35 pieces of advice on this board that tell you to do one thing (plus your sister’s advice), and 1 piece of advice that tells you to do the opposite. Come on, it doesn’t take a statistician to figure this out.
Just to bring some closure to this thread, as a small way of saying thank you to everyone (yes, **astro **too) for taking the time to give me some advice, here’s what happened.
I told him roughly what I said that I would, and he was very understanding He even opened up to me a little about some of his experiences. He told me that he would support me in whatever I chose to do. He reassured me, and he even thanked me for being honest. Like monstro’s experience, he said that he could tell something was wrong, but didn’t know what. He told me that if worse comes to worse, I could always teach with my masters at one of the many local community colleges and work on the dissertation.
I feel much better having talked with him. Thanks to everyone who gave me some perspective on this. Normally, I’m not this scatterbrained when I write, but I have to get to a meeting in about 20 minutes so I’m having to write very quickly. I didn’t want to wait until later to say thank you to everyone.
I understand that. I think there is very definitely a social stigma still connected with MI.
Statsman, does your school offer a support group for people with mental health issues? I’ll bet you could find one with students in it with ease. If not connected to the university, there must be one available through Social Services or a local hospital.
I know that people with MI issues struggle with what’s a realistic expectation for themselves. Who better to help you sort this out than others who are dealing with similar concerns?
I recognize that you’ve made a decision and will probably encounter like situations in the future. A support group doesn’t hurt.
What do you have to lose at this point? You don’t know where to go, or what to do. What you tried has not worked, this includes professional help.
I believe you have to keep trying new things, and asking for help from other is usually answered positively - many times a source of great strength is asking others for help, or just letting them know your struggles and listening, but it is something hard for us to do and something society teaches us not to do, actually society tried to make us fear asking for help and that denies us that great strength that is available to us.
I’m so glad to hear that. One of the things that anxiety and depression do to us is to twist our perceptions, so you aren’t really seeing reality. The reality is that this guy CHOSE you for this program - regardless of your opinion of yourself, he sees something in you. He’s not a fool; you aren’t pulling the wool over his eyes and hiding your massive incompetence (because I don’t think for a minute that you are massively incompetent - if anything, I bet you’re a diehard perfectionist).
This is awesome. It’s good that you went out and got some proof that your negative outlook on life was not realistic. I know you suspected as much intellectually, but it’s one thing to know something in theory and another to experience it in practice.
Right on man, I am very happy that you took this step and it worked out well for you.
Now (jumps up on soap box) the hard part starts. Please keep up with the treatment. This has to be your main and only focus for a while.
Resolving these kinds of problems is not easy. However, with work and dedication they can usually be solved. My experience is that the more people you can discuss your issues with, the better. Talk to people because they can put things in perspective for you. I know from experience that it is hard to see things clearly when this kind of shit is going on. Find people you can trust and talk to them. Most importantly, *really *listen to what they say.
And, of course, do what your doc tells ya.
Good luck. Remember (and I know that this can be very hard to remember) that other people have made it through this and you can as well.
As for whether it is safe to discuss about mental disorders, here’s my two cents worth: It depends. This comes from my experience, so you should take it with a grain of salt.
I went about for a while hiding the problem, figuring that no one would want to work with someone with depression. The catch is that depressed people aren’t that good are hiding their problems. It will surface somehow, so I figure it doesn’t matter if you tell it or not, because people can perceive.
Now the trick is whom you can confide to. There are certain risks in opening up about depression but I consider those risk to be in the same categories of developing a closer relationship with others. It’s not all rosy and not everyone is going to be supportive, but it’s either that or we remain in our little shell. I sometimes wonder which is more terrifying.
My point of view is this - if it is a superior, he would need to know the limits and constraints of his workers. If he has proven himself to be a good supervisor (not the boss from hell variety), I would take a chance. I did it a couple of time and there was once it went south; I was barred from going on an exchange program which I really wanted to go because of ‘stress issues’. However, in hindsight perhaps I wouldn’t be able to handle the program. Who would know?
I think part or most of my stress comes from the fact that I have been a student for 21 out of my 27 years of being alive. Now, I worked at a commercial radio station part time during undergrad, but basically I’ve always been a student. I believed (and I still believe–hence the depression) that my worth as a human being is directly related to my academic performance. And now that I see that I probably won’t be a great researcher, I’m having a lot of trouble figuring out just who I am. Most of the time, I feel like an actor playing a part; I do things and say things in my interactions with others that a lot of the time are phony, because I need to keep up a proper appearance. Given my distorted view of things, I’m probably not doing such a hot job with that, though.
Right about when I decided that I can’t let my academic life be my life, I had to attend a retreat for all doctoral students and faculty in my department. The point of the retreat (it was only a single 4-hour day) I suppose, was to get everyone acquainted with one another and to discuss matters relating to doctoral work. One part of the retreat was faculty introductions/career advice. One guy said, “People say I have no life. Well, this [academia] is my life. I suggest it be yours too, if you want to be successful.” No other faculty member said, “But it’s important to balance work and personal life.” So, a bunch of people that I should supposedly look up to for advice are all overtly or tacitly agreeing with my original view of myself: that I should define myself in terms of academic performance. I hasten to note that my advisor was not present at this retreat during introductions.
So, that’s where I’m coming from lately. I believe one thing, but am told by people who I’m supposed to look to for advice to believe another thing for the sake of my career. It’s difficult to know whom to trust.
Glad it went well for you, and that your adviser was sympathetic. He sounds like a pretty cool guy.
I do think that there’s a difference between making your work your life and making sure you’re safe and healthy. Working crazy hours is one thing, but if you’re depressed or in danger, no matter how devoted to work you are, it’s important to get help. And it can be hard, but there’s absolutely no shame in it.
I’m gonna climb back offa my soapbox before this makes me go off on a complete rant, but … setting aside my personal opinions of people who behave this way (it’s called being a workaholic - there’s nothing particularly noble about that) at a minimum, statsman, if this is the path you choose for yourself then at least go into it with wide-open eyes. I have a feeling the guy you quoted spoke the truth, for better or for worse. If that’s really what you want for yourself and your life, that’s fine - you’re the only one who gets to make that choice - but know what you’re getting yourself into.
When you listen to people who tell you to put your life into your work, understand that they may be a little biased. No one who is currently destroying their personal life for the sake of their work is going to say “well I work hard and suffer, but it’s probably all for nothing.”
Just look at where neglecting your personal life has brought you, and decide for yourself whether it’s worth ignoring it for your school work.
Right now you’re a only a student. I can’t think of any adult I know that ties his self worth to the grades he received in school. They care a lot more about what they accomplished after school.
I also don’t see what makes you think you won’t be a great researcher. Even if other students are better than you now, you will still have plenty of time in your academic career to catch up with them. If you put in more time and effort you can easily match people more intellectually gifted than you at some point. You don’t have be smarter than everyone the moment you earn your PhD.
I second or third or fourth those who say you shouldn’t neglect your personal life.
The thing is - what about you, what do you want? What is the most important thing for you? I was miserable when I let myself defined by how well I performed and what others think of me. It’s not totally wrong, we do have expectations to meet but I believe we all have to define for ourselves what is our ‘core’. The others at the retreat have decided what is their lot; it may not be yours.
People don’t like to think that something they’ve put a lot of work and sacrifice into getting isn’t worth it. That’s not a good feeling. This is why you’ll get a very different opinion of the value of (say) an astronomy degree if you ask people who have one, versus the opinion you’d get if you ask people who don’t. This is probably going to be true of just about anything that requires a lot of effort to get.
I went through the same thing when I first started thinking about leaving grad school in astronomy. Pretty much everything I did as an undergrad was directed toward the goal of getting into grad school in astronomy. I took a heavy class load, and had no time for much of anything outside of classes. Abandoning something you’ve spent six years of your life trying to achieve isn’t easy. But I look at Mr. Neville (who did get his PhD in astronomy, and is an assistant professor now), and, you know, his life kind of sucks. He doesn’t have the time or energy to do much other than work, when he’s teaching. I’ve come to realize that there’s something to be said for a job where you put in your hours at work, then leave it behind you when you go home. I used to look down on people who weren’t willing to neglect their personal life for their job, and admire people who threw their whole life into their job. I don’t, any more.
Now, I’m dealing with feeling worthless because I’m having trouble finding a good job. That’s a whole nother kettle of fish, though.
**purplehorseshoe, **I don’t want to be a workaholic, at least in the kind of work that a “good PhD student” would do. I have no aspirations to go to a Research 1 (that is, research-intensive) university, because I know for a fact that I would be miserable. The one think I like about my current gig is the teaching, which is the one thing a lot of doctoral students hate. So, if I do stay in academia, I will be going to a teaching-intensive place.
I started grad school as a master’s student. I dreamed about getting a PhD since junior high, though. Not for the job that it would land me, but just for the degree itself. After the first semester, my advisor (who taught one of my master’s classes) approached me about applying for the PhD program. The deadline for applications was exactly a week later. I had one week to 1). decide if that’s what I wanted and 2). write four application essays about my research goals, career goals, previous academic experience, etc. I just kind of “fell” into this. Most of my colleagues researched doctoral programs, went to many campus visits, and made thoughtful decisions. I was admitted (my advisor told me) mostly on my advisor’s recommendation letter. I basically got to bypass the normal doctoral student application route.
The reason I’ve stayed is twofold. First, I just want to get the degree. Nevermind what happens later. At times, I honestly feel that if I got my PhD and the next day went to work as a clerk for Gamestop (I have a great passion for video games), that would be fine. Secondly, I see the PhD as a minimax life strategy–the very worst job I can get with a PhD in statistics is better than the very worst job I can get without one. Not sure if that’s the case, because lots of jobs take experience over education, but still, I’ve always heard that additional education can’t hurt.
He even opened up to me a little about some of his experiences. He told me that he would support me in whatever I chose to do. He reassured me, and he even thanked me for being honest. Like monstro’s experience, he said that he could tell something was wrong, but didn’t know what. He told me that if worse comes to worse, I could always teach with my masters at one of the many local community colleges and work on the dissertation.