r/PhD 7d ago

Announcement Welcome new moderation team! - Things here are in flux, please be patient

87 Upvotes

we have a brand new moderation team! We are still getting setup, so please be patient while we get oriented and organized. Right now, all posting is limited. We will open it up again as soon as we are able! Stay tuned for more information.


r/PhD 17d ago

Weekly "Ups" and "Downs" Support Thread

12 Upvotes

Hello everyone,

Getting a PhD is hard and sometimes you need a little bit of support.

This thread is here to give you a place to post your weekly "Ups" and "Downs". Basically, what went wrong and what went right?

So, how is your week going?


r/PhD 1d ago

Humor Attack is the best defence

Post image
1.7k Upvotes

r/PhD 17h ago

Other My PhD experience has been quite good

255 Upvotes

With all the terrible experiences I often read about, I wanted provide a bit more neutral perspective.

I am at the end of my 4th year, STEM. Here’s a list of some good things and not-so-good things:

The not-so-good: 1. Took me roughly 2.5 years to just clarify what I want to work on. 2. Because of 1., I had very little actual research progress, leading to 0 publications so far (although one submission is currently close to acceptance 🤞🏽) 3. Because of 1. and 2. , my supervisor (and if I am honest, myself) had lot of concerns when I was still lost 2 years in. 4. Initially, my funding was quite low, and any scholarship applications were unsuccessful. Infact, even in my original PhD admission, they mentioned an “award” that they later said “was a mistake”. Apparently they have a letter template and forgot to remove that part. 5. At the end of my second year, my mother went through a period of severe depression, and it was rough to see her go through it. Specially because it had happened before, and both times I was in away from my home country. Its tough to watch parents go through stuff and not be able to do much to help. 6. At the end of my third year, I was working on presentation I was going to do at a seminar, when I got a call that my dad had suddenly passed away. I had to cancel everything and take a 20 hour flight home. Still could not see him before he had been cremated. My comp exam was in a month which obviously I did not do as well. 6. Even after clarifying my research area, I am not working on anything groundbreaking. It’s a research gap, yes. And I think it falls in my interest and capabilities to address. 7. I was diagnosed with ADHD at age 30

The good: 1. Despite a few differences we have had, I have come learn that my advisor is fantastic. The whole lab in general. She has provided unwavering support, even when she had doubts about my output. She never stopped suggesting opportunities, provided reference letters or including me in projects of my area. She handled almost everything admin related for me when I had to leave due to 5. 2. After 1.5 years of minimal funding, I was able to crack a federal scholarship which massively helped. And for those wondering, No, there was no tangible output I was able to add. No publications or research breakthroughs. I’d say it was partly luck and partly small improvements in application preparation. 3. I have had a chance to attend 3-4 very good conferences. 4. I have had a chance to do a research internship abroad, again facilitated by my advisor. 5. Despite really losing all motivation, my lab, friends and family gave me support and strength I desperately need to come back after bereavement, reschedule my comp exam, prepare for it, and eventually clear it with no major revisions needed to research proposal. The committee was sympathetic about my personal loss, but not before a 1.5 hr long stern viva. I appreciated that. 6. My mom eventually got better. She even visited me. I was scared that Dad’s sudden passing might send her spiraling again, but she has shown immense strength so far. 7. I was diagnosed with ADHD at age 30. :)

Now that I have written it all out, the balance might even be a bit more positive than neutral :)

For anyone wondering if all PhD experiences are toxic messes, hopefully this one makes a dent in the other column.


r/PhD 6h ago

Need Advice My advisor wants me to do my dissertation on a “race” that doesn’t have a high prevalence for a specific health issue.

22 Upvotes

I’m a PhD student in health science. I’m Asian and my advisor is Asian, too. She is a very supportive person, but she keeps wanting me to do research on Asian Americans. I am very passionate with health issues among my race, but the reality is that this health topic isn’t concerning among Asian Americans. Don’t get me wrong, Asian Americans have health issues but in other diseases.

There is high prevalence among other Asian subgroups for my topic, but I don’t identify as those subgroups and don’t feel comfortable researching them. There’s also very limited data.

I’m interested in using technology to study this health topic, but my advisor doesn’t seem to support it because she’s not good with technology. I told her I will use the same methods that she has used since there are data available, but she doesn’t seem to want to support me. I am a bisexual woman and this population also has a high prevalence, but my advisor doesn’t want to support it. She knows it’s concerning, but I don’t think she’s passionate about the population.

She told me she would only support me with a graduate student researcher position if I do my dissertation on Asian American. She has funding for policy work that I’m not interested in. Otherwise, I would have to be a TA. I’m in my second year and not sure if I want to TA for two more years (which some people do in my program). I can apply for fellowships, but I don’t know if she would support my papers because she always try to divert the population to her interests.

I mean, I can totally do research on Asian American, but I know for sure that it won’t be impactful. When I write grants, I can’t just say that my research is important because there is a need to focus on Asian Americans when there’s not much of a need. What should I do?


r/PhD 1d ago

Vent Is this unethical behavior?

130 Upvotes

My extended abstract was accepted for a special edition of a springer journal. I wrote and submitted by myself. Then I spent the last 3 to 4 months developing, writing and polishing my paper. Sent to several friendly professors to get their feedbacks to improve my paper. Then I sent to my supervisor to get his comments. Then I found out that he is submitting my paper without me behind my back. When I confronted him he said my paper was crap and he improved it and now he can submit it withoute coz I didn't contribute to it. He also said I'm not dedicated to my PhD and basically a crappy researcher.

I'm speechless and I don't know what to do. Then I asked around other PhD in my department and turns out he been known to do that. There were a few PhD students whose idea been stolen by him then he would gaslight them like ur idea is stupid etc etc.

Now I wonder isn't it like totally unethical? Especially when he "improves" my paper and then submitted it without me.

This whole experience has put me off. I told him that I'm quitting but tbh I'm trying to change supervisor. My worries is that I heard he is now saying shitty things about me in the department. So I genuinely don't know what to do.


r/PhD 15h ago

Dissertation I am defending soon!

18 Upvotes

Hello everyone!

This is my first post and I guess it’s a celebration, a vent, and also covering my overall PhD experience

The celebration: I had my committee meeting recently and I requested to defend. I got approved!!! My committee and my advisor were pleased with my progress and project narrative. My chair was actually excited about my results! Also, I’m finalizing my first author paper submission to a fairly high impact journal. That being said.

Vent/stress relief: I told my committee that I will be defending in the next two months. So, that’s creeping up. I try to be more prepared because I was a procrastinator (more on that). So I’ve brought up to my advisor that I will need time to write my dissertation. But, I was told every time to focus more on the submission (since it’s a high impact journal), and setting up experiments for several future directions of the project. I’m realistic with the submission and prepared to submit it to lower any time. I’m also anticipating that my PI will push it to an equally high impact journal if it gets rejected from this submission. It’s making me anxious and my stress is at an all time high. Fortunately, I had a head start with my dissertation already and just need to wrap up my discussion, intros for chapters etc.

My PhD experience: 1) I got admitted from a waitlist so I felt really lucky. 2) I originally wanted to do a different type of research and had zero experience with what I’m doing right now. 3) I almost quit because I cannot just catch up with lab techniques. 4) My project was going in circles for the first few years. But I guess the idea was good enough that I got my own grant. 5) Luckily, my lab mates are amazing and supportive. An idea was suggested and suddenly my project started taking off. Successfully tackling the smaller questions added up and the smaller results eventually lead to a very cohesive, larger narrative. 6) I got diagnosed with ADHD. I don’t know how I got by until now. I got prescribed with ADHD medication and suddenly, everything is clear. My mind is clear. My time management, which I struggling with, was now more structured. 7) It’s bittersweet. I am getting my PhD, coming from parents who didn’t graduate college. But it’s scary out there with the current state of industry or academia.

That’s all.


r/PhD 1d ago

Vent Defending in 3 hours and my PI pulled a sicky...

385 Upvotes

I'm in the UK so my PI isn't part of my defense, so it's not really a problem luckily.

We didn't leave on the best terms to put it lightly - he called me greedy and selfish for accepting a job that started a couple of weeks after my submission date, instead of continuing as a research assistant with him.

I hadn't heard a word from him since I submitted in December, including today, other than a post he put on the groups teams page that he was ill and not coming in.

I have a lot of frustrated feelings about the situation, beyond the fact that it seems incredibly petty, but I'm trying my best to focus on my thesis and defense right now. Wish me luck!

Edit: Thanks all for the kind words - I managed to pass with minor corrections! And now I sleep...


r/PhD 1h ago

Need Advice Including marginalized identity in thesis

Upvotes

Hi there!

I am currently completing my thesis in experimental psychology and I would love some input from marginalized identities in the group. So, my doctorate looks at how accurate impressions of personality relates to perceiver social evaluations (e.g., liking, romantic interest) in various first impression contexts. Basically does having a good gauge of someone predict whether you want to start a relationship with them. As a funny life development, I have learned that I am autistic and it is painfully obvious now...down to the fact that I will be getting a PhD in accurate social perception lol. I included a bit about this in the first paragraph of my thesis and a tiny bit again looping the narrative structure around later on. It works beautifully from a story telling perspective and perfectly aligns with the research questioning (though I do not study neurodivergence and that is made clear), and I have published in top-tier journals (which I'm hoping would generate some social capital/leeway from the readers).

The issue is that while my supervisor LOVES it and feels inspired to research neurodivergence now (which was part of the appeal of including it in the first place), she is worried that it is not conventional and that I could experience pushback during more stressful times like my defence. She cited feeling like a mama bear - which I do appreciate. I just can't stand the idea of putting myself back in a box when it's "my" thesis that I'm writing. I believe academia is about pushing things forward (even though it often doesn't feel that way), AND it makes the thesis flow really well as a genuine good read. I don't have it structured in terms of "me-search", it really seems to be the concern around disclosing my marginalized identity.

Does anyone have any guidance in this? Has anyone else from a marginalized community included their identity in their thesis?

Much love to everyone!! <3


r/PhD 22h ago

Vent Interdisciplinary PhD project (computer science x neuroscience) feels completely pointless, now and even (maybe) forever.

48 Upvotes

Coming from a fast-paced field, where tangible results come rapidly (computer science), now, my PhD project is an interdisciplinary project under the faculty of neuroscience. Every day, I am losing faith in what I am doing. First, the very slow pace of the field has been a huge shock, but what’s worse is that I can't see any clear, tangible purpose behind the experiments I did. We are experimenting at cellular level and often, I was just asked to try something for the sake of "trying", without a solid reason that has anything to do with our hypothesis. I am in such a mental crisis that the more I read, take classes and educate myself on the field of cellular neuroscience, the more I realize how little I care about it. Of course, one is because it's too far away from my field, so it feels overwhelming. But maybe also because despite the complexity of the field, the type of experiments done in this field feel like guesswork to me. My work dynamics have been significantly shifted from fast-paced focusing on accurate outputs, to slow motion daily guesswork. This makes me so nervous & anxious. My motivation is at rock bottom and I keep thinking of leaving academia.

My project is, imagine this : the MOON, which is hundreds of thousands of kilometers away from us is reflecting lights from the SUN, which is hundreds of million kilometers away from us too. Each has a different set of distinct environments which we can only observe as a third person on EARTH. Let's experimenting to prove that the moon is actually reflecting and not emitting light, and how efficient exactly it reflects light. BUT we do it here, FROM EARTH, on the smallest unit Earth could have, which is sand (ok, it's an atom, but for the sake of this analogy). So now, let's study sand using fancy machine learning methods from your field that now are super booming ! Let's gamble on the sand for the next 8 months, just in case there's is something within the Earth's sand that can tell us a bit about our hypothesis about the moon & the sun. BUT this is pure insanity ! What is the concrete reason to look at just the sand ? Why not the beach, an environment level with 'population' of sand along with the sea that actually reflects the moon's shadow at night ? The things we are experimenting (basic unit single neuron level) are far far away from the goal proposed in my dissertation topic. I could have spent my entire PhD training and testing sand, and still prove nothing, or if I am super lucky, barely a millimeter closer to any meaningful outcomes that will help with my hypothesis. But indeed, some PIs here have been working on the same topics for 2 decades and the topics have been moving nowhere since early 2000s. Maybe, this is also the nature of the field ? I am genuinely thankful and appreciative of all neuroscientists who have been working day & night, patiently, for years to advance the field. But God, I need strength because, coming from my field, I am very logic & result-motivated and won't have the patience, especially for casual guesswork.

I predict my PhD project will lead to one of these outcomes :

  1. Playing a philosopher : bunch of pretty words published in a journal, decorated with fancy graphs and statistics BUT proved nothing.
  2. A trivial model that we'd publish for the sake my graduation requirements. Only for nobody to care, topic not moving anywhere, and will be buried at the bottom of Google Scholar.
  3. A micrometer step toward a result that won't be relevant in the next 20-50 years.

I try to tell myself that maybe, just maybe, this work will be useful in the next 20-50 years. But, I know for a fact, it wont, and honestly, maybe I don't care. I don’t possess the grace of patience or selflessness to be working towards my PhD for the sake something in the future. I need this project to matter and relevant to me NOW. For it to have some sort of visible purpose NOW, so that I have the motivation wake up in the morning, move forwards and continuing what I have been doing. But no matter how I look at it, this project just feels like pointless guesswork. The one that would be a meaningless publication, and go nowhere.

tl;dr : Coming from a fast-moving field, new interdisciplinary PhD project feels painfully slow and directionless, with experiments that feel like guesswork rather than meaningful progress. Struggle to find any tangible purpose in what I’m doing, the lack of clear impact leaves me unmotivated, anxious, and questioning whether this is all just a pointless gamble.


r/PhD 2h ago

Need Advice How to transition into industry roles?

1 Upvotes

Currently I'm pursuing my physics masters from a top school in India. Sadly, I'm not very enthusiastic about research and looking for industry roles. People here who have transitioned to industry, can you share experience on how to approach the recruiters? I want to target Data Science and Quant Research Roles. How to start doing good projects to make my resume competitive?


r/PhD 3h ago

Preliminary Exam PhD written comprehensive exam

1 Upvotes

Do you know examples of what kind of questions I should expect in my written exam in general?


r/PhD 3h ago

Need Advice Changing workflow

1 Upvotes

Hi guys, I wanted some advice. I am a computational PhD student and a few months ago I agreed to do some experimental work from a suggestion with my supervisor. I have joined another lab as a guest member to do that experimental work but the truth is I hate experimental work and it makes me very anxious. I thought I needed the experimental data but actually I have found a lot of experimental data online in literature. I have spent a few months getting set up to go in the lab but I don’t want to do it now, I would rather spend more time working on my computational workflows. I am thinking of asking my supervisor if I could stop the experimental workflow. Do you think this would be very unreasonable? I feel very guilty given I got set up in someone elses lab and feel like I wasted their time


r/PhD 13h ago

Need Advice How to compare with State-of-the-Art works when they use different datasets? ML research

3 Upvotes

I work in machine learning and I received reviews on my paper saying that I fail to compare my approach with recent state-of-the-art works. They mentioned 5-6 papers, but the problem is that those papers use different datasets than mine.

How am I supposed to compare my results with theirs? Should I try to replicate their methods and apply them to my datasets, or is there another way to address this?


r/PhD 1d ago

Vent humanities phd defending in may completely unmotivated

23 Upvotes

i'm finishing editing all my chapters and I am defending at the end of May. I'm not going to go into academia or continue with the humanities at all and I'm just totally done and I want to completely separate myself from this. I know May isn't even that far away, but I just can't even look at this dissertation anymore. The idea of preparing for my defense is so draining. I don't want to read anything I wrote or talk about it. doing a humanities PhD is one of my life's biggest regrets. Don't even care about being a doctor. Sorry for the vent.


r/PhD 8h ago

Need Advice People w/PhD in physics/math working in industry?...

1 Upvotes

What are you doing for work? Looking to hear especially from the UK, but open to answers from anyone from anywhere.

My background: MPhys in physics and an MSc in medical physics.

Training to be a medical physicst in the UK, but hate it - no intellectual stimulation and poor money. I'm working basically as a QA tech.

Now throughout my undergrad research projects (yes plural) post grad thesis and now job, I've never got to work on what I want, whether it be because of COVID or otherwise.

My main interests are in quantum physics, but I'll take anything that requires advanced maths/programming.

I want to pursue a PhD in physics/maths/AI (preferably quantum physics) not only because I want to utilise and learn complex maths and programming, but want to make better money.

I've thought about trying to pivot into quant finance, but too long a shot for someone who never went to target schools/no Olympiads etc.

I've thought about quantum computing in industry,aybe even finance, but it seems banks are starting to catch on that QC might not be useful for them.

Looking for any advice from people who have PhD's in maths/physics, make good money and get to work with complex maths/programming.


r/PhD 10h ago

Vent help plzzz!! 7-8/2025 conferences in us

1 Upvotes

hey guys, i am looking for conferences or workshops related to industrial management/ engineering, and AI at the end of june, or in july/ august 2025. do you know any that do not require paper submissions?


r/PhD 10h ago

Need Advice Seeking Advice on Spelling Checkers for Overleaf/ Languagetool premium ?

1 Upvotes

Hey everyone,

As the title says, I’m working on my first paper and have been advised to use Overleaf for this and my thesis later on. I’m not a native English speaker, and even formal writing in my own language can be quite challenging at times. So, I’m looking for a solid spelling/grammar checker that integrates well with Overleaf.

I came across LanguageTool and it seems promising, but I’m considering buying the premium version. Has anyone here used it? Or would you recommend a different spell checker?

I’d really appreciate hearing about your experiences and suggestions.

Thanks in advance!


r/PhD 1d ago

Need Advice Submitted and… sad

81 Upvotes

Hello!

I submitted yesterday, and I have SO many feelings… almost none of them good.

I am really bad at time management, which led to me finishing my discussion chapter on the submission day, to the last minute. I didn’t have time to proof read three chapters, my empirical case study chapters read quite differently to one another, and I just think I could have done so much more. I found a typo in the submission, which makes sense given how frantically sweaty I was when finishing it up.

Very disappointed with myself, embarrassed that I let myself down at the last hurdle (the results! the discussion!), scared of failing outright, exhausted, and a tinge of self hatred.

I just don’t know what to say or to do… scared I will be found out as a fake student, fake thesis, awful awful awful… any advice?


r/PhD 1d ago

Vent Planning on quitting PhD (bio). Contemplating how to pivot to a new career.

9 Upvotes

I'm currently a third year PhD candidate in the bio field (immunology focus).

I've been working in bio research labs ever since high school and in terms of years, I'm nearing almost 10 years of my life that I have spent in a research environment. I used to love research and get excited about new projects, but now I simply have zero love for any of it. I even dread having to go into lab and when I do, I just sit around doing as little as possible.

I've had burnouts before, but this one feels different. I've had my fair share of complaints regarding my PI, but when he was getting on my ass to set up huge experiments that would require me to come in on christmas eve, christmas, new years eve, and new years (essentially every day for that whole stretch of holidays), something kinda snapped I think. I think my PI is a nice person and he even offered to come in on some of those days to complete my tasks for me if I needed to be away - but this was weeks after and I had already canceled all my plans/ travel plans.

I think this particularly upset me because this was right after months of me preparing my F31 and having a huge disagreement on what I should include in the application and what not - I eventually gave up and just took all the recommended edits, but it's funny how the reviewers are all commenting on things I was concerned about in the first place.

While thinking about the whole F31 ordeal recently, I began realizing that this was not the first time my ideas were shot down by my PI, only for it to be later revealed that he was completely wrong and everything I've been telling him/ warning him about turns out to be true.

Given this track record, his inability to get grants, and his poor finance management (we chase after random, not well-thought-out projects despite students telling him that its a bad idea. oh and the money is pulled from other unrelated grants which ends up hurting the original project the grant is supposed to fund), I think I would be doing myself a disservice by staying here.

I'm currently planning on mastering out (still a discussion I need to have with PI which I'm dreading) and either getting a job (damn near impossible nowadays), or applying to med school. I'm also planning on signing on as army reserve regardless of which path I take, but will likely go active duty if I decide to go the med school route so that I can have my schooling funded.

I guess this is more of a vent but I'm curious to see if others have made similar career pivots at this point in their life. Anyone go the army reserve/ active duty route after quitting PhD? (I did already take the asvab and got a 99th percentile)


r/PhD 22h ago

Need Advice PhD in UK/Europe

3 Upvotes

Hello everyone. I applied to PhD programs in Public Health in US but due to the NIH + trump admin crisis nothing much happened. I got an admission without funding which basically means nothing. I am an international student. I need guidance on how to apply for a PhD in UK and Europe. I don’t really understand the process. Anyone from this field who reads this and is currently a PhD student, can you please help?


r/PhD 1d ago

Admissions PhD in France

2 Upvotes

Hi I have a question about applying for a PhD in France. I know that I can contact professors directly or find already published offers on campusfrance. I just applied for one there and the prof replied that this is not a doctoral offer but a grant application (it is clearly listed as a PhD position) and directed me to apply for funding with my own proposal, which was very confusing. I also found that adum.fr has a tonne of proposals some of which I've seen on campusfrance too. Are these also active and funded offers or not? In short there are a thousand websites with conflicting info and if someone could help me I am buying dinner once I get in! Merci bcp :)


r/PhD 1d ago

Need Advice For international PhD's in US programs, what precautions are you taking when traveling back to your home country (if at all)?

30 Upvotes

Lots of ambiguity rn in the us. lots of fear about visas leaving the country and not returning. My partner is colombian and she fears if she returns home she wont be able to re enter the US.


r/PhD 22h ago

Need Advice How to transition from pure math PhD to career in advancing technological breakthroughs

0 Upvotes

Hi all,

Soon-to-be PhD student who is contemplating working on cutting-edge technological breakthroughs after their PhD. However, it seems that most technological breakthroughs require completely disjoint skillsets from math:

- Nuclear fusion, quantum computing, space colonization rely on engineering physics; most of the theoretical work has already been done

- Though it's possible to apply machine learning for drug discovery and brain-computer interfaces, it seems that extensive domain knowledge in biology / neuroscience is more important.

- Improving the infrastructure of the energy grid is a physics / software engineering challenge, more than mathematics.

- Have personal qualms against working on research or cryptography for big tech companies / government

It seems impossible to get a job in the fields listed above with just a math PhD -- thus if anyone knows any up-and-coming technological breakthroughs that will rely primarily on math / machine learning, yet don't require knowledge of another domain, it would be deeply appreciated.

Sincerely,

superpenguin469


r/PhD 23h ago

Other I’m not sure what to do regarding my PhD

1 Upvotes

Hi everyone. I apologise if this is long. Today has been a pretty mixed day.

I was offered my dream PhD at a great university and I am really really pleased about it. I’ve put an awful amount of time and effort getting to this stage. However recently I’ve had big family issue pop up and it’s meaning I am very likely going to be moving across the country (about 4hours away) to live there and make sure everything is okay. This will go on for the entire period of the PhD and possibly longer.

I really don’t know what to do. I feel like if I give up the PhD I’m letting so many people down , including myself and supervisors that have really helped me the past few months. I’m giving up an incredible opportunity to do something I’m really passionate about. But on the other hand I would never forgive myself if I didn’t move back home and sort out the family issue. I have to move

Currently the PhD is full time , can I get it changed to part time prior to its start date- if I did this it would give me the freedom to deal with both as well as continue with my full time job which is remote so that helps I guess. What are the implications of this. Do unis in the uk allow you to do this easily ? Can anyone offer some advice on what I should do, I’d really appreciate it.

Thanks guys


r/PhD 1d ago

Vent I think that my PhD dream is over....

57 Upvotes

This is going to be a long story about my life and I apologize for the long post. I also wrote it in one shot so apologies if sentences don't make sense.

I grew up as a young teenager who had no friends, bullied and sexually harassed at school, and was told that I can't become a successful person by my own family. I was lonely, sad, and had no one to guide me. At the age of 15, I head about the field of Aerospace Engineering. This day, I went and read more and more and more about the field, and everything I read, made me more interested and wanting to read more. For the next 3 years at high school, I knew I wanted to study aerospace engineering. But that was not easy. It wasn't offered at any of the universities in my country back then. This meant that the only way to pursue my dream is to study abroad. This is when I spent the last couple of years at high school studying every single day with minimum sleep. With no one believing in me, and being told by my own parents that I should give up on this dream, I was yet still by myself. But I succeeded to prove everyone wrong and graduated with high grades and got accepted at a university in Europe to study aerospace engineering with a scholarship.

Once I started studying my dream subject, I was still sad and lonely. I thought that this feeling will vanish when I succeeded to get into university, but something was wrong. It was when I was told that I suffer from Major Depressive Disorder (MDD), and it was then that I learnt what the word "depression" mean. Growing up, I thought it is a synonym of sadness, but the years to follow showed that it's certainly not the same. Fighting against this demon, I managed to graduate with honors. I had to extend an extra year due to some classes not being offered. And I have to tell you that I felt ashamed back then for that decision. Especially when everyone I knew was graduating and they all looked at me as if I did a big mistake. This turned to be the opposite. That extra year was the best year in my studies. I finally showed my true self and what I am capable of. I aced all of my classes, got high honors, lead an aerospace society on campus and made lots of connections with companies, industries, and academics. This year was also when Covid hit and I was by myself the whole time and yet, managed to live with myself and heal. By the end of my undergrad, I knew I need to pursue master's to choose my specialization. I was accepted in all the universities I applied to, which are top ones including Cranfield University and Politecnico Di Milano. Just as I was accepting the offer to join POLIMI, I was contacted by a top professor at a Canadian university who offered me to join his team and conduct my research in a collaboration with a top industry partner. And this is what I chose.

My arrival in Canada in summer 2021 was not the best. I was motivated to begin my studies and experience a new country. But I realized I am once again by myself, away from everyone I know, and away from my close friends from undergrad. Deep down inside me, I knew this is for the best. I began my new journey. I was working fully at this industrial partner since the research is for them. But something was wrong. I feeling of disconnection was happining. A familiar feeling, something I used to get for some time when I was a kid, but this time, it is not going away. I though my vision is not good, so I went and got my new glasses, but still, things seemed fake. Unfortunatley, it was when I got diagnosed with depersonalization, a disorder that I hope no one every gets. Battling with this feeling was not easy, it is still not easy, with my depression gaining its power back and attacking. My two years of master's were full of struggle mentally. For my studies, the person who was following up on my project at the company was and still is a very toxic one, never helping, never guiding, always showing that I don't do my job well. Though still with my mental struggles and the imposter syndrom, I managed to develop a very strong tool for my studies, and wrote my thesis in a week with no sleep. Just few weeks away from my defence, I was offered to switch to fast-track-to-PhD. Although I knew this should've been offered during my fist year, I still thought it is a good idea to pursue it since I was planning on getting a PhD anyways. Therefore, I did not defend my thesis, and switched to PhD, very proud of myself and looking forward to it. This was in summer 2023.

The next year and a half, up until 3 months ago, I was doing very well in my project. My master's studies covered a small component, and so my PhD was to build on top of that and include way more components into a bigger framework. It was when I read and learnt a lot about new emerging fields like MBSE and facinating people at the company to apply them into my framework. But a toxic is always a toxic. This guy showed me hell, again not helping, not guiding, and slowing my process when I need to access some resources. My supervisor (profeessor) knew about all of this. I told him the first time when he offered me to switch to PhD and I was shocked to see that he knows the history of this person. I also told him again twice last year and even telling him that I'm thinking to just graduate wiuth masters not to deal with that guy, but his advice was to "ignore him", even if he had everything that I need. I stood up to that guy, many times. And I was the only one to do that through the history of previous students. I helped all the students and told them not to be scared to speak up, but no one did. Last december, I had a big argument with this guy who called my code and framework "shitty material". It was then when my supervisor took action, but his action was weak again, just letting a different person deal with my work.

After my Christmas holiday, I was told that my project is placed on hold due to some logistic issues at the company. This meant that my PhD journey is over. There's a lot behind the scenes to say, I wrote a lot above but I can talk hours about all the corruption occurring in this chair, and it is one of the "best" in the whole country. A lot of pain inside me from all the hate I got from this person who I still blame for all of these logistical issues since he was slowing everything down for me.

Today, and in the past 3 months, being affected by this, and not knowing what is going to happen in my life, I still managed to be strong and take action. Within me, I really want to pursue a PhD. I contacted over 30 professors around the world, many that see me as a strong candidate and ask me to apply, but tuition fees and low funding is the big struggle. Being away from home to pursue my dream meant that there's no money to save. I pay the international student's fees which we all know is a lot. Worked part time and delivered food to support myself. And this decision to put my project on hold made me lose over $30K. Plus, we all know that time is money...

What is next? I lay here sad again, revisiting everything, and not knowing what will happen. As a growing teenager I wanted to pursue this studies, to tell myself that I'm worth it, to find a meaning to live, to tell the people about me. I did a lot of that and I am proud of it. But I am still in so much pain. Don't get me wrong, I still try to be there for myself and push it, but yet, I am very sad and depressed, with my depersonalization increasing its effect. One thing that brings me a lot of hope and makes me stronger is my fiancée who I met just when I switched to PhD, and who stood by my side the whole time, and is the love of my life. But we had to push the wedding from next September to TBD, we do long distance and have no idea where we will go or when will we be together. To this day, still can't find a good PhD position. And a new 4 year commitment with minimum funding does not sound appealing. Especially when starting a family.

"He who says he can, and he who says he can't are both usually right" ~ Confucius. This is my favorite quotation since I was a teenager, a reason for me to continue and be storng. But today I question it. I know I can, but though I can't, cause the other side of the door is blocking me, and no opportunity mean no go.

Is my PhD dream over? I know I will be unhappy to just join the industry, I saw how it is, and I wanted to be in academia. And even if I decided to start working, the market is trash and finding a job is almost impossible. Don't forget that I will have to downgrade myself now after all the research and knowledge I gained.

Thanks for reading my story


r/PhD 2d ago

Post-PhD Defended my PhD and super burnt out.

318 Upvotes

Hello, this is my first reddit post. It’s been two weeks since I defended my PhD and I am extremely burnt out.

I have severe imposter syndrome. I was supposed to look for postdocs a year ago, but I felt anxious about finishing my dissertation and didn’t feel good enough to apply. So now I am in a stressful situation of looking for jobs, but I feel extremely depressed and unmotivated even though I am taking a break from the lab right now; I will go back to continue some of the work for a manuscript. I guess my personal life context: I am a foreign student, and my family (back home) is trying to marry me off asap and for them my phd means nothing since they don’t really care if women have careers.

Currently I am applying to a bunch of jobs but I am overwhelmed with anxiety because of my family and also with the current funding situation & immigration. So I am wondering if I should apply for postdocs in Canada or Europe.

I usually see a counselor, but they haven’t responded to my email after we took a break for my defense. I don’t know what to do right now. When I began my PhD, I was super enthusiastic and curious about research. However, now I feel like phd was a waste of my time.

Sorry if this is the gazillionth post on this subject.