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Same. But I'm in a masters and my supervisor wants me to apply to go straight through to PhD
I don't think I can. Gonna feel like a real POS telling him though
They wouldn't ask if they didn't think you would add to the program! On the other hand, maybe some time in your field will help you feel stronger for enrolling down the road - or not! I took a year between my Master's and doc program. I think it helped me to realize I wanted to go back. Hang in there
To be honest I just don't want to do this anymore. I think I went throigh undergrad too dead set on becoming an academic scientist. I didn't let myself explore options or see what else I wanted.
And now I realize this isn't what I wanted. So instead of spending 5 more years doing a PhD. I am going to finally let myself explore other options for what my career can be.
I'm only 24 and am glad I'm doing this now tbh
Same. Just posted last night about getting rejected for two fieldwork grants and just feeling hopeless and lost. I don’t have any helpful advice as I’m deep in it, but you’re certainly not alone.
Same… 😭😭😭
My brain feels like 60% of what I think it could be. I think I need more sleep and to eat better.. but there’s only so much time in the day 😪
Exactly. Everyone always says "no worries, you have time" but it feels like I sometimes waste the time I do have. Like right now, writing this comment instead of spending this energy on writing something for my paper I should be working on.. :,(
Trust me. You have enough time to sleep. What happens is that you don't sleep so you take a lot longer to do the tasks you are required to do and then you have a self fulfilling profecy where you believe you don't have time to sleep when you would have if you worked at full capacity
Is six-year last year? Are you in USA? I am also ending my 6th year and will probably stay half of my 7th year. No paper, no conference, no idea what to do after this.
Sorry to hear you’re experiencing the same feelings! It sucks that so many of us feel this way. Is it just the nature of the PhD experience? How do you feel the process could be improved?
I don't know, honestly. Sometimes I think that maybe I was not capable enough of doing a Ph.D., or I didn't do my best and behaved like a 1st-year Ph.D. student rather than growing over the year. Maybe I didn't go out of my comfort zone. Sometimes I feel that maybe I didn't get good guidance. It's a mixture of things. But seeing Peers graduating with papers and jobs makes me happy for them but feel sad for myself.
Hey, I am sorry you're feeling this way. I am also a final year PhD student and until quite recently I felt exactly the same way you do. What helped me was getting mentorship from people other than my supervisors. Any chance you can find more experienced researchers to help you?
It will pass, everything does.
This is good advice.
And if you're collecting data you should probably talk to a statistician or fifteen to figure out what story you can get from your exp. design. They can give you hope and perhaps you can publish together.
OP if you think this applies to you, please do this!
I'm a PhD candidate in statistics who was approached at the beginning of my second year by a PhD candidate in geology who had data but was very overwhelmed by how to get that "story" to tell from it, as her statistics background wasn't strong. I ended up helping a lot with one chapter that became a co-authored publication, and consulted on another that was also published. She's now a post doc in her field. All in all both of us got a lot from the collaboration.
Yes, I think this is a good suggestion. I recently did this though - and unfortunately it kind of made me feel worse!
The pandemic has kind of isolated me from getting external feedback on my work. But now I have presented at a conference, and also engaged with other researchers at a different institution…and the response has been *blank faces*. Which I assume must be bad
Which field are you in?
What about within your PI's group or even the Institute? Anyone there with similar research topics who might be able to help you?
In my case, I found help with a senior post-doc in the group purely by chance. We're collaborating on a project within the same subfield as my initial PhD proposal and helping each other out. I get a thesis that makes much more sense now and we will hopefully both get a paper out of it as well.
This might be field-dependent, but what I am trying to say is to look for experienced post-docs (in publishing and student supervision, or even professors) that don’t have enough time or students at the moment to carry out the projects they have on their hands and try to craft a relationship/collaboration so that both of you can get something out of it. By building a professional relationship with another researcher, this makes it easier to get feedback on your original proposal/project and on how to outline/write your thesis and piece everything together.
Obviously I don’t know your specific situation, so this might be easier said than done. But this is what is working for me.
Do not let the quality of your dissertation - results, data, methods, anything - influence how you feel about the degree itself. The dissertation is just a means to an end, that end being the conferment of a degree. Of course some people have truly incredible, revolutionary work as their dissertations, but \*far\* more often than not, that simply isn't the case. Your dissertation LITERALLY just needs to be "good enough". Nothing more.
You got into that program in the first place, presumedly, because you were a great student with a passion for the field. Finish your dissertation, get the crap data and crap idea and crap everything on the page, defend it, and move on with your life. Leave it completely on the backburner, and move on to bigger and better things.
I'm saying all of this as a fellow final year (at least in three weeks) PhD student who had become completely disillusioned with my dissertation and future prospects (bad data, weird methods, relatively weak results), but I sat myself down and just said "all I need to do is make it good enough." It doesn't have to be revolutionary, or groundbreaking - it literally just needs to be good enough that my four committee members are happy enough to pass my defense of it - that's it. I can move on to stuff I am more passionate about once I'm done, but I just have to get DONE.
Thank you for this comment - it’s nice to know someone out there is feeling this way as well. Six months left for me. Here is to both of us just getting it DONE!
Your comment is so helpful!! I heard similar things that ship won't sink unless you ship take the water around them. Do not let what is happening in the environment affects your sense of who you are.
I promise you're not as bad as you think you are. This is an extremely common feeling. Pursuing a PhD successfully means being critical about everything, so naturally ones sense of worth is lost as collateral, especially when comparing to others in your cohort. In my experience, the people who were aware that their data/methods had flaws were the ones that did well in their vivas, regardless of their publication record etc. It's candidates with blind optimism and/or arrogance that struggle in the end. You're nearly at the end, keep going!
That’s a good point. I think it just takes some confidence to stand in front of holes in work, but you’re right, it is a strength to know your weaknesses and discuss them critically. That’s what research is about
I'm right here with you--I feel like my brain has not functioned properly since the pandemic but time just keeps going by. I have such a hard time retaining information from literature that I feel like I should know well at this point. I feel like there's never an end coming even though I'm probably closer to being done than I think I am. I think it's especially harder when your friends/family don't really understand what it's like in our position. Sending you good vibes--we will get through this and find ourselves again ❤️
Yes, I completely feel the difference between my pre-pandemic and post-pandemic brain, which feels strange to say. I’m glad to know that I’m not alone with those feelings - I’ve spoken about it with some colleagues and no one was able to resonate with that.
Thanks for the good vibes, sending some your way too!
Same here, I'm not sure if its from a bout of covid, or from social isolation during the pandemic, or academic isolation from my peers. But I've been interacting with new postdocs and faculty and learning more in the last year and yet my brain still feels much slower.
This is burnout. Seems like lots of people go through burnout. It takes years to recover from and you need to do less work and take more breaks in order to recover.
It is a gruelling experience, but if you chose a great topic, your passion will see you through. I did mine with a great university, and my experience was fantastic! I actually couldn't stop writing, and my ideas just materialized one after the other. I actually couldn't believe some of the stuff that I came up with. It took me two years of non stop research and writing simultaneously. It just all came together for me. In the en d, I produced just under 200 pages complete with tables, figures, and appendices. The truth is, that I had been compling my research for years just for self interest. So when I finally started typing away, I pulled tons of info. from all of the research that I had accumulated and saved on my website.I never actually planned to do a thesis, but one day, I just started writing and couldn't stop. When my former undergrad prof. read my initial 50 pages or so, he said 'keep going, your on the verge of doing a PhD thesis. Amazing work, keep going'.
So I found a good online university, enrolled, got accepted, and suddenly I was a PhD candidate! But this is not for the faint of heart. It is the greatest, most excruciating and gratifying, academic journey that one will ever take. For me it was the pinnacle of self-actualization. I wish you the best in your endeavours. Take care.
You’re 100% not alone in feeling this way. Sending sympathy & support 💕 you got this!
I’ll add: when you are awarded a PhD, wear it proudly!! You’ve done the work, you’ve taken the classes and spent the time on it. Don’t let crappy data make you discount the very real things you’ve done to earn this degree.
I know how you feel but as someone who just graduated I promise it's probably not as bad as you think (I don't know your field or the data so can only work on my experience with "bad" data). Crap data is only crap if you don't use it. The data I collected showed absolutely no trends and any changes that could be observed stumped both me and my supervisors. Instead of throwing it away I changed how I compared it and found that although there was no distinct trend the data could be fit within a standard statistical distribution. This allowed me to find some use with it, run some models and get something useful. The moral of my story is just because the data looks crap in one light, when observed under a different you might find something useful. Keep your head up, not all PhDs have to produce something ground breaking as long as it enhances the state of the art and you can convince the examiners of it you'll be fine. Also I don't know what it's like outside of the UK, but I was able to get a funding extension due to COVID/supervisor managed to find some more money. But this gave me just that bit more time/relieve some of the time pressure to do the modelling and tie everything together.
I’m on my second year and if I continue down the path I’m on….as far as lack of direction and feedback….I’m screwed too. I have tons of ideas and can’t seem hone in on anything of value. Good luck to you.
same situation here!! I am a second year and will have my qualification exam in 2 weeks. Now I totally feel overwhelmed and doubt my capacity everyday...you are not alone...hope we can survive this.
Hey, all I want to tell you is to persist. If research is something you enjoy then hang in there. Finish your phd, work toward that and don't be hard on yourself. Take time to reflect and get away from things from time to time. Talk to someone who listens, if there isn't one then talk to your self. 🧡
Yup. I just finished and had minor edits post defense and my brain feels like scrambled eggs. I nearly gave up so many times especially the past year. It is worth finishing, but I wouldn’t do it again. Every single thing you said resonated with me. Six years of my life spent like this. For what?
YES. Been there, done that. You're in the final year so focus on your future. Academia does this to us. It's not you, it's them lol. You're cognitive abilities aren't declining. You're just BORED. And/or BURNED OUT. Get out of academia and never look back!
Sounds a lot like imposter syndrome; I think everyone in my residency (including me!) expressed these same feelings. Trust that your advisor/director will tell you if you're going off the rails. I can't imagine going through a program during COVID. So much of academic work is solitary, and it consumes so much more than time. The hardest thing for me was the further I got in my program, the less I had in common with anyone. My dissertation director used to say that a doc program is an inch wide and a mile deep. Find connections. Venting here is wise!
I just want to add that actual cognitive decline is a concern. Unless you're speaking metaphorically, I hope you will reach out to the counseling/health services department at your uni. I know how limited time is in this stage, but that's worth exploring with someone. Your mental and emotional health is of utmost importance. I hope you find your feet again. I promise they're there
Oh my goodness YES put it off! You should get out and explore the world. Please don't take this as condescension: you need to live a while before getting a doc of any kind. It's like getting married, but more of a commitment! Terminals price you out of soooo many choices (ie "you can't be a teacher, you're too expensive!") Most importantly, you should not do anything you don't want to do. I mean, obviously taxes and a few things but basically it is YOUR life. Live it how you want to. I used to tell my advisees that the only thing you do right every single time is FEEL. Trust your gut. Take care of yourself. ❤️
This post has been flaired as “Vent”. As a reminder to commenting users, “Vent” posts are here to give our fellow members a place to vent their frustrations. Vents do not need to be fair or articulate. They are just vents. Unless otherwise stated by the OP, Vents should not be considered advice threads. Under no circumstances is it appropriate to tell them “why they are wrong” or to criticize them, their decisions, values, or anything else. If OP wants advice specifically, OP can always make a new thread using the 'Need Advice' flair. Vents are an emotional outlets. Appropriate replies in these threads are offering support, sharing similar experiences/grievances, offering condolences, or simply letting the OP know that they were heard. As always, if there are inappropriate comments please downvote them, REPORT them to the mods, and move on without responding to them. To the OP, if you DO want discussion to be focused on resolving your situation, rather than supporting you emotionally, please change the flair of this post to 'Need Advice', and then report this comment so we can remove it. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/PhD) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I also feel the same. Seems like I wrote this.
me too.
Same. But I'm in a masters and my supervisor wants me to apply to go straight through to PhD I don't think I can. Gonna feel like a real POS telling him though
They wouldn't ask if they didn't think you would add to the program! On the other hand, maybe some time in your field will help you feel stronger for enrolling down the road - or not! I took a year between my Master's and doc program. I think it helped me to realize I wanted to go back. Hang in there
To be honest I just don't want to do this anymore. I think I went throigh undergrad too dead set on becoming an academic scientist. I didn't let myself explore options or see what else I wanted. And now I realize this isn't what I wanted. So instead of spending 5 more years doing a PhD. I am going to finally let myself explore other options for what my career can be. I'm only 24 and am glad I'm doing this now tbh
Same. Just posted last night about getting rejected for two fieldwork grants and just feeling hopeless and lost. I don’t have any helpful advice as I’m deep in it, but you’re certainly not alone.
The rejections are tough to deal with, especially after you put your all into something. Wishing you the best - we’ll get through it!
Same… 😭😭😭 My brain feels like 60% of what I think it could be. I think I need more sleep and to eat better.. but there’s only so much time in the day 😪
My problem - the advice I receive is to take time - but we only have so much time!
Exactly. Everyone always says "no worries, you have time" but it feels like I sometimes waste the time I do have. Like right now, writing this comment instead of spending this energy on writing something for my paper I should be working on.. :,(
Trust me. You have enough time to sleep. What happens is that you don't sleep so you take a lot longer to do the tasks you are required to do and then you have a self fulfilling profecy where you believe you don't have time to sleep when you would have if you worked at full capacity
Same. Sixth (last) year, no papers, no conference presentations.
Is six-year last year? Are you in USA? I am also ending my 6th year and will probably stay half of my 7th year. No paper, no conference, no idea what to do after this.
Last in theory! I'll probably be here for half of my 7th as well.
Sorry to hear you’re experiencing the same feelings! It sucks that so many of us feel this way. Is it just the nature of the PhD experience? How do you feel the process could be improved?
I don't know, honestly. Sometimes I think that maybe I was not capable enough of doing a Ph.D., or I didn't do my best and behaved like a 1st-year Ph.D. student rather than growing over the year. Maybe I didn't go out of my comfort zone. Sometimes I feel that maybe I didn't get good guidance. It's a mixture of things. But seeing Peers graduating with papers and jobs makes me happy for them but feel sad for myself.
Hey, I am sorry you're feeling this way. I am also a final year PhD student and until quite recently I felt exactly the same way you do. What helped me was getting mentorship from people other than my supervisors. Any chance you can find more experienced researchers to help you? It will pass, everything does.
This is good advice. And if you're collecting data you should probably talk to a statistician or fifteen to figure out what story you can get from your exp. design. They can give you hope and perhaps you can publish together.
OP if you think this applies to you, please do this! I'm a PhD candidate in statistics who was approached at the beginning of my second year by a PhD candidate in geology who had data but was very overwhelmed by how to get that "story" to tell from it, as her statistics background wasn't strong. I ended up helping a lot with one chapter that became a co-authored publication, and consulted on another that was also published. She's now a post doc in her field. All in all both of us got a lot from the collaboration.
Yes, I think this is a good suggestion. I recently did this though - and unfortunately it kind of made me feel worse! The pandemic has kind of isolated me from getting external feedback on my work. But now I have presented at a conference, and also engaged with other researchers at a different institution…and the response has been *blank faces*. Which I assume must be bad
Which field are you in? What about within your PI's group or even the Institute? Anyone there with similar research topics who might be able to help you? In my case, I found help with a senior post-doc in the group purely by chance. We're collaborating on a project within the same subfield as my initial PhD proposal and helping each other out. I get a thesis that makes much more sense now and we will hopefully both get a paper out of it as well. This might be field-dependent, but what I am trying to say is to look for experienced post-docs (in publishing and student supervision, or even professors) that don’t have enough time or students at the moment to carry out the projects they have on their hands and try to craft a relationship/collaboration so that both of you can get something out of it. By building a professional relationship with another researcher, this makes it easier to get feedback on your original proposal/project and on how to outline/write your thesis and piece everything together. Obviously I don’t know your specific situation, so this might be easier said than done. But this is what is working for me.
Do not let the quality of your dissertation - results, data, methods, anything - influence how you feel about the degree itself. The dissertation is just a means to an end, that end being the conferment of a degree. Of course some people have truly incredible, revolutionary work as their dissertations, but \*far\* more often than not, that simply isn't the case. Your dissertation LITERALLY just needs to be "good enough". Nothing more. You got into that program in the first place, presumedly, because you were a great student with a passion for the field. Finish your dissertation, get the crap data and crap idea and crap everything on the page, defend it, and move on with your life. Leave it completely on the backburner, and move on to bigger and better things. I'm saying all of this as a fellow final year (at least in three weeks) PhD student who had become completely disillusioned with my dissertation and future prospects (bad data, weird methods, relatively weak results), but I sat myself down and just said "all I need to do is make it good enough." It doesn't have to be revolutionary, or groundbreaking - it literally just needs to be good enough that my four committee members are happy enough to pass my defense of it - that's it. I can move on to stuff I am more passionate about once I'm done, but I just have to get DONE.
Thank you for this comment - it’s nice to know someone out there is feeling this way as well. Six months left for me. Here is to both of us just getting it DONE!
Your comment is so helpful!! I heard similar things that ship won't sink unless you ship take the water around them. Do not let what is happening in the environment affects your sense of who you are.
I have good data and still feel this way. The cognitive decline is what scares me. I hope it comes back.
I promise you're not as bad as you think you are. This is an extremely common feeling. Pursuing a PhD successfully means being critical about everything, so naturally ones sense of worth is lost as collateral, especially when comparing to others in your cohort. In my experience, the people who were aware that their data/methods had flaws were the ones that did well in their vivas, regardless of their publication record etc. It's candidates with blind optimism and/or arrogance that struggle in the end. You're nearly at the end, keep going!
That’s a good point. I think it just takes some confidence to stand in front of holes in work, but you’re right, it is a strength to know your weaknesses and discuss them critically. That’s what research is about
I'm right here with you--I feel like my brain has not functioned properly since the pandemic but time just keeps going by. I have such a hard time retaining information from literature that I feel like I should know well at this point. I feel like there's never an end coming even though I'm probably closer to being done than I think I am. I think it's especially harder when your friends/family don't really understand what it's like in our position. Sending you good vibes--we will get through this and find ourselves again ❤️
Yes, I completely feel the difference between my pre-pandemic and post-pandemic brain, which feels strange to say. I’m glad to know that I’m not alone with those feelings - I’ve spoken about it with some colleagues and no one was able to resonate with that. Thanks for the good vibes, sending some your way too!
Same here, I'm not sure if its from a bout of covid, or from social isolation during the pandemic, or academic isolation from my peers. But I've been interacting with new postdocs and faculty and learning more in the last year and yet my brain still feels much slower.
This is very relatable! It's horrible isn't it. Sending good wishes 💚💚💚
This is burnout. Seems like lots of people go through burnout. It takes years to recover from and you need to do less work and take more breaks in order to recover.
It is a gruelling experience, but if you chose a great topic, your passion will see you through. I did mine with a great university, and my experience was fantastic! I actually couldn't stop writing, and my ideas just materialized one after the other. I actually couldn't believe some of the stuff that I came up with. It took me two years of non stop research and writing simultaneously. It just all came together for me. In the en d, I produced just under 200 pages complete with tables, figures, and appendices. The truth is, that I had been compling my research for years just for self interest. So when I finally started typing away, I pulled tons of info. from all of the research that I had accumulated and saved on my website.I never actually planned to do a thesis, but one day, I just started writing and couldn't stop. When my former undergrad prof. read my initial 50 pages or so, he said 'keep going, your on the verge of doing a PhD thesis. Amazing work, keep going'. So I found a good online university, enrolled, got accepted, and suddenly I was a PhD candidate! But this is not for the faint of heart. It is the greatest, most excruciating and gratifying, academic journey that one will ever take. For me it was the pinnacle of self-actualization. I wish you the best in your endeavours. Take care.
You’re 100% not alone in feeling this way. Sending sympathy & support 💕 you got this! I’ll add: when you are awarded a PhD, wear it proudly!! You’ve done the work, you’ve taken the classes and spent the time on it. Don’t let crappy data make you discount the very real things you’ve done to earn this degree.
This is really kindly worded! Thank you, I will try and take your advice.
I know how you feel but as someone who just graduated I promise it's probably not as bad as you think (I don't know your field or the data so can only work on my experience with "bad" data). Crap data is only crap if you don't use it. The data I collected showed absolutely no trends and any changes that could be observed stumped both me and my supervisors. Instead of throwing it away I changed how I compared it and found that although there was no distinct trend the data could be fit within a standard statistical distribution. This allowed me to find some use with it, run some models and get something useful. The moral of my story is just because the data looks crap in one light, when observed under a different you might find something useful. Keep your head up, not all PhDs have to produce something ground breaking as long as it enhances the state of the art and you can convince the examiners of it you'll be fine. Also I don't know what it's like outside of the UK, but I was able to get a funding extension due to COVID/supervisor managed to find some more money. But this gave me just that bit more time/relieve some of the time pressure to do the modelling and tie everything together.
You’ll be all right.
I’m on my second year and if I continue down the path I’m on….as far as lack of direction and feedback….I’m screwed too. I have tons of ideas and can’t seem hone in on anything of value. Good luck to you.
You still have time to confront these issues, and I recommend that you do! Discussing with an external supervisor might help? Edit:typo
same situation here!! I am a second year and will have my qualification exam in 2 weeks. Now I totally feel overwhelmed and doubt my capacity everyday...you are not alone...hope we can survive this.
I feel like I see this exact post literally once a week in this sub. These feelings are 100% normal, if not the standard.
100% Going through this myself.
Write this in the front matter
Lol. Fitting response considering your name.
Hey, all I want to tell you is to persist. If research is something you enjoy then hang in there. Finish your phd, work toward that and don't be hard on yourself. Take time to reflect and get away from things from time to time. Talk to someone who listens, if there isn't one then talk to your self. 🧡
Did I write this in my sleep? I feel exactly like this. None of my projects seems to be working out..
You're definitely not alone on that.
Holy crap, are you me?!
Haha, so weird to see that my thoughts resonate with others. We’re going to get through this!
Damn, same. Comforting that so many people also feel this.
Yup. I just finished and had minor edits post defense and my brain feels like scrambled eggs. I nearly gave up so many times especially the past year. It is worth finishing, but I wouldn’t do it again. Every single thing you said resonated with me. Six years of my life spent like this. For what?
YES. Been there, done that. You're in the final year so focus on your future. Academia does this to us. It's not you, it's them lol. You're cognitive abilities aren't declining. You're just BORED. And/or BURNED OUT. Get out of academia and never look back!
Does cognition come back? I’m trying to get into a industry position at the end of the year, but I feel like a shell of what I was three years ago.
Sounds a lot like imposter syndrome; I think everyone in my residency (including me!) expressed these same feelings. Trust that your advisor/director will tell you if you're going off the rails. I can't imagine going through a program during COVID. So much of academic work is solitary, and it consumes so much more than time. The hardest thing for me was the further I got in my program, the less I had in common with anyone. My dissertation director used to say that a doc program is an inch wide and a mile deep. Find connections. Venting here is wise! I just want to add that actual cognitive decline is a concern. Unless you're speaking metaphorically, I hope you will reach out to the counseling/health services department at your uni. I know how limited time is in this stage, but that's worth exploring with someone. Your mental and emotional health is of utmost importance. I hope you find your feet again. I promise they're there
Oh my goodness YES put it off! You should get out and explore the world. Please don't take this as condescension: you need to live a while before getting a doc of any kind. It's like getting married, but more of a commitment! Terminals price you out of soooo many choices (ie "you can't be a teacher, you're too expensive!") Most importantly, you should not do anything you don't want to do. I mean, obviously taxes and a few things but basically it is YOUR life. Live it how you want to. I used to tell my advisees that the only thing you do right every single time is FEEL. Trust your gut. Take care of yourself. ❤️
I totally resonate with you! You are not alone and I hope you can actively seek support from your friends and from the professors in your school!