Hi everyone,
It's only halfway through my first semester of my social science PhD and I am already struggling hard. The stupid thing is that I understand and enjoy the material I am learning, and I like my program and my cohort a lot. But I am struggling so, so much with the time management aspect.
I have always sucked at managing my time, but my level of suckiness regarding time has increased ten-fold during my PhD. I've already been late turning in 5 assignments in varying classes because I underestimated the amount of time it would take me to complete them, and I am late to classes all of the time by 5 or 10 minutes. One day I was even 30 minutes late. Every time I am late doing something, it is so embarrassing and discouraging. I know that it is making me look unreliable and irresponsible to my professors and my classmates, which is upsetting me. If it happened just once in awhile it wouldn't be such a big deal - but it is definitely a huge pattern. I have communicated to two of my professors that I know time management is an issue for me, and that I am working to correct it, and they were understanding. I framed the conversation as "just wanted to let you know I do care a lot about these classes - don't want you to think I am blowing them off, I just struggle with time and am working on it," rather than giving excuses. I can't believe that I had to have that talk with them - being late has always been a problem for me but not missing deadlines has NEVER been something I thought it would develop into. I guess my time management problems are just a lot worse than I thought.
Meanwhile I am trying to work on things - I am in therapy to deal with my ADHD and anxiety/depression (contributing factors to my time management issues) + starting a new medication, bought a planner, and have been trying to track my time and set deadlines for myself. But I still keep turning things in late and being late to classes, and every time I am getting more and more frustrated. I don't want to wreck my chances to do well in this program or mess up my professors and classmates opinions of me. Plus it is so embarrassing that I am almost 30 and still haven't figured out how to be on time to things, when everyone else in my cohort is in their early 20's and doesn't struggle with this issue. I know fixing this is going to take time and can't figure out what to do to get better in the meantime. I'm trying to take it one day at a time, but I am getting really discouraged and starting to wonder if I should just put my PhD on hold until I get this under control. I am just worried I am going to do too much damage to my reputation while I am fixing it.
Just UGH. Does anyone have any suggesstions? Has anyone else ever struggled with this? I know I have skills in other areas that others lack and so comparing myself to others is dangerous but time management as a skill is SO IMPORTANT and seems SO BASIC that I just feel so silly for lacking it.
