obsessed

[sr0304]

this may be an awkward time and place to bring this up, but is this website even healthy? i am not an obsessive, anxious person, and here I am, clicking refresh, fantasizing about getting into my dream schools, looking into acceptances and rejections from programs I don't know anything about, comparing GRE scores to see where I stand...

 

what is happening to me?

because if i'm the only one, i need to check myself. and if i'm not the only one, it would be nice to hear from you and be assured that we all take the same dose of crazy pills during this process.

 

i mean, in all candor, part of me wants to post this in the forums to find out how well or poorly everyone else is doing. so shameful.

[nohika]

Oh don't worry, I'm sitting here refreshing waiting for people to talk about applications so I can talk about applications and feel slightly less unhealthily crazy than I have so far.

 

Fun?

[LDNgrad]

I'm alternating between refreshing GradCafe and refreshing my email. You are not alone in your obsessiveness.

[firstsight]

Establishing Operation: Anxiety due to low-grade experiential neurosis (we don't know the outcome of something; we can't predict, can't prepare, not really)

Stimulus: ... Probably a chain of SR responses, actually, but we'll call the stimulus the existence of these forums/site, just for the sake of argument.

Response (class): Logging in, refreshing a page, writing a post, reading a post, watching the results page.

Consequence: reading other people talking about things you think about, finding information that relates to your situation, talking to other people, bonding over similar circumstances.

Reinforcement happens; positive reinforcement (new, novel, social interaction! UBER-REINFORCER WARNING LABEL GOES HERE) /and/ negative reinforcement (escape aversive stimuli such as... feeling alone in the process [social belongingness = uber-reinforcer too] *and* probably avoidance [who cares about doing those pesky dishes?]).

As a consequence of the reinforcement, response rates rise, leading to further reinforcement, leading to higher and higher response rates.

So it's basically Facebook... on crack. I'm freakin' surprised an applied bx analyst hasn't taken this as a tremendous opportunity to look at group activity from a behavioral standpoint. A whole group of people with high response rates, all basically on variable ratio schedules of reinforcement? And all pure, timestamped data? At least I know what I can do if my PhD plans don't go through. XD

[Bearcat1]

Wow, that's so fancy and impressive. (I realize that will read as sarcasm, which it is most certainly not.) Sometimes I forget I'm in such an unprecise field, and that really we make a lot of things up. This is so much more neat and tidy than anything I ever do.

[firstsight]

Behavioral stuff is fun, and really simple once you get the hang of all the terms! You can really explain any behavior in conditioning terms. Trust me when I say it's not hard. But it doesn't really tell you the depth of it; it's kind of... cold, I guess. Saying "people stop to look at art because it's reinforcing" may be absolutely correct, but /why/ you may stand there marveling for the seventy-billionth time about how gorgeous a Monet is and how peaceful it makes you feel just looking at it... that's something not quite so easily quantifiable, but just as accurate (and important). I think. I'm a little brain-dead from all these damn apps. XD

[Bearcat1]

A lot of art historians deal with things like that, but I've never come across any of those terms in art historical writing. Generally they use Freud and Lacan to explain reactions to art, which I don't find ever applies to what I study. Maybe I will break new ground and combine theory with actual, current behavioral methodology! The secret science nerd in me is always up for combining science with art.

[amlobo]

this may be an awkward time and place to bring this up, but is this website even healthy? i am not an obsessive, anxious person, and here I am, clicking refresh, fantasizing about getting into my dream schools, looking into acceptances and rejections from programs I don't know anything about, comparing GRE scores to see where I stand...

 

what is happening to me?

because if i'm the only one, i need to check myself. and if i'm not the only one, it would be nice to hear from you and be assured that we all take the same dose of crazy pills during this process.

 

Don't worry, overdosing on crazy pills here.  I can't figure out if this website is healthier or unhealthier than just having access to no information.  I have convinced myself that there is some kind of solace in the "known"... and that collective obsessing makes me feel at least a little bit less crazy.  Lol.  I have probably read all of the results for my program in the history of gradcafe... at least a few times.  

[viggosloof28]

Don't worry, overdosing on crazy pills here.  I can't figure out if this website is healthier or unhealthier than just having access to no information.  I have convinced myself that there is some kind of solace in the "known"... and that collective obsessing makes me feel at least a little bit less crazy.  Lol.  I have probably read all of the results for my program in the history of gradcafe... at least a few times.  

I am right there with you, amlobo!  I certainly feel less crazy chatting with everyone here...so - while it might not be the healthiest or most productive use of my time - I will continue this obsession at least until I hear back from my programs!

 

Heh - and just like you, I've been compulsively combing through the results for my field.  If I can't know the results yet, I'd at least like to know when I'm going to know the results!!

[amlobo]

I think if I can just get ONE acceptance, the level of crazy will decrease exponentially.  

[nohika]

I think if I can just get ONE acceptance, the level of crazy will decrease exponentially.  

 

Agreed. We'd know we're going SOMEWHERE, even if we weren't 100% sure where. I think I'll be hit with a bunch of senioritis when accepted, but...I just want to relax.

[whirledpeas13]

I KNOW I'm going insane. Lol. I have obsessive, perfectionistic, control-freak tendencies AS IT IS, but combine those qualities with what feels like I'm planning the rest of my life AND with the winter break where I am not getting out and interacting with many other human beings on any given day, and we get: super obsessive, cathartic, grad school hopeful obsessively monitoring her email and grad cafe.

[EdYouKateOr]

I KNOW I'm going insane. Lol. I have obsessive, perfectionistic, control-freak tendencies AS IT IS, but combine those qualities with what feels like I'm planning the rest of my life AND with the winter break where I am not getting out and interacting with many other human beings on any given day, and we get: super obsessive, cathartic, grad school hopeful obsessively monitoring her email and grad cafe.

Ditto I need you guys..kind of like a support group (full of enablers!!!) lol :-)

[nohika]

I KNOW I'm going insane. Lol. I have obsessive, perfectionistic, control-freak tendencies AS IT IS, but combine those qualities with what feels like I'm planning the rest of my life AND with the winter break where I am not getting out and interacting with many other human beings on any given day, and we get: super obsessive, cathartic, grad school hopeful obsessively monitoring her email and grad cafe.

 

Are you my twin?   I was absolutely delighted to go back to my work (at school) a week early because - people!! Not only people, but people that understand the wait!

 

School starts back up on Monday and I'm almost paralyzed now because I have sooooo much to plan for when it comes even just to schoolwork. A lot of my bad mental health-ish habits have started coming back because the anxiety is so bad. It's concerning to me, because I don't know what I'll do if it keeps getting worse...

[EdYouKateOr]

Are you my twin?   I was absolutely delighted to go back to my work (at school) a week early because - people!! Not only people, but people that understand the wait!   School starts back up on Monday and I'm almost paralyzed now because I have sooooo much to plan for when it comes even just to schoolwork. A lot of my bad mental health-ish habits have started coming back because the anxiety is so bad. It's concerning to me, because I don't know what I'll do if it keeps getting worse...

I too welcome back my work on !Monday! It will be a great distraction...no break til Spring Break and hopefully by then I'll know my fate!

[ridofme]

i am not an obsessive, anxious person, and here I am, clicking refresh, fantasizing about getting into my dream schools, looking into acceptances and rejections from programs I don't know anything about, comparing GRE scores to see where I stand...

 

Exactly! I really am not obsessive or anxious by nature, but this process has revealed a totally unexpected side of my personality. After exhausting most of the relevant threads in the Government Affairs sub-board, I found myself browsing only tangentially relevant posts by applicants in totally different fields - the humanities, engineering, geology, etc. My dreams have vacillated between getting into my top choice and having a blow-out party, to getting rejected by every single school and collapsing in shame.

 

I asked my parents, who applied in the 70s/early 80s, what this process was like pre-Internet. They said you basically fill out a form by hand, type your resume, gather a few materials, make a bunch of photocopies, buy some postage, drop everything in the mail, and wait a bit. I think they both took standardized tests of some sort, but neither remembers it as a particularly harrowing process. What simpler times...

[firstsight]

Yeah, access to information and that whole instant gratification thing makes this whole process /worse/ rather than better, I think. I've managed to wean my checking of the application status pages to maybe once a day... hearing back an informal rejection (interview invites apparently went out for one of my more reach-ier schools, nothing in my mailbox!) I think tempered/soured my desire to check obsessive-compulsively. But before that I was wearing out my mouse clicking 'refresh' on all the assorted browser tabs... >.>

[shadowclaw]

Well I am sometimes anxious about things (especially final grades, even when I know that I did well). However, I'm not prone to obsessively checking my email and searching forums to see how strangers are faring at the same things I am doing. There's just something about this process and how important it is that makes me refresh my email on my phone every 15 minutes when I'm away from home, and to stare at my computer constantly. So don't worry, you're not alone.

[PhDreams]

Awwwwwwww...... you become a different person until about April and then you morph back into the sweet, wonderful person that you always are.

 

Last year I saw myself turn into this obsessive catastrophe too...lol. But as soon as I got the first acceptance, it got a little bit better. I even applied to 10 schools! And as soon as I got an admit on the top half of my list... I started to feel normal again!

 

Promise you will get better and than you won't stay crazy for long!! All the best.

[sr0304]

i feel like i'm in good company : )

[Robin_Sparkles]

You know...I keep telling myself that this cannot be healthy.  Obsessively reading about other people obsessing over grad school and contributing my own dose of crazy here and there.

 

Yet then I think about it a little more.  I can only talk to my friends so much because most of them are not applying to grad schools.  And yet, it's constantly on my mind and there's a desire to talk about it. All. The. Time.  Here, we find other people that are obsessing, we find people willing to listen to our crazy thoughts on Holiday Greeting emails from out top schools, hoping it's a subtle sign of good things to come.  We can mention that during the meteor shower will driving home, we saw thirteen "shooting stars"...and that's the exact number of grad schools and internships we're applying to!  That has to be a sign.  And this is very cathartic.

 

We find people not only willing to listen to our crazy, but embracing it and sharing their own crazy.  I think this website, though unhealthy on so many levels, is preventing several of us from jumping off a bridge...or at the very least, saving our friendships with people who don't want to hear about grad school 24/7.

[sr0304]

amen to that scambra! i have many friends who are blindly optimistic ("why are you stressing?of course you'll get in everywhere") when they really don't understand the process, the degree of commitment, the level of stress. most of my buds (and i love em!) equate grad school with undergrad, downplaying the fact that grad applications are far more competitive and spots in programs are few.

 

sigh. i must admit i feel a kinship with my fellow "crazies." we're really not crazy...just...passionate. haha

[nohika]

You know...I keep telling myself that this cannot be healthy.  Obsessively reading about other people obsessing over grad school and contributing my own dose of crazy here and there.

 

Yet then I think about it a little more.  I can only talk to my friends so much because most of them are not applying to grad schools.  And yet, it's constantly on my mind and there's a desire to talk about it. All. The. Time.  Here, we find other people that are obsessing, we find people willing to listen to our crazy thoughts on Holiday Greeting emails from out top schools, hoping it's a subtle sign of good things to come.  We can mention that during the meteor shower will driving home, we saw thirteen "shooting stars"...and that's the exact number of grad schools and internships we're applying to!  That has to be a sign.  And this is very cathartic.

 

We find people not only willing to listen to our crazy, but embracing it and sharing their own crazy.  I think this website, though unhealthy on so many levels, is preventing several of us from jumping off a bridge...or at the very least, saving our friendships with people who don't want to hear about grad school 24/7.

 

This...so much. Thankfully my professors are more than willing to listen to me ramble (a couple of them, anyways) and two of my LOR writers are very similar to me in different ways and have had some strategies to help me calm down, but. Most students don't understand what a PhD is, what is expected of it, what the application process is like, etc. I'm basically the one that teaches them.

 

It's the bridge for me...I'm doing better, but I'm focusing on schools and fretting myself to death over insignificant stuff because I can. Not exactly healthy...

[Robin_Sparkles]

This...so much. Thankfully my professors are more than willing to listen to me ramble (a couple of them, anyways) and two of my LOR writers are very similar to me in different ways and have had some strategies to help me calm down, but. Most students don't understand what a PhD is, what is expected of it, what the application process is like, etc. I'm basically the one that teaches them.

 

It's the bridge for me...I'm doing better, but I'm focusing on schools and fretting myself to death over insignificant stuff because I can. Not exactly healthy...

 

Fretting over insignificant things is a special skill of mine.  I often contemplate putting it on my resume.  Particularly since I have auditions coming up. I've been obsessively going over my packing lists, making sure my apartment is spotless so I can focus easily and come home to a welcome environment, deciding and re-deciding on outfits, shoes, hair, accessories, and portfolio inclusions.  Details help.  They make you fret more, but it gives your mind something to work on and make important...because it can sometimes trick you into forgetting about the big things you're waiting on...

[nohika]

Fretting over insignificant things is a special skill of mine.  I often contemplate putting it on my resume.  Particularly since I have auditions coming up. I've been obsessively going over my packing lists, making sure my apartment is spotless so I can focus easily and come home to a welcome environment, deciding and re-deciding on outfits, shoes, hair, accessories, and portfolio inclusions.  Details help.  They make you fret more, but it gives your mind something to work on and make important...because it can sometimes trick you into forgetting about the big things you're waiting on...

 

I have been working on planning out every space of time for the next sixteen weeks. Or at least close to it. I pick random things (I study Japanese for fun, so I fret over that) to fret myself half to death and it works okay because it keeps me away from the issues that /really/ matter. Basically, worrying about anything but graduate school school.

 

I have so much going on this semester that I'm worried about how things will play out...