How do I ace an SOP without recommendation from research mentor?

[poeticlife]

Dear all,

I am editing my SOP and feeling very insure. I started my biology research (regarding tissue regeneration) last year and it lasted till this summer. I was interactive, passionate, and willing to correct my mistakes asap in experiments. Also, I could learn lab skills faster than PHD candidate in my team. You know, I used to be a blank sheet of this field. I felt very very happy and peaceful in lab. My research mentor was a smart European professor, kinda strict yet very smart. She knew what my progress was and what mistakes I made. All went well.

Yet in February, I experienced a car crash accident. My TMJ had some problem before it, and this accident apparently made it worse. I could not show up regularly for 3 weeks. At the beginning of March, a university sent her a final notice concerning recommendation letter submission (she was one of my recommenders last year before I changed my direction of research). She then contacted me and said she would not write LOR since I was not showing up (before this accident, I put all my extracurricular time into research, almost). My mother educated me that I should show up, for instance, 2-3 days a week. The problem was, I was in pain and dizziness all time. I did not wanna screw up the experiment, wasting reagents for nothing and, yes, I said I could not go. 

After sincere apologies, she let me continue my project. I finished it up this summer and wrote a dissertation. At this time, I am pursuing a different, quantitative and interdisciplinary field of biology. And surely I am not gonna beg for a potentially bad LOR.

Oh, for supplement, she said in April that I did very well before Feb. Later it was just bad. I have to admit that later my efficiency was not high. I became literally dumb for a couple of months and later only pain and dizziness bothered me. But I kept my grade in course works.

I was upset for more than half year. It seemed that later mistakes were no longer tolerable. No compensation counted. I showed up, attended the lab meetings, worked my ass off on the dissertation. Yet I can no longer feel the pure happiness as what I had last year. This issue, the denial of recommendation seemed like an entire denial for my work, my potential, and my personality. 

I have learned a lot from this research project, gradually building up skills and the recognition of what my potential weaknesses which might prevent me from being a good researcher. This is s treasure for me, indeed. Yet I also face such a dilemma: how could I prove that I am a good candidate, if my research mentor does not write a LOR for me, proving what my reliability is? I do have good letters from other lecturing professors, yet how about my research? 

 

Yes, I could say what I did not do well were:

1 Last Feb., I could not tell her in advance that I could not show up (I tried too hard to prove that I could do it, yet I JUST COULD NOT.)

2 I should tell her how my disease had interfered my life.

 

I could even show AdCom letter from my doctor. But, but, but, I do not think it is meaningful or persuadable. Nor do I wanna earn the attention in such way.

 

Yet, here comes the question:

How do I prove that I would be a quality candidate without recommendation from research mentor?

[fuzzylogician]

I was upset for more than half year. It seemed that later mistakes were no longer tolerable. No compensation counted. I showed up, attended the lab meetings, worked my ass off on the dissertation. Yet I can no longer feel the pure happiness as what I had last year. This issue, the denial of recommendation seemed like an entire denial for my work, my potential, and my personality. 

 

...

 

Yes, I could say what I did not do well were:

1 Last Feb., I could not tell her in advance that I could not show up (I tried too hard to prove that I could do it, yet I JUST COULD NOT.)

2 I should tell her how my disease had interfered my life.

 

...

 

How do I prove that I would be a quality candidate without recommendation from research mentor?

 

From what I understand you didn't share the information about your medical condition with your advisor? If so, then consider how things look from her perspective - you started off well and did good work in the lab; then you disappeared for a while; then you came back but didn't do well; you improved for a bit; and then you were not doing well again. So while there were stretches of good work, overall you were not consistent both in showing up and in performance while in the lab. You have valid reasons, but you did not communicate them to the professor, and therefore she did not feel confident writing you a letter of recommendation. It's important that you realize that this is her interpretation of the situation based on incomplete information, and it's not -- I repeat, NOT -- a denial of your work, potential, and personality.

 

Now, you could try and talk to your professor, explain the situation and apologize for not sharing the information with her earlier. Of course, it's a legitimate decision not to share private medical with your teachers, but this choice may have consequences like the ones you are suffering from -- the professor only has partial knowledge of the situation, they see your struggle but don't know there is a reason for it. If you tell your advisor about the accident, she may choose to reinterpret past events and rethink and her conception of you. Perhaps through putting things in a new light she will agree to write you a letter, but you should be aware that the letter will probably have to mention both the periods of successful productivity and the periods of struggle; you will have to also address these periods of struggle in your SOP and explain that they will not recur (because they were the result of an accident, and otherwise you were doing well).

 

Will one or more of your other letters of recommendation discuss your research? If that is the case, then you could be successful without a letter from your advisor, although it might raise some questions. If this is the only letter writer who could discuss your research potential, then it's more of a problem. It's a likely eventuality that if you don't have a letter that talks about your research then you will have a hard time being admitted. It may still be worth trying, because you never know, but if you get rejected it will probably be because of this problem. It's possible that the best solution would then be to take another year to work as a research assistant in order to obtain better letters, and then try again the following year.