Venting Thread- Vent about anything.

[ihatechoosingusernames]

On December 18, 2015 at 4:14 AM, gingin6789 said:

While it's a good thing sleepless nights don't matter much now that the semester is over, sleepless nights still suck. I'm sick of this.

For me, sleepless nights usually happen for one of two reasons: 1) I'm worried about something and can't sleep, or 2) At some point I messed up my sleep cycle by staying up too late and then can't get back on a good cycle. For both of these, I've found that Emergen-ZZZ (Emergen-C with melatonin) helps a lot. It tastes better than regular Emergen-C, and I can drink a glass at night and be out like a light in 30 minutes no matter what is on my mind. The berry flavor is great, and the added vitamin C is always nice  

[gingin6789]

8 minutes ago, ihatechoosingusernames said:

For me, sleepless nights usually happen for one of two reasons: 1) I'm worried about something and can't sleep, or 2) At some point I messed up my sleep cycle by staying up too late and then can't get back on a good cycle. For both of these, I've found that Emergen-ZZZ (Emergen-C with melatonin) helps a lot. It tastes better than regular Emergen-C, and I can drink a glass at night and be out like a light in 30 minutes no matter what is on my mind. The berry flavor is great, and the added vitamin C is always nice  

Thanks for the suggestion, friend! I will have to pick some up from the store! 

That night, I was hurting quite a bit (had surgery December 4th, body is still recovering!) so I took a painkiller that did make me sleepy, but I find it also yields very shallow/light/not-deep sleep. And my mind was also racing that night! So I think this emergenzzz is something that could help in a pinch. Good alternative to my standby,  melatonin :-)

[ihatechoosingusernames]

8 minutes ago, gingin6789 said:

Thanks for the suggestion, friend! I will have to pick some up from the store! 

That night, I was hurting quite a bit (had surgery December 4th, body is still recovering!) so I took a painkiller that did make me sleepy, but I find it also yields very shallow/light/not-deep sleep. And my mind was also racing that night! So I think this emergenzzz is something that could help in a pinch. Good alternative to my standby,  melatonin :-)

I think Emergen-ZZZ and massive amounts of ibuprofen are what got me through the aftermath of my car crash right before Thanksgiving. Airbags hurt, man  Light sleeping is the worst, too. This application season has seen far too many nights of sleep where I'm pretty certain I've just laid there with my eyes closed. It's almost like my body is asleep, but my mind thinks all through the night. 

[gingin6789]

4 hours ago, ihatechoosingusernames said:

I think Emergen-ZZZ and massive amounts of ibuprofen are what got me through the aftermath of my car crash right before Thanksgiving. Airbags hurt, man  Light sleeping is the worst, too. This application season has seen far too many nights of sleep where I'm pretty certain I've just laid there with my eyes closed. It's almost like my body is asleep, but my mind thinks all through the night. 

Ugh, sorry to hear about the car crash... That's really scary and painful, too :-( I hope you are doing better now! 

That's exactly what it felt like to me: laying there for hours, thinking with my eyes closed! My favorite is when I mentally plan out these cool discussion points/lectures (not even a prof,just a TA) for hours...  of course I'm never as cool in real life as I sound in my restless mind though, lol!! 

 

[shadowclaw]

@highborn I really appreciated your vent on body image, gender, and race. While I'm white, I've often wondered if any of the negative or nonexistent responses from POI's were because I am female. As a fellow fat person, I also wonder how my weight factors into things. I've never had a grad school interview in person, so I really can't say my body factored into any admissions decisions. However, it has certainly factored into where I applied. I am overweight, but I'm not crippled by obesity by any means and I love hiking and other outdoor activities. I've had field jobs that required me to do a lot of walking in the woods. Yet when looking for labs, I saw several advertisements for PhD positions that specially started that applicants should be physically fit (because outdoor field work was involved). They didn't say "applicant should be prepared to hike rough terrain" or something like that. I felt like it would be a waste of my time and money to apply to these positions because I don't look fit (and obviously there is much room for improvement), and that these male professors would judge me on my looks and wouldn't give me the opportunity to prove myself. I guess we'll never know.

I can say that it did happen to me when I was 14. I was in our school's ecology club and the teacher ran trips to Panama and Ecuador every summer. I had saved up my allowance and Christmas/birthday money for two years and my parents matched my savings. I was so excited when I had enough money. I filled out the paperwork he required, but he never called my parents like he said he would do for all students who applied. They tried calling him, but he never returned their calls. When I asked him about it at meetings, he kind of beat around the bush and said he didn't have time to call them yet. Eventually, a friend who had gone on multiple trips with him (and coincidentally was a size 0 all through high school) asked about it for me, and he told her that he didn't think I could handle hiking in the rain forest and that maybe I could go when I had lost some weight. I ended up not joining the club in subsequent years. 

I don't want to get into my whole personal history, but I've been burned many, many times for being a girl, being fat, or both. So it's oddly comforting to see others with the same fears and experiences as me. I think I've been lucky in that I haven't experienced too much sexism in the schools I've ended up at, and no one's been terrible to me because of my weight in a while. But I do carry with me a lot of psychological baggage from my younger years when people were vicious or creepy. 

[kingslayer]

@shadowclaw For me, it's comforting as well because I need to hear stories of plus sized people who are in grad school/attending grad school so that way I can feel like I have somewhat of a chance (I'm super selfish right now in that aspect because I'm really scared). I honestly do know/believe someone with a 2.5 GPA and average weight would have a better chance than 3.5 GPA fat me. I am trying to work on myself, but it's not going to happen overnight--it's certainly not going to happen before interviews (if I get any at all) or before I start applying for jobs. Even in the job sector, I'm not going to fare too well even if I will have the luxury of flashing two bachelor's around. It just merges into all aspects of life. I mean, food is the one thing you can't avoid. If you're an alcoholic, you can avoid alcohol. If you're a smoker, you can cut smoking out of your life completely. But you need food to survive. People can understand, "forgive," and want to help someone who is anorexic, but someone who has binge eating disorder is ridiculed, shamed, blamed (especially by people who have no idea & have been average since birth).

I have the same problems you have though. like I still have flashback and trauma that accompanies bullying. I've been fat all my life so it's actually become part of my personality.

But let's face it; if you were a guy, you probably would have been allowed to go on the trip. Society is much more lenient toward men & body image than women.

[kingslayer]

My GRE scores were sent yesterday (12/23) which is great because I think I have around 6 applications that are due the 1st to the 5th. I'm just in panic mode because transcripts that were sent are not up on my portal yet. I'm telling myself it's because they're busy, but I have no idea of knowing. It was my fault because I sent them out in late November (there's a 1-10 day processing timeframe) due to financial reasons. But I made it really easy for all of my colleges; I pre-typed all of the transcript request forms (I have super bad handwriting), I included address labels so everything would be correct. A couple of them decided to not use said labels--I requested for a transcript to be sent to me, and they spelled my last name incorrectly. What if they did this with a college and it ended up not getting there?? All they literally had to do was print off 12 copies of my transcript, put them each in an envelope, stick on my label and a stamp, and that's basically it. I think if I DON'T get in anywhere, next cycle I'm only going to apply to colleges that ask for scanned transcripts initially, and then official ones if you are accepted. I hate that parts of my future are out of my hands. I actually read a story where the grad school received the transcript, lost it, and auto-rejected the applicant even though it was on them. Nightmares. Same goes with my GRE scores.

I've been debating whether or not I want to apply to another college. I really want to, but I don't know which one. I think I need another safety--I was thinking about applying to a pay-to-play college that accepts you as long as you have a heartbeat, but they'd want official transcripts so I wouldn't have enough money for that. At this point, I think time is going to either tick by dreadfully slow, or go into hyperdrive.

[Oshawott]

11 hours ago, highborn said:

 Same goes with my GRE scores.

 

Honestly, if you have a middle name, leave it out of your GRE's. A lot of schools I applied to didn't "receive" my GRE's, but it turns out they were just unable to match it to my application. Even though the applications had fields for "First Name", "Middle Name", and "Last Name" to fill out, they couldn't match my GRE's because the GRE makes you list your name like "FirstMiddle" with no spaces. I think its particularly problematic when they used an automated system to match scores with applications (even though the test scores have specific codes attached to them that some schools ask for)

My advice is if you are in this situation, first call the ETS to confirm the send date of your scores and anticipated arrival time, then call the institution with this information.

[haltheincandescent]

Brief holiday vent:

If you say "I'm not doing gifts, so don't get me/us anything either!" please, please don't actually still get people gifts, even small ones. ("You" here being my family.) While on the one hand, I understand that this is somewhat of a polite convention, wherein everyone says this to try to seem like they don't want something (when they really do--almost like fishing to see: "Does this person care enough to get me something even though/especially since I asked for nothing?"), and then everyone still gives gifts....on the other: just this one year, when I'm totally broke from application fees and only having an entry level job for the time being....it was a nice, slight relief to have to get nothing. I mean, I love finding gifts for people (more than I like receiving, to be honest), but just this year, I was totally down for a material gift-less get together, just spending time together. 

But, here I am, come home giftless (well, almost: I brought something small [a bottle of locally made coffee liquor], for both my dad and his [recently new] girlfriend, though it turns out she doesn't like it--so it ends up being mostly just for him), and now I feel terrible, because both my dad and his girlfriend have things for me. And now there's the slightest awkwardness from her, as if: "so do you not like me, or....?" So uncomfortable on about ten levels.

[gingin6789]

@hal, I totally agree!! My fiancé and I got each other gifts on black Friday and said "no more gifts, ok?" and we both kept the promise!! It was such a welcome relief to actually have  someone say "no gifts" and mean it!

It never usually goes that way though and it sucks. 

 

[lovekilledinos]

On 12/24/2015 at 11:49 PM, shadowclaw said:

I felt like it would be a waste of my time and money to apply to these positions because I don't look fit (and obviously there is much room for improvement), and that these male professors would judge me on my looks and wouldn't give me the opportunity to prove myself. I guess we'll never know.

This breaks my heart in so many ways. How awful that we've allowed others to make us limit ourselves due to negative perceptions. I had a similar problem--tangentially related, honestly--a few years ago while in undergrad; I got accepted to study abroad in Russia but for a while there I debated if I should go or not, because I felt that as a person of color, I didn't want to deal with racism in a country with which I was not personally familiar. Then I thought to myself, well screw that. Why should we stop living our lives because others are jerks? Why deny myself the experiences, opportunities and chances to do something amazing because I'm afraid of what others would say or do?

So I went abroad, fat Mexican girl and all, and I had a great time. 

I'm like 5'2" on a good day, I weighed in close to 300lbs at the time. I know absolutely what you ladies are feeling right now. If you ever wanna talk about weight, weight issues or even your relationship to food, I'm totally willing to chat. I've lost more than 100lbs between 2012 and 2014. 

[shadowclaw]

On 12/24/2015 at 4:11 AM, highborn said:

But let's face it; if you were a guy, you probably would have been allowed to go on the trip. Society is much more lenient toward men & body image than women.

Maybe, but maybe not. I know that probably 85% of the students that went on the trips were male. That may have just been an artifact of the ratio of applicants or who got their money in first. What I do know is that the teacher most definitely favored students for other club activities that were most like him - vegans, vegetarians, and really skinny people (not average people, but but students who looked a bit underweight).

On 12/24/2015 at 4:36 AM, highborn said:

My GRE scores were sent yesterday (12/23) which is great because I think I have around 6 applications that are due the 1st to the 5th. I'm just in panic mode because transcripts that were sent are not up on my portal yet. I'm telling myself it's because they're busy, but I have no idea of knowing. It was my fault because I sent them out in late November (there's a 1-10 day processing timeframe) due to financial reasons. But I made it really easy for all of my colleges; I pre-typed all of the transcript request forms (I have super bad handwriting), I included address labels so everything would be correct. A couple of them decided to not use said labels--I requested for a transcript to be sent to me, and they spelled my last name incorrectly. What if they did this with a college and it ended up not getting there?? All they literally had to do was print off 12 copies of my transcript, put them each in an envelope, stick on my label and a stamp, and that's basically it. I think if I DON'T get in anywhere, next cycle

It's always a good idea to e-mail admissions and confirm that your transcripts and other materials have arrived. Sometimes they are just slow in marking them received on the web portals, but sometimes the transcripts are just floating around. I know that this past application cycle, a lot of my materials were under a slightly different name. I got married while getting my masters, so my GRE scores and undergrad transcripts were under my maiden name, while my masters transcripts were under my married name. Even though I filled in the box on my applications that asks for other names materials may be submitted under, the admissions office at several schools didn't match them up until I e-mailed them about it. So it's very possible that if your school misprinted your name on a transcript, it could be sitting in the admissions office. It's also a good idea to contact your school and confirm that they sent out your transcripts. After being accepted to my masters program, I had to send final transcripts after graduation from undergrad. The transcripts were evidently lost in the mail, because when I e-mailed the registrar, they told me that they mailed my transcripts but never received the receipt confirmation card that they include (I'm not sure if this is a service the post office provides or if they actually include a postcard with the transcripts to be mailed back). So they resent the transcripts for me free of charge.

On 12/26/2015 at 0:29 AM, haltheincandescent said:

But, here I am, come home giftless (well, almost: I brought something small [a bottle of locally made coffee liquor], for both my dad and his [recently new] girlfriend, though it turns out she doesn't like it--so it ends up being mostly just for him), and now I feel terrible, because both my dad and his girlfriend have things for me. And now there's the slightest awkwardness from her, as if: "so do you not like me, or....?" So uncomfortable on about ten levels.

I feel your pain. We are really broke right now because my husband's work screwed up his paycheck and he didn't get paid before we flew home to visit our families for Christmas. So we had no money to buy any gifts, and even if he had gotten paid, the gifts wouldn't have been big, anyway. I ended up buying some things from the craft store and made a variety of ornaments for everyone, which they certainly appreciated. However, everyone was so freaking generous because we just moved out to the west coast for school in September and it's our first apartment and all. My sister and one of my brothers gave us gift cards on top of the gifts they gave us. They each must have spent close to $100. Granted, they can both more than afford to give so much, but I felt soooo bad. My parents also bought us a really nice kitchen mixer and had it shipped to us towards the beginning of the month and it was supposed to be our one big gift. Then come Christmas, they gave us a bunch more stuff plus a few hundred dollars in cash. Which is awful because I owe them some money that we borrowed to help move that isn't fully paid back yet, AND they spent so much money on us while we were visiting - they took us out to dinner three times, my mom took me to get a pedicure, they took us to the movies twice (and bought popcorn and drinks, which costs a small fortune at the theater). I feel immensely blessed to have such a wonderful family, but I feel very guilty not being able to offer anything in return.

8 hours ago, lovekilledinos said:

This breaks my heart in so many ways. How awful that we've allowed others to make us limit ourselves due to negative perceptions. I had a similar problem--tangentially related, honestly--a few years ago while in undergrad; I got accepted to study abroad in Russia but for a while there I debated if I should go or not, because I felt that as a person of color, I didn't want to deal with racism in a country with which I was not personally familiar. Then I thought to myself, well screw that. Why should we stop living our lives because others are jerks? Why deny myself the experiences, opportunities and chances to do something amazing because I'm afraid of what others would say or do?

So I went abroad, fat Mexican girl and all, and I had a great time. 

I'm like 5'2" on a good day, I weighed in close to 300lbs at the time. I know absolutely what you ladies are feeling right now. If you ever wanna talk about weight, weight issues or even your relationship to food, I'm totally willing to chat. I've lost more than 100lbs between 2012 and 2014. 

I'm super jealous that you got to visit Russia! I studied Russian in high school, and juniors and seniors had the opportunity to do an exchange for a few weeks. We would spent three weeks with a Russian family in the fall, and in the spring, a student from our host family would come stay with us for three weeks. There were five spots and as a junior, I was picked to go. Unfortunately, the trip got cancelled that year because 9/11 happened. However, I didn't have to reapply the next year. I had all of that money saved for the trip to the rain forest that I was going to use to pay for the trip to Russia (we had to pay up front for the trip, but then did fundraisers throughout the year to get as much money back as we could), but since I didn't go that year, I ended up buying a car. I got a second job over the summer to help replenish my savings, but the car ended up having a bunch of problems and all my money went into fixing it. So come senior year, I couldn't afford the trip anymore and gave my spot to someone else (who coincidentally was a kid with rich parents who drove a fancy car and didn't work during high school). The worst part of it all was that they were so successful with the fundraisers, that each student only ended up paying $400 towards the $2500 trip. If only we had done fundraising the year before!

I was also rather apprehensive each time I went abroad, wondering if people would see me as the fat American and be rotten to me. I had heard stories from other students about going to Italy and waiters refusing to serve them when they found out they were Americans... and these people were thin! I thought perhaps I should try to pretend to be Canadian and hope no one asked for details. However, I felt very welcome wherever I went, although Japan was a little awkward, but mostly because I could speak so little of their language and I was in a fairly rural area where few people spoke English. I did have an interesting conversation with a woman who knew about 5 words in English, and I knew about 3 in Japanese that were relevant to the conversation. It's surprising how well you can communicate using hand movements!

 

[St Andrews Lynx]

21 hours ago, StrongTackleBacarySagna said:

I can't please both people who like short hair Bacary and long hair Bacary. I feel like I have betrayed half the population that gets to witness my amazing hair

Cut off your hair and distribute it in bundles to the people who prefer the long hair. Everybody wins.

[Kleio_77]

My first vent: 

I moved from the west coast to the east… and most of my cohort are from within an hour or two of my school. I really like everyone in my cohort but when the rare chance arises and we have free time, no one wants to explore the area like I do. I am close to Niagara Falls, Detroit, New York, Chicago… etc., all places I would love to see but am alone in this. My peers also have their own "hometown" friends close by and I have been feeling pretty isolated since moving out east. 

I am doing well in my program and have no intentions to move back home. I am just lonely and wish there were a few more students in my cohort from further locations. 

[hippyscientist]

@Kleio_77 what's stopping you from going and exploring by yourself? I often find the best way to find friends with similar interests is to go and do the thing you're interested in and meet people along the way. Does your school have a facebook page or a message board where you could post something saying "I'm headed to Niagara Falls tomorrow/at the weekend, anyone wanna come with?" if no one replies you go alone, if others do reply you add them to your group. 

[shadowclaw]

@Kleio_77 I agree with piglet, you should head out by yourself if you really want to see these things. You'll never get anywhere if you wait on other people. Although I find it odd that no one wants to go to Niagara Falls or NYC! I went to Niagara Falls as a teen (Canadian and US sides) and it was a lot of fun. When I was back in Pennsylvania, I went to NYC every year near Christmas and sometimes other parts of the year, too... that city is never boring. Also, since you are in close proximity to these cities, does your school do any bus trips? My undergrad school had an annual bus trip to the museum of natural history in NYC, and where I did my masters, there was a bus trip to NYC and to Philly about once a month, and it was cheap. If so, you could go and see if you can join a group of people already going.

My own vent:

I really don't like the quarter system. I'm so not ready to go back to class tomorrow. I really liked having 5 or 6 weeks off between semesters... 3 weeks off seems like so little, especially since I was so busy over the break. Plus I got sick yesterday. There's also only 1 week off between the winter and spring terms, so it's going to feel like a mega semester instead of two quarters. I am also feeling a bit apprehensive about my TA position. Because I was offered one starting in the winter term, I didn't get a day-long training session like the one held in the fall. Instead, I got a two-hour crash course. The business office also hasn't processed my hiring paperwork yet (even though I filled it out the day I signed my contract last term). As a result, I'm not getting my first paycheck on time and I can't be added as a TA to the online system, so I can't see my class list or anything. Sigh.

 

[carry97979]

First vent:

I've lurked this thread occasionally and am finally jumping in.

I am so fed up with this assignment I have for work. Since July or June--I don't know, in my memory all the months have melted together--I have been writing this literature review with very little to no help from my supervisor who indicated from the get-go that he would play a strong, collaborative role. But the lack of help is really not even the problem. It's the pressure, the constant unending pressure, to wrap up over 50 pages (single spaced) of writing so he can send it around to people. So they can help or criticize it? As Toby from the West Wing said, "You can't rush these things. It's not like putting a hammer to a nail." This review is driving me absolutely crazy and there's really nothing I can do about it. I'd quit, but I need the money and I've already invested so much time in and out of work doing this that I'm sure at some later point in my life I'd reflect and regret throwing away something that, despite sucking so much time and energy out of me, could have proved useful to someone, anyone on the verge of a critical development in the field. Or not even to this arbitrary someone, but to me whose career is still at its inception. What's even more soul-crushing, besides waking up every day with this burden still in my life, is that I'm not even doing what I want to do in science; I have a whole body of potentially fruitful ideas that I've been cultivating for so long and that I care about so much that may never come to fruition. Again, after six or seven months of staring at this screen crafting page after page after page I'm still not finished. I don't think I have writer's block; I think I have writer's fatigue--the words are just words now; it's like they're completely devoid of meaning or feeling or whatever it is that makes words worth reading. Sometimes they're not even words; they're shapes holding my sanity hostage. I just really don't see any way out of this that isn't going to involve at least a month, maybe two, more of work. I think I should assert myself and ask for help, but I don't want the perception to be that I am incapable of finishing what I start or that I'm in some other way unsuited for a long-term career in this field. Maybe I am unsuited for a long-term career in this field.

So this is a vent/thinly veiled cry for help/trigger for the re-evaluation of my imagined professional trajectory.

[StrongTackleBacarySagna]

On 1/2/2016 at 3:43 PM, St Andrews Lynx said:

Cut off your hair and distribute it in bundles to the people who prefer the long hair. Everybody wins.

That just might be crazy enough... TO GET US ALL KILLED

[Kleio_77]

Thanks piglet and shadowclaw. My friend actually told me about meetup.com the other day and although I was hesitant, I looked up groups in my area and there are lots that are of interest to me. Lots of hiking, kayaking, exploring the area, etc. I will definitely be looking into some of these group meet ups. I had no idea that website even existed but it is exactly what I need. I hope this doesn't sound like an advertisement for that website haha. 

[shadowclaw]

There are days when I feel like I should throw in the towel on my PhD program. Sometimes it's because I feel incredibly homesick and I am about as far away from home as I can get without leaving the country. Sometimes it's because my husband is incredibly unhappy here and can't find a job. Sometimes it's because I'm tired of struggling to make ends meet. Today it is because I've realized getting my PhD is going to put me further in debt and I already owe my firstborn to Sallie Mae and AES. 

When accepting my admission offer, I knew that I'd be taking out loans for this year because my only funding came from a tuition scholarship that only covered resident tuition, but I had high hopes that I could secure a TA position for my remaining years or my advisor would pick up some funding for me along the way. Now that I've managed to secure a TA position for this year, I've found out a few things about tuition remission that fill me with doubts. The tuition remission only covers resident rates, so I still need loans to cover the approximately $3000 gap between resident and non-resident rates each term (that's $9000 a year).  Sure, I could use my stipend to pay the difference, but not when my husband is unemployed, and even with a job, it would be hard to live on just one income. I also have to be enrolled in 12 credits as a TA, so it's not like I can try to save money by taking fewer credits. I will also never be eligible for resident tuition unless I was to take a year off from school and work in the state, and even then I might not get it.

If my advisor can secure grant money for me, then I don't think I'll have this problem anymore because we could allocate enough funds towards tuition to cover it all, or if that's not allowed for some reason, she could just give me a larger stipend (and as far as I can tell, there are no caps for stipends). However, that's a big if.

I wish this information was in a more obvious place on the graduate school's website. The page with info on TA positions just says that the position comes with tuition remission, health insurance, etc. You have to dig deep to find out that tuition remission only covers resident tuition. Had I been aware of this, I don't think I would have come here. There is too much working against me financially. Sigh.

[Mattie Roh]

I hate how application season happens to fall during a really quiet time at work for me. I find myself on gradcafe all damned day constantly hitting 'refresh' because I'm so bored.

Why aren't you people entertaining me more?

Edit: That came out snarkier than I intended. Obviously I'm joking. Is it 5 o'clock yet?

Edited January 8, 2016 by Mattie Roh
social idiot

[hippyscientist]

@Mattie Roh I hate how application season is turning me into a raging neurotic! I hate how everytime my phone vibrates with a new email notification I jump. I hate how addicted I am to refreshing application status pages. I hate how addicted I am to gradcafe forums. I just want to knowwwwwwww. Join our whine, wait and wine thread - that's entertaining. 

[kokobanana]

3 hours ago, shadowclaw said:

There are days when I feel like I should throw in the towel on my PhD program. Sometimes it's because I feel incredibly homesick and I am about as far away from home as I can get without leaving the country. Sometimes it's because my husband is incredibly unhappy here and can't find a job. Sometimes it's because I'm tired of struggling to make ends meet. Today it is because I've realized getting my PhD is going to put me further in debt and I already owe my firstborn to Sallie Mae and AES. 

When accepting my admission offer, I knew that I'd be taking out loans for this year because my only funding came from a tuition scholarship that only covered resident tuition, but I had high hopes that I could secure a TA position for my remaining years or my advisor would pick up some funding for me along the way. Now that I've managed to secure a TA position for this year, I've found out a few things about tuition remission that fill me with doubts. The tuition remission only covers resident rates, so I still need loans to cover the approximately $3000 gap between resident and non-resident rates each term (that's $9000 a year).  Sure, I could use my stipend to pay the difference, but not when my husband is unemployed, and even with a job, it would be hard to live on just one income. I also have to be enrolled in 12 credits as a TA, so it's not like I can try to save money by taking fewer credits. I will also never be eligible for resident tuition unless I was to take a year off from school and work in the state, and even then I might not get it.

If my advisor can secure grant money for me, then I don't think I'll have this problem anymore because we could allocate enough funds towards tuition to cover it all, or if that's not allowed for some reason, she could just give me a larger stipend (and as far as I can tell, there are no caps for stipends). However, that's a big if.

I wish this information was in a more obvious place on the graduate school's website. The page with info on TA positions just says that the position comes with tuition remission, health insurance, etc. You have to dig deep to find out that tuition remission only covers resident tuition. Had I been aware of this, I don't think I would have come here. There is too much working against me financially. Sigh.

I have many of the same feelings as you. I moved from the West coast to the East coast (I guess in the opposite direction as you!), and it's been a struggle. I'm living with my boyfriend, who is in a PhD program, and I'm applying right now. It's tough emotionally and financially, especially when half of my monthly pay goes straight to rent. I'm taking a major pay cut to go to grad school and on top of that, I'm trying to balance the stress of lab work / applications / life.... while my family is all the way on other side of the county (literally, almost the farthest possible place in the contiguous states). And I have no idea where I'm going to be 6 months from now.

I'm sorry to hear about what you are going through. I know this might not mean much from a stranger on the internet, but I genuinely hope things will get better for you and your husband.

 

Edited January 8, 2016 by kokobanana

[Need Coffee in an IV]

We all need to vent and I hope everything works out for everyone! My vent is my reference STILL hasn't written any of my letters to any of my schools. I constantly keep checking the results page hoping there are still openings for my programs. Other times I look into Public History programs but I'm not a history major or have a minor. So I can't apply to those programs. I mean I could but it would be less hassle to just set money on fire. I just wish my adviser helped me out, she is an amazing geology professor. But shes so busy with other things that she hasn't helped me at all. I planned my course schedule for every semester and look into programs myself. It would have been nice to know what I needed to do to have more options. I'm severely limited now unless I want to try to gain a minor and add more semesters to my undergrad. But I'm a senior and its my last semester now. I mean my school has museum studies classes but I couldn't get into them because I didn't have the prerequisites! I like her but she isn't a good adviser at all.

[shadowclaw]

8 hours ago, kokobanana said:

I have many of the same feelings as you. I moved from the West coast to the East coast (I guess in the opposite direction as you!), and it's been a struggle. I'm living with my boyfriend, who is in a PhD program, and I'm applying right now. It's tough emotionally and financially, especially when half of my monthly pay goes straight to rent. I'm taking a major pay cut to go to grad school and on top of that, I'm trying to balance the stress of lab work / applications / life.... while my family is all the way on other side of the county (literally, almost the farthest possible place in the contiguous states). And I have no idea where I'm going to be 6 months from now.

I'm sorry to hear about what you are going through. I know this might not mean much from a stranger on the internet, but I genuinely hope things will get better for you and your husband.

 

Thanks for your words of comfort! Luckily (or maybe not luckily), my employment before graduate school was at Pizza Hut, so I'm not taking a pay cut. Although I did take a pay cut for my masters program. My assistantship there had a terrible stipend and I made a few hundred dollars more each month at Pizza Hut. However, my stipend here is actually quite decent, but my rent and utilities are so high that almost all of my stipend goes towards it. I don't understand how a water/sewer bill can be $90 per month for two people. We don't even have a washer and we normally don't shower every day. I've vented before about how expensive this apartment is, especially given its size, condition, and the crappy appliances. On the plus side, we did get a new dishwasher installed today. Hopefully my dishes will actually come out clean now.

It turns out I was freaking out for nothing regarding tuition remission. It seems not everyone knows what they are talking about at school. Tuition remission does only cover resident tuition, but there is another policy that says TA's and RA's are charged at resident rates regardless of actual residency status. Phew! Turns out the business office just hasn't bothered to update my charges yet and the person who told me that I was SOL on the difference between resident and non-resident tuition is confused. It's still a financial challenge, though, without my husband at work. In retrospect, there were a few jobs with low pay he should have applied for because we would at least have some income coming in for him. He also worked a seasonal job before Christmas, and the company hasn't paid him for his last week and a half. It's like they dropped off the face of the earth - voicemail is full, no one is at the office, their facebook page was deleted. They owe him close to $1000, and it really screwed us over for Christmas.