Absolutely insane stress levels here, how to stay motivated?

[SymmetryOfImperfection]

Multiple people from my cohort have quit or decided to drop after a MS.

The stress level here is absolutely insane. We are to teach (with a huge workload) until we pass oral comps at the least. Some people have been teaching for 5 years. Simultaneously we have to produce research.

The other thing here is that some of the supervisors have limited availability. Mine in particular doesn't seem to be highly interested in my project (that he assigned). This means we are supervised mostly by postdocs in such groups. The postdoc in my group has very high expectations and doesn't tolerate mistakes. The pressure is very high to perform and I can't handle that very well; when I work with the postdoc on projects, I seem to make more mistakes than when I work by myself or with other grad students

Because of this, it is hard staying motivated between a low availability PI who seems disinterested, very tough direct management and other people quitting left and right. Any help?

[TakeruK]

I'm sorry to hear about this. Honestly, when I saw the thread title, I was expecting to read about "standard" stress levels**, and to respond with good coping strategies. I also think it's not abnormal for people to not finish their PhDs---I think it's typical that 30% to 50% of people starting graduate programs will not finish a PhD in the end (but most will get MS degrees). However, what you are describing here is not normal or typical stress levels and it is not healthy. 

Unfortunately, I don't really have good advice on resolving your situation. But, I think it would be a very very good idea for you to speak with mental health providers at your school. Hopefully the ones affiliated with your school's health center are free, or your student health plan covers visits with external providers.

I know there is a lot of stigma with seeing mental health providers, but there shouldn't be! It's incorrect to think that you only see a mental health provider if there is something wrong with you. Instead, think of it more like taking your car for an annual tuneup, your bike for a seasonal tuneup, going to the dentist for a checkup or getting vaccinations/annual checkup at your doctor's office. 

I think that a mental health professional visit can be very useful for graduate students and they help us understand our stress better. We learn what causes stress to us and how to manage symptoms of stress. They also provide us with tools to prevent future stress. And, for more pressing situations such as yours, I find that they can help you think about difficult situations and tough decisions you might have to make.

For example, in your situation, I can think of a few things you have to decide:

a. Can you manage the stress you are feeling?

b. Is the cost of managing this stress worth what you will get out of this degree program?

c. If yes, then how will you know when it's no longer worth it? What would you do to continually evaluate whether or not this is something that will still benefit you in the end?

d. If no to "b" above, then what are you willing to do about it? Would you be able to talk to your advisor about their availability? Would you want to speak to the postdoc about the work environment they are creating? Would you be willing to change advisors and groups?

e. If you decide to take one of these actions, who will you get help from? How will you bring up these tough conversation topics? These are hard conversations to have---how will you ensure you get the support you need to clearly express your concerns and needs in a way that the other party understands you and will change? 

This is certainly not an exhaustive list and I don't know the answer to them. But just examples of what a mental health professional can talk you through and help you cope with current stressors as well as help you come up with a strategy/plan to prevent future problems. They are a great resource for graduate students and I really hope our community continues to reduce the stigma on seeking mental help and realise that seeking help is not a sign that you are broken, but it's part of keeping ourselves healthy.

(** By "standard", I mean regular amount of occasional stress that is typical for a job similar to ours. I don't mean that being stressed out all the time is a normal healthy grad student lifestyle).

[SymmetryOfImperfection]

Just now, TakeruK said:

I'm sorry to hear about this. Honestly, when I saw the thread title, I was expecting to read about "standard" stress levels**, and to respond with good coping strategies. I also think it's not abnormal for people to not finish their PhDs---I think it's typical that 30% to 50% of people starting graduate programs will not finish a PhD in the end (but most will get MS degrees). However, what you are describing here is not normal or typical stress levels and it is not healthy. 

Unfortunately, I don't really have good advice on resolving your situation. But, I think it would be a very very good idea for you to speak with mental health providers at your school. Hopefully the ones affiliated with your school's health center are free, or your student health plan covers visits with external providers.

I know there is a lot of stigma with seeing mental health providers, but there shouldn't be! It's incorrect to think that you only see a mental health provider if there is something wrong with you. Instead, think of it more like taking your car for an annual tuneup, your bike for a seasonal tuneup, going to the dentist for a checkup or getting vaccinations/annual checkup at your doctor's office. 

I think that a mental health professional visit can be very useful for graduate students and they help us understand our stress better. We learn what causes stress to us and how to manage symptoms of stress. They also provide us with tools to prevent future stress. And, for more pressing situations such as yours, I find that they can help you think about difficult situations and tough decisions you might have to make.

For example, in your situation, I can think of a few things you have to decide:

a. Can you manage the stress you are feeling?

b. Is the cost of managing this stress worth what you will get out of this degree program?

c. If yes, then how will you know when it's no longer worth it? What would you do to continually evaluate whether or not this is something that will still benefit you in the end?

d. If no to "b" above, then what are you willing to do about it? Would you be able to talk to your advisor about their availability? Would you want to speak to the postdoc about the work environment they are creating? Would you be willing to change advisors and groups?

e. If you decide to take one of these actions, who will you get help from? How will you bring up these tough conversation topics? These are hard conversations to have---how will you ensure you get the support you need to clearly express your concerns and needs in a way that the other party understands you and will change? 

This is certainly not an exhaustive list and I don't know the answer to them. But just examples of what a mental health professional can talk you through and help you cope with current stressors as well as help you come up with a strategy/plan to prevent future problems. They are a great resource for graduate students and I really hope our community continues to reduce the stigma on seeking mental help and realise that seeking help is not a sign that you are broken, but it's part of keeping ourselves healthy.

(** By "standard", I mean regular amount of occasional stress that is typical for a job similar to ours. I don't mean that being stressed out all the time is a normal healthy grad student lifestyle).

Thank you for the hints. Should I talk to the counselor at my school, or seek outside help?

Can I PM you some things? I'm worried that this environment is unusual, since right now you're saying that it's not what you think is expected. It at least feels alot different than at my old school.

[Levon3]

The counselor at your school is a good first step, as they often have one or two free visits.

[Need Coffee in an IV]

I don't think anything is worth staying in a toxic environment. You need to look out for your mental health and happiness. This is definitely not normal and I can see why people leave. I think I would too. I understand grad school will have stress but this isn't healthy stress. Don't let anyone try to tell you this is "how things work".

[Eigen]

If you want to PM me, I'll be glad to talk with you in more specific terms. 

I will second the advice of seeing a mental health professional- your school might have some that specialize in working with graduate students, or you could go outside the school. I would go with whatever is most convenient. 

It's hard to see how "normal" what you describe is without details that I don't think you'll want to post publicly. Most of what you describe seems fairly normal to me (heavy teaching loads for a relatively long time, with simultaneous research expectations), as does a slightly disinterested/unavailable PI. I think most of us work much better not under pressure- I know I make more mistakes when people are around, whether I'm teaching them or learning from them. Another person is something added to keep track of. 

In Chemistry, at least, it's quite common that you have limited interactions with a PI, and are predominately "managed" by post-docs- this is especially true at larger/higher ranked schools, or in larger research groups. We recently had a speaker in for a symposium that described the "ideal" lab as around 60 graduate students, organized under 10 post-docs, with each post-doc managing the graduate students working with them. I have friends that work in labs around that size, and many meet with their PI only once or twice a year for progress reports/updates, and are almost exclusively mentored by their post-docs. 

That's not to say it's an ideal environment, by any stretch- it's one of the reasons that I chose a smaller, lower-ranked school where I'd have more direct interaction with my PI, and less intermediate managerial layers. 

"How things work" and "normal" are hard terms to use. Different people do well in different environments, and an environment doesn't have to be "bad" for it to be a bad environment for you to thrive in. I have some colleagues that work at their best under pressure, and chose (and continue to choose) PI's and post-doctoral advisors that are known for pushing their graduate students. On the other hand, I prefer a very hands-off approach, with low external pressure. 

We hate each others environments, but we both do well where we've set ourselves up. 

Times like this are a good time to think in terms of what is best for you and your growth, rather than what is normal, or what works for anyone else. A good therapist can help you work through that as well. 

As to people quitting with an MS, attrition rate in Chemistry PhD programs is pretty close to 50%. Yours may be more, or may be less- or maybe your cohort is being hit particularly hard. It's definitely harder to deal with stress when you have lots of your peers leaving.

[TakeruK]

17 hours ago, SymmetryOfImperfection said:

Thank you for the hints. Should I talk to the counselor at my school, or seek outside help?

Can I PM you some things? I'm worried that this environment is unusual, since right now you're saying that it's not what you think is expected. It at least feels alot different than at my old school.

Regarding the PM, I have replied to you now. But I think there could be others in your situation so I'm adding some details here and making some general statements (without compromising your PM) to you, to others in this thread, and to those in similar situations who might be reading this now or later.

On the counselor choice, it's up to you. At my school, cost isn't an issue as we get unlimited visits with the ones at the school and 25 visits per year at an external provider for free, then the remaining visits that year with a $15 copay per visit. However, due to limited resources, the dozen or so counselors on staff generally will see a student a few times and then if it appears that you will benefit from regular weekly (or every 2 weeks or monthly) visits, then they will refer you to their colleagues off campus. The reason our school's health insurance covers such a high number of visits to a counselor is because this is something students have fought for.

At my school, the health center staff are also "confidential resources". This definition of "confidential" means that whatever you tell them, they will not take action, unless required to by a small set of specific laws or by aggregated reporting requirements (e.g. Clery Act). The point is that you talk to the confidential resources when you want to tell someone about your situation, bounce ideas off someone, figure out what to do next, etc. (in addition to the normal services provided by the counselor). Because the on-campus counselor will know your school, your department, etc. then it might make sense to first go to a counselor at your school. You'll also get the benefit of accessing a confidential resource. And, a lot of students find it hard to find a good counselor off campus, so getting a recommendation from an on-campus one might help.

There are some downsides though. Some people feel that talking to someone on campus, even if they are a confidential resource, to be too "close" and they would greatly prefer to speak to someone 100% disconnected from the school. If this is important to you, then I think you should go this route---it's more important to have this comfort than to get the benefits above (and you can also go back and talk to your on-campus confidential resources later if you want to access those resources).

In addition, at my school, there are also non-confidential resources such as the Graduate Associate Dean that will help mediate and resolve conflicts between students and advisors. Here, "non-confidential" doesn't mean that they will blab to everyone about it---they are a discreet resource. But non-confidential means that the purpose of talking to them is to make a choice about the action to take (the choice could be to do nothing though). At my school, the Dean will always consult with the student and act in the best interest of the student (e.g. as one can imagine if a student complains about Prof X, telling Prof X to "knock it off" probably will hurt the student more than help, so the Dean will act in other ways to smooth things out).

9 hours ago, Eigen said:

"How things work" and "normal" are hard terms to use. Different people do well in different environments, and an environment doesn't have to be "bad" for it to be a bad environment for you to thrive in. I have some colleagues that work at their best under pressure, and chose (and continue to choose) PI's and post-doctoral advisors that are known for pushing their graduate students. On the other hand, I prefer a very hands-off approach, with low external pressure. 

Definitely agree that there are such things as different working environments that work better for some and not for others. But at my school, I am finding that actual toxic and inappropriate behaviour are being excused under this reasoning, and that's just not right. Usually, this excuse is brought up when the advisor (whatever rank they may be) is a research superstar, producing a ton of great research and it seems that the leadership (both at the department and school level) value the advisor's research output over the well being of their advisees. Here, note that I'm not talking about obvious cases of misconduct, such as Title IX violations, but misconduct where there aren't laws about it. For example, there aren't a set of laws that prevent an advisor from being a jerk and demoralizing. This situation is something our students and faculty have been working together to resolve and it's a tough task because it's a fine line between academic freedom / the right to run your group your way and being fair to your students.

In particular, this is of interest at my school because we are a very very small and research focussed school. This means that for a lot of subfields, there is only 1 faculty member for that subfield, and so "switch advisors" isn't always an option. I think that when faculty are in this position (being the only person offering opportunities to work in subfield X), that faculty member has a lot more responsibility to run a fair/diverse group. For example, I see some faculty in this position requiring their students to do things that generally exclude certain groups of students, such as requiring late evenings work making it harder for students with family or other outside commitments to do well in the group. This is why I don't think the attitude that "well, everyone knows Prof X runs the group this way so if you don't like it, don't join the group" is a healthy one to have.

That is, I think there is a difference between some work environment differences (e.g. mentoring style, whether they are hands-on/hands-off, group size, etc.) that are okay and that students need to be responsible for knowing when choosing a group, and other environment differences (e.g. being a jerk, denying required vacation time, requiring excessive work hours) that should never be okay and should not be tolerated by either the students or administration as reasonable leadership. Unfortunately faculty aren't actually trained in research leadership! Because of the second set of things, I worry that sometimes when we say that "different PIs work for different people", we will accidentally normalize the toxic behaviour as well and students who need help will think it's normal and not seek it.

[St Andrews Lynx]

With any kind of stress levels it is important to (i) do stuff other than your research & teaching (ii) take care of yourself. Even when you have a lot of stress and limited time it still means taking some time off at the weekends to do other things; eating well; going to the gym (even a 30 min workout in the morning is great for me); perhaps going home to do grading instead of staying in the lab late.

If the one postdoc is part of the problem, maybe you can try and switch to work with someone else? High standards by themselves aren't a bad thing (more on that in a second): but if the postdoc can't give you useful feedback to learn & improve, or is rude towards you...ask to work with someone else. Obviously you need to be careful how you go about this - and be prepared for mediation rather than a transfer - but it seems like the obvious thing to try first. 

I think it's important to differentiate between "high" and "impossible" standards. PIs want to publish high-quality papers. A quick way to bring a paper's quality down is through things like messy spectra, badly-designed experiments that don't account for certain variables, etc. In that sense, having high standards about how clean your materials are and how carefully you gather data are really important. And it's something that you need to start taking on board as soon as you arrive. But there also should be some logic as to WHY particular standards are expected. And other group members should be communicating the standards before you collect the data and find you need to re-run it all again. Also, the goalposts shouldn't be continually shifting.

The PhD is all about training you to become a better scientist. But not at the expense of making you miserable and destroying your self-esteem. There's no shame in walking away from a situation that's damaging you. 

[SymmetryOfImperfection]

2 hours ago, St Andrews Lynx said:

With any kind of stress levels it is important to (i) do stuff other than your research & teaching (ii) take care of yourself. Even when you have a lot of stress and limited time it still means taking some time off at the weekends to do other things; eating well; going to the gym (even a 30 min workout in the morning is great for me); perhaps going home to do grading instead of staying in the lab late.

If the one postdoc is part of the problem, maybe you can try and switch to work with someone else? High standards by themselves aren't a bad thing (more on that in a second): but if the postdoc can't give you useful feedback to learn & improve, or is rude towards you...ask to work with someone else. Obviously you need to be careful how you go about this - and be prepared for mediation rather than a transfer - but it seems like the obvious thing to try first. 

I think it's important to differentiate between "high" and "impossible" standards. PIs want to publish high-quality papers. A quick way to bring a paper's quality down is through things like messy spectra, badly-designed experiments that don't account for certain variables, etc. In that sense, having high standards about how clean your materials are and how carefully you gather data are really important. And it's something that you need to start taking on board as soon as you arrive. But there also should be some logic as to WHY particular standards are expected. And other group members should be communicating the standards before you collect the data and find you need to re-run it all again. Also, the goalposts shouldn't be continually shifting.

The PhD is all about training you to become a better scientist. But not at the expense of making you miserable and destroying your self-esteem. There's no shame in walking away from a situation that's damaging you. 

thanks. i fully understand that high quality papers need high quality graphs to go along with them. problem is, I wasn't given an explicit checklist which I'm used to getting for things that have to be done exactly in one way.

Edited March 26, 2016 by SymmetryOfImperfection

[anthrostudentcyn]

I once worked in a lab and had some difficulty/a bad work environment with the post-doc who supervised it. PM me and I can chat. 

[Eigen]

5 hours ago, TakeruK said:

Definitely agree that there are such things as different working environments that work better for some and not for others. But at my school, I am finding that actual toxic and inappropriate behaviour are being excused under this reasoning, and that's just not right. Usually, this excuse is brought up when the advisor (whatever rank they may be) is a research superstar, producing a ton of great research and it seems that the leadership (both at the department and school level) value the advisor's research output over the well being of their advisees. Here, note that I'm not talking about obvious cases of misconduct, such as Title IX violations, but misconduct where there aren't laws about it. For example, there aren't a set of laws that prevent an advisor from being a jerk and demoralizing. This situation is something our students and faculty have been working together to resolve and it's a tough task because it's a fine line between academic freedom / the right to run your group your way and being fair to your students.

In particular, this is of interest at my school because we are a very very small and research focussed school. This means that for a lot of subfields, there is only 1 faculty member for that subfield, and so "switch advisors" isn't always an option. I think that when faculty are in this position (being the only person offering opportunities to work in subfield X), that faculty member has a lot more responsibility to run a fair/diverse group. For example, I see some faculty in this position requiring their students to do things that generally exclude certain groups of students, such as requiring late evenings work making it harder for students with family or other outside commitments to do well in the group. This is why I don't think the attitude that "well, everyone knows Prof X runs the group this way so if you don't like it, don't join the group" is a healthy one to have.

That is, I think there is a difference between some work environment differences (e.g. mentoring style, whether they are hands-on/hands-off, group size, etc.) that are okay and that students need to be responsible for knowing when choosing a group, and other environment differences (e.g. being a jerk, denying required vacation time, requiring excessive work hours) that should never be okay and should not be tolerated by either the students or administration as reasonable leadership. Unfortunately faculty aren't actually trained in research leadership! Because of the second set of things, I worry that sometimes when we say that "different PIs work for different people", we will accidentally normalize the toxic behaviour as well and students who need help will think it's normal and not seek it.

Oh, I completely agree that it can be over-used. You and I have talked before about differing backgrounds leading to different assumptions. My experience acting as a representative to our administration for graduate students having problems has been that frequently, "toxic environment" can be used to refer to an advisor that actually expects their RA's to be working for the time they're being paid. 

There are many things that clearly cross the line. I was at a conference recently, and "toxic labs" was a discussion that got brought up over dinner. It was broadly agreed that, for instance, yelling was very rarely justified, and almost never beneficial. There were some standout examples in the case of building being burned down by a careless student.

Things such as required work hours are a bit harder- I think that frequently does fall under the blanket of "that's just how they run their group". I think it can be horribly counterproductive most times, but I think it's the right of every PI to run their labs and career into the ground without realizing it. That said, if the PI crosses the line into being verbally abusive *about* the required work ours, that's a different matter. I've run into some that are very calm, very up-front, and very civil about discussing requirements.