There are many, many points along my grad school path where I paused and asked myself, what am I doing? Each time this has occurred, I have some how choked down my reservations, redoubled my efforts, and told myself it was all worth it in the end.
There is no point in quitting now. I am ABD (all but dissertation) and the chapters are coming together.
But, in hindsight, I am not convinced all my hard work will be worthwhile.
Part of my frustration is rooted in the departmental culture. I have always been the bastard stepchild in my lab group. I wasn't in a good place when I started graduate school. I was depressed and trying to hold together a depressed and exhausted spouse. This has not changed over the past four years. I am sure my anxiety and depression showed and didn't give people in my department the best impression of me. I am still depressed, but (if you can believe it) I am in a better place today than I was when I started graduate school. But it really is true that there is only one chance to make a first impression and the difficulties and stress imposed by military life appears to have marked me permanently.
We have a seminar for people in our division of the department. I dread this weekly opportunity for people in our division to find ways to make snide remarks about me (to me and everyone else). If I try to say anything, I am labeled as an uncooperative bitch. If I say nothing, the stereotype of me gets perpetuated. It's gotten to the point where I dread going to lab group. I wish we could be a team. I don't understand why the divisions exist that are there. I feel like it is because I am some sort of terrible person, but then I contrast this with my gov't job (at the geological survey) here that pays for school. I work with several really awesome people. We don't always get along and we don't have all the same interests, but we all really care for one another. Going to my job, even on days when everything seems to be going wrong, because the people I work with are awesome. I want this for my lab group. I just don't know how to get it and I feel like I am blamed for the lack unit cohesion in our lab group.
It makes me sad.
It makes me question my path. Should I have skipped getting the PhD? Was proving to myself that I am not the poor kid from the projects anymore really worth all this drama?
If this is academia, is this what I want to deal with? I am not sure it is.
I try to tell myself it's just my lab group, but I am president of a student organization. In 4 years no one has launched a successful field trip. The trip gets planned, but then there is a lack of participation, so the field trip doesn't occur. So this year, I organized a local overnight trip and we had 8 people show up. It's not a lot, but it is more than what anyone else has done. It gave me hope that we could use it to show people that we could actually run a successful trip. Apparently, the faculty view my efforts as a complete joke, which I was informed of last Friday. Why do I bother to try?
People tell me this is just graduate school burn out, but I wonder whether this is an area I want to press on in when I don't ever meet people who are happy. I don't meet people who aren't obsessed with cutting the legs out from under the people around them in the name of "victory." I want to do something positive and life affirming, which appears to be the opposite of academia.
I am hoping this is graduate school funk. I hope this is exhaustion and stress. I don't feel like people understand that I am not under, nor have I ever been under "normal" graduate student stress. The Navy has made sure that it is always amped up by a factor of 20. When my husband says to me, "When are you going to be finished? I just want us to be together when we can be," it breaks my heart, because I feel like I've done this to us. The Navy keeps us apart to an extent, but I've just laid a whole new layer on top of it.
I worry all this sacrifice won't have a pay out at the end that will make it all worthwhile. I know it sounds lame and corny, but I want a good job that makes me happy (like my GRA) that has a decent paycheck so that I can support my family and alleviate the burdens on my husband's shoulders so that he can leave the Navy without worry about our financial future. If an oil company, or an energy futures company, or a postdoc (which is a stop-gap at best), or a government position, or a non-profit, or a lobbying firm, or maybe (sigh) academia shows up and says they can allow me to do science or talk about science related issues for a company or institution where I can work with cool people and be happy, I'd do just about anything for it. I just want to be able to be with my family and have a normal life. Any industry who offered that to me, with the security of a decent paycheck would have my undying loyalty. I just don't know how to go about finding it.
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