# PhD



## Battleac (Jun 25, 2006)

Any PhD students here?

I'm a second-year PhD student (studying English) and I'm really struggling. It's not the work itself - the thesis is going fine - it's the other stuff. Like, every few weeks I have to meet with my supervisor to discuss my work. She's really nice, and after we've been chatting for about fifteen minutes, I can feel myself calm down, but beforehand, I spend at least a day worrying about the meetings. As I'm walking to her office, I'm sweating and shaking, and I feel nauseous. And it's like this every time. 

In four weeks I have to present a paper at a conference as part of my course requirements, but I honestly don't have a clue how I'm going to manage it. I haven't even written any of the paper yet because I feel like throwing up uke just thinking about it. 

I haven't told my supervisor how I'm feeling and I don't really know what to do. Should I just try and battle through? I'm thinking about making an appointment with the uni counselling service, because seriously, I've been panicking about this conference since I submitted the abstract about three months ago. Is this normal behaviour?

Any thoughts?


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## ColdFury (Nov 6, 2003)

I've thought about a doctorate, but I think it will probably be too anxiety inducing and stressful.


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## anonymid (Oct 16, 2005)

Yes, I'm a PhD student, also studying English. I struggle with it a lot, though my struggles are not so much SA-related (though that's a factor). I can manage meetings, conferences, and things like that ok, but what I'm really struggling with is my motivation, confidence, and ambition. I have enormous self-doubt issues. So I guess it's more my depression than my SA that's threatened to derail my PhD work. My biggest problem is that I'm not sure this is really what I want to be doing; I don't seem to have the passion for this that other grad students seem to. I feel like I'm doing this because it's the only thing I can do.

I'm not sure I have any advice for doing the conference. I've done a few conference presentations, though they've never gone terribly well, usually because I underprepare (I have serious procrastination issues as well). It is normal to panic about that kind of thing, but you should definitely talk to your advisor (or at least somebody, anybody) about it; don't try to battle through it on your own.


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## guy_in_maroon (Jan 23, 2006)

Disclaimer: I worked on a technical PhD, so this will have a technical twist to it, but most should apply to English majors as well.

Giving presentations is not something you can avoid in most PhD programs. The best advice is to practice, practice, practice - starting small. You really should take every opportunity you can - do the presentation for your advisor, do it for your peers, hell do it in front of your parents. Lots of graduate programs have seminar courses where every meeting is just some student giving a presentation he/she has been working on. It does three things: 1) you get better at presenting, 2) doing it in front of supportive people will help you build confidence, 3) it prepares you for potential questions that could come up.

In the end, it comes with the territory. Presentations are a part of life if you plan on finishing your PhD. If you are serious about it, you just need to practice. Start really small if you have to, but you're not going to avoid it.

About PhD's in general....

You really need to ask yourself why you are doing a PhD and be honest with yourself. If you are not sure, and the only reason is you're trying to "avoid the real world," you're probably making a big mistake. Motivation and passion are probably more important than pure ability (everyone admitted to the program should have the ability to finish). See the link below.

From personal experience, SA presents a couple of major obstacles to finishing a PhD
- Self-confidence - you will be presenting and defending your ideas, sometimes to a room full of experts on the subject matter (i.e. authority figures). Unchecked confidence issues will make this extemely difficult.
- Networking - unless you are extremely talented or lucky, you will need to know lots of people in lots of places, and they will need to know you

If you haven't already, check out the graduate school survival guide:
http://www.cs.unc.edu/~azuma/hitch4.html


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