Elin, a second year Psychology PhD student, talks about some of the challenges she has faced while studying for her doctorate and the strategies she uses to help manage her mental wellbeing.
In 2014, I moved from Sweden to Wales to complete a BSc in Psychology at USW. After getting my degree, I worked as a mental health support worker for a few years, before deciding to come back to the university for the MSc in Clinical Psychology. At the time, I was not planning to pursue a PhD – but after thoroughly enjoying the process of working on my MSc dissertation and being offered the opportunity to work on a PhD project that I feel enthusiastic about (investigating the identification of frontal lobe impairments in alcohol-related brain damage), I decided to start my journey as a postgraduate student. I am currently in the second year of my PhD, and for world mental health day, I wanted to share some of the challenges I have faced throughout my time in relation to being a postgraduate student, and some of the realisations I have had and strategies I have used to help with my mental wellbeing – in the hope that this may be useful to other students experiencing similar challenges.
Photograph: Travelling to the UK from Sweden for the first time
One of the challenges I have faced during my time as a PhD student have been my tendencies to engage in repetitive self-criticism consisting of thoughts often focusing on not being ‘good enough’ and this presented itself in relation to my work (e.g., not working enough hours, or progressing with my project quickly enough). These thoughts would often appear when trying to relax and unwind, leading to my time away from my project involving repetitive negative thoughts, emotions, and anxiety. Consequently, the time spent away from my project did not enable me to gain the rest I needed to be motivated and productive the following work-day. It was thus quite an early realisation for me that this was a vicious cycle of thoughts and behaviours that I needed to focus on and learn how to manage.
Photograph: Some of my crochet and knitting projects
I started to seek out reassurance from others to disconfirm my own negative beliefs. But I felt that this was a constant need that only made me feel better for a moment. Although hearing from, and talking to, other PhD students is definitely important to identify that you are not alone in how you feel, I think that my problems partly stemmed from trying to live up to an identity that I have created for myself as a high-achiever and high-performer, and a lot of my self-worth has been tied to me being ‘a good student’. I imagine other postgraduate students may experience this issue, particularly after having received a lot of approval and praise from family and friends in regard to our academic achievements over the years. Coming to this insight, I have realised the importance of seeing myself as a whole person who has many values, interests and hobbies, and the importance of having a balanced life.
Further, I personally believe it is important to look for that one (or more) interest or hobby that allows the mind to relax. For example, I have always enjoyed working with hand-crafts and have realized that the process of, for example, knitting and crocheting allows me to purely focus on this task while forgetting everything else around me, and this has a very calming effect on me. Some examples of other tasks that have a similar effect on me are listening to music or a podcast while cooking or baking, going for a nature walk, reading (non-work focused) books and playing calming games.
Another strategy that has helped me was shifting my thinking about what the PhD is to me. Although I view my project as not only a ‘job’ but also a passion of mine – I think it is important to treat it as the former, while remembering the many benefits that it has that most other jobs do not. For example, I try to set myself realistic targets each week and work the required hours for being a full-time student – but as PhD students we have a lot of freedom, so if I want to have a slow morning or a longer break to engage in an activity I enjoy, I allow myself this. Further, keeping in mind that every hour cannot be spent producing work. There is a lot of thinking, problem-solving and creativity involved in the process, that can better be achieved away from the laptop screen.
Photogragh: One of my favourite places to go walking
