Working in research and science - becoming too absorbed in a research project

Hi everyone, Your comments and support really helped me get through the past weeks and I thought it would be nice to update you, especially as the news are good!

I returned to the lab this week and met with the postdoc and PI who are supervising me and it turned out much more positive than expected! They were very understanding and concerned about my wellbeing- I was told to take it easy and to only focus on one smaller project that needs to be finished and they suggested I could work from home for part of the time if that helps. I had been extremely stressed and worried about their reaction and had also not felt ready to return yet at all. I can tell that it will be a struggle for me to find a balance and not spiral down into overworking and burnout again but I am going to do my best and it seems that I am being given a chance to take things more slowly. I can tell that I am already putting myself under pressure again and also still really struggling to focus, but I am determined to take it slowly and hopefully have some more insight now and also more support.

I am still not sure whether I will be able to stay here long term, but I will see how the situation evolves and  if I can be fine in this environment and whether we can all work well together. 

Thanks again for all your help and support!! 

Yes, the insurance issue is something I also worried about. Having people work illegally and unpaid initially seems to be something that they like to do here, I found out later that they did exactly the same to the other PhD student (just worse as he worked even longer unpaid...) and there are some other dodgy things that have come to light over time. Hopefully I have learnt from this experience and will find a nice lab where I can settle down :). Thanks for all your advice! 

Well I'm now retired but look back at my career, which was medicine and research and realised I spent too much time on research and so hardly saw my family, which I now greatly regret. I should have been doing more with them and not doing research 

NAS78521, great to hear an update. Glad you've seen your GP and a mental health team (and good luck with the ASD assessment), and good to learn that your energy is returning.

I really appreciate you raising this issue, as it has resulted in some really practical advice from other members here - many with *much more experience* that I have in the area! I hope it continues to be supportive and useful for you.

(About the doing very little comment -it sometimes helps to rephrase that mentally. "Doing nothing" can be interpreted as a negative value judgment. If you are doing online gaming and sodukus, then you're doing online gaming and sodukus. And if you're sat enjoying the sun, you're enjoing the sun. This is something I keep trying to do - and it helps sometimes to avoid pushing for more narrow productivity)

Hi James, 

Thank you for your reply. It is really helpful. Thanks for checking how I am doing. Having some time away from the lab and work has been the best thing that happened to me. At first, I felt even worse when I started the time off (completely depressed, hopeless, exhausted, burnt-out). However, I am starting to feel a bit more energised, though still nowhere near back to full strength. I have done very little (I had an initial phase of online boardgame playing and I have now moved onto killer sudokos- which I highly recommend actually). Not doing much is quite unusual for me as I usually cannot cope at all with being unproductive and not having something to obsess about and focus on. But I think this is exactly what I need. It is also allowing me to self-reflect and I am starting to see patterns and understand better where things go wrong. 

I have also seen my GP and a mental health team who should get back to me with their recommendations soon. Plus I am trying to get assessed for ASD (but it will take a long time). I am a bit concerned though as I felt quite misunderstood by the mental health team and I am not sure I will get the right kind of help from them (the suggestion of the day clinic is stressing me out). Lots of things to decide and sort out at this point. My intuition is that what would help most is some more time away from everything, but I need to see if I can make this happen (with work and financially etc.). I am still in a fragile state and I think returning to work at this point would result in me falling back in the same pattern. 

Sorry this has turned into a long post again... Thank you so much for your support! Finding the community here has been so helpful for me. 

It's worth remembering a mphil / PhD student is still a student. are there any student clubs you might join?

Germany, known for its rather long PhDs. I have a friend from Augsburg, who did her PhD in my lab. She chose the UK precisely because of our 3 year PhDs (back in the days of EU membership). The illegal working is a bit worrying, would you have been insured, in the event of an accident? It sounds like your PI is rather more exploitative than most. I was lucky, I had the same PI for 24 years, he was keen on getting results, but fair and consistent. I was the lab manager for the last 6 years. I agree, looking for a different lab is a good idea. If you are interviewed and shown around the lab and department, always try to talk to the existing students out of earshot of the supervisor; it should give you an invaluable indication of how good they are to work with/for.

Yes, so this is in Germany, where being an employee during the PhD is common. They keep putting off finding me an official supervisor though. So I still have not been able to officially register as a PhD student which means I am left without support. 

At this point I have lost some of the trust (also as I realised they essentially had me working illegally for a while now and seem to have done the same to the other PhD student...). My plan is to email outlining what I have been struggling with/ my concerns (I like the idea of putting the main points in writing as in meetings I somehow never end up saying what I mean to- this way there would be a list of points to discuss when we to meet).

I will see how it goes but I might try to find another lab/PhD where maybe it will be easier for me to find a healthy balance. 

Happy to be of use. If you are working as a paid research assistant, while pursuing a PhD, then you can be legitimately asked to work outside of your PhD project. However, this work should not replace work on your project entirely, or take up the majority of your time. You need to see your PI and work out a reasonable schedule of how your project should progress, what are the milestones - such as formal reports to be examined - and, very importantly, a firm timeline for finishing. Like I said, you need only as much in the way of results as will guarantee passing the viva, while your PI wants to exploit your abilities to the greatest extent possible. Most universities appoint a PI who is not your supervisor to look after your interests, if no such person has been appointed for you ask about it, if one is in place, you can legitimately take any concerns about overwork to this person.

Yes I do struggle with making friends - Right now I don't really know anyone outside the lab as I only moved recently and have been too busy to do anything other than lab work (and also struggle with making friends in general). I did have a few friends at university and I am still in contact with them virtually- It was so much easier to make friends while I was in Cambridge- best place ever for "fitting in" . I am not sure where I would meet anyone here. At university, most of the friends I made were through my course, or college or through shared interests (such as attending scientifc talks). Right now part of me just wants to be alone at home (having some time off to myself is letting me regain some energy)- though I do feel a bit lonely and wish I had someone to go on a walk with or phone occasionally. 

Thank you Martin, your reply is very helpful.

I think realising that the PI and postdoc who is supervising me have different interests/priorities to me, will help. I also realised that when someone asks me if I "can/want to help out with a project" the underlying assumption for me is that the person asking expects me to do it, (otherwise they would not go through the effort of asking). However a friend recently pointed out to me that in her view that assumption is not always true and that people can and do sometimes ask without actually expecting you to agree- this has been a real revelation for me. 

I will try to put into place some more boundaries in terms of working hours (my working hours were quite crazy and just kept getting longer- and yes I have done the crazy 16 hour things or overnights in the past- but that was a bit different as I chose to do it because I really wanted those results). I find drawing up boundaries particularly difficult as I have very high intrinsic motivation (I just love science)- for example, when I started off in the lab I would sometimes go in at weekends to use the microscope because this is what I consider "fun". Reading a paper can be so relaxing. I can also get a bit overexcited about a project and try to do too much at once. However, in my current lab I never even got around to properly starting my own project (and if I did do things I was genuinely interested in it would be very late or at weekends after finishing all the other work). I hope that if I set limits on working hours, science will become more fun again. 

The postdoc who is supervising me seems to think it is normal that my main task is to help him finish off his projects (he doesn't really do any wet lab anymore) and that my project takes second place/ is to be done in spare time. I am not sure if this is normal?

I do think I have been taken advantage of (also regarding the contract I was promised), however I think I make this very easy for people as when I joined the lab, all I cared about was the science. 

Thank you so much for your advice and for sharing your experience!!

I had a 34 year career in science, most of it in molecular parasitology research, but the last 10 years managing scientific facilities and services in a research institute.

I think that you have identified your major problem, not being able to say no to requests. You probably need to recognise that the interests of a supervisor and bench scientist - PhD students, technicians and post-docs - are fundamentally different. The PI wants to get as much work as they can out of their students and staff, however, the PhD student only needs to do as much work as will reasonably guarantee passing the viva, the professional bench scientist wants to do as much work as is consistent with producing publishable material, but at the same time having a social/romantic/family life, and remaining sane. Once this dichotomy of interests is recognised it becomes easier to say no to requests to do extra work. Have I done some stupid things because I was asked? Yes! 16hr long experiments through the night,  and 12 hour experiments taking samples every hour on a Sunday to name but two! However, as I worked in my field for longer, my confidence grew and I was able to politely decline such requests.

It is also useful to be able to distinguish between genuine deadlines, like writing material for a presentation at a conference, when some extra work would be of genuine use, and routine demands for working long hours which are not, certainly not for one's health. Outside working to a genuine deadline, you need to set definite boundaries on the time you spend working. I would normally work an 8:00 to 4:00 day in the lab, Monday to Friday do no more than an hour's work on any weekday evening, take Friday evening off completely, and keep my weekends free of work. If there were a genuine deadline approaching, I would work Saturdays, but never Sundays. If you set yourself definite work time and me time boundaries, you will not be sucked in to obsessive overwork.

I'll tell you something else though. I had difficulty publishing and it hampered my career academically. I bounced around in industry, the civil service actually, doing jobs with research in the title but very little actual research was involved. It drove me crazy and I got very depressed. It seems I'm basically ruined for anything other than science. So before you jump 'into industry' make sure you can actually cope with the kind or work you'd be doing in industry.

Ann :) said:

I would be interested to hear about your experiences of working in academia and in research labs. At this point I am very worried that science is not good for me and that I will never be able to balance and will have to stay away from it (I have been off work for over 3 weeks now as I could not cope any more both physically (too underweight) and psychologically (utterly exhausted and burnt out).) This is very sad: Science which has been holding my life together for so long and which I have long loved and sought comfort in, has now turned into an additional source of stress in my life.

I know how you feel. I'm good at science but feel very bad at navigating academic politics. But my issue seems different that yours. I can get over stressed and shut down a bit too much. My best advice is friends. Get a social life with people. It forces you to break from work and indulge in an outlet.

I realise saying that getting and maintaining friendships is incredibly hard for some autistic people but its the only thing that ever really helped me.

Dawn said:

What does PI stand for?

The general structure of university research is you have a PI (principal investigator) who is generally on an open ended contract and under him work research assistants and other post docs (on fixed term contracts) and PhD students often working on the PIs area of research. Its something like a team leader.

Hi Ann :), commenting on your original post and Dawn's helpful comments.

Dawn said:

I am so sorry you are going through this, and I hope your health improves soon, but do remember you are a valuable asset to them too. It's in everybody's interest for you to get the conditions you need to succeed.

This.

Ann :) said:

I recently finished my MPhil

Congratulations on finishing the MPhil. That is a significant achievement and a *lot* of work.

Ann :) said:

I always want to please people and find myself unable to say no when asked to help out with projects and lab work. I do love getting involved, but as I am unable to say no, I take on more than I can cope with, including projects that I am not so interested in.  

Glad you raised this issue, because it is incredibly important. In addition to Dawn's good suggestion about "A chat with occupational health", it may also help to see a counsellor too.

Ann :) said:

I love research and science has always been a source of stability and comfort in my life. However, for the third time now (over the past years) I have ended up extremely underweight and this time also utterly burnt out as I end up focusing on my research to the exclusion of all else (I have food/eating issues anyways, but what happens in this case is that I do not want to deal with it and end up stuck in a routine eating the same handful of foods in same order over and over again).

Everyone's situation is different, and when you mention "I have food/eating issues anyways" you raise another issue which I don't have the knowledge to address. But the point of research really chimes with me. From my own experience, when I'm engrossed in research or in writing, I lose all sense of time, forgetting to eat, drink, and other basic requirements. I end up utterly exhausted, and frequently have moments of burnout. I found having colleagues who have a strict timetable - e.g. one who always goes to lunch at a particular time and pulls me away - is incredibly useful. (It also helps if the colleague is really considerate of what to eat - I was living off junk food and snacks, leading to weight gain and fluctuating moods, and a more careful, considered diet *works wonders*.) Same goes with how long to spend researching - if you have a colleague who comes to you and says, right, finished for today, let's go - it's annoying as hell, but it does help enforce a routine. And having a social group outside of the research similarly helps. (BUT - this is a personal response to what appears to be an institutional issue. )

Ann :) said:

I also suspect that I have also been taken advantage of (was not paid for 6 months now, despite being promised a contract from after the 3^rd month onwards etc.).

Something that has taken me a long time to learn: seperate the institutional issue from the personal issue. This might be accidental or it might be something nefarious. As Dawn suggests, a polite and clear email, with various people cc'ed - usually helps to raise concerns and clarify the situation, but your institution might be different.

Ann :) said:

I always want to please people and find myself unable to say no when asked to help out with projects and lab work. I do love getting involved, but as I am unable to say no, I take on more than I can cope with, including projects that I am not so interested in.

This is another important issue, and thanks for raising it. Being helpful and being of great assistance is a really good characteristic to have, but in a lab, I presume, it can be easily taken advantage of. It might help to ask the question whether the additional projects connect to your research (and/or career intentions) - and, if not, avoid. Don't get into the habit of doing other people's work for them - particularly if there's no acknowledgement (e.g. pay, publications, etc).

Ann :) said:

(I have been off work for over 3 weeks now as I could not cope any more both physically (too underweight) and psychologically (utterly exhausted and burnt out).)

This, somewhat hidden in brackets, is a really important issue to address. How are you now? What will help you immediately? Does your workspace have a counsellor?

Thanks! I will write to my supervisor and occupational health- you are right it is better to do it in writing because whenever I try to talk to people (even when I make detailed lists/notes in preparation), I never end up saying what I mean to and the issue does not get resolved. 

PI = Principal Investigator 

What does PI stand for?

On the point about talking to your supervisor, can you write instead and copy in HR and occupational health? Tell them how much you enjoy the work, but in view of the fact that you are undergoing assessment for autism, you feel that you must achieve a balance between looking after yourself and work in order for you to be well and for them to continue getting benefit of your talents and that you are looking for their support in this. Both you and your organisation have everything to gain from addressing the problems. A diagnosis will give you legal rights for reasonable adjustments etc, but you need them to be truely partners with you in the finding the solutions. I'd then give them the detail on the points that are difficult for you. Tell them you are writing because you find the difficulties hard to express in person. It could well be that it is a simple case of nobody having this far really understood what the problems are for you.

A chat with occupational health would be a very good idea. It's their job to advise your bosses about how best to support you.

Developmental neuroscience, you say...I'd have thought logically you should be in an ideal environment to get the required understanding, but somehow it sounds as though no one has this far picked up on your need.

I would also get some help from any disability support group or union  you may have within your organisation. They may well help with respect to your employee rights and advocate for you.

I am so sorry you are going through this, and I hope your health improves soon, but do remember you are a valuable asset to them too. It's in everybody's interest for you to get the conditions you need to succeed.

Keep us posted.