The book I am reading and the patient cases described therein made me think of all the people whom I have met through the years, mostly in academia, who have had mental or behavioral health issues. I don't know if academia is rife with mental health problems or whether it is better or worse than any other industry, but I know I have met quite a few people who might have or actually have benefited from some form of therapy.
After my BS, I taught physics part-time at a high school for the kids gifted in math and science. It was an elite school in my home country and the kids were unbelievably bright. It was a pressure cooker, and every year several students would have breakdowns and have to leave school. I had one such student in one of my classes, it was really heartbreaking...
Shortly after I had begun grad school in the US, I witnessed a professor undergo a breakdown following separation from spouse. This was the first manic episode of this professor, who was subsequently diagnosed with bipolar disorder and has been controlling the condition with medication reasonably well ever since.
My best friend from grad school, whose cubicle was next to mine, was treated for anxiety and depression during grad school. I often wanted to tell him that maybe his body was trying to tell him that this program was not for him, which I really thought at the time. He had come from being very successful in a career where structure and hierarchy and orders were sacrosanct, into graduate school, where he worked for the world's most hands-off advisor on a project that was very open-ended and quite complicated... He did persevere and eventually graduated, currently doing great in industry.
Very recently, a former visiting scientist sent several cryptic, incoherent emails. Upon exchanging a few emails with his former advisors, it appeared that similar emails were sent to all the scientist's acquaintances. He had a breakdown brought on by too much stress and too little sleep for too long, and he became manic. I don't know what the future will hold for him.
A dear colleague from another department left his tenure track position after only two years. Having spiraled into deep depression, he finally sought and received help, left the job for which he had felt poorly suited and found one that seems to make him much happier.
Academics move a lot and are usually very far from a strong support network of close friends and family. The job is stressful, replete with rejection and with few affirmations. In many fields, job prospects are mediocre to bleak, yet personal sacrifices are often great. So people suffer.
Do academics go to therapy? I am sure someone somewhere has studied this phenomenon seriously, but that does not mean we cannot do a poll. If you are in academia (e.g. graduate student, postdoc, professor, research scientist, instructor/lecturer) or were in the past (in which case answer for the time when you were in academia):
18 comments:
A regular reader, but will stay anonymous for this one. I have had anxiety and depression for the better part of the last 7 years. They are caused not so much by academia, but mainly by having to suffer chronic pain from my medical condition (which is unresponsive to whatever medicine can offer) and having a severly sick parent on top of this. I also can not take any antidepressants, due to side effects, so I have been sent to therapy at some point during the last years - I went 4 or 5 times, but did not find it very helpful at all and was told by the therapist herself that I should try something else. The reason, as she put it, is that therapy helped people to find out what is causing the depression, while I know already and very clearly what is going on and how my ruminations patterns, etc. start. So she felt she couldn't help someone who was so clear about their inner thoughts. What I wanted from her is not to know *what* is going on, but *how* to get beyond all this, but that is something that she said noone can do for me. And I still don't know how. Managing stress via meditation has helped somewhat, but the patterns persist.
I voted 'other': I had counselling through the university counselling service which was really, really helpful for a couple of years, but then the right was withdrawn from staff, it's only for students. I then had a few sessions through the health service, but they weren't helpful partly because the therapist was just really confused that someone could be so self-reflective and still be all messed up (and you have no choice of therapist with the health service). I have depression and GAD, but I'm not ill enough to get any more help through the national health service. Finding someone privately, though - so scary! I should. Because just having someone neutral to vent to can be really helpful. But I keep not getting around to it. Thank heavens for blogging :-)
Anon at 5:37 AM, from what I understand is that traditional therapy (rooted in Freudian psychoanalysis) focuses on finding out the hidden roots of problems, and that is supposed to help you deal with them.
REBT is different in the sense that it says -- whatever it is that causes the problem to begin with and no matter how bad it may have been (e.g. childhood abuse, your child or significant other dies, chronic illness) you actually have the ability to prevent it from ruining your life. The whole philosophy is about helping yourself get unstuck and try to achieve an enjoyable existence even though it will never be problem-free.
So you may want to consider a therapist who specializes in REBT or CBT? Or grab a book as the first step...
(Obviously, I am not a therapist, and I might be totally talking out of my a$$. If there are therapists among readers, please, do chime in.)
JaneB, yes, I think many universities do offer some type of employee assistance but usually only a limited time... I am sorry your benefit got cut. Is it really hard and/or expensive to find someone on your own?
My first breakdown was in the summer between high school and undergrad and landed me in an intensive daily outpatient program. Undergrad didn't make things much easier. I started having manic episodes in the first year which promptly landed me a bipolar diagnosis and lithium (which turned out to actually be a sleep disorder). I was chucked into on campus therapy. My therapist was a very sweet intelligent man but I wasn't in the head space to actually do much good. Fast forward three years and we get to breakdown number 2 and an inpatient stay. Dropped out of school and shoveled antidepressants in my face. Went back to school the next semester and realized that the drugs were seriously screwing up my ability to process information. After talking it out with the doctor we decided to go off of them with very careful monitoring until I graduated.
This when I went off to grad school. I decided that as much as I wanted the PhD, I wasn't going to sacrifice my mental health for it. Before I joined a lab I discussed with my PI that if he was expecting 13 hour days + weekends and working at home then I would find someone else to work for. But I made the point that when I was in lab I would work and as long as he clearly communicated his expectations that things would always be completed. He decided to take a chance on me and was never disappointed.
Without the drugs and therapists I knew I'd need to make some serious changes. I turned my home into a haven and made sure that my work never followed me past the front door. I learned to recognize when my thoughts were spinning out of control and how to derail them before they built up steam. Even though it seems like these measures are counter-intuitive to how an academic should work it held me together and made me successful. I wouldn't have been nearly as productive had I let myself get caught up in how a grad student was "supposed" to work rather than the practices that kept me sane and happy.
I have been med free for nine years and not needed the talk therapy in seven. For me successful science in the face of mental dysfunction is identifying what you need to take care of yourself and not feeling guilty for doing it.
Thanks for the post. I think mental health issues are really important to talk about especially in high stress careers such as academia.
I'm current a post-doc in engineering. I've had what I'd call 'functional depression' for most of my life but never sought treatment until my second year of graduate school when I started feeling overwhelmed and anxious about preliminary exams. I went to the campus counseling center and met with a counselor who specialized in cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT). It was GREAT.
The idea behind CBT is "you feel the way you think." So your shitty feelings stem from shitty thoughts, but your shitty thoughts usually stem from some flawed assumption, which fall under specific categories (called cognitive distortions). So part of CBT is tracing your negative feelings to a negative thought, and continue breaking it down until you realize you're upset over something ridiculous and untrue. Since I am an overly self-reflective and a scientist, maybe that's why I liked this approach. (I didn't need space to vent, I needed specific advice on how to feel better, and the CBT methods worked for me. (Dr. David Burns books are great also because they give you all kinds of writing exercises.)
So I've had good experience with part-time therapy during a particularly stressful time in my life. Later on, I realized that therapy is only as good as your therapist... I've gone to therapy other times and have not has as good experience because the therapist and I simply did not 'click'. Maybe I got lucky the first time around, but what I learned is it's really important to feel comfortable and have a good rapport with your counselor/therapist.
I have been in therapy for several years and it has been enormously helpful. I went because I was in chronic pain. Then, a couple of years after I started, my husband was diagnosed with an untreatable degenerative neurological disease. We are both astrophysicists (though we both left the field some time before I started therapy.)
I had always had some struggles emotionally, but now I realize I had actually had some level of depression and anxiety my whole life. My life is much fuller and calmer now. More joy, less anger, less frustration. Even with a severely ill husband. Had I found the right therapist when I was 20, (I'm 53 now) I would have dealt much better with the rigors and stresses of academia, and possibly never left it. (Though leaving it may have been right for me either way.)
It can take a few tries to find the right therapist. It's about compatibility, so the good news is that you will know who is right just because you like them right away. I liked mine in the first 2 minutes, though I tried 3 others before I found her. And you should very quickly feel that you can trust them. Trust is critical. Therapy isn't painful or scary like getting a filling or having surgery. It's much more like a really good massage. It should be enjoyable to talk to your therapist and you should look forward to it. Every time. If it isn't and/or you don't, find someone else. It's like test driving a car - finding the right one is worth the effort and it doesn't mean you are "less than" because you didn't like the one you tried.
My physical therapist at the time gave me the name of my psychotherapist (LCSW, in case anyone wants to know.) Physicians can also make suggestions. Sometimes your employer's health center has someone you can see (as was described by another commenter) or can refer you to someone outside your workplace. There are differences (such as time limits, confidentiality) between paying out of pocket to someone privately and someone at your workplace or outside your workplace but paid through insurance.
Academic culture tells people to put their health, physical and emotional, too low on their priority list. Thank you for raising this topic, GMP.
I'm in the "Other" category. :-) I started Jungian psychoanalysis in March of this year and it has already done incredible things for me. Issues that I've had for years, or even for decades, are suddenly gone, completely. It's been like a miracle for me. I haven't finished analysis yet but already the progress is amazing.
I'm no longer in academia (left after grad school, coming up on 15 years ago now....) but I thought I'd chime in that I had several sessions with a counselor (I'd guess she was a licensed social worker, but I honestly don't know) during my first year of college, and it was immensely helpful. It helped me get past some of the issues that were undermining my confidence at the time. I doubt I would have been as successful in my academic life, either in college or grad school. if I had not had those sessions.
I've considered doing it again at various points in my life, but the closest I came was some sessions with a career counselor. Also immensely helpful.
I think that even if you don't have anything that would be characterized as a disease or even a dysfunction, talking to someone who is not invested in the decisions you make can be really helpful.
I didn't vote in your survey, though, since I don't really fit the category of people you're trying to poll.
"I often wanted to tell him that maybe his body was trying to tell him that this program was not for him, which I really thought at the time."
I hope this isn't what you'd infer now about someone with GAD or depression. Some environments can be toxic, but often (as I think you know) the problem is more about maladaptive beliefs and not knowing good self-care. I think it wasn't until my third year of grad school when I went two weeks without seriously considering dropping out--I was convinced I wasn't smart enough--and now I'm a TT prof in a top department in the field. I find I have the same glum worries at every stage, although I'm getting better at handling them. I think I'd have these concerns in any career, as long as it was something that challenged me. It's about learning how to relate to the bar that I keep raising.
I've been tempted to conduct of study looking at advisor stability/sanity and the onset of mental illness in their grad students- this after managing to leave a terrible advisor, half of whose students began medication during their tenure with her
Anon at 10:15 AM, I was totally clueless at the time about mental health issues. In my defense, I didn't bother my friend with my ignorant beliefs, since I figured he was already seeing a doctor and what the hell do I know anyway. I think I am slightly less clueless now, and I think I can appreciate what you are saying
"I was convinced I wasn't smart enough--and now I'm a TT prof in a top department in the field. I find I have the same glum worries at every stage, although I'm getting better at handling them. I think I'd have these concerns in any career, as long as it was something that challenged me. It's about learning how to relate to the bar that I keep raising."
I actually have a lot of the same feelings myself. On the upside, I credit them as the source of my ambition. On the downside, of course, there's feeling anxious and glum...
I do not think that people in academia have any more mental issues than people in other professions. However, since much of the work we do in academia is mental, it has a greater effect on job performance than a mental illness in someone who mostly does physical work.
As far as maintaing my mental health in academia I think of academia as a 9 to 5 job that pays the bills and I work hard to keep it that way. I know many people that disagree with this idea, but I think it helps me maintain balance and sanity.
Additionally, I lower my expectations. I remind myself that research, science, students, and professors are not perfect. With that in mind I find my work more focused and enjoyable. I find that its important to allow yourself to make mistakes and try not to know everything.
"Additionally, I lower my expectations. I remind myself that research, science, students, and professors are not perfect. With that in mind I find my work more focused and enjoyable. I find that its important to allow yourself to make mistakes and try not to know everything."
This is good. I think there can be a tendency to err toward overdeterminism sometimes in careers--e.g., "If I were smart enough and my research were perfect, I'd of course have multiple R01s, awards, and great publications. The fact that I don't have these things must mean that I'm doing something wrong." There's really a heck of a lot of chance. It seems most sanity-preserving to focus on quality input (good, self-reflective practices and strategies in going about research, teaching, and service) and relinquish the rest to fate. I have this silly metaphor that we're each particles exploring this hyperdimensional surface of truth, and we have only limited information on whether we might be in an area that's truly explorable (interpretable) with our present tools.
The structure of academia may exacerbate the problem, but I also think academia (or at least the sciences) attracts people who are predisposed to be somewhat obsessive and self-critical. I often say that I want to go work at McDonalds because I'm tired of being stressed. My husband replies that then I would obsess over crafting the perfect Big Mac because that's just the way I am.
I used the campus mental health system in grad school but I found that many therapists are heavy on emotive reasoning but not so strong on analytical thinking. They would think it was a breakthrough if I cried while I kept waiting for some actual useful information. It was not a good match.
I think academia allows people with certain issues to stay when they would probably be shuffled around a lot in industry. I think people in academia do have a higher incidence of certain issues because of that, and I also think the system is a pressure cooker, making them worse. That being said, there are other issues I've run into when in industry. People at start-ups tend to be the high strung types and can have some of the same issues as in academia. At more established places, there are other problems, but the environment isn't (generally) so stressful. It may not set off those issues quite as often, but the environment may not be as stimulating.
I guess you just have to pick your poison...which is unfortunate.
Reading through what anonymous 10:51 said about industry made me think of another unique issue in academia. As a TT professor there are no parallel moves to be made at the institution. You can't switch to accounting or marketing if you don't like your position in research. Also, for me, I find it quite stressful that the lives of so many graduate students and postdocs depend on me. There is almost no safety net for these people. I can't just up and quit or even hire a replacement. Luckily these days I don't feel that way. I saw a counselor the first time during my third year of graduate school, when I really felt like everything in life was becoming overwhelming. Unfortunately, the university only offered 6 sessions and the meds I was prescribed for depression and anxiety had significant side effects. I pushed through and graduate somehow and life in my postdoc was somewhat better. I was still depressed, but was in a foreign country with different cultural beliefs. I went to see a therapist, who was not from my home country, and they simply told me to change jobs. When I got my TT job, I finally got good medical insurance and started going to therapy. I tried a few different medications before I got one that worked and it works very well. I also changed therapists once because I couldn't establish a good rapport with the first one. My life these days is much happier even though it continues to be stressful and therapy helps keeps everything under control.
I've lived with depression for most of my life now (first breakdown at 14.) Getting away from home helped, but I struggled through undergrad, with the help of therapy. There was too much pressure from work, I'd always been good in high school, so I never needed to develop good study skills, my coping strategies living at home lead me to develop some very bad self care habits that exacerbated the problem.
After college, I lived by myself working in the NGO sector for a few years. Less stress allowed me to focus on self care skills, and for the first time, my depression seemed under control. As a result, there were some teary and panicky periods in gradschool, but those 5 years generally saw an increase in my mental health as I learned to deal with my stress better. I had some PTSD at the beginning of grad school, saw a therapist who seemed more interested in talking about my mother than the PTSD inducing event, so I quit after a year.
After Epsilon was born, the lack of sleep during his first year, and the single parenting / commuting to solve our 2 body problem has killed my ability to take care of myself (sleep being a major component). I can no longer claim that my depression is mostly under control. I'm seriously considering therapy in my new post doc city, but it seems very complicated, since I'll only be there 4 days a week, and I'll only be in the position for a year or two, and the process of finding a good therapist so long and painful.
I've heard from others that knowing what type/school or therapy is good for you is a good way to narrow down the field of therapists to see. I'll look into REBT/CBT. I'd be happy to take suggestions from your readers of other resources. Sorry for the long confessional comment. I guess I echo the other comments that this is a valuable topic of conversation to be had in academia.
This is a sad sad post. The pressures of academia that are put on us by others and that we put on ourselves are too much.
In previous institution, famously creepy now, my colleague's husband didn't get tenure and the drama would have made a good movie. She suffered from depression and was open about taking antidepressents, as if it was a blanket excuse for however she behaved. Once she was ticked off with me and came banging on my office door. I still react badly to door-banging and being startled in my office.
There are too many screwed-up sick jerks in academia that are tormented and torment their colleagues. That is one reason why it is so difficult to cut it.
PS I'm taking a blogging break for a few months.
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