How to handle the stress and worries of doing a PhD abroad?
I’m interested in this line of questioning that has come up a few times now in different letters, about ‘rational’ concerns or worries or feelings. If you (your brain and your body and your spirit) are spending energy and thoughts and minutes/hours/days of your time worrying about making friends and having a social support circle, the least important question is the one about classifying it as rational or not. Because it is already happening. It is in your zeitgeist, so let’s hang out with it.
Abroad or not, I want to be honest about my experience that the PhD was the loneliest thing I have ever done. And it is not loneliness in the sense of isolation or even feeling misunderstood or disconnected. It was loneliness in this way of it existed in my brain and body and it was my job to communicate why this research, why I should be the researcher and steward of these projects, what the findings are, what the findings mean, etc. No one else could answer those questions for me or give the answers. They could be next to me co-working, or we could even be in conversation about it together, but the way to a done PhD wasn’t anywhere but within me. With my voice, thoughts, and words.
It was lonely to be staring at a screen all day and finding a paper that validates your direction and have no one to turn to share the win with. It was lonely learning how to communicate the research and make it compelling. It was lonely writing up findings, immersed in an intersection of topics that no one else was at.
And none of that had anything to do with my friendships, abroad or not, or even the quality of my relationships with my colleagues or supervisor or advisor.
It is just a damn lonely experience. Or, at least it was for me.
I felt it was important to start there because I want you to consider if you have an experience like mine, would you feel okay being abroad? With new friendships and time zones between you and older friendships? Or would you want to have an established support system (because I think I understood you correctly that it is either go abroad or stay at the university you are at?)?
There are many other considerations to doing a degree abroad including the visa situation, if you would be doing a PhD in your native language, the cultural differences, the length of the degree, financial questions, ability to visit home or not during the degree. I don’t mean to list all that out to deter you; I would chose doing my PhD abroad over again in a heartbeat! I just think informed decision making leads us to making the best choices of our lives and that requires considerations and intentional contending.
My PhD was part of a research centre, so there was built in community there, and I had multiple PhD students start with my supervisor at the same time which added a ‘cohortness’ to it as well. The research centre is related to play and children, which I find to attract a very specific type of person and one whom I typically get along with so I didn’t have many concerns about building a support system in my research centre. I also had the advantage of the college system in Cambridge (which operates a bit like a Hogwarts house with meals in the Great Hall and common rooms and a library to study in) that brought about another opportunity for making friends. The latter being where I felt more of the international community support with events for international students.
Between college and my research centre, I felt like there were many opportunities to make friends. There are unique challenges to making friends during a PhD, like people working whatever hours are most productive for them or people going away for field work or people are living through mental health challenges (related or unrelated to the PhD) that cause withdrawal or low energy to engage. However, it’s such an incredibly unique few years of your life that there can be this naturally quick bonding that can happen between people.
I can’t be sure what your potential university will be like in terms of support and how well you will mesh with the people around you, but I would say that it takes a specific amount of effort to built new friendships and support systems (new country or not). I don’t think it is something you can plan for and know how to navigate it before you’re in it, but I do think it’s worth knowing your energy levels may be lower throughout the PhD than other people who aren’t doing a PhD abroad because they aren’t navigating new grocery stores and calls across timezones and learning to trust new friends and adopting new cultural practices on top of all that a PhD entails. They may be navigating new friends and the newness of the PhD with you, but there may be this extra layer for you as an international PhD.
And that you will be struck by how many emotions can bubble up when you have to ask someone in your new country to be your in-country emergency contact. Or when you see the first wedding or birthday party you miss back home posted online. Or when your own birthday comes up for the first time and the vulnerability flashback of inviting people to your birthday party back in elementary school comes. Those emotions may knock you out for a night or distract you from your work for the afternoon. It’s worth knowing that will be part of your experience in some shape and form and intensity. Even if we don’t know what exactly your experience will be like.
What I hope this letter leaves you with is more questions than when you started, only in terms of being able to reflect more honestly about who you are as a person, how easy it is for you to make friends, and how much you want to be balancing being abroad on top of the PhD. Because there can be such an aspirational and inspirational glow to doing a PhD in the same way as there is when people talk about living abroad, and it is really in your best interest to look at the choices of both deciding to do a PhD and moving abroad for one with lots of care. Look beyond the glow.
I hope you take time to find other accounts online of people who are international students doing a PhD and maybe even find a creator or two from the potential schools to reach out to. I hope you ask your potential supervisor and lab mates about their experiences with social life at the university (through the lens of students for your supervisor, obviously I hope lol) and reach out to the international student office to see their resources or supports. I hope you process with your friends about transitioning to long distance friendships and you maybe even start seeing a therapist to talk through this decision with.
Most of all, I hope you listen to all the emotions this letter brought up for you and all the thoughts it made you think and explore those carefully. I hope the decision you make feels clear and easy once you’ve had more time to process.
I believe in you.
Til next Sunday,
Dr. Sydney Conroy
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