PhD Mum

I’ve lost count of the number of times someone said to me “I just don’t know how you manage to do a PhD and raise a child” during my studies.  And it made me realise that, perhaps from the outside looking in to my life, it did look challenging. I wanted to write this post for anyone who might be thinking of studying, whatever the course. To discuss the multitasking of child rearing and meeting deadlines. The majority of challenges of any course [be it undergraduate, accountancy, PhD etc.] are the same for most parents. If it’s not about the money side of doing the course, it will be about whether or not you can fit it all in and meet the course deadlines. The unsurprising underlying truth of this multitasking challenge is that it is difficult. It is difficult logistically, it is difficult financially, and it is difficult psychologically – particularly if your studying is seen as a “hobby” (as mine was by my family) and if you don’t get a weekly/monthly pay slip for ...

As part of my PhD education, I attended a training session on communicating research. During this session, the trainer quoted a well-known saying; that verbal communication is less than 10% of the entire communication process (the precise figure was 7%). The rest is “everything else”; body language...cadence…pitch. Communication is only 7% verbal/words Kids get this. Most toddlers don’t have a huge vocabulary but are able to understand easily the message that is being conveyed to them. In my house it is usually me stood with a hand on my hip, the other pointing at a shoe, eyebrows raised, high pitch. My kid gets it. They use the 93% available to them to figure it out. Toddlers: masters in communication. Whilst the accuracy of this 7% quote is up for debate, it still gets me thinking about communication via messages only. Particular in the world of Instagram, twitter, facebook, whatsapp…where a status/tweet/caption becomes scrutinised by all. It is part and parcel of part...

I always feel a sense of irony looking back at my ignorance of parenting before actually having to do it. The ignorance and arrogance of youth who think they know it all. I am sure 99% of people reading this with kids think this too, as we all sit on a sofa covered in baby snot and chocolate handprints. But in fairness, I had good reason to be cocky. I grew up in a large extended family (I have 30 cousins!), surrounded by babies. Before I was pregnant, loads of my friends had kids, my sister has kids, cousins had kids etc. You get the idea. I was relatively late at reproducing. And I thought I knew what to expect and that I was able to deal with any eventuality. Looking back at when my little bundle of joy arrived, the first few months are hard to recall due to a heavy mix of sleep deprivation and anxiety. But on reflection, the first two years of parenting were relatively straight forward: make sure the baby was physically looked after, remember to feed, change, &...

Before I go on, please know that this is a lighthearted piece . There are many women who struggle daily with mental health conditions every day and there are great services available to offer support (God bless the NHS). Please do not take any offence to what I write, and please if you think you might, stop reading. After completing my undergraduate degree, I took a few years off from academia. I then returned to complete my MSc. During this course, I had to complete a piece of original research. I decided to study schizotypal traits in religious people (as you do). Which simply means that even in a undiagnosed population (your average Joe), there are traits or behaviours that could be considered a psychiatric illness. I was lucky enough to be supervised by Professor Richard Bentall during my MSc. His book, Madness Explained , is a very good read. Similarly to the book by Jon Ronson on Psychopaths , they make you question the psychological testing method and how exactly someone i...