{"id":1261,"date":"2021-10-12T13:22:30","date_gmt":"2021-10-12T17:22:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/?p=1261"},"modified":"2025-04-29T10:04:49","modified_gmt":"2025-04-29T14:04:49","slug":"phds-mental-health-and-belonging","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/2021\/phds-mental-health-and-belonging\/","title":{"rendered":"PhD’s, mental health and belonging"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\n PhD’s, mental health and belonging\n <\/h1>\n \n \n <\/header>\n\n <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n

As a PhD student with mental health challenges, I sometimes question whether my experience is the same as my peers. Did they look for a supervisor who understands mental health? <\/em> Do they see themselves reflected in resources about \u2018caring for your mental health\u2019 and \u2018self-care for students\u2019? <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Don\u2019t get me wrong, entering a PhD and being me<\/em> has been remarkably rewarding. I have a supportive environment to explore my ideas, where my strange questions can lead to insightful conversations. I\u2019ve met peers who not only accept and encourage me but challenge my conceptualization of the world and my approach to research. I have a supervisor who sees value in my perspectives and believes in me. When applying to Carleton, I was even exposed to students who use their experiences to shape their research and help their community<\/a>. In essence, it feels like my potential in defining myself as an academic is limitless. While I\u2019m still waiting for this to come crashing down (I\u2019ve heard this happens in second year), I can\u2019t help but think it\u2019s the contrast between the supportive spaces I\u2019ve found and the concessions I\u2019ve had to make that makes my disappointment sting all the more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At times, it can feel like the very institution of academia doesn\u2019t accept me, and that even with acceptance, inclusion isn\u2019t guaranteed and support is strictly rationed. For example, despite publishing an article on breaking the silence on mental illness<\/a>, Carleton\u2019s counselling services aren\u2019t set up to provide long-term support \u2013 which automatically necessitates that I seek support off campus. In order to pay for therapy, I\u2019ve had to label myself on provincial and school documentation as having a disability (regardless of whether I identify as that). While I\u2019m grateful for the support that\u2019s offered, the process of being forced into a label has sucked.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

While writing this, the qualitative researcher in me couldn\u2019t help but see the underlying theme in my experiences \u2013 the disconnect between the people and the system. My social and academic environments are ones of support and collaboration, where being me is a strength. How, then, have our institutional processes and policies not caught up?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These systemic barriers probably won\u2019t change anytime soon (or maybe they will, and I\u2019d be thrilled to be wrong here) but here are steps that prospective and current PhD students can take to protect or maintain their mental health based on my own experience:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prospective students:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  1. Include what you need (for your mental health) as a criterion in your search for the perfect supervisor or school.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Have open conversations with your potential supervisor about mental health. See if they are open to using different approaches to support you.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. See if you can speak to a current graduate student about their experience. This can help you get a feel for the lab culture, and if it would be a supportive and inclusive environment.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    New students:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    1. Get registered with your university accessibility services as quickly as you can. Your disability coordinator can help you navigate OSAP and the NSLSC.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    2. Think about moving your health information to Health Services on campus. This can be helpful for coordinating your services and setting up a comprehensive circle of care.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    3. Pay attention to when bursaries open and close at your university. There are usually programs or bursaries that are specifically for helping people with disabilities.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    4. See if you qualify for any of the awards on external websites<\/a>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    5. Be open with your supervisor. It\u2019s not all sunshine and daisies and sometimes they can suggest strategies to help you cope.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    6. Establish your support network prior to entering the program. Your supervisor isn\u2019t your therapist, and it can be easy to cross boundaries and over-share if you don\u2019t have solid supports in place prior to starting the program. Further, I\u2019ve found it hard to connect with peers if they don\u2019t share similar life experiences and have relied on my friends more than ever.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

      The items in this list came from hours wading through blogs and Reddit treads (which, frankly, are often gloomy) and conversations with other folks who have been there, done that. As such, this isn\u2019t a prescriptive list outlining the steps to success for PhD students with mental health concerns, but rather steps that have been helpful for me so far. I hope these lists might even slightly reduce the amount of labour necessary for our participation in academia. At the heart of it, I write this because, at the end of the day, we belong here. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

       <\/p>\n\n\n\n

      Mel Edwards<\/a> is a first year PhD Student in the Spatial Determinants of Health Lab. Her research interests include the use of e-mental health to support underserved populations in rural communities<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      As a PhD student with mental health challenges, I sometimes question whether my experience is the same as my peers. Did they look for a supervisor who understands mental health?  Do they see themselves reflected in resources about \u2018caring for your mental health\u2019 and \u2018self-care for students\u2019? Don\u2019t get me wrong, entering a PhD and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1122,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[20,71,25,94],"tags":[33,73,113,116],"class_list":["post-1261","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-about","category-academic","category-highered","category-mental-health","tag-education","tag-mental-health","tag-student-experience","tag-students"],"acf":{"cu_post_thumbnail":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1261","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1261"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1261\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1266,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1261\/revisions\/1266"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1122"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/determinants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}