u/AngieKaoru

I think by the title of this post all of you may think that I am going crazy, specially considering the current unstable situation in the US, and basically worldwide. I just need some honest advice on my career pathway. I will briefly summarize what has been going on, and hopefully you can give me more ideas on what to do.

I graduated from PhD (I am in Health Sciences, ( I am not a practitioner because I have no license here) from a Japanese university in 2014. Got some papers and moved to the US for 2 years as an entry level postdoc. My PI at that time was not really into mentorship and since the PI was changing for another working place and moving the whole lab, I was encouraged to get a clinical training or looking for more options. Even though my postdoc experience was not great nor bad I managed to publish in a good journal. I was very interested to return to my country (third world country) and work as a tenured Assistant professor at my alma mater so I gave up my postdoc and returned for good in 2018 after a short internship in Europe. Also, I had personal reasons to go back, I wanted to start a family and so on, but it never happened at the end.

Well...I never landed the Tenured assistant professor position back home...basically because I was not on the side of the dean and because there were no vacancies for my area. I got a kinda stable position at a private univ. but with little chances for research. I think it was okay, but later pandemic came in 2020 and my situation became very unstable...At that time I applied without many hopes for a postdoc fellowship in Japan under the sponsorship of my former PhD supervisor. I surprisingly got it (it was very competitive) and I returned to Japan in 2021.

I was all good as a postdoc , and one day I was offered an assistant professor permanent position in my lab. The previous Assistant professor had already left them for personal reasons that I now understand. I naively thought it was a good move and I accepted the position in 2022...I believed it could help me to get an assosciate professor or asistant professor in other country..but reality seems different now.

Next year it will be my 5th year in this position. Things have turned downwards. the lab head is retiring, and no prospects of progress for me. I have now little to zero collaborations, I have published some papers, and at the end it is only the associate professor and me who will take care of lab and educational duties. The associate professor does not collaborate with me in any project, but we have good relation. In other words , I feel stuck, and if you know japanese academia, you will understand that I have no independence, and I am alone pushing my projects forward without much impact. Plus, there are no graduate students in our lab.

I think if I stay here, I will be assistant professor forever with a little impact on my field, basically, I feel like I am in a mediocre postdoc...I cannot speak fluent japanese, so I have less chances to participate in other roles...I have obtained local grants, and give lectures (in english), but I feel kinda..stupid because I cannot read or speak properly, truth is that at my 43 yo, i just cannot have enough energy at the end of the day to learn japanese. I dedicate my energy into progressing my research and trying not be be burned out so often.

Recently I am considering to move to US or any other english speaking country, maybe to start again, I can teach basic courses for medical sciences, but seems that getting a postdoc is better at this point...I still have the aim of making good research in my field, I think I am good at lab work..handling animals..educating...maybe there are more opportunities for me there...I am not willing to earn the nobel prize, or become a great PI with lots of R01s, something modest is okay for me.

I am married , but my partner is supportive and he is also wiling to move abroad if needed.

Thanks a lot for your kind attention to this post.