u/NoMoreScaryDreams

1.) My advisor asked me to complete a task, which I did. We went over it together and she told me she was “very pleased”. The next week she asked where the task was and I told her we went over it the week prior, she told me that I misunderstood, that’s not what she wanted, and that I need to stop falling behind.

2.) She gave me another task to do and told me to follow up with an email to explicitly state what the task was to ensure I understood . I did. I came back with the task completed and before I showed her she said “you never sent me an email…”. I showed her that I did, she even replied to it, and the task was completed.

3.) She has made jokes about my disorganization in front of my peers.

4.) In an annual student review she flagged me as falling behind and being disorganized. This has hurt my perception in the department and I have now learned that if I get a similar review again, I could be terminated from my program.

5.) The other student that she advises has pulled me aside twice now, asking “is ‘advisor’ okay?”. They don’t really expand on why they keep asking me this, it just seems like something is going on.

6.) I worked on a research project for her that she then wanted me to present to my cohort, expressing she was excited about it. When I presented it to my cohort, she expressed that she thought my results were uninspiring and not sound, and used the presentation as a launch board to ask my peers to join the project. This has also hurt my social standing. I later found out she asked one of my cohort members to reach out to me and tell me good job.

I’m just confused.

I know this isn’t a personal problem. It may just be an institutional issue at my university but every person I know doing a PhD is miserable. No one says “I have excellent work life balance” or “the pursuit of this PhD has really helped me blossom as a person”.

It feels like we’re all developing anxiety disorders as we drown under the work. Weekends are non-existent and holidays are forgotten. Family never comes first and health gets neglected. Sure we “say” that we need to take care of ourselves and our contracts state that 50 hours of work should never be exceeded… but then expectations would never be met and you get punished for inefficiency.

I’m just wondering… does anyone know about the history of PhDs? Has it always felt this fundamentally incompatible with life? I know they’re supposed to be hard, but this feels life damaging sometimes.

Given, this just might be my university. We’re a notoriously high pressure university in the middle of nowhere with very harsh winters that keep us indoors for the majority of the school year. People joke that there isn’t much else to do but work… but it’s not a joke.

I found out my ex had cheated on me with 40+ people… and I couldn’t face reality and stayed with him, believing that our plans of marriage and family were still possible. Big shocker, he discarded me for another woman a year later. He claimed he “needed space” only to enter a relationship with her after a few days and never spoke to me again. I wasn’t even given the dignity of being broken up with.

All this happened while I was living in Washington DC, and for reason, the city itself became this big monster in my mind. A month after everything exploded, I moved across the country to start my PhD, and if I so much as had a flashback of DC it would trigger panic attacks. It sounds so stupid to say, but once I saw a picture of the Washington Monument and I had to dash off to the restroom to bawl my eyes out. It felt like the city itself betrayed me.

I’m proud to say that I decided to go back to DC yesterday and confront my demons. A year has passed, I know I’m stronger, and I wanted to test myself. Sort of like pressing on a bruise to see if it still hurts.

It doesn’t… not really.

When I got to the city I was confronted with so many memories that genuinely had nothing to do with him. Those big scary places were just… places. My heart didn’t feel like it was being ripped out of my chest, it just felt like I was in an old memory. A bit dreamy, but not in the nightmare sort of way.

I booked a beautiful AirBnB, high up in the sky, and it felt like I was given a perspective I didn’t have when I was at rock bottom. I even went on a date, and I didn’t feel any of that strange residual guilt I used to.

I know I don’t love him anymore, and because of that I think I’m a bit more free.

I will say, I cried when I left. It felt like reenacting the abandonment. But it wasn’t like the gut wrenching crying I had done a year ago. Just a few tears and a heavy feeling of “the time is forever lost. I can’t go back”.

I’m glad I did it. It feels like I have a more measured perspective on what happened. My life wasn’t ruined because of that lying fuck. I certainly had time and experiences stolen from me, but I also have memories and experiences that still belong to me.

And most importantly, I now have evidence that I am in fact healing. My life is recoverable.

Anyhow, I thought I would share my story. It’s a healing journey for sure, but there’s small victories and self discoveries along the way.

My mom has been making remarks along the lines of “when you finally get a job” or “you’re avoiding a career by staying in school”.

It just sucks. We went to the movies the other day and there was a poster that said “now hiring”, and she nudged me saying “see you can work here!”. Not as a joke, mind you. As serious life advice.

I feel like such a loser in her eyes. I’ve been trying to explain to her that getting into an Ivy League PhD program is good for building my career, and that it opens doors. But she doesn’t want to hear it. She just thinks I’m avoiding real life.

She’ll tell me that I should take nail painting classes at my university or cooking classes. I tell her that I need to be taking classes relevant to my dissertation and manage my time well enough grade and teach my students. She will then ask me why I don’t just work in our local school district as an elementary school teacher. (Nothing against elementary school teachers, it’s just not my personal goal)

It really sucks. I can’t go to her for advice, help, or even understanding. A lot of the time I feel completely alone in this. I would hope something like this would have made her proud (this isn’t my primary intention, more so a byproduct I looked forward to), but I feel like I’ve just disappointed her further.

Is anyone else dealing with this?

The part that feels the most unfair is that they will never experience the emotional fallout of this. We pay the price emotionally, not them.

They know that they are doing the worst behavior. So they brace themselves for impact when it falls apart. Whereas we give our all into something that feels so sacred and walk away feeling that our best isn’t enough.

I’m genuinely so emotionally damaged from this. It’s been over a year and I still don’t know when the pain will stop. It hurt my career, my friendships, and killed a few of my dreams. I have a therapist who says “you can’t let yourself believe that”, but guess what, it’s not a matter of perspective if it’s the truth. I altered my whole life for him, and now I live in the destruction of it.

And what happened to him? He bounces from relationship from relationship, living the sex life of his dreams. He even messaged me on a dating app a few months ago, telling me how he reads a lot of smut. I was absolutely DISGUSTED. 1.) he didn’t recognize me, the woman he was with for two years, planning to marry, and was close with his family. 2.) His bio was all about being honest, transparent, and had a section that said “just please don’t be judgmental“ (he cheated on me with 40+ and would mock how much I loved him with his partners).

He’s bypassing all the pain- he’s just seeking out pleasure like a phototactic bug. His actions make it so hard for me to even see him as a human being sometimes.

God.

I hate him.

To make a long story short: Met a guy, fell in love. Started planning future, careers, family and marriage together. One day, after I lose my neighborhood in Hurricane Debby, I find out he has a cheating kink. He starts a slow, month by month reveal of the full extent of the betrayal. The full truth is that he’s a serial cheater who gets off on degrading me to his 40+ affair partners. I stay, because I’m fully in denial and he’s my only support network. The story gets complicated after this, but it ends with him ghosting me because he fell in love with another woman. I’m completely alone and have to start my PhD on the other side of the country a few weeks later. I lose my mind.

To say I feel humiliated is an understatement. Sometimes I wonder if God is punishing me, or worse, maybe God is getting off on degrading me too. I HATE myself for staying. I HATE that I gave all my power to him. I begged, sobbed, and pleaded with this man not to go. Snot nosed and sniveling. Of course he merrily catapulted into the arms of another, I was so pathetic, he would never want me again. He gets to feel like this desirable man that women make fools of themselves for, meanwhile I’m left with memories of being told that he “could do so much better” than me, I’m “too pale and skinny”, and “clingy”. All my self worth was tied to him, and honestly, so much of it still is.

I don’t understand what happened to me. All I know is that I’m hurting, ruminating, and unable to move on. I can’t even think sometimes. It’s like part of my brain calcified or turned into mush after this.

He gets to keep his sanity and his life (which he will use to do this to more women). Meanwhile I’m struggling to trust my family and closest friends after this. I don’t even trust myself.

I feel like all I hear our success stories of people going through something like this and coming out better. They become smarter, more successful, more beautiful… just MORE something. Meanwhile I feel like a shell of my former self. I miss the person I used to be more than I miss him. I can’t believe I let another person destroy my inner world so badly.

He’d even said “I feel like I broke you”, and used that as a reason for leaving. So the solution is to become not broken, right?

I don’t know how to do that. A part of me believes that it is possible to heal from this, and another part of me believes that I can’t. I want to keep trying to move on. What has helped you guys? I can’t stay like this forever but I don’t know what to do.

I had a phone call with a guy that sucked in a subtle way. The first thing he said was “I’m glad we’re calling instead of grabbing drinks first. You can usually tell within the first 15 minutes or so if it’s going to work out or not- then you have to sit through it”. Which made me feel a bit bad, like I needed to prove myself to him.

When he asked where I was from I joked “I hope I don’t sound arrogant but I’m a third generation (city I live in)”. He sarcastically replied “wowww 🙄”.

The entire time I just felt like I was irritating him. He mentioned liking instagram. I told him I like it too, and briefly told him that my advisor and I did an experiment on Instagram, and that of the findings were unexpected. Again, he said “wowwww 🙄”. I wasn’t trying to brag, I was just making conversation…

He then ended the phone call after 15 minutes, saying “Sorry to do this… but I have to go. But uh, yeah, text me if you want”.

I feel like I totally failed his appraisal.

Ugh. There’s something about dating apps that creates an atmosphere of ”perform for me”, and it makes the whole interaction feel off.

Essentially a friend (F26) who I (F26) haven’t been texting back often over these past few months reached out to me saying that they no longer wanted to be my friend because of my lack of consistent messaging.

I explained (as I have before) that my father is receiving end of life care while I navigate my PhD. My life is a bit hectic right now, so I haven’t been as available as I used to be. I also asked them if they’d be willing to work it out with me, because I had no idea that they were upset.

She agreed to talk about it with me, and apologized saying I had I point, she should express her feelings before ending relationships. She went on the explain that our friendship doesn’t feel right, and compared it to her other friendships, because I didn’t send her a Christmas gift and that I didn’t attend her graduation (I live in a completely different state than her). To be fair, I expressed interest in wanting to do these things for her, but that was before my father’s health started to fail. I’m really upset that I need to explain the fact that my dad is dying to her again. I don’t have the mental, emotional, or physical means to prioritize her.

At this point, I haven’t responded to her messages because I’m angry. I feel like she’s keeping score in one of the darkest time in my life. I was already trying to create a bit of distance between us before my father’s health started deteriorating, because she had done things that made me uncomfortable (ex. Calling me her “puppet”, telling me she has a crush on me in the middle of a serious work meeting, gossiping about me, etc).

I feel bad. I said I wanted to work it out, but now I just feel like I can’t see a point in being friends with her at all because of her behavior, judgement, and expectations. But I’m the one who suggested we talk it out. I feel like I’m doing DARVO or something. But the more we talk it out, the more I see her perspective, and the more I realize I don’t think she’s a person I want to be close with in life. 

Would I be the asshole if I said “you know what- never mind”

TLDR

Friend wants to end friendship with me for not texting them back consistently. I asked if we could talk it out. The more we talk it out the more I’m realizing I don’t want to be their friend. Would I be an asshole if I called it quits?

Maybe I’m dealing with self blame, but I can’t help but wonder what the signs were in the beginning that I missed. I just can’t believe something so destabilizing and life-altering came with no signs whatsoever.

Sometimes I get flashbacks of things he said at the beginning of our relationship that were red-flag-ish (ex. “all my friends say I’m super flirty but that’s just my culture“, “I once had a one night stand with a woman and later found out she was married- the guilt eats me alive“). Given, these were so subtle and didn’t really indicate that he‘d have 40+ affairs. But they were odd.

Do you all feel like there were signs? Maybe we could compile them here and learn how to protect ourselves more from people who are capable of this horrible betrayal.

A little over a year ago I thought I met the man I was going to marry. I fell in love hard. I thought I knew what being on love was before I met him, HA, I had no idea. We planned a future together, talked about marriage, and how we wanted to teach at the same university. We were one another’s best friends and were completely entangled in on another’s lives. I was close with his family.

…Then one horrible day I find out about his double life and that he had 40+ affairs. Not only this, he’d do this while mocking me behind my back to his friend who knew what he was doing. Even worse, I took him back because I thought he had a problem and I could love him through it.

Yeah… I know

But after several months my family said they could never accept him after what he did. One day, in a moment of rage and grief, I ended our relationship. But we still stayed incredibly close friends. I’m talking falling asleep on the phone every night, still talking in detail about how we loved one another more than we’d love anyone before, spending hours and hours every single day together. We were still intimate. It was like nothing changed but the label. I thought we were building trust back up in our relationship. He kept telling me how remorseful he was and how I was helping him change for the better.

Until, three months later, he meets another woman. He assures me it’s just friends with benefits and that he could never love anyone else but me. I tell him I’m confused, hurt, and don’t understand what’s happening. Then a few weeks later tells me he fell in love with her and that he’s moved on from me. I lost my mind. It sounds dramatic but it felt like a part of me died. I trusted him again and not only did I lose him physically, I lost him emotionally too. My reaction put a bad taste in his mouth, he said he needed space, and he never spoke to me again. I haven’t been the same since and I still think about it everyday over a year later. It’s like I lost him, my mind, my dignity and trust in others all at once.

And it kills me because I’ve heard through the grapevine that he keeps jumping from relationship to relationship. The woman he left me for didn’t work out, he cheated on her too. Now he’s with another probably doing the same thing. I personally can’t date anyone. Men have asked me out and tried pursuing me, which I try to engage with. But I just can’t emotionally connect with them. I feel so far away and like a part of myself is gone. I want to move on. It’s like he broke my brain and got to move on with his life while I still live in the wake of his destruction. (He even said this to me when leaving “I like I’m someone who was in charge of a village, and I burned it down, and now the villagers will never forgive me even though they say they have).

Has anyone went through anything like this and recovered? I feel like my heart is completely broken all the time.

A little over a month ago I started talking to this man romantically. Since then, we’ve be calling one another every day (we’re both on summer, normally we’re in person at Uni), until a few days ago when he stopped speaking to me out of nowhere.

I sent him a text, which he never responded to, but I can see he’s still viewing my social media.

Quite frankly, and I really mean without any ounce of bitterness, I think it’s for the best. I don’t think we’re a good fit romantically and I’m sure he senses that too. I tried talking to him about what we are and he just said “I’m courting you, but I hope you’re not talking to anyone else because I’m not”.

I want to reach out and confirm that’s 1.) he’s alright, and 2.) that we should see other people.

I don’t want to come at him and sound accusatory, or like I’m trying to retaliate against his silence. I truly just need to know if we’re done so I can continue on without a guilty conscience. There’s a few people who have been asking me out to dinner, and I keep telling them no out of respect to this person.

How would you all go about this respectfully? I don’t want to hurt his feelings or make him feel like I’m punishing him. But it feels so awkward to respond to someone’s silence with “hey, I think we should see other people”

After one of the worst years of my life (father is dying, the person I thought I was going to marry left me for another woman, and I’m completely isolated in a new state across the country). The first year of my PhD was absolutely miserable, I’m just surviving. I’ve finally gotten my performance review back and it says “needs improvement“.

I’m just so deeply ashamed of myself. No one gets a “needs improvement“ rating their first year, it’s a known open secret. I just really hate myself right now. Everyone told me not to worry because that never happens to first years.

I’ve been flagged in the system and multiple people in my program are now aware of my standing. Outside sources are contacting me and telling me I need to make plans with them.

I’m just so crushed. The ”student strengths“ section was left blank.

I already felt ostracized by my program and I feel like this is confirmation that I don’t belong here. My advisor is saying that I was flagged because of my executive functions skills (answering emails in a timely manner, showing initiative, communicating clearly and early about potential problems).

I know part of academia is being able to receive feedback. I want to improve and come back stronger. But I don’t know how to push back against the growing stigma against me in the department because the entire faculty and staff were present in the meeting where this was said about me and I was compared with my peers (who were all given great academic standing reviews).

I have diagnosed ADHD and Dyslexia and honestly, I’m at a point where I feel like I can’t keep up anymore because my symptoms. Unfortunately, I think the workload is making them even worse (two hours of sleep a night makes reading the next day even harder).

I’m terrified that if I get accommodations going to be ostracized by my department. Sometimes people are so cut throat here… the things I overhear make me feel like the smallest sign of ‘weakness’ will lead to lost opportunities and respect.

I don’t know what to do. Sometimes I think I should just drop out entirely.

Essentially a group of colleagues and I went out for dinner, and there was a moment where we were trying to determine who should take over for a committee at work. None of us wanted to do it, so it became a bit of sycophantic flattery where people would say "Ohhhh but Debra- you're sooooo organized. You'd be perfect!" or "You're so friendly and welcoming Dave, people would love you!". Everyone basically was playing this game until it got to me. I was told "well you have a car, so it would be easier for you take the role on".

It hurt my feelings in the moment. Especially after dinner ended and one of my colleagues asked me for a ride home. This same colleague wrote me a birthday card a month prior that mainly said "thanks for giving me rides" . Which sucks because we've hung out a lot outside of work, she's been to my house, we've seen multiple movies together, and I even helped her find a roommate when she was unable to find a place to live.

One of my cowokers/friends talked to me afterwards and said it was so weird that they did that to me. And that it was coming from a place of disrespect.

I don't know what to think. It feels like I shouldn't really trust or be friendly with these people anymore because I'm not being treated particularly well. But maybe that would be me overreacting.

I’m sorry if this post isn’t very relevant. I’m just really looking for advice, woman to woman. But honestly, kind of person to person.

I just had a dinner with my colleagues, all women, and had one of the worst panic attack of my life afterward. I feel so doomed and helpless.

My whole life is my PhD. There‘s no room for anything else. I barely get to speak with my family… I call my mom maybe twice a month and our phone calls last about five minutes. Thats all the family connection I have here

I haven’t called or spoken to my friends back home in months. And I don’t trust anyone in my program enough to be close to them. Everyone talks about everyone, my life business would become everyone’s business.

I have no emotional support here. None. There’s no one to call when I need help. I spend so much of the time in complete silence alone.

I’ve been living like this for 8 months and I‘m at a breaking point. I realized over dinner that my colleagues don’t respect me and that I’m mostly like the office weirdo/dunce. These are the only people I have in my life.

Everything that’s gone wrong over the past year is hitting me so hard. My heroin addicted father‘s rapidly failing health, my partner/bestfriend cheating on me and ghosting me for another woman, losing my entire neighborhood and most of my belongings in a flood. I fee like I’m in a nightmare. I tell myself everyone has their hardships but then I look around and see that, no, none of what I’m going through is normal.

I’ve told people in my program about these things, and it’s so unusual, I feel like they think I’m an over exaggerating liar. I feel so isolated. So looked down. So mutilated by my life circumstances. I can’t take it

I know this sounds so unserious- but I really mean it. I feel like what I'm doing wont matter anyhow or benefit humanity. I see these oppressive power dynamics everywhere, I write about them extensively, and I don't know... I feel doomed.

I'm not exactly sure what I'm working for.

I mean that in every sense. I don't know who is benefitting from my work. I don't know what purpose my work serves in the world. I don't really know why I'm doing this anymore.

This isn't something that's going to be solved by leaving the PhD. If anything, the PhD opened my eyes to how this is inescapable. It feels so clear that there is an existential crisis happening that we've become numb to. How can I keep working when I see the work perpetrates a system that is running itself into the ground?

I just finished The Wretched of the Earth, and I'm sick. I just don't understand what the hell I'm doing. We are not supposed to live like this. This isn't a broken system- there isn't supposed to be a system in the first place. This is so existential that is feels like cosmic terror. What have we done to the Earth? What have we done to the bodies of plants and aninals? What are we doing to ourselves? How much more control and mastery does there need to be? When will it end? Why does freedom feel like a flickering light that's going out?

What will be left? I'm serious. In the next 2000 years what will be left?

I want out, but what is left has been destroyed. There are no other viable options. So I have to keep working. But what for?

I feel like the absolute worst. I'm working as a TA with my advisor and majority of my cohort this semester. This happened last week:

We were supposed to have 50% of our grading done by Thursday to cross compare averages... but I totally forgot about this. I thought we just needed to get our grades in by Friday night. So I didn't do anything.

I came to the meeting on Thursday totally unprepared and my advisor said they're "not angry- just disappointed" to me in front of my peers, explaining that I get paid to work 15 hours a week and that she could treat this as a contract violation. Additionally, she had a harsh reprimand for another one of my coworker/friends. I feel like I pulled an innocent bystander down with me- it was all my fault.

I can't really look my advisor in her eyes, this isn't the first time she's told me she's disappointed in me or "mortified" of my lack of preparedness. I feel like this person really does not like me at all.

I also feel alienated from my cohort after that. I feel radioactive and that I reek of failure, I don't think anyone wants to be associated with me. I also just feel awful that the youngest member of the team got pulled into the fire with me. She left work early after that, and I just know she's beating herself up for a mistake that is my issue.

Maybe I don't belong here if I can't keep up with the logistics. I love theory, writing with these high level concepts, and research. But my organizational skills to manage administrative tasks feel nonexistent, and honestly, I think that's the part that actually matters here...

I really don't know what I'm doing wrong or how to fix this. The work load I've had is so insane, I work until midnight and get up at 2AM to stay on top of it. I eat every other day.

I cannot function. I cannot think. I feel brain damaged. The more I struggle, the slower I move, the more time I have to spend working. The less I can rest. Downward spiral.

On top of this my advisor tells me that I'm mortifying and "they're not angry, they're disappointed". I'm so tired, I don't even really remember getting reprimanded, my colleagues (who were also reprimanded), had to remind me what was said because I forgot. My other colleague has told me I'm actively getting bullied by administration and that I need to change advisors ASAP before it's completely out of control. I'm so exhausted, I can't even tell that I'm being treated weirdly. Let alone have to capacity to do something about it.

I can't tell the difference between dream and reality. Every email makes my blood pressure skyrocket.

I talked about transferring with a graduate student support center. I don't know what they said. My notes are illegible. I can't understand what people are saying. And at this point people aren't really able to understand what I'm saying anymore either.

I'm so tired, I can't get my head above the water.