Has anyone done a PhD?

[AgrippinaT]

I'm looking into PhD study having just completed my MA (in Classical History) and wanted to know parents' experiences of such intense research while juggling kids.

I would do it full time, and hopefully gain funding for it.

My kids are 10, 8 and 4. They're fab kids and happy to go with the flow for most things. I worry about not being able to devote 100% of myself to them though. And it's no surprise to people that I am considering baby number 4 also.

If anyone has any experience, or advice, I'd be grateful to hear

:)

My colleague did but she is a machine and she didn’t let anything slip. I personally think you would be crazy having a baby by choice whilst doing this. She had 3 dc and I think the youngest was about 7 but it was before I knew her . She did love telling anyone who showed any sign of weakness that she had managed this. She was marking exam papers on Christmas Day.

Plus are you after a job in academia? It’s always been mighty tough but almost all Universities offered redundancies in lockdown and a few of my colleagues and ex colleagues took that offer up. Though hopefully this will settle post lockdown. In both DH and my disciplines there is money from industry. Still extremely competitive but he was lucky and had his entire PhD funded by a company. So how will you fund everything?

We were also lucky to get permanent jobs, we did have to relocate cities once and we both worked at different Universities so bought a house sort of in between them. But it meant a long commute for both of us. We have had friends who have to follow temp posts in the Uk and overseas many times.

If your doing it for the love of study and have money to back you up great. If you need to work using this when all done consider how and if you would relocate with four dc.

I'm doing mine part-time as part of my job. Just about to go back after my second maternity leave. It's been hard to build up momentum, I'm hoping that is a bit easier this time.

What would be your circumstances? If you can get funding and don't need to work otherwise and have childcare, then I guess it would be just like any other full-time job. You would have to be motivated but that's the same for any PhD student regardless of children. If you need to work alongside or didn't have childcare then I think it would be very very difficult.

Also consider why you're doing it, it may not open many doors afterwards compared to your MA and academic jobs are very very difficult to find, especially if a young family means you're not flexible re location.

It's absolutely doable with children as long as you are able to treat it as a job - with full time childcare in place or a partner who is flexible and able to do school runs and other things if you have meetings or teaching or other things going on. I did mine with a baby/toddler and then had my 2nd just after I finished. Your kids are old enough (assuming you don't have baby #4 right now) that they will be able to manage themselves after school if you are working and aren't too much of a nightmare to get to bed (as you'll probably need to work in the evenings as well).

I would think carefully about having another baby right now though, if a PhD is the plan. I took a full year's maternity (I was also self-employed, so that paid for my maternity allowance, took a leave of absence for about 1.5 years from my PhD). Then we needed to pay for part-time and then full-time nursery. This is the expensive bit that I would think carefully about. School age children are a bit more affordable and don't need the same intensive level of childcare. But a baby/toddler will mean nursery fees and more sleepless nights.

I would also give really careful consideration to your long-term career plans. Do you want to be an academic? Academic jobs are hard to come by. Would you all be able to move for a likely short-term contract? (usually 1-3 years to start) Would you be able to commute to a university a long way from home? My current commute is 3 hours door to door. Obviously not during COVID as we all work from home. But normally, I commute up and back 3 days per week, 6 hours a day of travel with about 6 core hours in the office for teaching/meetings/supervision that I can't do from home. It's very doable and I love what I do and I'm well paid for it. But you do need to make some sacrifices if you want an academic career. If you don't, what are your other options? I assume you could work in a museum? That's what a friend of mine in Classics did. Are there other options outside of academia? (I'm in the sciences, so I don't know much about classical history).

Yes and I'm sorry but I do not recommend it with kids. No kids here and nearly killed me.

Thank you for both of your lovely honest replies.

Circumstance wise; financially we are great (through many years of dedication and commitment I may add, rather than just lucky). The PhD would be my full time job, I have an office at home which would be my main base, as most programs I've looked at require minimal campus contact due to Covid.

I work in education at the moment, which I would give up. The reason for the PhD is not to further my career really, it's for the sheer love and PASSION I have for new research in classical history (women's health in Roman antiquity, if anyone is interested). Of course eventually I would love to work within the research dept of a university, or curating at the Ashmolean, but this would be a bonus.

I cannot imagine not taking my research as far as I can, and I guess that's the main reason. I live and breathe ancient history!

I did a PhD in Neuroscience (2006-2010) long before children....not sure how I could have done both. Also, i'm not sure a PhD in Classical History is really a great career move (although i appreciate it might not be for that specific purpose). I know all humanities/arts students had a much harder time getting proper funding, jobs, or academic positions that us scientists ever did. Don't let this put you off completely, although be aware that this will likely not make you more employable...possibly much less employable in fact.

I did one - I did a BSc and then went straight onto a PhD as got a good enough grade in my first degree to bypass the Masters. I was 21 when I started, so no other commitments. I also got funding from the EPSRC, so got my fees paid for and some money to live on for 3 years.

By far the hardest thing for me was just 'keeping going'. I would wander into the office at 10:00 - Leave by 16:00, I wasn't pushed to publish papers, published 4 in the three years but my colleagues published 10+ in IEEE journals. The difference being, I had a (very lovely) Chinese Professor and I was white British and the rest of my colleagues were also Chinese and he treated me very differently to the others - much more 'hands off', which was interesting.

I passed with minor corrections with a 45 minute viva BUT was told I was on the cusp of major corrections as had to add a whole chapter in my thesis about 'research methods' which is something I believe may still be very, very important?

Mine was in Computer Science - Artificial Intelligence.

Tips?

1. Make sure you can be self-motivated when needed - even if you're not writing things, make sure you're reading / researching / doing what's needed 5 days a week
2. Make sure when you start writing up you have 2-3 people reviewing your thesis regularly. I didn't and it cost me a year to re-write the entire thing as if I had submitted it the first time, I would have failed. I had to started working and re-writing in my spare time and THAT was the time I was really, really demotivated and exhausted.
3. Don't assume you just need to be smart to do one - I'm not, I got an E at A level maths and am still pretty useless at a lot of stuff... BUT.... you need to be motivated, that's the really key thing as you just..have... to...keep... going...
4. Having others to bounce ideas off is so important - I was lucky to work in an office with other PhD students and looking back, it was so helpful to discuss concepts and theories with them - if you won't have that, see how you can find similar people / researching similar things
5. Set goals - 'In 1 year I'd like to have published a paper on this', 'in 18 months, I'd like to have published 2 papers, one in this journal'.... it seemed to help me keep on track and demonstrate progress.
6. Be very, very, very clear what your contribution is to the research domain and why it's unique to anyone else.... always review every 1-2 months - have other things been published in that time? do you need to change? My research did change from start to finish so you need to be flexible.

I'm not an academic... I work in Cyber Security and the PhD meant absolutely nothing for the first 10 years of my career. I have even been turned down for roles due to 'Oh? You have PhD? but you have an 'E' at A level maths so due to your academic qualifications you aren't what we're looking for So, be honest with yourself about why you want to do it and be realistic as to whether or not it will help you.

Reading with interest... I'm currently doing a Masters and would love to continue my research and do a PhD. My kids are all older and I wouldn't be doing it for the career prospects either.

All very interesting!

I’ve recently finished a PhD in a social science field. My children are 8 and 11 now, youngest was 3 when I started. I did a mixture of part time and full time during the 5 years. It’s totally doable with children, but a baby is a different kettle of fish. A fellow student who started before me never completed after her maternity leave - she just found it too difficult to get back into after such a long time off and her research felt like it was getting out of date quickly. My advice would be make sure your family is complete before you contemplate a PhD.

Then, as others have said, you need to treat it like a job - so my children went to after school club some of the time so that I could work full days on it. You have to be really disciplined and organised, but it is entirely workable.

I did mine alongside working. Many of my clients are African and Asian - they like qualifications and academic authority, and I was being disadvantaged as plain old ‘Ms’. It took six years, but a pathetic part of my brain gets a massive kick being addressed as ‘Dr’ (although as I’m Asian everyone assumes I’m medically qualified which is tiresome).

As expensive hobbies go, it’s no more demanding nor expensive than owning a horse.

Currently in my writing up year here having had 3 years full time funded. I’ve tried to treat it as a job, going to work on campus (when that was a thing) and making friends with my cohort. Good times!
My oldest was 16 and my youngest was 9 when I started. You have to be pretty well organised and willing to let certain stuff (my house!) slip. Not sure if I could do it with a baby - just home schooling 1 was difficult enough. There have been a couple who managed to come back and complete after babies but a couple of relationship breakdowns too

I ought to have clarified that mine was self-funded, and subject only to the 21 terms restriction. Hence the hobby comment.

A funded degree with an end-date and specific career goal is definitely a job.

Your suggested thesis area sounds fascinating, by the way.

Yes and it was hell juggling children. Wouldn't do it if I could choose again.

Ctd...Sorry to be so negative but I felt I made the wrong decision. Taught me so much though and I suppose it showed me I was tougher than I thought. If you feel it could work for you then go for it.

Thank you all, these are all really valuable. And lots to consider!

@MNChkn thanks, I'm a raging feminist and trying my best to give the birthing women of classical Rome a voice 😝

My best friend got a fully funded PhD when her dc were 2, 7 and 8. It was her job and she had free childcare for the youngest so she was in a relatively good position until she unexpectedly fell pregnant after the first year. It was a very difficult pregnancy and she was in and out of hospital a lot which set her back, (she was only allowed 16 weeks maternity) and then when baby was 3 months old we went into lockdown 1 and her parents (free childcare) were shielding so she had a baby and toddler at home and got nothing done. Long story short, she is very behind, there is a lot of pressure to write papers and book chapters and she has to do a certain amount of teaching and marking. It is likely she will run out of funding and not get to finish it as she can't afford to self fund.

Can I ask how old people were when they started their PhD? Due to time constraints I’d be 45-46, anyone around the same age bracket?

I'll be honest and say I don't understand why you would actively try for baby 4 while doing a PhD. Doing it with even one or two children is extremely difficult, with 3 children and a new baby I don't really see the point. If you are not doing it with career ambitions but for the love of the research, why would you want to make this period so thoroughly stressful and unpleasant?

You would also need to be very realistic about a future career, those kinds of jobs are like hen's teeth and getting rarer by the day.

There are plenty of ways to pursue your passion without doing a PhD. In fact, doing a PhD can be one of the least interesting ways to do research -- you have to focus on a very narrow topic and research it to death, this can get quite boring after the initial honeymoon. If you are funded you will likely have to do research and write articles on topics that don't interest you very much at all.

If you are definitely going to have another baby, my advice would be to take the next couple years and develop your research interests more. Read everything you can and narrow down what sort of research questions you would want to pursue (this must be very specific and original). Start blogging about it, get on social media and connect with other people, develop a profile in the area. Then dive full on into a PhD when the baby is a bit older.

Also look into PhDs in History of Medicine, I suspect this would open up some more career options.

@Diadora30

Can I ask how old people were when they started their PhD? Due to time constraints I’d be 45-46, anyone around the same age bracket?

In my department our PhDs range in age from 25 to 65! I don't think age matters as much as your personal circumstances, whether you will have the time and resources.

Age can be a factor in career options afterward though, as academia can be just as age-ist as any other field.

I just clocked your user name op :)

I would say go for it due to money being ok but if you have three dc already maybe not add the extra pressure of a small one.

If you are just doing it for the love of it rather than because of specific career ambitions, and you really, truly want a fourth baby (and can afford to do both), I would have the baby now, and then aim to do the PhD when your baby turns 3 and is eligible for 3 year funding. There is no reason to struggle to do both at the same time if you don't need to. I would enjoy your time and make the most of it. That said, doing a PhD on a topic is the surest way to ruin it for you. I don't know many people who came out of a PhD still enjoying their area of research. I work in a related field now, but different research area (same disease, but different field and different research approach) and I can't even bare to think about my PhD research now. My friend did her PhD on women's health in Ancient Greece actually (looking at some sort of artefacts, communal ritual vessels or something, I think). She hates it now. She's a part-time art teacher and works for her family's printing business. You might find in the meantime that reading independently, blogging, Twitter, and seeking an MA-level research position may allow you to explore the field a bit and satiate some of your interest, until you decide if you are ready to jump in and do the PhD.

Nope.

I did my PhD fresh out of uni at 22. Without kids.

Mine was science, so it was a “job”. In the lab every day, library at night finding papers and reading- although that may be easier now you don’t have to physically load up medline cd’s in the library 😂.

You have to be very non- distractable. Kids around asking for this and that interrupts chain of thought- i don’t know about you but I need relative peace and quiet to study.

Also there were many conferences and events where you gave talks or made posters to publish your work. A lot of talking to people round the world about ideas and using that to expand research. It was normal to do one big international one, two domestic, and a few more dotted around depending on who was speaking where. Lots of staying behind to attend weekly invited talks or general university lectures. My uni also made you attend a certain amount of undergrad classes in different areas.

Oh and mat leave- with a phd some areas move fast so a few months out and someone else has jumped in and published first, and you’re back to the beginning.

Writing up was 3 months solid of 8am-11pm work.

You will need reliable childcare, a cleaner, gardener, and any other home help unless you dh is willing to take on the majority of that. I was able to fit in the gym but only because uni had a 6pm class I went to straight after work.

Definitely a lot of truth in Virginia Woolf’s words about a pram in the hall.

Four kids is a full time job on its own for most people, but if you can afford childcare easily it ceases to be an issue.

One watch-out if you’re combining young children and study - illness, whether yours or the children’s, will bring everything crashing down.