Retraining in Psychology

[ScottishMouse]

Instead of reviving an old thread, I thought I would start a new one and hope that the OP on the other one - @Honestlywtf - see this. I would love to know what decision you came to last year with regard to retraining, and how you are getting on?

I am also in Scotland, and thinking about retraining in psychology after a long period at home with kids and then working part time in early years education (not teaching). Prior to that I spent a while in academia in an unrelated field (PhD, postdocs).

I am eyeing up the MSc conversion in psychology of mental health at Edinburgh and wondering if I should go for it or not. Perhaps a naive reason (although I guess we all have something that inspires us into an area/career), but I have been hugely inspired by having therapy in recent times, and as a result have been reading round and about me in psychology literature and loving it.

Like you @Honestlywtf, I am not cut out for working on a ward restraining patients, and I would prefer to develop a relationship with those I am helping rather than crisis care. I am motivated by a fascination in how the human mind works, why we behave the way we do, our patterns of behaviour, but also a desire to do work that can help people in a measurable way.

My therapist is a clinical psychologist, and I have been reading a lot about that role. The route in is intimidating, and I am not young, but on the other hand, I am not afraid of hard work or digging deep to achieve what I have set my sights on. I am less well read up on other possible jobs.

Right now, the alternative is to apply for jobs in other areas and put this dream to bed, but most I have seen in the last number of months leave me feeling underwhelmed. I love learning, being challenged, thinking logically and in depth, and the jobs that otherwise appeal lack depth in these ways.

I’d love to know what you decided to do @Honestlywtf. And if anyone else has any other thoughts or advice, I would love to receive that too. Thanks for reading!!

Have you thought about being a counsellor? Minimal registration requirements and you could work towards further qualifications whilst you work. You could do it part time if you a more established career. Or psychotherapist if you want to work for the NHS?

Thanks @BungleandGeorge , I need to look into these options more. I like the idea of the possibility of being close to research too, though I would only want that to be part of my work. Full-time academic research is not for me anymore.

Tbh I’m a little bit worried that your only experience of clinical psychology is your own therapy. In general there’s a reason why universities require multiple years of full time client facing work experience (Southampton, for instance, wants 3) before you can even apply to start training-the job isn’t really what people think it is and, especially if this is coming from a place of significant therapeutic work of your own, there’s a possibility of a certain degree of transference/psychologist “hero worship” rather than genuine interest.
I’m even more worried that you seem to think that all other MH professionals just “restrain” and do “crisis care”. This is for two reasons:
a) MH professionals often work with people for months or even years. Of course they build relationships with service users. Wards are not warehouses for the insane, valuable work takes place there.
b) Clinical psychologists who work for the NHS generally see people who are very unwell. They are usually attached to MH hospitals or Community Mental Health Teams and the work involves a lot of assessing, report compiling and generally very slow progress.

I’m sorry if this comes across as harsh. I’m a MH nurse who works very closely with a clin psych and so sees the work that they do. Most people who want to be a “psychologist” don’t really understand what the role is, especially its function in modern MH services. If you’re really serious, and before you make any leaps, I would suggest getting some shadowing work experience. I would even suggest getting some MH support worker paid work as this would really help you understand the client groups that MH professionals work with.
Honestly, the service users can be really challenging but the work is so rewarding. I just want you to walk into this eyes wide open.

if you'd prefer to develop a relationship rather than dealing in crisis care, have look into being a counsellor/psychotherapist. Clin Psy's do a lot of crisis work and also a lot of diagnostic work, which is extremely challenging. I'm a counsellor as I wanted to do the deeper, more therapeutic long term work. The NHS leans more towards short term therapeutic interventions like CBT which doesn't interest me. Clin Psys get paid
more which is a massive benefit but they have to get on to very competitive doctoral
courses and spend years
and years training first.

Thanks for your thoughts @JennieTheZebra I realise, reading back, that some of my post doesn’t make a lot of sense. I had written it as a response on another thread, but then it wouldn’t post there (I’m not a frequent poster here!). The comments about restraining and crisis care were in response to something on that previous thread. The OP had similar questions in their mind to me, and I was hoping to find out what decisions they had come to about a change in career.

Absolutely not harsh, and I take your points well. I am reading around, but getting the thoughts of those in the know is much more useful. Yes, fully appreciate the reason that clinical experience is needed ahead of being accepted onto the doctorate for clin psy. And also that I may be coming at this for the wrong reasons. It is hard to know how to figure that out, and how to know what the job really is like before jumping into the first step towards it so thanks for replying.

Psychology was what I originally intended to study many moons ago, but I made a decision that I shouldn’t have, and ended up elsewhere. So I know that psychology has long interested me (my previous field is not closely related but there are some overlaps). I would love to do the conversion course just for the sake of it, as I know I would enjoy it, but I have to be realistic and not go into it without some sort of a plan for what might come after, as money is tight and I am not getting any younger.

Thanks @funnystuff123 , yes, this may be a better route to think about. I did read a bit but to be honest got quite confused about the routes in this direction. I will do some more research. Do counsellors or psychotherapists ever do research work alongside their therapeutic work? My guess is no.

I have spent a long while on a low salary, so I’m not thinking about any of these options for the money. I just want to make a good choice for myself after some not so great choices in the past. That may be to go down a different road altogether, but I’m trying to gather as much info at this stage as possible.

Be prepared that psychology is a very competitive field to enter. I’ve retrained from another profession to be a psychotherapist and it was my masters in psychology, coupled with extensive experience in a similar field for 12 years that helped. There was an expectation. Of significant prior knowledge of mental health and psychotherapy to get the trainee position. For every one position available, 12 people applied and they are brutal in not even giving very capable people an interview.

Also, the psychology profession is very biased towards younger people, as often the paid positions which provide the experience to get onto academic courses are very poorly paid or even voluntary.

Honestly, if money and time are tight I would seriously consider MH nursing. It's a shortage profession so there's always, always work, you can get funding through Student Finance even if you already have a degree and there's no need for conversion courses or extensive work experience so within 3.5 years you'll be earning.
I know you said you didn't want ward work/crisis care but MH nurses do many of the tasks you say you're interested in. As a MH nurse I have long term relationships with my service users. I'm trained in multiple therapeutic modalities, including DBT, Family Therapy, ACT and, of course, CBT (CBT was covered in my undergrad). There's so much space for personal development and training in MH nursing, even up to PhD level if you feel like it, and progression is fast. You can work with children, older adults, or even prisoners and in the community as well as hospitals.
I really would think about it

My DSD is studying for her PhD in Psychology. She's been plugging away since graduation, lots of work experience in relevant areas, masters and a mountain of student debt. It's hugely competitive. Even getting a masters place took 2 years as she wasn't offered anywhere first time round.
MH nursing was suggested to her as an alternative route when she was struggling to get a masters place and it's a good idea. It's paid study in a relevant field with lots of practical experience too.

Are you prepared do a PhD and another two years clinical experience?

Unless you will go that far, psychology is a bit pointless

I would recommend really thinking how you want your working life to look like. I'm a counsellor/therapist in private practice and love it but it's very different from the security and stability of employment. If you want to go down that route you also need business skills.

You could do a counselling or psychotherapy training and top it up with a masters if you want to do research - although actually a lot of theory in this field is developed and written by people who are skilled clinicians, you don't necessarily need to have academic training in this area specifically.

I think having had your own therapy is very helpful though as it will give you a realistic idea of what therapy is like.

Lots to think about here, thanks so much everyone.

@fernz , interesting point about business skills. I hadn’t really considered that. It’s not the most intimidating part to be honest, but definitely not something I would love. Some stability of employment also appeals, I’m not super keen to go back to the uncertainty that I had working in academia (which is a different type of uncertainty of course).

I would add to the above that I've done a counselling course and hopefully will finish my psychology undergrad soon. I've also had lots of therapy. I would say that the issue about basing it off your own experience is a real one. You've had therapy. That's got almost nothing to do with the work, other than giving an understanding of how you felt during therapy. You'd be surprised at how differently people with seemingly similar underlying issues respond.

The people on my courses who have come because they had therapy, were very often less than open-minded to the idea that their lived experience of therapy was little more than their experience. There was an idea that they were experts because they'd "been there".

Additionally there is/was the idea that "you've been through so much, you'll make a good therapist". No. Honestly, no. Unless the person was lacking in empathy before whatever happened and then had a personality change, then it's barely relevant.

So I'd advise really looking around the MH field and examining especially what you want to get out of it.

There's also the role of counselling psychologist which is PhD/doctorate level and involves more therapeutic involvement with patients/clients. It's better paid, like clinical psychologist, but more training time (so also more costly). I'm abroad so different system but in the U.K. I'd seriously look at MH nursing. There seems to be a lot of opportunities both in employment and growth. Depending on your age, when you cost out the price of training, lost earnings due to volunteering etc to get into psychology vs getting paid in a relatively short time with nursing, it may actually bring in more income more in the end.

• not saying money is the driver, more pointing out that the noticeable difference in pay may not be what it seems (might be too but worth factoring it all in, if income is an important issue, which it is to most of us who have bills to pay!).