General Tips For Passing Comps and Saving Your Sanity

So, I passed my comps.  I did so with surprisingly little fanfare on behalf of my bipolar disorder or OCD - two things that have, typically, made me feel shitty for every finals week in history minus the last two.  Comps is the juncture when most of my friends have ended up seeing a therapist and shrink and/or getting put on meds.  I fared ok, though, thanks to their advice.  Had I not had an immense amount of support from my family, friends, and therapist, I would have been fucked.

I think our department, historically, is pretty open with advice and support of those of us suffering through this exercise.  It's not seen as a competition between members of cohort or a cutthroat situation.  We all help one another.

But, not every department is similar.  And not every situation works out this way.  The cohorts before mine were rather large and studied together.  My cohort has 4 people - only 2 of which were taking comps this time around.  So, we were really too small to do anything together.  It felt lonely but I made my own support network and worked it.

Here are some general tips that may be helpful...

1. It's a marathon and not a sprint.  There is a good reason for this.  I had all summer to study.  In reality, you can probably take a month off of everything and study your ass off and pass but you will lose your life and mind in the process.  Make it easy on yourself, give yourself time to adjust, give yourself time to get confident and feel comfortable rather than cram.

2. You can't read everything or prepare everything.  You just can't.  You will feel like, even on the last day of studying, that you still have SO much to do but you can't do anymore.  It is time-dependent and, yes, you could study for all eternity.  While it is tempting to study for another semester, you are better off just to take your exam.  It's key that you do as much as you can and then let it go.  This was excellent advice I was given by friends.

3. Making comps a "job" is much better than freaking out and trying to cram it into every hour of every day.  I'm a sucker for a schedule and when I go into "work" to get things done, I generally do them.  If I stay at home, nothing gets done.  I took a summer class mainly to ensure I was in the office every day.  It was the best decision I made.  I went into class in the AM, did a bit of work for that, and then studied from 1-5 PM for comps daily while doing that scheduled.  Then, it was a 9-5.  It worked.

4. You need days off - plenty of them.  This a million times over.  Again, if you make it into a marathon pace, you can afford to take the time.  Take your time and finish strong.  I told friends and family that their job was to distract me when I was off the clock.  Yes, you will still wake up and have a full on conversation about Street Level Bureaucrats at 3 AM with your SO but, for the most part, you can get them to help you ignore comps and start fresh the next time you pick up a book.  Weekends were KEY for me.

5. Talk to your advisor - he or she will most likely be helpful.  My advisor was awesome during the entire process and so were other committee members.  Everyone gave me good advice and I was talked off the ledge a couple of times by faculty members.  It was good.  Don't be afraid to reach out.  They have all been through this and talked a number of students through it before.

6. Talk to friends that did it before you and take their advice seriously.  My friends were really helpful.  I found an officemate and friend who was much like myself in terms of stress behavior, OCD, and past experiences with school to be particularly helpful.  Even if they have no clue what you are preparing, how much they are preparing, etc. even a strong word of encouragement will help you keep pushing.  Hang out with these people, listen to their stories, it will help.

7. Ask for past comps notes.  Either study with your cohort and trade notes or ask for them from the people that have come before you.  I just handed my stash of notes off to the people in my cohort taking comps next semester. I am sure some of what I did will be useless to them but a lot of what I was given was helpful so use it!  People aren't generally shy about sharing.  After all, you just took a shit ton of notes that you won't use again until you need to make a syllabus, right?

8. Read over past questions before you get too involved in studying to help you figure out what matters and what doesn't.  Before you freak out, it may be helpful to look at past questions just so you can say "yes I can answer this".  When my roommate was taking comps the semester before I did, I read over past questions with her and found that I felt a lot better about my own chances of passing after reading them.  She said they helped her as well.  We have very different approaches to studying but that was one thing that worked for us both.

9. Stop studying well ahead of when you need to take your comps or defend them.  I stopped almost a week before I took my writtens to go swim in a pool.  I couldn't feasibly do anymore.  I didn't do any prepping after that point.  I focused on getting sleep, hung out with my boyfriend, and didn't do a whole lot more.  It was good.  I went away the weekend before my defense and brewed beer.  Believe it or not, there isn't much you can do but take them.  About 2-3 weeks before you take your comps, you will feel like there isn't much more you can REALLY do. You are probably ready at that point to take them even though you would like to prep indefinitely.

10. Get mental health support and get it often if you need it.  Almost every department has a stress or panic attack nightmare to do with comps in recent history.  My advisor told me REPEATEDLY over the course of comps that the only real fear she had about me was my stress derailing me about 4 weeks before my written exams.  I took 4 days off, started fresh, and calmed the fuck down.  I also upped my dosage of valium, something I take for sleep.  My shrink and therapist were there every step of the way.  I impressed them in the end with my ability to stay on target but it really was just doing all of the things I'd been doing before.  If you are feeling completely out of control, go see someone!  Honestly, I slept 8 hours before my writtens AND orals because of life-saving meds that kept me from being manic.  I felt like I was cheating in one way but the reality was, I would have failed without regular behavioral modification and medication.

I didn't experience true hypomania at ANY point on my comps journey past the initial stress of trying to study while taking care of a very sick roommate.  This is the longest I've been stable.  I didn't let that first experience color my ability to pass, either.  I listened to my gut, went home for a couple days, studied there, and then got back on track.  Take care of yourself and be kind to yourself (as my therapist tells me).

Feel free to include your rec's in the comments....

Are there any luxuries in grad school?

Are there any luxuries in grad school?

The comment seems ridiculous when you think about the things that we put up with during our time here:
*low wages
*long hours (20 hours a week for teaching?  ha!  Try like 30-35 on teaching alone!)
*high stress - publications, comps, dissertations, conferences, and all this ON TOP of your course and teaching load
*low regard - your family probably doesn't understand and makes commentary about you "being in school forever", your spouse/SO doesn't understand, people think you are uppity
*some people (thankfully not me) don't have health insurance covered by their stipend or any affordable options.  Dental? As if...

And that's just to name a few things that spring to mind...

But that said, grad school does afford us some luxuries.  Or at least it has me.  I realized on a message board  I frequent that I am "lucky" in that I have the flexibility and encouragement of like-minded peers when it comes to things.  This affords me some pretty cool opportunities.  I'm going to name a few.  See if you can name any yourself or if any of these match up.

1. Travel
I am pretty lucky in that most of my adult life has allowed for travel.  My parents are rather worldly people in that they like culture and good food but I didn't grow up travelling the globe - just North America.  My parents made it possible for me to go abroad and I did so during my junior year of college.  I spent a year abroad in the UK studying and researching my senior thesis on health care.  It was amazing.  I couldn't have asked for more.  I also got to see much of Europe.  I spent two weeks in Italy lounging by the pool and taking pictures.  I spent Christmas in Bavaria - Nuremberg to be exact.  It was a Christmas unlike any I could forget.  4 and a half weeks in a picture-perfect little place with friends.

Last year at this time I was landing in Rwanda for coursework and field study that my university paid for in large part.  I moved most of my things into a storage locker here, moved the rest home, and then moved in with a close friend and a colleague when I came back from my trip.  It was an amazing experience and I learned a lot.  It also has helped me look good on a CV.  And it proves that, despite all my himming and hawwing, I can still speak French - like it or not!

I've also gotten to travel on conferences.  Most notably, I travelled to Canada and visited the U.S. embassy in Ottawa during a conference.  My week-long stay was paid for entirely by the U.S. and Canadian government.

Travel is a luxury, though.  Most people don't have the money or reason to go so they can't prioritize it.  It annoys me to see Americans being so damn uppity about what they have when they've never seen the outside world.  The world isn't America, contrary to a recent comment made by some idiot in a facebook war about why America doesn't provide proper health care to its citizens and why it should.  It isn't the world and people do just fine on their own minus our "help".  I am an American but I'm not that dense, basically.  I don't assume that our way is best.  Leaving the country made me appreciate things like a welfare state and transport (I never owned a car until I graduated school and still hate driving) that the U.S. really doesn't provide as well as any other HDC.  However, leaving the country also made me appreciate things like food.  I still stand by the fact that the U.S. has one of the best food "cultures" around and Chicago, specifically, is a food mecca that I have come to miss when not living in the metro area.  Still, it was academia and research that afforded me these experiences.  I wish everyone had these opportunities but my job is unique in allowing me such things.

2. Time
I make my own schedule.  I doubt I will ever find a job more flexible than this.  And that's why if I ever have kids I will likely be the person that is running the kids to the doctor, dentist, etc because lord knows I can.  I still work 80 hours a week but I don't see that block schedule that my Dad does.  He's a banker and works a ton of hours.  He has a hard time believing sometimes, I think, that I work as many hours as I do but I really do.  I take my work home with me.  I grade papers all of the effing time, I eat while I'm reading for courses, and I think up paper ideas or keyword searches in the shower.  Work never stops, of course, which leads to stress, but if I manage it, I can have a pretty good schedule.

This schedule allows me to travel, to have the summers off, and to set my own hours.  Few jobs allow for this but if I stay in academia, this will always be my blessing (and curse).  I want to look at it as a glass half full, though.  No need to be a total pessimist.

3. A community that "gets it".
My colleagues are also my closest friends and my committee is made up of trusted mentors.  I am able to surround myself with people that think like me, work like me, and are interested in the things that I am.  Well, not exactly the SAME things but many of the same things.  When I am stressed about comps, I have shoulders to cry on.  When I am worried about a final paper that just will not work, people get it.  When it is conference season and I am fried and need a break, I have people around me who need the same.

Now, again, this is good and bad.  If you get into a fight with someone, it's an issue.  If you date someone in your program - rule number one you shouldn't break (take it from me!) - they can choose to be an asshole and air your dirty laundry to the program staff at any minute.  Ask me how I know.  Oh wait, that's because it happened 2 days ago to me.  I also share an office with 15 people.  I love most of them some of the time.  I hate some of them some of the time.  I don't hate or love everyone all of the time.  It's bound to be like that when there are so many type A's in a room.  So, it can be good and bad.

But it's mostly good.  Your family (unless they are academics) won't get you.  Your significant others from non-academic backgrounds will NOT get you.  And they may think what you are doing is a joke because your pay is so little.  But, I can assure you, someone at the office WILL get you.  It may not be everyone all the time and sometimes things are better than others but someone will always get you all of the time.

Have any of your own thoughts?  I know graduate school is no luxurious way to live.  Paycheck-to-paycheck and all.  But it does afford us some luxuries.  It reminds me of a faculty member who compares it to playing ball.  If you do the best you can, you will end up being able to come in and play ball day after day.  It's a dream job and if you work, you can keep it, according to him.

Mental Illness and Grad School: You aren't alone

As I bind up these various articles, notes, and papers  into neatly-made subject-specific binders for my comprehensives, I am left to reflect on past  years and the struggles I have had.  Currently, I am not even half way done with my courses and the tower of binders is higher than our coffee table.  My roommate faced a similar situation in January while studying for her comps.

But it gets me thinking.  There's a LIFE in there.  There's my academic life- the good, the bad, the awful, the REALLY good.  There's a student just on the verge in there and an academic ready to publish in there.  Well, on that last part, I can dream, right?

In there, I manage to see that even during the worst times of my life, I've managed to take good notes and keep it relatively together.  There have been points when I honestly didn't feel like living was the best option in my life.  Most of those points were pre-grad school but my first year here was hellacious.  It was wrought with financial difficulty when the university made an accounting error and granted me no money for 3 months.  It was full of more financial difficulty and physical pain after an emergency surgery left me with a $3500.00 hospital bill in the middle of my second semester.

And yet, here I am.  I'm the strongest I've ever been.  It hasn't been an easy week, after all.  My roommate is dealing with tough shit, too.  Everyone is.

Recent talk of mental illness on twitter got me thinking about things.  Several people have been talking about this on my feed.  One commenter noted that she was dealing with problems that seem to be similar to issues that I have with OCD but didn't want to be "labeled" or have it reported back to her supervisor.  Grad students worry about such things.  Hell, I worry about this blog labeling me in some ways but I think the blog shows that there is far more to me than OCD or bipolar disorder.

Most people wouldn't see me and go "yep, she's got a mental illness".  A lot of people are surprised to find this out if they ever get to know me well enough.  I certainly don't TRY to hide it.  If someone is to ask me, I cop to it because I want to show people I'm NOT afraid.  And that's a personal prerogative   Not everyone has to be so open.  But I don't appear any different.  I do well in my program.  This year is a year that has been rough because I have been diagnosed with something new.  PTSD is now the new word.  Another diagnosis - oh, joy!

But my therapist said something to me that stuck.  How many people can you think of that you would label as being "OCD" or "bipolar"? "No one," I replied.  But then he asked me how many people I know have mood or anxiety disorders in academia.  I counted in my head for quite some time.  He then asked me how many people that I had known had had panic attacks.  I counted some more.  There were more people than I could count on fingers and toes.  And, while these disorders may be "labeled" something, I don't label the person that.  I doubt that anyone else does the labeling thing, too, despite a high prevalence of mental illness and anxiety disorders among academics.

It's not a surprise that many of us have such similar issues.  Grad school is incredibly stressful.  It can be down right impossible.  You work 80 hour days, you take your work home with you, and the only people you generally hang out with live with you, work with you, research with you, and share your interests.  It's a giant, stress-induced fishbowl of epic proportions.  We're talking The Hills for smart people sort of drama!

I work in an office with 14 of my colleagues - basically all in one big room.  We know WAY too much about one another and boy have I seen a lot of panic attacks.  I've talked people down and they've done the same for me.  So I know many people who suffer from similar illnesses.  But they are still just people I know, respect, and talk to on a daily basis.  They are friends and colleagues.  And no one judges them for it - or they really shouldn't.  That'd make them terrible people.  As long as you do your job and aren't a total ass, no one cares.

But that doesn't mean you should suffer.  And labels only matter if you let them.  I don't think of myself as bipolar, for example.  I, like many people in my family, suffer from the disorder but I am still probably the most functional diagnosed person in my family.  That's a source of pride in some ways.  I'm NOT the disorder I was so afraid to be labeled as.  I did not want to suffer the way I have seen other family members suffer.  I did not want it to be this ugly mark on my record.

But, you know what?  It's not.  As long as I don't let it.  It's not easy to do that.  It's easy to get sucked in and scared.  I'm not saying that it hasn't taken a long time.  It's taken three years of intensive therapy, maintenance, and drugs to get me to this point but that success is on me.  A lot of other people do the same and you'd never know.

And really, everybody's got SOMETHING.  If it's not mental illness, it's a death in the family or something major.  One of my colleagues lost his father last year.  His father was dying while he was taking comps.  I have had friends that have suffered from really bad illnesses themselves while dealing with the stress of grad school.  Some people have families or start families.  Everybody's got something that makes things hard.

So, don't feel alone.  Just feel like you have the right to be stressed and you have the right to talk to others about this stress - especially medical professionals that CAN help.  And feel that no one has the right to define you with a stupid label, sure.  But get that help and hold your head high.  The only other choice is to throw your hands up and give up.  Fuck that.  You're a grad student.  You came this far partially because you ARE crazy for wanting to do this to yourself and partially because you are insanely motivated and WANT this.  Don't let anything take that from you.  You are a million, billion times stronger than that.