Podcast – If you can’t love yourself, then how the hell you gonna love your science – Part 2

Voice Over:

Welcome to the NIHR Dementia Researcher Podcast, brought to you by dementiaresearcher.nihr.ac.uk in association with Alzheimer’s Research UK and Alzheimer’s Society. Supporting early career dementia researchers across the world.

Adam Smith:

Hello, thank you for listening to the Dementia Researcher Podcast. I’m Adam Smith and we’re back for part two of our podcast today, discussing the mental health struggles in academia and hopefully talking these through and showing that this isn’t something you have to go through and certainly not alone. Thank you very much to our panellists. So, I am going to welcome back now, we have Dr. Katie Askew, Dr. Isabel Castanho and Makis Tzioras. No, got that wrong again.

Makis Tzioras:

It’s okay, it was very close, very close.

Adam Smith:

So thank you for coming back again, obviously in reality, we’re carrying on talking about this subject. We’re releasing this as a two part podcast. Purely because I think trying to talk about this in half an hour is just impossible. So I thought rather than just cut this short and make this a conversation that’s not particularly helpful. We’ll extend this to two 30 minute podcasts and hopefully we’ll get all your thoughts captured. So maybe for those that haven’t already listened to part one, please go away and have a listen. Because we’re not going to do full introductions again but maybe if I could just ask you to say who you are and where you come from. Katie.

Dr. Katie Askew:

Hi, I’m Katie. I am a postdoc here, working at the University of Edinburgh on the innate immune system in vascular cognitive impairment.

Adam Smith:

Thank you, Katie. Makis.

Makis Tzioras:

Hi, Makis. I’m a PhD student at the University of Edinburgh and I work on Alzheimer’s disease. And specifically I’m looking at microglial cells and their interactions with synapses.

Adam Smith:

And Isabel.

Dr. Isabel Castanho:

Hi again, my name is Isabel. I’m a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Exeter, where I work on epigenetics of Alzheimer’s disease using mouse models.

Adam Smith:

Thank you very much all. And thank you for joining us, joining us again, for the second part of this podcast. So if you’ve missed the first part, you’ll be aware that the title of today’s podcast is If You Can’t Love Yourself, Then How The Hell Are You Going To Love Your Science: A Semi Serious Chat About Self Care In Academia. So thank you very much everybody, for joining us. Makis, I wanted to come to you with my next question. So what kind of day to day pressures do you face practically? And how do you cope with this on a day to day basis? I know we’ve talked a little bit before about staying outside of work but you’re still in work all the time, right? You’re there a lot. How do you cope with the pressures you face and what are they?

Makis Tzioras:

So the day to day pressures can change a lot, depending on whether you’re writing a paper or writing a grant. Or if you’re having problems with someone at work or if your experiments are not working. So instead of going to each one individually because it’s just so many of them, I think for me, what it all boils down to is how I cope with the pressures. And it doesn’t matter at the end of the day, what the pressure is or what the challenge is. So whether that is a problem that I’m having with someone or with an experiment. Or with not being able to focus for a day to write my thesis or write a paper. I think learning to be forgiving to yourself and feeling your current feelings will help you, no matter what your problem is. Because it’s impossible to make a list of all the problems that you might face.

You’re going to make yourself crazy thinking about, oh but what if this happens? What if this is the problem? What if I try to fix the problem but then this problem arises? You can’t do that. What you can do is you can bring the control back to yourself and say that well, today I cannot focus on writing my thesis. What am I feeling and what can I do today? Is today better spent by not working that much and maybe easing myself into working on my thesis tomorrow? Or am I feeling in a mood to maybe read a paper or maybe plan an experiment. Even now that we can’t actually go into the lab, if you feel like well, I’ve got this idea and I wish I could do it, write it down. You know what I mean? And I agree 100% with what Katie said before.

The environment that you’re surrounding yourself with plays a huge role in your mental health. But I think you can also have a very big say in how you react to things. And it’s a very hard thing to do. It takes a lot of self-work, to get to a stage where the situation around you doesn’t affect you as much. But I’m going to come back to the title we’ve chosen, which for the people who don’t know, it’s a play on words on RuPaul’s mantra. That if you can’t love yourself, how the hell are you going to love somebody else? Which is exactly that. If you cannot be forgiving and good to yourself when things are difficult, how do you expect your work to go anywhere else? Your direction.

Adam Smith:

Yeah and I think you made some important points there. And the pressures you face, just are different at different times, right? When you first start your PhD, you’re feeling rather lost. Nobody’s telling you what to do. You’ve got to be self-driven and then you’re feeling like, oh my God, am I supposed to be doing something? Should I be reading something? I shouldn’t be here, right? Somebody’s got to tell me what to do. And you’re sitting there staring at your inbox or looking around at the equipment in the lab and nobody’s telling you what to do. And then later on, you’ve got the pressure of oh my goodness, it’s three years is up already. I’ve got to write, I’ve got my fiver and then I’ve got to find a fellowship and I’ve got to find funding and I’ve got to find this.

I don’t want to oversell this because my background isn’t in academia. I worked in the NHS. I worked in the Department of Health. And these are pressures other careers face too, right? Bus drivers have their own stresses. They’ve got different pressures too. And I don’t think academia is particularly special in that respect but we probably talk about it a lot more than bus drivers do. And I think having those strategies to cope with it are important, which comes into our next point, Isabel. Which is a question I’m going to put to you. So if you are struggling and getting demoralised and things aren’t working well for you, how do you personally manage that?

Dr. Isabel Castanho:

So Katie mentioned this as well when she runs experiments. And I have to admit that not every time I see it clearly but I found that the best thing to do is just to take a break and step away from it. And again, highlighting that not every time I see this immediately but I try to keep remembering this. And sometimes a few hours will suffice, other times, a few days, weeks, even a holiday. And actually I had it recently. I think it was before I went on my honeymoon last year in November. I was doing this experiment. This was just a really simple experiment, a PCR, which I had done a million times before. And I did I think four times, it didn’t work and it was urgent, I had to do it but I couldn’t. I went on holiday for three weeks. I came back, turned out it wasn’t that urgent. Nothing was on fire when I came back. I did it and the first time, bam. It worked immediately. So clearly, I was tired. I was pushing myself. I just needed to take a break and actually, the other thing that sometimes happens is that in more severe cases, I just burst into tears, to be honest. Obviously… Well, I say obviously but it has happened that I did this behind the freezers in the freezer room.

When I was alone in the room, just burst into tears. So one thing, I think yoga helped me a lot with that as well. Again, coming back to yoga but before, I used to think that crying was silly and today actually I have a different perspective. I think that hiding your emotions or repressing them. That’s what silly. And sometimes, I feel it’s a very stressful week. I just keep piling the emotions and then in one day I just completely break. But actually right afterwards, I feel much better. It’s like I just exploded and put everything out. And I think the important part to take from it is just that then you go and solve whatever problem you had. Yeah and then the other thing again, which I keep mentioning, it is yoga and meditation. But again, this is me personally and you did ask what I did.

Adam Smith:

That’s all right. So here’s a good question for you, it’s a tricky one. Is it okay to cry at work?

Dr. Isabel Castanho:

Oh, cry at work.

Adam Smith:

Everybody’s nodding, I guess I’m slightly uncomfortable like that. I haven’t cried at work but I’ve had staff who have cried and I’m kind of slightly… I feel uncomfortable. I don’t know how to deal with that. I wonder how your people react when that is the case.

Dr. Isabel Castanho:

Yeah. I don’t know. So I would say it’s okay to cry. Absolutely. At work, it is a tricky question because I’ve been in both sides. When someone cries in front of me, sometimes it’s hard. You don’t know, what should I do? Well in a way, you do try to help the person. But sometimes when you realise that it’s up to them, there’s nothing you can do. It can be a bit overwhelming as well. On the other side… Sorry.

Adam Smith:

I was going to say, I think the room is generally in agreement that it’s okay to cry at work but somewhere private or at your desk?

Dr. Isabel Castanho:

I would say somewhere private. I’ve done it with someone that you feel you can chat with. Oh, I’ve almost cried in front of my supervisor but I felt… That’s the other thing that has been mentioned in this podcast today, your network. Oh my God, it’s so important. And hearing your supervisor saying, “Well you can cry if you need to.” Is one of the best things but still, I wouldn’t feel comfortable doing that. So I would say it depends. Everyone is different. I would just highlight that it’s okay to cry. It’s okay to just go down. As long as you pull yourself back up, I think.

Adam Smith:

I think it’s a tricky one, isn’t it? Because crying at work, I think at the time you do it and then you’ll feel anxious as hell afterwards. Particularly if it was in front of your supervisor because then you’re worried about has that changed their perception of you? Do they now think that you aren’t strong enough? Can you do this? This is a tricky… Or Makis, you had a point to make, I think.

Makis Tzioras:

Yeah on that, recently I had been facing a lot of difficulties at work because I had got a paper rejection. And since then, my confidence had really been shaken. And for the past few months, I was not in the best place in my PhD. Well that happened and I think everyone’s come through that. And Katie talked about it as well, is that it was the first time where I felt, am I supposed to be doing science? Maybe I shouldn’t be doing this. I just lost a bit of my excitement that I had for what I was doing. And very recently, I was having a meeting with my supervisor and she said “So what you’ve been up to?” And I just stared and I was like “Nothing, I’ve done nothing this past two weeks and I don’t want to do anything.” And I just started crying.

And for me, that was a very turning point in me getting better. Just letting it all out and feeling my feelings and just knowing that my supervisor knows exactly where I’m at. I’m not trying to make anyone uncomfortable. If I wanted to laugh, I would have laughed. Now I want to cry, so I’ll cry. For me, it’s the same thing. And for me, it was a really nice moment because I do have a very nice relationship with Tara. And she was very nice about it. And it’s not really that she said anything in particular that made me feel better. But the fact that she was there for me and just gave me a tissue, that’s what I needed in that moment. And so, it can be real turning point. If you just let yourself experience your feelings.

Adam Smith:

And that comes to a good point again about supervisors I suppose. Crying in front of a supervisor, if you’ve got a good supervisor, it won’t make any difference at all. If you’ve got a bad supervisor, it probably will. And I think you’ll know for yourself to be able to judge that relationship and whether this is something… Sometimes you can’t control these emotions. They just happen. It’s just there, bang all over the table and it just comes out. And sometimes you can, you can go find somewhere quiet to go. Katie, did you have something to add to that?

Dr. Katie Askew:

So I have cried in front of every supervisor I’ve ever had.

Adam Smith:

Is this a deliberate strategy though?

Dr. Katie Askew:

No. It’s really annoying. I cry a lot and that’s fine. It is what it is. I have cried multiple meetings with all of my PhD supervisors. One of them was like “What are you doing? Would you act like this in real life?” And I was like “Yeah, probably would. Yeah, this is what I do. I cry.” And it’s super awkward and it’s super embarrassing and sometimes you just can’t help it. I have been found crying at my desk, in my postdoc by other PIs who don’t know what to do with you because you’re not their staff. I have been found cry behind buildings, in toilets. My friend Ellie and I used to go and sit and cry in the corridor during our PhDs. It happens. If you’re a person that cries a lot, crying at work will probably happen to you and it’s embarrassing. But don’t worry about it because pretty much everybody I know has been there. And you just have to kind of…

Yeah, Isabel’s got her hand up now, Isabel’s been there too. You just have to pick yourself up and say right okay, today’s been rubbish. My partner and I, whenever we have bad day, we say that we’re just going to reset and go again tomorrow and that works for me. So if I spend a whole day crying at work, the next day I’ll just get up and be like right, yesterday sucked. Today we’ll reset.

Adam Smith:

I think that’s a good idea. And do you know what? I think you don’t even have to wait for tomorrow, if you like. I know sleep counts. I think one of the things with doing things tomorrow is you can often put things off to tomorrow. This is just me. I’m one of those people that oh, I’ll do that. I’ll do it tomorrow or I’ll reset and I’ll sleep overnight and I’ll be better tomorrow. And actually then somebody pointed out to me well, after lunch is okay too. You could go away, sit in a park, take some time, come back. But I agree. The main point of that is it’s not the end of the world. You can just start afresh. These are really good points. We’re taking so long over this but I don’t want to cut this conversation down. Because it’s really useful.

The importance of support networks. I had a big question about this but I think the problem with some of these conversations is, is you feel like… So all these things are so obvious, right? Yoga, resetting, setting your emotions aside, being mindful, taking time out, having good support networks, talking to people. Going and seeing your GP if you need to. Calling on external resources, having friends. These are all on that obvious bullet point list that we’d all write. But the big differences is actually doing those things, isn’t it? And so I’m going to come back to you, Makis. How do you recognise these things and actually put them into place? Sometimes Twitter is amazing because it has fantastic people in there who will help you. And also as well, sometimes it can be the worst place because you’re just reading it and everybody else is so mindful and they’re so amazing and they’re doing so great. And I’m just one of those complaining old people that just… Any of that. What do you think?

Makis Tzioras:

No, that’s a really good point. I think we need to tap into our inner intuition. I think our inner intuition is often not used as much as we should. Because when you go on Twitter and you see a post that is supposed to make you feel good but it doesn’t make you feel good, that is your inner intuition telling you, this is probably very fake. This person is trying to gain a likeness by Twitter, by social media and is not being genuine about it. And you know what I do in that moment? Unfollow. It doesn’t matter who it is, I’ve unfollowed people who I know. And I just felt like this is not good for me. This is not supposed to be in my life and it shouldn’t be in my life. It’s up to me and it’s supposed to be me, the person who just says this is the limits and I do not accept anything that’s making me feel a certain way.

Adam Smith:

So again, I think real life networks, right? Real life networks have got to be better than virtual ones. And I think if you are using virtual networks, I think you just have to be cautious because they can be good and bad. And if you’re seeking a pick me up or a pat on the back or a come on, you do better, well done, they can be good for getting yourself a… What’s the word? The American phrase that had a boy. It can be good for getting that, aren’t they? But equally, then posting and saying oh, I’m having a terrible day. Are the replies saying oh, come on, get up. You’ll be fine. You’re doing amazing. Do you find those helpful, Katie? I wasn’t singling you out as one of those people. And I did just check that Makis still follows me on Twitter.

Dr. Katie Askew:

So I am being singled out as one of those people because I had a terrible day yesterday and I spent my morning crying on my living room floor. So I put this on Twitter because I used to be one of those people that only put the positive stuff on social media because it’s nice for people to pat you on the back and be like yeah, you’re doing really well. Well done. Look at you, you’re great. What a great human being. And then actually, I went through a phase where I couldn’t think of anything positive to put on there because everything sucked. Well, not everything sucked but things sucked. And yeah, I think there’s two questions here. One is the use of Twitter as networking, presentation of yourself, realism of social media, which is a whole different ball game. And the second is having a support network that will have your back when things are tough. And I want to talk about the second thing more than the Twitter thing because I have a lot of thoughts about that. This is a total side note.

Everyone that replied to me yesterday was lovely. Thank you all. Obviously there’s not going to be real life yesterday for people who are listening to this. This is back in April. But I think having even just one person who will have your back, regardless of what’s going on. Whether you’ve made a mistake, whether someone else has made a mistake, is really important. And I think Isabel, Makis and I are in a position where we have spent a lot of time working on our mental health and figuring stuff out and getting ourselves into the position, we’re in today. There are going to be people listening who aren’t there and who don’t even remotely know where to start with this. And who are like well, these people are talking about mental health but they all seem really put together. So actually this doesn’t reflect how I’m feeling. I want to acknowledge that because it sucks thinking everyone else has their stuff together and you’re in a downward spiral and you don’t know the way out of it.

For me, I started with one person that I went to. I had a postdoc during my PhD and when things were going bad with work, I went to him. And then I had my PhD friends who were my cohorts, I went to for personal stuff. And this has developed over time. In Edinburgh, I have a group of postdocs and PhD friends that I’ll go see when things are going bad in the lab. I obviously talk to my partner a lot about stuff. I’ve got PhD pal Sarah, who I mentioned earlier, who I message every day about random things.

And I think I’ve always been quite lucky to be in the position where I’m in a lab and there’s a lot of people to talk to. And there’s always someone that I could go to if I had a problem. There are some people where it’s just them in their group. They are the only PhD student or the young PI and they haven’t got anyone they can go to. So they’re struggling through things alone or they’re the only postdoc, struggling through it alone. And don’t feel like they can talk to anyone or they’re in a group where a lot of the lab is really tight knit and they feel like they’re on the outskirts. And if you’re in that position, you’re not limited to your lab. There will be people in your building. There’ll be people in the university that you can talk to, whether that’s in a formal or an informal setting. Now as a postdoc, if there are PhD students in other labs, I like to talk. You may have noticed that I talk a lot in podcasts and in real life. And I like to think that makes me quite approachable because I will just chat at you until you feel comfortable replying.

So I do this to people that I think might not have someone to talk to. And then eventually they will either come and talk to me about stuff or they won’t. And it just takes one thing. You just need to go up to one person and be like “Hey, I know you’re busy. I am also busy but I’m having a hard time. Can we get a coffee?” And most postdocs or the PhD students won’t turn you away for that because we all like a coffee break and we’ve all been there. Even if we’re not in your exact position, we’ve either done PhD or we’re doing a PhD and we’ve had crappy days. We’ve had problems with supervisors, we’ve had problems with colleagues. Everybody has experienced trials and tribulations with research. So there are a lot of people who will want to help you out because they know how it feels.

And if they didn’t have somebody in that situation, they want to make sure that nobody else feels like that. And so reaching out is super hard, don’t get me wrong. It took me a really long time to be okay with going up to someone and being like “Hey, I’ve got a problem. Everything’s bad. Please help me.” And I’m still not always great at doing this. So even if you can’t do it in person, send them an email. Put a little post it note on their desk, that’s a bit old school. But also if you see someone who looks like they’re having a hard time, ask them if they’re okay. There’s a student that sits near me in my office now and the other night, not the other night, this was a while ago. We were both in the office late and she was sat there and just looked absolutely miserable. So I was like “Are you okay?” And we sat for an hour talking about stuff that was going wrong with her PhD. And she hadn’t had anyone else in the lab to talk to about that. And if I hadn’t asked, she would have just sat there by herself, stewing in this stuff that was going on. So if you’re doing okay and you see someone that’s struggling, reach out to them. Or just check in with your people.

Adam Smith:

I am going to just do one more round the table, just to ask you to make any final key points that you think are important. Your key takeaways. I think just to pick up on the things that I’ve reflected on. Certainly, it sounds like having outside of work interests is important and creating that separation where you can. It’s okay to have periods of time when you are more involved with work. If that makes you feel better about yourself but not to the point then that it becomes all you’re about. Turning your phone off to work emails is okay too. Particularly on a weekend and evenings. Some form of I’m going to say yoga. I was going to say meditation, do you both meditate as well? Or yoga is your meditation? So yoga has come up a lot in this. Yoga, video games are OK too, to escape it.

Support networks are clearly very important. It’s okay to use Twitter I think, as long as you’re aware that you’re using Twitter. And that that comes with good things and bad things. And some people like to share, some people don’t and I think that’s okay. It has its uses but I think proper support networks are more important. Knowing somebody, having somebody to talk to and being one of those people who is willing to chat to somebody else. I do this once in a while, you’ll be sat there thinking I haven’t spoken to that person for a while. I haven’t seen for… Let’s just drop them a WhatsApp. Just say hey, how are you? And I think being one of those kind of people… If you’re going through so many issues with that and I think everybody does and it’s great we’re able to talk about this. But being one of those people that’s willing to just reach out and be an ear is helpful.

Supervisors are important. We’ve separate topic for that. But I think what you can be really cautious of, as James Quinn made in our webinar last week, is choosing the right supervisor. And if you know you are the kind of person who struggles with anxiety, that has problems, that does take work home with you. It’s important that you find the supervisor that you chat about those things up front. That you don’t suddenly become surprised when the supervisor isn’t very understanding because well, what did you expect, right? You’d met them before, go talk to their other PhD students or their other fellows before you choose your supervisor. And choose carefully and find the right supervisor for you. Because I think by doing that, we’ll hopefully get the bad ones to improve when nobody wants to work for them, right?

I say that terribly. So those are all key things that I think I’ve picked up on from our conversation here. It’s okay to be emotional, think about that. Sometimes you can and can’t manage that and how you use that and play that out is I think, down to each one of us to work out. And I’m going to go around the table for some final points. So, I am going to come back to you Isabel, first.

Dr. Isabel Castanho:

So one thing that I just wanted to add is the importance of talking about it. And that’s why we’re doing this podcast. I’m already using the wrong words but sometimes I feel in a position where it should I be exposing myself in a way? Talking about depression and anxiety and the importance of being emotional. But on the other hand, you want to feel good and be in a workplace that accepts you how you are. So I think it’s really important that everyone is talking about it and touching on the point that Katie made about reaching out to people. And my final thought I think is don’t ever think you’re alone because you’re not and I often forget about this and it takes two minutes to reach out to someone and then their concerns are exactly the same that I have. So yeah, I think this is really important.

Adam Smith:

Thanks Isabel. Makis, last point.

Makis Tzioras:

Yes. Just from what Isabel say about not being alone, I always come back to… There’s this musical called Into The Woods and a lot of musicals. So in Into The Woods, there’s a song that’s called No One Is Alone and it’s true. When I feel certain way, when I feel lonely, I think I’m not alone because no one is alone. And it’s just having those little checkpoints in your mind. When you see yourself going into those darker thoughts, snap out of it. Be like Cher, “Snap out of it.” Just wake up and tell yourself okay, I’m going now to part of my mind that I don’t really like. Do something that just will get you out of that and you know best what works for you. Just to bring it back to that, people will relate to honesty.

So whether you are deciding to share your feelings on Twitter or with another person in real life, people will relate to honesty. So if you choose to share emotions that society has deemed taboo, like being sad or being depressed or being anxious. Don’t care about what they’re saying. If you’re feeling this way, people will see that. And will say “Yeah, I feel that. I know exactly what you’re saying.” And that’s the point I was trying to make before, that if you’re trying to convince the world that you’re happy, then just do the best you can to be happy. Don’t try to convince them, do it.

Adam Smith:

Important point. Katie, quick final one from you.

Dr. Katie Askew:

Yeah, I think it’s just important to recognise that what you’re feeling is always valid. Don’t compare your level of anxiety or mental health or whatever, to anybody else’s. Because all of us have different reasons and different triggers and different things underlie the way we feel and none of those are invalid. So as much as you can… This is another Adrian thing, accept where you are today. You just have to feel your way through it and that’s fine. It might take an hour, it might take a day, it might take a couple of months but you will be okay. And there are people that will support you. And I don’t know if the other two agree with this but I will be one of those people on the internet. If you want to message somebody just say “I feel like crap, can we talk?” Go for it. Happy to chat.

Adam Smith:

Thank you Katie and thank you all so much for contributing. Obviously some of these things are difficult to discuss but I think it’s important that they are discussed. And it’s really fantastic that all of you are being so open and willing to share. And I hope this podcast has been useful to some people out there. I think everybody goes through anxiety and the stresses in their own personal way and experiences these things differently. And some people like to talk and some don’t but thank you ever so much, everybody here. And I hope somebody out there, if you are struggling, please do talk to somebody. There will be some information with the podcast on where you can talk to external if you want to. I think your own institution will also have support there for you. Really, you shouldn’t feel bad about drawing on that support, it is there.

And do talk to a friend, family members, colleagues and your PIs as well. They aren’t all gruesome and some are very nice as I’m sure you know. So thank you very much again. It’s time to enter today’s podcast. Before I go, I just want to add that as I said before, if any of our listeners have had problems with these topics we’ve discussed today, help is out there. Please don’t struggle on alone.

I would like to thank our panellists, Isabel, Katie and Makis. We have profiles and contact details on all our panellists on our website. Including that of their Twitter accounts. We’ll also link to information on their work. If listeners have any questions, we also have a WhatsApp community group which is also up there. Which you can certainly use that group to talk through some of the work challenges you might be facing. There’s over 100 early career researchers in this group now, who are all super supportive and very happy to chat through both personal and professional issues that you might face and we have lots of discussions on there. So please do join that, the details on how to join are on our website. We also have a new webinar series where we’re talking about some of these things. So please look at that too. Finally, remember to like subscribe and review our podcasts through our website on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, Podbean, SoundCloud. Pretty much anywhere where you can find podcasts. And thank you very much everybody, for joining us today. And we will come back to you again in two weeks’ time with our next podcast. Thank you

Voice Over:

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