Advice on maintaining good mental health

PhDs can be lonely, isolated places. These resources will be useful if your PhD impacts upon your overall wellbeing.

Advice For New PhD Students

By: Dr. Mercedes Gómez-López We here at The PhD Proofreaders invited Dr. Gómez-López to share her advice for new PhD students. This article is based on a viral twitter thread they published. It has been two years since I successfully completed my PhD. Looking back,...

15 things to remember if you’ve started to hate your PhD

Conducting your PhD literature review and worried about worried that there is no literature in your discipline? This guide is for you.

The new normal isn’t so new anymore.

Devastated by unexpected constructive feedback? Take time to rage against the feedback then look after yourself and start again. Supervisors only give you feedback to help you pass your PhD, hard though it is to hear.

Tips for practicising self-care as a PhD Student

Does your PhD have you burnt out? Here are some practical tips to aid in managing your self care as a PhD student.

The year of pestilence and a hint of hope – 2020 as a PhD student

Everyone is suffering from the pandemic, but now there is hope. Vaccines are slowly becoming available. If they prove one thing, it is that research works

How to survive the first year of your PhD

Just starting out on your PhD? Here are our tips on how to survive the first year of your first year and make it out in one piece.

PhD and Mental Health – Finding the Balance

Doing a PhD while struggling with mental health can be difficult, but there are things you can do to look after yourself and your well-being.

Pandemics, PhDs and Blind Luck

So many PhD students aren’t getting the support they deserve during Covid. It’s making a difficult task almost impossible.

Combatting the Curse of Knowledge (and related illnesses)

You’re already familiar with imposter syndrome. It is intrinsically linked with the lesser-known Curse of Knowledge. Here we explain how to manage this common struggle.

PhD survival during the pandemic: sharing experiences and ideas

This blog is an expression of my personal experience as a mature woman and a part-time doctoral candidate, with a full-time job and other social and cultural responsibilities.

80 things I wish I knew when I was doing my PhD

Often, the difference between unnecessary worry and successfully muddling through is having someone on your side who can tell you that what you’re feeling is normal and reassure you with good, practical advice that speaks to the core of you. That is the goal of this article.

‘It is a special time’ – PhD student responses to the coronavirus crisis

We wanted to find out the effect that coronavirus was having on PhD students around the world. So we asked them. Over the course of a week, over sixty PhD students answered a simple question: How has coronavirus affected your PhD and how have you adapted?

6 ways to overcome PhD loneliness

PhDs can be the loneliest places in the world. You may be part of a bigger cohort of students in your department, but ultimately it’s down to you to power on through, turn up every day, make decisions and deal with problems. It’s you that has to carry around the weight and anxiety that accompany your PhD, and it’s you who has to constantly find a way over what seem like insurmountable hurdles, problems and sticking points.

How Moments of Mindfulness Can Thwart the PhD Blues — The Science of Mindfulness for Students

PhD students are six times more likely to experience depression or anxiety than the general population — that’s what a recent survey of over 2,000 graduate students found. To those of us currently on our PhD journey, perhaps this won’t come as a surprise. Doctoral...

39 PhD Mindfulness Exercises To De-Stress Your PhD

Research has shown how mindfulness exercises can be important in lowering PhD stress. Here we present 39 mindfulness exercises to help you towards a successful submission.

There’s no place for struggle-porn in academia

Ever slept under your desk? I have. I was proud of it. It was something to boast about the next day. People admired me because of the amount of work I was putting into my PhD. Awful, right?

How attached to your PhD thesis are you?

If you’re anything like I was, your PhD thesis is like your baby. You’ve bought it into the world and you’ll die for it. It’s tested you, pushed you harder than you ever thought possible and bought your to tears many, many times.

People like me will never do things like that: PhD imposter syndrome and academic anxiety

To those who think they’re not good enough I say two things. First, good enough for what? To be an academic? Well, you are one. You’re a trainee. Second, you’re not good enough yet. There’s a big distinction.