A new Doctor on the block.

Completing my Doctrate degree is with no doubt my proudest and most challenging achievement to date. I have found this idea perplexing lately, given that my Master's Degree in Neuropsychology was a Clinical program spread over 2 years with tons of clinical work, clinical assessments, written assessments and exams and of course a mini-dissertation. Before embarking on the PhD journey, fresh off graduating with my Masters, I thought I had conquered my toughest challenge yet. Anyone who has completed a clinical program can tell you that it is no piece of cake.

To my surprise the Doctorate despite being a thesis-only (i.e no course work, or exams) program proved to be even tougher. The hardest thing ever. No words can do justice to how challenging this degree is. For a bit of context, I am one of eight students who were enrolled in the University of Bristol - University of Cape Town Cotutelle PhD program intended to foster research collaboration between the two institutions and support research(ers) in Africa. This has no doubt been a life-changing experience. This meant that I got to travel and experience the UK and other European countries, make new friends and attend prestigious courses that advanced my research skills through the University of Bristol's Medical School Short Course program. I also received world-class tutelage, leaving me with an extensive knowledge arsenal, however, this experience had its own challenges. As part of this program, I have had four international moves between the UK and South Africa from 2019 to date. Moving is taxing and can be considered a traumatic event, as such the emotional, mental and physical toll of this has not been easy. Secondly, who has forgotten 2020? Yes, just after embarking on this PhD Journey whilst adjusting to life in a foreign country (UK), the COVID-19 Pandemic hit. This added another layer of challenges. Thankfully I had a great support system in the UK, consisting primarily of other PhD students and supervisors which helped a lot. I should also mention how instrumental my therapist was in helping me through this. If you are a PhD student reading this, I would be doing you a disservice if I fail to mention that you should consider seeing a therapist if you don't already have one.

Nevertheless, despite these challenges, in my reflection, the main difficulties I faced on the PhD journey were with the actual work needed for one to have a completed thesis. From my conversations with others who have gone through the process, despite having different journeys and topics, our challenges seem to be the same, i.e. the thesis itself. There are many reasons I have come to understand that make this Degree excruciatingly hard, here are two:

1. Novelty. The essence and key requirement of a PhD project is that it brings new insights into the research area. This means that no matter what background you have, you are going to encounter challenges you have never faced before, for which you do not currently have experience or tools to overcome easily. You have to constantly learn which means more studying, more consultation with your supervisors and trial and error. This is likely what fuels the imposter syndrome that a lot of PhD students describe. I only stopped feeling this way in year 4.

2. It's personal. It is yours and yours alone, you cannot run or hide from it. Even if one has supervisors, it is not their thesis (this becomes clear, unfortunately later rather than earlier), they have theirs already, they can help you with yours but you realise at some point that you are the one walking this journey. There were so many countless days and nights where I was haunted by my PhD work. Breaks and holidays were ridden with guilt even though they were well-desereved and needed. In my dreams I was often solving some PhD-related problem or picturing data. This frustrated me a lot, because I thought sleep should have been my respite from the torture at the very least. Unfortunately, the PhD said no, I was forced to make peace with it and it became the new normal.

Despite these and many other experiences that are tied to this process. I got it done. I wanted to quit daily, but I was resilient and kept going. I submitted my thesis, I defended it well and will graduate with 2 PhDs from two prestigious PhDs. I have 3 publications accepted for publication and one more underway. I managed to become a budding epidemiological researcher and merged this with my first love, #psychology. Through my topic, I have also become somewhat of an advocate for the protection of children from harm, something that has changed the course of my life.

I cannot wait for my next journey and I am even more excited to incorporate the skills I have learnt through this process in my endeavours (because if not, what was all the pain for right ??). I am also available to help others on their PhD journeys. You can reach me if you need support through this process, I couldn't do it alone, you shouldn't either.

P.S If you are a PhD student, you can do it! If you are thinking of doing a PhD, don't ??.