Confessions of a PhD

Hi! At the end of January 2020 I’ve now completed 4 months of my PhD and I thought this would be a great time to reflect on what it’s been like so far. I knew that starting a PhD would be a complete lifestyle change and so far out of my comfort zone that it was long lost in the horizon behind me. Knowing how difficult I find change I knew there would be an adjustment phase where I spent the first few months in the same state as Ross from Friends when he drank all the margaritas and kept telling everyone “I’M FINE”.   But I made it through and just like I predicted, I’m feeling a lot better. Although after speaking to a few different PhD students over the last few months I’ve come to the realisation that I may never feel completely settled or confident in everything I do here, I do feel like I’m starting to find my feet. Baby steps eh? Back to the start: day one Photo by Danielle MacInnes on Unsplash I suppose it is hard to prepare someone for the sta...

Hi there!  I’m Erica and I thought I would introduce myself a little before getting into the swing of this blog. Photo by  Octavian Dan  on  Unsplash I’m currently a full-time PhD student at Loughborough University of London and am fully funded by Technē. My PhD is on the topic of spoken word poetry communities and their use of digital media (I’ll go more in depth into my topic at a later date when I’m not only 4 months into the PhD!). I began my PhD in October 2019 so at the time of writing this I’m still fairly new at it all. I’ve decided to start a blog for 3 reasons: 1.      Prior to starting my PhD I couldn’t find a lot of information online written from a student’s perspective about what a PhD would involve and what it would be like day to day. I’m hoping I’ll be able to document my journey here and potentially help some people who are in the same position I was. 2.      I’ve heard that st...