betrayed by PI

[QofQuimica]

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Thanks for your kind words. I'm just tired of continuously asserting for myself for the entire year and half while I was in the lab. I honestly thought I've gotten along w/ ppl close enough there for at least one person to get concerned of my absence. And it was really hard for me to remain motivated while no one even cares abt my existence especially since I was carrying a heavy courseload at the same time. What I have done so far is basically letting the PI know how I felt abt this whole situation and hopefully something will work out from there. Although I could technically work in the lab for the summer, I'm not sure if that is the best soln at this pt especially since my collaboration with my "bosses" have not gone particularly well.

Yeah, I see what you're saying, and you could be right about it not being such a great solution to go back since there are so many bad feelings now. I was just thinking it would be a shame for this to screw up your chances of getting a strong LOR from him for med school and/or getting your pub. Or are you already accepted to med school? In that case, you're right that you could probably do something more useful or at least fun this summer.

Can I ask you something kind of personal? Do you think there is any chance that you might be depressed? Don't feel obligated to post an answer to that question on SDN, but I'm throwing the thought out there just in case you think it's worth considering.

 

[nancy0223]

Yeah, I see what you're saying, and you could be right about it not being such a great solution to go back since there are so many bad feelings now. I was just thinking it would be a shame for this to screw up your chances of getting a strong LOR from him for med school and/or getting your pub. Or are you already accepted to med school? In that case, you're right that you could probably do something more useful or at least fun this summer.

Can I ask you something kind of personal? Do you think there is any chance that you might be depressed? Don't feel obligated to post an answer to that question on SDN, but I'm throwing the thought out there just in case you think it's worth considering.

I'm actually on several WLs right now and I already got a LOR from this PI a while ago when I was in a very good position with him. As for depression, I think it's very likely that I've gotten depressed from this entire med school appl. process. And I'm very sad myself that things have turned out this way but it's just too difficult to patch things up now this late in the semester.

 

[Neuronix]

I'm actually on several WLs right now and I already got a LOR from this PI a while ago when I was in a very good position with him.

Cool. All is not lost. My last undergrad PI was really, really pissed at me, but it didn't matter because I already had LOR in hand. So eh, screw it. Just learn your lessons and move on. I just hope you get in this year WLs really tend to to move around May 15.

About depression about this process... It never gets any easier. You're going to continue to have extreme challenge and stress. Try to learn how to deal with it now. In my grad lab, it was always expected that you would keep working in lab while in med school. Even if you told the PI you wanted to stay in that lab and that you would pick your rotation project back up, your rotation project would instantly be picked up by someone else and you would be thrown off the project if you were in med school or even away for a month. My MD/PhD buddy spent a year and a half on a project only to get scooped by a post-doc in his own lab and get his name misspelled in the acknowledgements (i.e. not even an author on the paper). They knew he'd be pissed about it, so they just didn't tell him. He saw it when the paper showed up in Nature Somethingorother. Think there's any recourse? Hah! Of course not. My PI expected me to keep working in his lab through third year of med school, which is an absolutely ridiculous request. But he wouldn't listen to anyone otherwise. His response would be, "You're MD/PhD aren't you? You should be doing both research and clinical work. You're just lazy." The same would be said about the research residents who weren't doing research.

And then talk about stress... There's always another major exam that could sink you. There's always some ***hole you have to kiss up to because your grade depends on it. There's residency to apply to. All the while, they hold all the cards. They can absolutely screw you with no recourse. If you fail to match because even though you went on 12 interviews, good luck finding a FP residency in the scramble. If you report a rotation to the dean because it's 120 hours a week and there's a 80 hour work rule (not that it's enforced and it doesn't apply to med students anyways), it'll be you who fails the rotation (seen this happen). If you piss off the wrong attending in residency, every mistake you make can be amplified until they nitpick on you and throw you out, and then good luck getting another residency.

How do you keep this stuff from happening to you? Keep upbeat, doing take things personally, and keep pushing towards your goals. We're bred to be sheep in this hierarchical game. It lends itself to abuse. I can't even count the number of times I was told I didn't get a real PhD because I didn't spend as long getting it or I wouldn't be successful in my field because my PhD wasn't in Physics or Engineering. Or how many times I've heard MDs and MD/PhD doesn't do real/serious research anyways! Think I can argue with these people?! I've tried, and then I get labelled as confrontational and acting like I'm better than them 😕. Teaching is the last thing on the mind of most PIs and attendings, because it isn't rewarded in this system. Rewarded are grants, obtained in part by publishing quickly and often, i.e. not cutting you any slack for things in your life, and on the clinical side, clinical throughput, also not cutting you any slack for things in your life. What if you get sick? Well you better be practically dead to not come into residency.

Welcome to the MD/PhD life. You won't be in any position to have any control over anything until you're in your 40s. Then if you actually do keep doing research, the extreme pressure is on you to keep bringing in grants at 10th percentile funding levels. Good luck getting anything resembling a startup package or tenure. If your money runs out or you fail to ever get any because you were never given a chance to begin with (too much clinical duty, no resources), you're liable to get tossed out on your rear, or at least if you're board certified you can be pushed to the clinical realm without any hope of ever coming back to research. I've heard that story over, and over, and over again. I never knew about it when I was an applicant or a first year because I'd only met happy and successful MD/PhDs. You don't get to meet those who were run into the ground or ****ed over.

What's my point? This is the reality check. Calm down. What's going on to you right now isn't that bad if you do manage to get into a program. Screw your old lab, but only in your own mind. It's worth keeping your enemies to a minimum. Just grin and bear it for now.

 

[Red Leader]

Come on, dude, that's pretty harsh. No need to kick the poor girl while she's down. Especially if she comes from a different country/culture, these skills aren't always easy to develop, and there are plenty of people who are innately shy. It's great if being outgoing and assertive comes naturally to you, but some people really have to work at it.

Apologies nancy, no harm meant, my lack of tact is just one part of the flawed human being that I am. Hopefully my directness helped you somehow.

That said, juggling school and lab is difficult and sometimes you just wanna drop one completely to focus on the other. That's why so few people can successfully pull off their grades and research at the same time. I'm not one of those people, but we really have no other alternative to continuing to fight.

 

[Red Leader]

About depression about this process... It never gets any easier. You're going to continue to have extreme challenge and stress. Try to learn how to deal with it now. In my grad lab, it was always expected that you would keep working in lab while in med school. Even if you told the PI you wanted to stay in that lab and that you would pick your rotation project back up, your rotation project would instantly be picked up by someone else and you would be thrown off the project if you were in med school or even away for a month. My MD/PhD buddy spent a year and a half on a project only to get scooped by a post-doc in his own lab and get his name misspelled in the acknowledgements (i.e. not even an author on the paper). They knew he'd be pissed about it, so they just didn't tell him. He saw it when the paper showed up in Nature Somethingorother. Think there's any recourse? Hah! Of course not. My PI expected me to keep working in his lab through third year of med school, which is an absolutely ridiculous request. But he wouldn't listen to anyone otherwise. His response would be, "You're MD/PhD aren't you? You should be doing both research and clinical work. You're just lazy." The same would be said about the research residents who weren't doing research.

Dude I always like your posts. They fill me with this weird feeling that is a hybrid of despair and resoluteness. On one hand I feel "this f**king blows." On the other hand I feel "for some reason I still want to do this because I think I can make it happen."

But the bolded part is really messed up IMO. I literally threw up a little in my mouth.

 

[Myempire1]

Get used to it. ..... The positive side is: this doesn't really matter. .... try not to burn any bridges with your dissatisfaction. ..... Expect that similar things can and will happen in graduate school.

I totally agree with Neuronix on this one. Definitely get used to it, but this doesn't really matter that much in the long run. In the end, don't burn your bridges and don't let this sort of thing ruin your interest in science.

You may get screwed by your PI or thesis committee when you are a grad student. You may get screwed by your PI or your K32 grant when you are a postdoc.
You may get screwed by your chair or RO1 grant committee when you are a PI. You may get screwed by your chancellor or the NIH T32 grant czars when you are a chair. Finally, when you are the HHMI-funded guru and decides who gets the coveted NIH funding, you'll get screwed by the grad student messing around with your wife.

 

[Neuronix]

don't let this sort of thing ruin your interest in science.

I agree with the rest of your post, but I have to ask the question that stands like an elephant in my my room. And it is a very nice room, don't get me wrong. They gave me a fellowship office that overlooks the city and the lake and the airport. Every day I watch the birds fly by and the bicyclists come off the mountains and then the sun goes down slowly and the city lights twinkle at night. All this because I'm not working in Radiology, in which case I'd be in an old, run-down shoebox office with no window. Just like grad school where the IM clinical researchers or the image processors got nice high rise offices while I sat in a dank, poorly climate controlled, and leaky basement. Oh wait, back on topic.

The elephant sized question in my mind is. Why shouldn't you let your negative experiences influence your career decisions? Wouldn't you be a fool to continue a path that abuses you (and has personally abused you), is unstable, pays less, gives less vacation, provides more stress, and requires more training? Personally, why should I spend the rest of my life in a shoebox with no window, just so I can keep working on some concept of "science" that nobody seems to appreciate? I think I'd have to be crazy. Well I am crazy, so it's still possible. But I think that's what it takes.

 

[Jorje286]

The elephant sized question in my mind is. Why shouldn't you let your negative experiences influence your career decisions? Wouldn't you be a fool to continue a path that abuses you (and has personally abused you), is unstable, pays less, gives less vacation, provides more stress, and requires more training? Personally, why should I spend the rest of my life in a shoebox with no window, just so I can keep working on some concept of "science" that nobody seems to appreciate? I think I'd have to be crazy. Well I am crazy, so it's still possible. But I think that's what it takes.

I guess the idea is that you should be passionate about science itself and trying to answer a scientific question/work on one of your long-term goals. I don't know about people not appreciating the science concept. I think science most definitely has its own standing and value. It's obviously not for everyone, but I can see why for some people it's worth sidelining the negative things that come with it.

And TBH I don't see any abuse in this case, and it's important to let the OP know that. If you decide to take a leave, it's your responsibility to let your PI and the people you work with know. I would imagine that is similar in any work situation.

 

[engineetor]

And the PI was simply using me as a research tool.

Sorry to hear about your plight but that's pretty much the role of any research student.

Have you discussed with your PI about post-graduate options, as in, do you plan on staying with him/her for a Masters or PhD? Were you also working for free?

UG researchers are at the very bottom of the Academic hierarchy. Most "rising stars" need to publish extensively in order to gain notoriety/tenure and they might trade the guaranteed publications with a postdoc than with an UG who they aren't funding.

 

[witness23]

I agree with the rest of your post, but I have to ask the question that stands like an elephant in my my room. And it is a very nice room, don't get me wrong. They gave me a fellowship office that overlooks the city and the lake and the airport. Every day I watch the birds fly by and the bicyclists come off the mountains and then the sun goes down slowly and the city lights twinkle at night. All this because I'm not working in Radiology, in which case I'd be in an old, run-down shoebox office with no window. Just like grad school where the IM clinical researchers or the image processors got nice high rise offices while I sat in a dank, poorly climate controlled, and leaky basement. Oh wait, back on topic.

The elephant sized question in my mind is. Why shouldn't you let your negative experiences influence your career decisions? Wouldn't you be a fool to continue a path that abuses you (and has personally abused you), is unstable, pays less, gives less vacation, provides more stress, and requires more training? Personally, why should I spend the rest of my life in a shoebox with no window, just so I can keep working on some concept of "science" that nobody seems to appreciate? I think I'd have to be crazy. Well I am crazy, so it's still possible. But I think that's what it takes.

absolutely. this experience should definitely impact your decisions. I think people have to remember that they might end up getting married/having kids/have other responsibilities. Its not just your happiness but other people will depend on you too. Going back home and complaining to your family (when you would be making less money than a clinician - which you will always tell yourself you could have been) can be stressful on a few people.

don't get me wrong, science is great, especially when your experiments are successful (or if they lead to new grants). you have be a bit self-absorbed to be a "good" PI though.

 

[mustang sally]

Hi all,

I really appreciated all the helpful advises that u guys provided when I started this thread a while go. Since then, I decided to keep my head down and take up my PI's offer as the 3rd person in the project. However, things did not really work out from there. Although I'm still technically part of the team, my two "bosses" never really bothered to voluntarily involve me in any discussion of the proj nor bothered to notify me of their plans. Because I was also loaded with my senior eng. design proj at the meantime, I decided to take some time off from lab and come back when one of my "bosses" contacts me for help.
Finally, after a month & half, I was asked to notify my PI the progress of "my" project. As soon as I told him I was absent from lab for a while, my PI insisted that I reduce the # of credits I'm currently taking for this research project. When I explained the communication prob btw my bosses and I, the PI simply assumed I quitted because I was unhappy with his decision to kick me off the leadership role. Since changing credits is impossible this late in the semester, while my PI insists on it be done, I'm really lost on what to do. What I'm most disappointed with was the fact that literally no one in the lab grp bothered to contact me while I was not around although every single person noticed my absence 🙁.

Hey Nancy,
I don't know if you're still reading this thread, but I just wanted to let you know that I don't think your situation was all that unusual. I am working on my third lab now, and I have always kind of been the underdog in all of the labs. At my last lab job, I used to tell my husband that I could probably keel over dead at my bench and none of my labmates would even notice, that's how bad it was. Now I am a lowly PharmD student admist PhDs and post docs...so yeah, more of the same. But yet I keep coming back for more. So it really doesn't surprise me that the people in your lab group wouldn't have contacted you.

Anyways, your situation has probably resolved itself by now, just wanted to let you know that you're not alone! Hope the summer is finding you happier.

 

[link2swim06]

Hey Nancy,
I don't know if you're still reading this thread, but I just wanted to let you know that I don't think your situation was all that unusual. I am working on my third lab now, and I have always kind of been the underdog in all of the labs. At my last lab job, I used to tell my husband that I could probably keel over dead at my bench and none of my labmates would even notice, that's how bad it was. Now I am a lowly PharmD student admist PhDs and post docs...so yeah, more of the same. But yet I keep coming back for more. So it really doesn't surprise me that the people in your lab group wouldn't have contacted you.

Anyways, your situation has probably resolved itself by now, just wanted to let you know that you're not alone! Hope the summer is finding you happier.

I agree one of my best friends had a terrible lab experience and now has found a better lab and enjoys it much more