Hi SDNers, I am currently in my internship year and miserable. All I see here is how happy people are with their sites... I am grateful to have matched, I just wanted to get some normalizing and potential commiseration. Maybe the location of mine is making things worse, but i dont really like any of the people. How are people on internship feeling?
Internship woes
- Thread starter Qwerty10
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hey OP,
I matched to my lowest (8th) site for internship. While I was far from miserable, it was also far from a great experience for me, despite my best efforts to get the most out of it I could. I say this to say that after internship, things can get a lot better. Just finish. Dissertate and dont stagnate!
I matched to my lowest (8th) site for internship. While I was far from miserable, it was also far from a great experience for me, despite my best efforts to get the most out of it I could. I say this to say that after internship, things can get a lot better. Just finish. Dissertate and dont stagnate!
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I enjoyed my internship, but certainly know folks who did not. I would say just do your best to try make friends/do things outside the program, visit home when possible, and keep your eye on the prize. And "dissertate don't stagnate" is great advice. A year can sound like a long time, but hey, we're already 3-5 months into it, depending on when you started. And who knows, maybe future rotations will be more enjoyable.
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Good news, it is only a year. It will end and the next step will begin. Hopefully it helps you identify things to look for in postdoc or employment interviews.
I had a pretty rough internship year. What seemed like a great place during interviews turned out to be not at all the right culture for me. Mediocre training, few opportunities to take advantage of the available resources (the institution itself was world-class), zero intellectual curiosity and lots of politics and passive-aggressive folks. I considered leaving around this time last year to the point that I actually emailed my DCT to find out if it was an option to switch into the experimental track of my program, but ultimately decided to stick it out. Even made an effort to stay for post-doc (just to avoid another move) but am now outrageously happy to be elsewhere. Better city, better work environment, better colleagues and more opportunity. So hang in there!
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I had a very rough start to internship. I matched at one of my bottom-ranked sites so I was not super excited to begin with. Then I had some things happen in the first few months (lost training opportunities, in a nutshell, one of which was my #1 goal for internship training) that made the experience even more difficult. Over time things improved and, looking back, I can say now that I did enjoy my internship year. However, there were certainly moments in which I felt bitter and had the belief that my internship would not get me where I needed to go. I remember thinking about my other sites and wondering what it would be like had I matched somewhere else. I experienced a lot of "what if I had done this instead," and it only made me miserable. In the end, to borrow the DBT framework, I realized that I was not accepting reality and was suffering on top of experiencing pain. Once I had this realization, things got a lot better for me.
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I disliked internship and most people I have spoken to dislike internship as well.
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I can't really say I disliked my internship, but I was ready to be done by that point, so certainly had the anxiety of "God , can we just be done yet?" I hate being poor and want to start our family."
The quality of my internship (training, opps, supervisors, structure, professional support) was all pretty good though. This was a VA internship.
The quality of my internship (training, opps, supervisors, structure, professional support) was all pretty good though. This was a VA internship.
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I had a love/hate relationship with my internship. Add to the consensus that some days you just have to focus on getting through it and on to the next step. In retrospect, I think I learned more from some of the negative aspects of the experience than the ones that I enjoyed.
D
deleted343839
I had mixed experiences on internship. My primary track activities and setting were great, didactics were hit-or-miss, and I didn't really enjoy much else. Plus, the workload was pretty heavy. I was happy when it was all over.
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I'm apparently of the minority in having loved my internship. Lot pf leeway on planning my training rotations. Great supervisors. Great cohort, one of which is one of my best friends still. And, a letter of rec from a pioneer in the field which has been great going forward.
Wow thank you all for your feedback! Ollie123 I think we are going to the same internship you described my experience perfectly. People are so passive aggressive and frankly miserable and just spewing their misery everywhere. The training is so so I don't know that it's bad training but I also don't feel like I'm learning anything new just getting more experience of the same. The politics are horrible and it's hard not to take things personally when people just say mean things to your face. And just to clarify I'm not used to not being welcomed by my training environment so I'm not thinking I have glaring personality defects I wasn't aware of before internship. They hyper analyze everything that everybody says and I swear they're just looking to diagnose everybody they know. Dynamicdidactic my friends also aren't loving internship but it was hard for me to see that message anywhere else. I can't wait to finish!! Thank you all, am happy to feel some support!
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I'm very happy at my internship so far. However, to be honest, I'm very lonely. I'm already 5 months in, I can't believe how fast the year is going.
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Yeah, I suppose I'm the exception, too. Overall, I had a great internship year....in hindsight. Learning curve was so steep and I finally met my nemesis supervisor 
. But I enjoyed the patients, staff, and my fellow interns...so that made those rough days better. However, I learned a lot about how to maintain my grace under pressure and I would not have that opportunity if everything was peachy. The last few months came and went so quickly...so OP, that's something to look forward too, maybe?
. But I enjoyed the patients, staff, and my fellow interns...so that made those rough days better. However, I learned a lot about how to maintain my grace under pressure and I would not have that opportunity if everything was peachy. The last few months came and went so quickly...so OP, that's something to look forward too, maybe?Haha, yeah, it's been suggested to me by others that I will learn the most here given how difficult it is to hold on to myself in the face of such dysfunctional dynamics. So far though, it seems like a lesson in depressing numbness. I am just counting down the days, but get a lot of strength from knowing I'm not alone!!
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I think one thing that can come into play is the mindset at internship sites of, "we're the last step before this person becomes a license-eligible psychologist," so some may be stricter/harsher than many folks are accustomed to. Not to say there aren't also just outright dysfunctional internships, but sites generally seem to take their responsibilities for training and stewardship of the field seriously (to a fault at times), and they also don't usually have the benefit of having known the interns and their capabilities for years.
There can also be a feeling out process in terms of the supervisor/supervisee dynamic. While sites do ultimately view interns as junior colleagues as the year progresses, it's still a training relationship, and that can take some adjusting all around. Especially if, say, your grad program was fairly informal while the internship site maintains a fairly strict hierarchy.
Just a couple things to keep in mind as the next crop of folks gear up for the internship interview process.
In the end, as has been said above--it's just one year. And as long as that might seem at times, it will eventually pass. And then you're done.
There can also be a feeling out process in terms of the supervisor/supervisee dynamic. While sites do ultimately view interns as junior colleagues as the year progresses, it's still a training relationship, and that can take some adjusting all around. Especially if, say, your grad program was fairly informal while the internship site maintains a fairly strict hierarchy.
Just a couple things to keep in mind as the next crop of folks gear up for the internship interview process.
In the end, as has been said above--it's just one year. And as long as that might seem at times, it will eventually pass. And then you're done.
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In hindsight I hated my intership at times but also loved it. Didactics reflected low effort and supervision was mediocre, but the patient population was so awesome for learning. Politics were evident more than I had previously seen, but it was good exposure to how clinical departments operate. If happens everywhere so you may as well pick up some perspective where you can.
The year itself was a breeze because my dissertation was long done. In that sense, my attitude was to take whatever I could learn, leave the rest, and think about postdoc. I did make great friends in my internship cohort that I keep up with. Every experience is an opportunity for networking and friendship. The year might go faster if you and the other interns blow off some steam occasionally
The year itself was a breeze because my dissertation was long done. In that sense, my attitude was to take whatever I could learn, leave the rest, and think about postdoc. I did make great friends in my internship cohort that I keep up with. Every experience is an opportunity for networking and friendship. The year might go faster if you and the other interns blow off some steam occasionally
I am still working on my dissertation so that may add to the feeling of foreverrrrrr but at this point research is looking like a nice rest. I definitely prefer clinical work, but now I'm wishing I was in a part research internship just to get away from everyone. And yeah, the passive aggressive indirect conversation is not often about me. It's like a healthy triangulation of don't tell so and so, and then fake smiles in the hallway. I am no stranger to politics. I worked for a few years before grad school and my department was by no means perfect, but this is a whole new level. Appreciate everyone'ssupport! It is helpful to remember that this is the last year...
