Hi Cobweb and everyone

I feel the same kind of isolation too. I just started my PhD at the start of October so am still trying to find my feet, but it does seem really hard to start those conversations that can lead to friendships and so on.

I'm in a large research office - there's usually about 20 or 30 PhDers in on any one day but many more than that altogether, so there's always different people - but it's not very welcoming. It's a hot-desking system but people who've been there longer have established their own areas so new people just have to fit in around other people's piles of books and things, it means I usually end up sitting a long way away from anyone else and never get to break into the established groups, especially as everyone works in silence so you can't just chat to anyone. There's a weekly meet-up for coffee and biscuits but it's so dominated by a small clique of people who are in their final year that it's really off-putting, they just talk over new people with silly in-jokes that they don't bother to explain, and I kind of resent feeling like I have to learn their jokes and fit in with them when they don't bother making any effort to include new people. Maybe I should try harder, but it feels like too much of an investment of my time when I'm feeling pressure to make some progress on my own research!

That sounds very negative. I have met three or four people who I always say hello to, so I guess as time goes by that will expand to more people or develop into deeper relationships. Maybe it's just such a different environment to any other environment I've ever been in? My Masters degree gave a natural structure for meeting people - we were in class together and talked about assignments, and that developed into friendships - and I've spent the last 12 years working, where you naturally get to know your colleagues through working together. The isolation of a PhD is very weird and working in silence is taking a lot of getting used to - I like it, I get a lot done, but it's just so so weird!

It's good to have found this forum, I hope I'll get to know the people here a bit better anyway.....

I agree totally about the positives. I may only just have started my PhD, so am clearly still in the honeymoon period (!!!) but having worked in a lot of different places since finishing my first degree 14 years ago (yikes!) I know exactly how demoralising and disspiriting many jobs can be. Even if this is just a brief respite of three years of being in control of my own time and being able to pursue topics that interest me, that's a sight more than most people get to have, and there's a reasonable likelihood that the work I'll be doing once I've (hopefully) got the PhD will be far more interesting and challenging than the work I was doing before. Nothing is ever perfect, but this path seems more likely than many to lead somewhere interesting and rewarding, and that's good enough for me!

I was so glad to read this thread! I spent the last two years working full-time and doing my MSc part-time in evenings and weekends, and getting funding to do a PhD full-time just seemed like a dream - no more killing myself, going weeks without a day off, always exhausted, always running to catch up with myself. But I was starting to wonder if my 9-5 approach to the PhD was realistic when I heard how hard other people were working - it's a huge relief to know it is possible to do a PhD and also have a life!

Hi Phoebe
Hang in there! I think what the others have said is right - this doesn't mean you're unworthy at all, it means you're taking a big step and the first things you've come up with haven't quite bridged the gap. But you'll get there - you're only a few weeks in and I bet very few people can jump straight from undergrad to PhD on their very first attempt at writing something. Everything I've read (on this Forum and elsewhere) about doing a PhD emphasises how much it's about starting again and questioning assumptions and thinking afresh about things, so maybe this just gives you a good opportunity to do that? I know it's hard, I've been feeling out of my depth as well, but if we were offered funding to do a PhD, they must have seen something in us that suggested we were capable of it!
If you ever fancy catching up on campus, drop me a line.... :-)
Batfink

Hi there. I'm new to these boards and new to a PhD - started last Thursday! All very daunting and scary but slowly starting to make a little more sense I think! Just wanted to say hi, cos having read through a few threads I have the feeling this forum may come in very handy!

Oh, and a couple of people said they were at Loughborough - that's where I am too, in Civil and Building Engineering (though I'm not an engineer, just a weird cross-disciplinary mixture). Be great to make contact with other Loughborough people!