Hi Tulip. I hear this kind of story all the time. I agree with what Fled said about priorities, but I would like to add that things may well change for the better in the future. For example, think about what will happen when the day comes when you are better educated than him and earning more than him. Given that his job is so stressful, won't it make sense for him to stop working such long hours, become less uptight and more fun to be with? It could even be that he is one of those great guys who will be relieved to take care of some of the homemaking chores (that men typically avoid!) which will do wonders for healing your relationship.

Hope this helps :)

I don't know whether you are a man or a woman, but for women pretty much every university in the UK now has equality schemes in place (e.g. Athena SWAN) for those wanting to do PG subjects in STEMM subjects. There are also lots of equality grants e.g. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-25300669 If you find a university that does not have equality schemes for STEMM, be sure to remind the university that they will soon no longer recieve funding from the major funding bodies until they mend their ways and catch up with 21st century equality.

You are in luck - grants of £6000 per year (+£2500 emergency funding) are available to women studying a PhD in the UK http://ffwg.org.uk/

Good luck with your studies :)

I feel sorry for women in countries outside the UK who aren't able to compete for jobs on the equal footing offered by Equality programmes such as Athena SWAN and Project Juno. However no doubt these programmes will become mandatory internationally before long - and about time too.

Hi incognito. Sorry to hear things aren't going too well at present. However things might not be as bleak as you think. Word to the wise: if you are a woman looking for a job in a STEMM area (science, technololgy, engineering, mathematics, medicine) in the UK, you should contact the Equality Officer or HR Dept of whatever organistation you are applying to, and make sure you are aware of what types of programmes they have in place to help your career. Almost every university in the UK has got programmes in place (ask the HR Dept about Athena SWAN) so it's your responsibility to make sure you benefit from them.

Hope this helps :)

You have my total sympathy. I hear women say things like this all the time, and the solution is always the same: if the man in your life can't support your life choices, then you have to seriously question how he values your role as a woman. As others have put it:

Wouldn't Dr Satchi-Blanc be the best solution?

It may seem that you are failing at everything, but the truth is that the system is failing you. If you think about it, the university system was developed by men for men, and fails to support women especially through the difficult years of motherhood.

My advice is to contact your Equalities Officer and see what s/he can advise you about the ways in which your university is obliged to support women. For example, lots of universities have grants for women e.g. are lots of grants for women in education that you can try for e.g. http://www.imd.org/programs/mba/fees/Funding-for-Women.cfm Find out what is on offer and insist that your univiersity respects you as a woman by honoring their obligation to make sure women don't fail in postgraduate education.

Hope this helps :)

Most psychology students are women and the good news is that there are lots of good opportunities for people with psychology qualifications. But in fact you don't even need to be a graduate to get some really well-paid work helping people. A prime example is this post as an equalities officer which pays £30,000 per year pro-rata https://atsv7.wcn.co.uk/search_engine/jobs.cgi?owner=5062976&ownertype=fair&jcode=1388074&vt_template=1434&adminview=1 So if you are passionate about people's human right to access career advancement programmes for women in the academic sciences, then this is the kind of job you would really enjoy.

Hope this helps :)

Hi Elethu. I'm really sorry to hear about the horribly unfair way you have been treated. However all is not lost because there are lots of grants for women in education that you can try for e.g. http://www.imd.org/programs/mba/fees/Funding-for-Women.cfm The main problem you might experience is that you normally get the grants before starting. However your circustance are special, and you should explain them so that they are fully understood by the funding body.

If you don't have luck with this or other grants, then I suggest that you contact the absolutely wonderful Cherie Blair Foundation http://www.cherieblairfoundation.org/ which is about empowering women in business. They provide all kinds of grants to women and I'm sure will be very sympathetic to the gender aspects of your problem.

Hope this helps :)

A very good idea is to find out what kind of grants for women are available at the institutions you want to go to. In the UK we have various grants for women (e.g. a close friend of mine got a Foundation Awards scholarship of £6K per year for women at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine), but each institution has different awards. Best thing to do is contact the Equality Officer at the institution and find out.

We have all heard absolute horror stories of supervisors who are a total let-down. I heard of someone in Canada a few years ago whose supervisor went abroad for the duration of her MSc and wouldn't even answer any emails!! The university wasn't able to do anything concrete to help within the time frame of a 1-year MSC so the student paid for a private supervisor. As far as I can see, the problem here is not paying for supervision, but being let down by the official supervisor and university. The student justified this to the university pointing out that she was just seeking guidance and the 'private' supervisor wasn't writing her thesis or anything! She also asked for the university to pay but they refused. She moved on and did her PhD in the UK and dropped the payment issue.

These days there is more support available to women who have this sort of horrifying experience, and my advice is to contact your equality office and ask about signing up to workshops, networks, and mentorship schemes which are part of most institutions today (e.g. in the sciences Athena SWAN, WISE or project JUNO). Your institution will most likely have various mentoring schemes, but you need to ask your equality officer because different things are available at different institutions.

Congratulations!! I see that your study is in women's health, so there is a strong chance that you can access various kinds of support from equality schemes. In the UK we have various appropriate schemes for women (e.g. Athena SWAN and WISE) and I know that Australia is similarly progressive, so you should have no problems at UoT Sydney. All you need to do is contact the equality officers there and they should be able to direct you to various equality schemes which will support you through your degree and career. Well done you!! :)

Sadly, jobs in the sciences by tradition expect people to be workaholics without any respect for work-life balance. This tradition needs to change, but this won't happen overnight. In the meantime, the best advice is to take a break from it all and come back to it later.

:)

Hi IntotheSpiral. It's good to hear that you have heard about Athena SWAN and I sincerely hope your institution is benefitting from being Athena SWAN active. It sounds like you haven't been keeping up with all the developments though. One of the key developments is that the NIHR will soon only be funding institutions with an Athena SWAN silver award: "The NIHR has stated that for future competitions to designate and fund NIHR Biomedical Research Units, Biomedical Research Centres, and Patient Safety Translational Research Centres, it does not expect to short-list any NHS/University partnership where the academic partner (often the Medical School/Faculty of Medicine) has not achieved at least the Silver Award of the Athena SWAN Charter for Women in Science" http://www.ris.port.ac.uk/athenaswan/nihr-statement-on-funding-links-to-athena-swan-silver-status/

This is just the beginning: the other four major funding bodies are going to do either exactly the same in all science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine areas (i.e. require an Athena SWAN silver) or do something very similar e.g. require compliance with JUNO or WISE standards. To be honest, I don't know why it has taken SO long for proper equality standards to put in place in Britain, and most decent people will agree with me on this. One way or the other, institutions that insist on acting like gender dinosaurs are soon going to be about as active as dinosaurs ;)