Um.

[kaberett]

Can people, like, talk to me about the economics of doing a PhD part time? Because I think I need to at least consider doing this part-time rather than full-time at least temporarily (witness the last month, the majority of which I have spent asleep and incapable of sitting upright for more than about 5 minutes without noticeable impact on brain function), but I'm terrified because I have no idea which of ESA, Housing Benefit etc I'd be eligible for, and how much of my savings I'd go through before they arrived, and if they'd even make up enough of the shortfall.

Comments

[sebastienne]

if your institution is anything like mine, you might be able to do this without officially moving to part-time status, by postponing milestones.

(I don't know how they do things where you are; at my place, there's a 'transfer of status' after 3 terms which can be moved as late as 5 terms)

so informally - in terms of what your work plans are with your supervisor - you could be working at part-time levels, towards a further-away deadline; but it won't make any official changes to your enrollment, entitlements, etc.

(sorry this month has been tough.)

[sidheag]

Here, it isn't possible to change status to part time part way through a year - at least, according to my student who investigated doing so at one point. Though I did find this very surprising, and did not verify it; for her, the apparent need passed. Worth checking though, especially if you are just about on a year now.

[karen2205]

You can claim ESA now anyway - you're eligible as a full time student in receipt of DLA.

Off the top of my head I don't know what counts as income for the purposes of ESA/what sort of funding you've got the PhD.

The same is true of Housing Benefit - as a full time disabled student you are entitled to claim, though I'm not sure what counts as income.

I can look this stuff up when I'm at work and have the right book to hand.

The other thing to check will be the arrangements you've got with whoever's funding your PhD - often for part time students the award is fees only not fees + studentship.

[kaberett]

My award's from the university directly, I'm pretty sure it's fees+studentship if part-time, in that I've been told I have x amount of money spread across y time, and how I choose to use it is up to me, to large extent.

[shehasathree]

sorry on comment on your specific situation but ALL the empathy. <333

[tim]

Like sebastienne, I suggest negotiating that informally if at all possible. Your advisor sounds pretty understanding from what you've written, and it's likely to be way easier to work something out with her than with the government.

[sidheag]

Don't know whether you or sebastienne are currently in a university, but the reason this may need to be official is that universities are now under huge pressure to have PhD students finish inside four years - we lose funding for each one who doesn't. So informal part time is much less possible than it used to be.

[davidgillon]

Might be worth putting out a request for advice via @PHDisabled on Twitter, that's picked up a whole bunch of followers in the process of doing a PhD while managing disability, so hopefully at least some of them have run into the same issues. There's also a bunch of blog pieces by their contributors at http://phdisabled.wordpress.com/ though I don't know if any are directly relevant.

Having BTDT with the bendiness, sitting and a job if not the PhD, I'll have a think about whether I had any good coping strategies that would help, but nothing's springing immediately to mind - sneaking off to the disabled loos for a rest was about as close as I got to a viable strategy while working for evil ex-employers inc. Actually something does spring to mind that I probably didn't do enough of - I took a camping mattress into the office and used it for rests from sitting at lunchtime, that would potentially be easier to scatter through the day with a PhD environment than the software environment I was in (I tended to push it until I ended up curled-up on the floor in the foetal position, unable to think straight, which didn't impress management). On the same principle @Spoonydoc got a sofa provided to allow her to lie flat while she was doing her PhD - though easier to work that way for a mathematician than for most, can't recall if it was via DSA or ATW, but she's very approachable. Might also be worth following @Bendygirl as she's mentioned this weekend that she's going through similar issues WRT her bendiness and managing a job (already part-time/work from home) with an unstable c-spine.

David from Worldcon.

[kaberett]

Thanks for the pointers!

[davidgillon]

Further thought: one thing my physio had me doing in order to try to get me able to sit longer was alternating between two radically different chairs so I was using different sets of muscles. I ended up with an individually fitted office chair (at one time we had this on a bar-stool height base for lab work) that was technically designed to be individually customised for people with ortho issues, but it stopped short of being fitted with specialist ortho stuff like lateral supports, and a Balans kneeling stool. IIRC she wanted me switching between them every 20 minutes and doing stretches as I did so - though she admitted during our more recent sessions it's actually totally pointless having me do stretches as my ROM is so large.

[(Anonymous)]

Years and years late and may not be seen, but is part of the record. I find that there is still a need to stretch but a different range of motion, so some of the traditional stretches don't work and I might need more tools or a person to avoid injuries elsewhere. I've also found it's the same with strengthening, using my own body as resistance is a bad idea, mostly that means either pilates reformer or a physio providing the resistance.