I am so stressed out about my husband finishing his PhD

[Anonymous]

It's scary not knowing where he will get a job offer. It could be anywhere. He's in the last semester now and he's getting out of state interviews. His field is statistics. I work from home in market research. I feel like I'm too stressed. Is this normal? I've got to expose this to someone... I don't want to let my husband know how I am feeling. We also have a 1 year old.

[Anonymous]

As a wife, you have as much right to a say as to where you live as your DH. You absolutely should make him aware of any issues you would have with relocating, especially if it affects your job. The two of you should talk this out and come up with a plan that you both agree to. If you can't talk about life decisions with your DH, you should get counseling.

[Anonymous]

The federal government is a great place to look for statistician, math, data science careers. Obviously most people want to go into academia because of the work environment and the job security if you get tenure, but that is a hard road to go down especially with a family.

[Anonymous]

Check out the forums on Chronicle of Higher Ed. Lots of trailing spouse / two-body-problem discussions there.

[Anonymous]

I hear you. I was there three years ago, and it all turned out fine. Our family is living in a town I never would have thought of before, and we love it for the most part.

One of the most important things we did was to sit down at the beginning of his job search, and talk about "deal breaker" areas. Together, we decided that he wouldn't consider any schools in Texas or Alaska, that we needed to be within a 1.5-hour drive of a major metropolitan area, and that there had to be job opportunities for me. When he got offers from three colleges/universities, we made the decision together about where we would go.

Tl;dr: it's important to have an open conversation between spouse and (future ) professor.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The[b] federal government [i]is a great place to look for statistician, math, data science careers. Obviously most people want to go into academia because of the work environment and the job security if you get tenure, but that is a hard road to go down especially with a family.

Umm, hiring freeze at Fed.

[Anonymous]

I know lots of biostatisticians. My understanding is that are three job openings for each candidate. So, stop worrying?

[Anonymous]

I understand - it is stressful, especially if you don't like change and you may not know until pretty close to graduation if/where they will be employed.

My requirement was living in/right by a major city, and not in the South. We've moved twice for partner's academic job; second city has been much better for employment opportunities for me.

[Anonymous]

If he is applying for academic jobs, you need to understand that academic jobs are a NATIONAL market, meaning that you have to be ready to move where the job is. If he gets an offer at Begonia State, that might be the only one he gets, and it's that or nothing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If he is applying for academic jobs, you need to understand that academic jobs are a NATIONAL market, meaning that you have to be ready to move where the job is. If he gets an offer at Begonia State, that might be the only one he gets, and it's that or nothing.

Um yes I understand this and that's why it's scary.

[Anonymous]

OP, my a few years back my DH got a temporary job in DC. Well first, it was held up for a while, so I was on permanent limbo for over a year. Then it happened and happened so fast I had to find us a place to live and we moved all in three weeks; staying in Oakwood apartments until our rental period started. I had to pull the kids out of elementary and my oldest was in hysterics.

We were fine! You will be fine! Your baby will be fine! I'm an anxious person and the best piece of advice was something I heard while flipping through radio channels:

The difference between Panic and Peace is a Plan.

So here is part of your plan: When you find out where, or have a choice of two or more places, come back to DCUM and ask if anyone has lived in Begonia, ST, USA. And you will get tons of helpful advice about Begonia living.

Here is another part of a plan: When I found out we were moving, I got an old-fashioned paper map and stared at Northern Virginia and DC and part of Maryland, and I had no clue where to live. I marked all the Whole Foods because I frequent Whole Foods, and decided I wanted to live near "a friendly face"--which means, something familiar. That really helped! So pick your store or thing you frequent, and work out your neighborhood from there.

[Anonymous]

BIG DATA IS HUGE. He will be fine and making bank soon.

[Anonymous]

I am sure he is 10x more stressed than you. Do you have any concerns for him?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The[b] federal government [i]is a great place to look for statistician, math, data science careers. Obviously most people want to go into academia because of the work environment and the job security if you get tenure, but that is a hard road to go down especially with a family.

Umm, hiring freeze at Fed.

Right now yes, but it won't be permanent. By the time OP's husband graduates, things could be totally different. For the most part, Feds are just starting to get into the "big data" jobs. Also, state agencies are looking for math types too, especially insurance departments that need to audit insurance companies and make sure their rates are correct.

[Anonymous]

I am pretty sure you posted about this before.

First, there are plenty of jobs for statisticians. There are very few academic jobs.

That means he will find a job, but probably not an academic job.

If you are the the DC area and want to stay here, I am not sure. I do not know what will happen to the market as Trump's/Bannon's policies come into play. But, the big data/data science/data analytics field (whatever they are calling it) is hot right now, and is nothing more than applied statistics.