Dr. Abigail Leigh Phillips

Author: Abigail Phillips

  • The Traveling Academic: Maintaining (a Reasonable Amount of) Sanity

    The Traveling Academic: Maintaining (a Reasonable Amount of) Sanity

    Recently, I listened to a new episode of one of my favorite podcasts, The Hilarious World of Depression, during which the host and Jeremy Pelletier, a non-profit director and geographer, talked about the impact of travel on mental health, particularly Jeremy’s. After having a major panic attack in an airport a few weeks earlier, it was so wonderful to hear that I’m not alone in my travel panic and anxiety. I know I’m not alone. I’ve been a mental health advocate for several years now. “You are not alone” is my mantra, but in the moment (several hours) at that airport it REALLY felt like I was very much alone.

    Art Institute in Chicago.
    Photo Credit: who took this photo of me??

    While listening to the episode , I began to recognize many of my own anxieties, obsessions, and paranoid tendencies towards travel. I recognized how little importance I’ve placed on my mental health. I travel quite a bit for both work and personal random excursions. I’ve always loved to travel and explore. As a kid dreaming of roaming around the world. It may be partially why I majored in anthropology in undergrad…. (did not work out. Apparently, I’m not as cool as Ruth Benedict.). But I suffer from major depression, generalized anxiety disorder, social anxiety, and panic disorder and have for many years. Why I didn’t connect the anxiety of travel with my mental health struggles, I’ll never know.

    I didn’t notice a change in my mental health and traveling until slightly after I moved to Utah in 2016. During my postdoctoral fellowship there, I attended (flew) to a lot of conferences. I was also had a partner in Florida and all my family back in Georgia. Requiring lots of holiday travel which I’ve never needed to do before. I made the mistake of flying several red eyes (New experience. Never again.) to Florida. Red eye flights mentally and physically knock me out for days. Personally, it’s not worth it.

    During one flight to Florida from Utah for Thanksgiving, I had my first panic attack mid-flight. I had a window seat (where I sit has now become very important) and suddenly wanted TO GET OFF THE PLANE. IMMEDIATELY. NOW. Of course, the plane was in the air which posed a few problems. I felt an overwhelming sense of fear, claustrophobia, racing heart rate, confusion, and dizziness. Somehow I calmed myself down (or cried and calmed down or mentally shut down.) My memory is always a little fuzzy after these experiences. Either way I did eventually get off the plane.

    The worst (to date) has been when I went to three cross-country conferences back-to-back-to-back: Philadelphia, Chicago, and Stanford. Why would any relatively intelligent person do this to themselves knowing ONE conference is draining enough? Still haven’t figured it out. I wasn’t pressured. I asked to go. Dedication? Stubbornness? Odd belief in myself? Bad ideas, eh?

    By the time it was time to finally fly out of the San Francisco airport, I essentially crawled onto the plane, physically sick, and agonizing every moment I wasn’t home yet. Again, in my brain, I begged to GET OFF THIS PLANE once we were in the air. It took a several days for me to recover once I got back to Utah. I could barely function. The combination of extreme panic, stress, anxiety, and depression overwhelmed my brain and body. Small tasks were impossible. Hopefully, that will remain the worst.

    My travel anxiety begins the minute I book a flight. I stress over everything – getting a hotel, figuring out my schedule if it’s for a conference, wondering irrationally how I will get from the airport to my hotel or AirBnB (what I can’t find a Lyft?!?!?). There are a few tricks/tips that do (most of time) help me.

    • TSA Pre-Check – lasts for 5 years and relatively expensive ($85) for the relief it brings my getting to the airport anxiety.
    • AISLE SEAT – I need that seat. I will not change seats with you, fair warning. Some illusion of freedom is what I need.
    • Early morning flights – less people and we’re all usually half asleep anyway. Nice and quiet.
    • Klonopin – Just saying. Psychiatrist prescribed.
    • My worry stone and my “I am enough” ring- my former therapist in Utah taught me a lot about how something physical or doing something tactile can help (e.g. tapping side of your leg softly, practicing four square/box breathing). Small things do wonders for me.
    • Making a special playlist and downloading several episodes of podcasts.
    • Delta Sky Club if I have a long layover – Honestly, you’ll spend the same amount of money in the airport, but in the Sky Club you have quiet. And cookies. And all the outlets. And fewer children.
    • Making up stories about people on the plane. Flying brings out surprisingly unique habits and actions in people (me very much included).
    Me & Snowpocalypse in Philly.
    Photo credit: Julia Skinner.

    Sometimes these don’t work, and I end up in a random corner of LAX crying. But THAT’S OKAY. I’m not okay but that’s also okay. In that moment, I’m doing all I can. I can’t let my brain mishaps keep me from doing the traveling I love. I live with mental illness and probably always will. That’s the reality I know. But I’ve made it this far. Can’t stop me now.

    Readings of Interest:

    We Need to Talk About Mental Health and Travel
    National Alliance on Mental Illness: Tips to Stay Mentally Healthy While Traveling
    5 People Reveal What It’s Like To Travel With A Mental Illness

  • When the narrator becomes confused because change is necessary yet intensely hard.

    I recently moved from Logan, Utah to Milwaukee for a faculty position at the University of Wisconsin (wait for it) Milwaukee. The nature of academia means you move where the job takes you. I’m pleased that it took me to a new part of the country and a new work environment with supportive and welcoming faculty and staff. The goal for many leaving a doctoral program or post doc (as I did) is a tenured track faculty position. A challenge to achieve that (honestly) I try to share with doc students or those considering entering a doctoral program. During your last year of a doc program or post doc, you apply, apply, apply, interview, interview, wait (for what seems like an excruciating amount of time), and maybe have an on-campus interview and (possibly) get something. There’s so many of us searching for these idealized tenure track positions while there are so few of actual positions to go around. I am where I am now for a number of reasons (hard work, mentorship, networking, a great post doc). Some that I may not even know about. I am happy where I am. But the transitional period from post doc to faculty and from Utah to Wisconsin has been much harder that I expected.

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  • My Winter of “No. You Really Can’t.”

    I’ve written in the past about my lifelong struggle with mental illness. Since I posted Parts One and Two last July about my panic attack during this past ALA Annual, I suffered two major bouts of depression – one that I’m still in the process of working through. Writing about these experiences reminds me that while I have really bad lows, I usually manage to crawl my way out of them through medication, therapy, exercise, and sharing.

    My current episode of depression began in mid-December when I realized, “Oh. I’ve majorly overextended myself.” I procrastinated, misjudged deadlines, made promises that I thought I could deliver on, and more. I’ve told myself over and over again to back off and slow down. Once this spring semester began, I knew I was in trouble but still thought maybe I could manage. It would be some sort of point for bragging on social media among academics that I see all the time, right? “I’m so busy. I have so much work to do. I’m so committed to my profession.” and on and on.

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  • Guest Blogging: Connecting Research to Practice and Practice to Research: A Brief (Fun!) Introduction, by Abigail Phillips

    Guest Blogging: Connecting Research to Practice and Practice to Research: A Brief (Fun!) Introduction, by Abigail Phillips

    Recently, I’ve been having fun writing for practitioner-focused blogs about topics. It always a challenge to learn to move from academic-speak to librarian-speak and back and forth. Here’s my guest post for Letters to a Young Librarian. You can find the original post here.

    Back when I was in library school, I had few expectations concerning what I would learn or how it would apply to my previous experience work in libraries. (I didn’t plan on beginning this post the way it happened, but here we are.) I started my MLIS program in what was then the School of Library and Information Studies at Florida State University with the goal of becoming a librarian, learning whatever I needed to learn to become that librarian. I wish I could say that I had an interest in LIS scholarship beyond what an instructor required me to read as part of a course. But I didn’t. That’s why I think it’s a bit funny that I ended up with a PhD in Information Studies.

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