An incredibly hard, but good, problem to have

Multiple PhD admissions offers!! MULTIPLE!!!

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t expect multiple offers. I’m human, after all. Of course, I’d hope to get multiple offers! What I didn’t expect was how difficult it would feel to have multiple offers. How does one even begin to make a choice? Especially when the Pro/Con lists keep balancing themselves out?

My answer: get as much information as possible.

I’m reaching out to current and former students of my prospective programs and faculty advisors. I’m booking flights and hotels for Visit Days. I’m looking at Apartments.com and Zillow, weighing renting vs buying (a story for another time). I’m poring over program websites and Reddit posts and talking everyone’s ears off about my dilemmas.

I’m doing everything I can possibly do to get as many data points as I could because this decision will dictate the next 5 (potentially 6) years of my and my husband’s lives. This is an incredibly big investment of time, effort, and lost income, and I want to get it right.

And oh boy is getting it right so hard when this process is deeply personal and incredibly subjective.

Because what if the perfect professor that everyone loves, you actually cannot stand? What if you thought you could handle your new dreary/snowy days, but then it sends you to a seasonal affective disorder-induced spiral?

Or, worse of all, what if you regret choosing X over Y?

So, yeah, catch me at the Visit Days with a notebook full of questions, a bunch of extra meetings, and four layers of clothing. And maybe—hopefully—a month from now, my next post will be up with my answer to this very hard, and very good, problem I have.