I have been blessed to be accepted into a clinical psychology program. By all accounts, I should not have been accepted. Everything in my background was perfect, except my GREs, which were around 1100. I was accepted by my top choices.
However, as I have posted elsewhere on this board, I am in my early 30s and a lawyer making gobs of money. I am not proud of that either. Golden handcuffs. Making that money is painful. I feel every dollar. Ironically, I don't even work that hard anymore. I have pretty regular hours, but lots of stress, billing hours in 10 minute increments, and it is soooooooo boring, i can't even describe it. Law school was the first time I ever hated school. So, for those of you who are envious of your buddies going to law or MBA programs, just know that. I don't know many lawyers who like their jobs -some tolerate it, a few like it, but very few. They are generally DA's or public interest lawyers making in the 30s-40s or power-driven, drama freaks that are trial lawyers or introverted, unsociable, control freaks who make great transactional lawyers.
Anyway, I have seriously contemplated not going to a Ph.D. program this year. I have started making these deals with myself...you can just do this until you are 45 and then do something you want, no it won't be psychology, but something else. You can just live for your expensive vacations, the weekends, your child's nanny...just like your friends do. My friends go to France, Indonesia, Micronesia, all of these crazy places for weeks at a time, drive BMWs and Mercedes, have 500K houses at 30 years old, and they can live with their deal. Why can't I? Why? And everyone on this board compares everything to doctors. My immediate supervisor, a partner at large law firm in his early 50s, makes $1M a year. My other supervisor is in her early 40s and she makes around $550K or so. In general, if you go to a big law firm, you can make more than most doctors will ever see with only 3 years of grad school. But you have to be in it for the $ and I am clearly not going to make it.
This Money magazine article completely has thrown me for a loop. I know that I want to be a clinicical practioner primarily, but I want the research training because I believe it is important to the validity of my profession. However, I read everywhere that this degree is obsolete. Although my personal experience has always been that people will pay a therapist out of pocket where they won't pay a psychiatrist, I here so much negativity. But I have seen so much evidence to the contrary....Many of my lawyer friends, despite HIPAA's protections, don't want any type of record out there that they went to see a therapist. My Dad says liking his therapist is more important since his MD just gives him pills and spend 30 minutes every 4 months with him - he just wants her to be covered. I know a handful of therapists who are extremely successful that have NEVER been on any managed care panels. I know others that are all doom and gloom because they rely on managed care. So, I just don't know what to make of it.
It is like jumping off a cliff for me. I would be going backwards. The only way it is worth it if I could actually enjoy grad school, the internship, and the profession. If I can make remotely close to what I make now at any point, then that is enough. I have just went down the wrong path once, and I don't want to do it again. I guess its because this time, I have something to lose. When I went to law school, I was 21 and didn't have any other options. I am almost a partner at a law firm now and barely 30. I hate my job and have wanted to do this for 10 years, but maybe it is just too late.
