Published online 31 January 2007
Postdoc journal
Happily ever after?
Maria Ocampo-Hafalla
Maria Ocampo-Hafalla is a research fellow at Cancer Research UK's London Research Institute.
Choosing a mentor can be excruciating.
He was a smart and successful scientist whose profile I had read on the Internet. We exchanged a few e-mails, and before I knew it, I was on a plane to meet him. I was so nervous I could hardly sleep. I saw where he worked, met his colleagues and was interviewed by his friends. After I flew home, I waited anxiously until he contacted me again.
Then we decided to move forward. Within weeks of finishing my doctorate, I left my family, my friends and my home in the United States to join him in London. I have been with him for one year now, for better or for worse, in good times and in bad... And he's not even my husband.
Choosing a postdoctoral mentor is like deciding on a life partner. You consider your similarities and differences, you decide what you bring to and want from the relationship, and you plan a future together. I changed my field from DNA repair to chromosome segregation, my model organism from mouse to yeast, and my country of residence from the United States to the United Kingdom.
After all, every good relationship entails hard work and sacrifice, as my husband (the real one) and I experienced when we both had to find postdocs in London. But how do you cope when it feels like the honeymoon is ending? One year into my postdoc, I am still striving for happily ever after.
Postdoc Journal Keepers 2007
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Moira SheehanMoira Sheehan is a postdoc in plant breeding and genetics at Cornell University.
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Peter JordanPeter Jordan is a visiting fellow at the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases in Bethesda, Maryland.
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Maria Ocampo-HafallaMaria Thelma Ocampo-Hafalla is a research fellow at Cancer Research UK's London Research Institute.
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Chris RowanChris Rowan is a postdoctoral student in the geology department at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa.
