From clinical work to research.

Here is a thing that is not that weird in general, but is proving to be a weird experience for me. So two weeks ago I finished my year-long clinical internship at the VA and went back to UCLA to finish my dissertation. This has been quite a transition, going from full-time, 40 hours a week of doing therapy and assessment to fucking around with Matlab all day. People in the know have been asking me how it's going so far in that sympathetic but slightly amused tone of voice one reserves for gently inquiring after someone's hemorrhoidal issues.
I came into UCLA for the first time in mid-August and I just sat there and tried to figure out what to do. My first thought was that, just one week prior, my day would consist of going in and doing 1 or 2 sessions of group therapy, seeing an individual or two for therapy, writing up some notes, writing an assessment report, and then I would be totally and completely done with all work that I could possible do that day. Not only that, but people would notice that I had done this work and they would appreciate what I had done and I would be considered competent at my job. Now I come in, and I have no idea what I’m supposed to be doing. There is no one here who can tell me what I’m supposed to be doing. If I should, against all odds, happen upon something to do, there is not really any one who can judge if I am doing it well or doing it poorly (unless I meet with them for an hour and explain the thinking behind what I have done and what series of problems and stupid Matlab issues led me to this point, and even then it would take great strength of will on their part to give enough of a shit to even offer a vague opinion that what I have done makes sense and is fine. And believe me, nobody wants to have that meeting). But here is the kicker: irrespective of the competence with which I execute whatever thing I should happen to do on any given day, no one will really care if I did it or failed to do it. I will spend the next year of my life working on something that will have no positive or negative impact on anyone, whatsoever. It will be regarded as, at best, an inconvenience by everyone who comes in contact with it. As soon as it is done it will be forgotten about, forever. If you took the average societal impact of performance art pieces carried out by undergraduates in fulfillment of the requirements of their minor in Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies at third-tier liberal arts colleges, that average societal impact would vastly overshadow whatever impact my dissertation will have on the world.

On the plus side, I can no longer be sued for malpractice if I show up for work drunk.