Life

Sometimes life gets in the way of pursuing research.

Over a year ago we students were to pose for a photo for the OUBS research students' web page. I should have been in that photo, but daughter collapsed at breakfast and we both went off to hospital in an ambulance. Loads of tests later, we got told that she had low blood pressure. However, she kept collapsing at taekwondo so went back to the doctor. Now she's got a diagnosis of hyperthyroidism.

I had thought that my interruptions would be through elderly relatives being ill, not my teenage daughter.

But we all have some such problem:

• a colleague has a wife with heart problems,
  
• another's mother has just recovered from dengue fever
  
• others struggle with their marriage
  

Others will have problems but just won't have mentioned them. It's not anything to do with doing a PhD that brings the problems, just life.