June 2026: A Mixed Bag & Legal Dispute

Life Update

GRIEF

• No update here, so I'll repeat last month's update (again): This continues to be the centerpiece of my life. It is my immediate feeling when I wake up, as I go about my day, and as I drift off to sleep. It permeates everything. I think it may be getting worse as reality sinks in. A true living nightmare.
  
  
• June was the seventh full month without my dad. June also contained Father's Day. There are always tears, esp for those milestone holidays and when thinking about my defense and how he isn't here to celebrate. I'm SO LUCKY I have so many people around me wanting to celebrate my accomplishments, but my heart just feels sadness about the one key missing person not able to be there.
  
  
• During every weekly phone call with my Mom and sister, I bring him up. Sometimes I just need to say his name and for other people to tell me they miss him just as much as I do. I just want him involved in the conversation as usual, I guess. Even though I'm atheist/agnostic, in case he is somehow able to listen, I need him to know he is still a part of our lives and thoughts. 
  
  He'd normally be interrupting and dominating the conversation. It's a bit boring and quiet and rote without him, and I miss his boisterous, sometimes obnoxious energy so much. It's just all so hard.
  
  
• I finished the group grief counseling course in May, but the lessons I learned persist. There was a guy in the group who was grieving the loss of his job. That has become pertinent to my life, as I was let go from my 18 year job in June, my landlord is planning to put my flat of 12 years up for sale, and my Mom will be selling the house I grew up in from age six and have visited almost every year since leaving at 18 (so 30 years of month+ long visits plus 12 years of living there full time). All of this change is incredibly, horribly painful. 

 

PhD & WORK 

• My PhD defense is done. I passed with revisions to my written thesis to do. It took them a whole month to provide the list of amendments they expect, so now I have three months to do them. The problem is that I'm going to be in the US starting Sept 1. So I really have less than two months in all actuality. I will NOT be doing work in the US. Plus the Uni is going to end my access to well, everything, including office365, after my contracts end on 31 August. 
  
  
• My grief peaked while prepping for the defense. The amount of digging inside of myself to make myself get out of bed/start studying while I was bawling...oh man. I scraped to the very bottom of myself to do that. I've just been so empty except for the sadness. I feel no joy at being done. This is a problem because so many other people that got me through it are happy for me and wanting to mark the event, but I can't bring myself to enjoy it, or even fake it. This past weekend, a friend held a 'Christmas in July/Fourth of July/birthday/PhD defense' party that was partly in my honor, and I kept feeling myself shrink and the sadness creep in. Part of that was the drinking I'm sure. I cannot drink when I have strong negative feelings inside - they just take over completely. 
  
  
• There is a bigger summary of the defense in my last monthly update - I wrote the May update after the defense was already done.
   
• Pertinent: right after my defense, my boss said she had gotten a notice that my contract was expiring soon and we would need to talk. My 18-year job was at risk. My other contract with my employer lasts until end August, but then it looks like I have nothing on the horizon.
  
  
• So yes. The job saga. After my defense in the first week of June, I followed up with my department head, who was looking into ways to keep me around, and that his understanding was that my 18 year contract was going to be renewed but my secondary post doc contract was ending on 31 August. I was overjoyed at this news! That is exactly what I wanted. He said that he had a meeting scheduled the next day with the HR people and he'd confirm. 
  
  He had just had surgery so I was being respectful of his time but a week passed with no update, so I followed up. He then said HR said that there was zero way for me to keep my job. He and my boss met with me and said that HR "can't" renew, but were very unfamiliar with the details as to why, since 
  
  1. the funding is guaranteed as continuing, 
  2. the need for my work is continuing, and 
  3. my boss, the funders, and the School want me to stay and keep doing the good work I've been doing. 
  
  The last week of June, my boss kept saying everything would be fine, they'd figure something out - until she had a meeting with one of the Deans to run some final ideas by them. 
  
  They turned every. single. option. down. I am not allowed to work on a short contract or go casual or even subcontract for the Uni. Why? Well, your guess is as good as mine. 
  
  HR keeps saying I'm a 'liability' and a 'risk' and "if the funders want her so badly, THEY can hire her" and they think that my 18 years of knowledge that I've built up as a researcher and project manager for my research programme while working for the Uni is "pure admin" that "anyone else will be able to pick up quickly" so therefore it shouldn't be a problem to get rid of me. They have run my boss around in circles and never give clear answers, apparently. 
  
  And throughout the ENTIRE process, HR have never once asked to meet with me, told me that my job was ending, nothing. It's been crickets, and my supervisor and HoS have said to let them handle it, so I haven't reached out to them directly.
  
  It is purely a University policy thing preventing me from continuing. I therefore want the EXACT policy and law they are basing their decision on, but they have never provided it. So as any good US American would do, I turned to the legal system. I have a union rep now and they are handling it. She is great. She first set up a meeting with HR so we can ask questions and hopefully get real answers. That is all I wanted! 
  
  HR then, on the last day of my contract, responded that they couldn't meet with me and the union rep until a few days later when they KNEW that my rep had union activities happening - she had sent out a Uni-wide blast about it. Apparently this is a routine stalling tactic to run out the clock on my contract and make life harder for me and the union. So my union rep recommended escalating and I acquiesced. I don't know how many details I'm allowed to go into here but essentially now lawyers are involved and I'm working 'as usual' in protest of the issues with my contract ending illegally (allegedly). 
  
  My boss keeps assigning me work, meeting me, etc. like normal. I dunno. But I guess I'm doing the work for free now? 
  
  I'm also lucky that my boss has a few other options up her sleeve. She approached someone at my project's partner organisation to see if they would hire me instead. It would require a 1/3 paycut and a doubling of the overheads that the funders will have to pay, but would at least give me minimal employment to keep me on the project and in the country. Luckily, I have cultivated a lot of relationships through the years and the person in charge of pulling together a case to hire me is one of my best friends in NZ. I feel so fortunate that so many people are trying to keep me in the mix. Honestly, it makes me cry.
  
  I'm not holding my breath for either the union rep to get results nor the hiring at the other organisation to come through, but I appreciate all the work people are doing, and at the VERY LEAST, after 18 years, I feel that Uni HR owes me some answers. I'm hoping that the union rep can at least get me that.
   

HEALTH & LIVING

• With my 18 year job fiasco, no matter what happens, I'm down 3/10's of my salary in July and August. I put out a flatmate ad and after a few interview disasters, finally found someone I think I can run into in the kitchen and not hate life. She is not ideal - she is very young, just here to learn English (so no job), and is only here until November - but the income helps massively with the financial stress and my gut says she's gonna be fine in the short-term. I still check references, but at this point I just listen to my gut when it comes to who I choose to live with!  
  
  
• I have not been going to the gym. I'm just down in the dumps, never feel like going. It is the task switching aspect of it for me, plus wanting/needing to get certain bits of work done, plus the amount of time in my day it takes up. I wish I could get focused on my physical health again, but my grief just has taken over my life completely. Even going for a walk feels like too much.
  
  
• I still haven't followed up fully on my urgent care visit where they found blood in my urine during an acute gut pain attack (left side so not appendix!). I took another test and this time no blood but they found white blood cells. I'm supposed to go see the doc but the last time I saw her she told me my symptoms were in my head so I'm looking for a new doctor. 
  
  
• I've still been able to avoid most junk food and am eating less - mostly when I'm hungry. This turns out to be about mid-afternoon and half way through the evening, or about twice a day. I'm focusing on protein and whole foods, but dark chocolate (with fruit), cheddar cheese, and sandwich meat sneaks in there quite a bit. 
  
  
• I'm trying to get my supplements sorted. I still take fish oil, probiotics, some fibre, multivitamin, and B12. I still need to add back iron, magnesium, and get more fiber in there, but those all can cause gut issues. I ran out of Vit D and K and biosil drops.
  
  
• I did research and found a physio I want to try out, but when I went to make an appointment, I got a notice saying they are not taking new clients! Now I need to do more research. GRRR.
  
  
• I also want to go to the dermatologist and get a ferritin infusion since I stopped taking the iron pills. I set up my free optometry check up through work since I get that perk as a staff member until my current contract ends. Lots to do!

 

TRAVEL & FUN 

• June was mostly me trying to recover emotionally and mentally from my defense, plus navigate the job stuff. My friend did take me out for brunch at a new place and for a little walk around a nice park, and I visited that same friend at her new place about a half an hour away. 
  
  
• I still have a weekly 'date' with some friends to catch up and watch a tv show. Those resumed. I introduced my friends to K Pop Demon Hunters and their reactions were exactly as I'd hoped!
  
  
• My feelings about travel right now are just a repeat of last month: I saved up for so much travel post-PhD! But post-my dad passing, I do not feel like being anywhere except my home, cozy in solitude and in my comfy bed, or with my family in the US. Nowhere else has any sort of appeal right now. I want familiarity and low energy activities. The travel I do is usually the exact opposite of those things, and I can't fathom spending tons of money just to lay in a strange bed, not seeing or experiencing the new sights and culture around me - I may as well just stay home in a controlled environment if I'm going to just want comfort.
  
  

FAMILY

• My sister found out there is something wrong with her blood counts last month. The docs referred her to a cancer clinic but their first opening isn't until August, so we have to wait until then to get answers. 
   

MONEY THOUGHTS & MOVES

• With the high rent, gym membership, and new private health insurance, my spending is way above normal. This was the last month of full time salary I'll have for the foreseeable future (the job market in NZ is abysmal).
   
• My 0.7 FTE income is only guaranteed through 31 August. That is not expected to renew. Right now, I have zero job or income prospects after that date.
  
  
• My usual car service, Mevo, went into receivership and I had $1500 NZD worth of credit with them that I bought with a US credit card. I complained to chatgpt and they said to write into the US consumer financial protections office. The bank the credit card is with investigated. In June they awarded that money back! It is sitting as credit on a card I canceled long ago so I have to write to them to get the money sent to me in a check form I guess.

MONTHLY CHALLENGES

• Previously my challenge was to get back on the healthy exercise train, but I keep failing. I have made some strides with eating less junk, though. But I give UP on the rest, I can't do it right now. I just try to get through the days as best I can.
  
  I have so much on in July and August that I don't expect this to change anytime soon. Maybe when I return from my US trip in mid October. Right now I am just doing the easiest self care possible (e.g. massages) and trying to get back in touch with my brain and body.