First Antarctic Field Season - Done! Also, All About My New Homeward Bound Journey
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All work is performed under NMFS Permit No. 23095 with the Biotelemetry and Behavioral Ecology Lab at UC Santa Cruz (and all images taken in accordance with that permit). Please do not share images without explicit permission.
This is obviously a little past due, but I have a few life updates that I really want to share as I have linked to this website on a few profiles and posts lately, and I want to make sure it’s up to date.
1) My first Antarctic field season is done. I am incredibly proud of everything our team was able to accomplish, and though it was emotionally challenging for a lot of us, we got through it and came out with some very useful and important data on whale health and behavior. The highlights for me were gaining several hours of flight time as a drone pilot over marine mammals (in often challenging conditions), preparing and presenting several educational lectures and workshops on my research, and meeting people from all over the world.
The BIG highlight was experiencing one of the most incredible ecosystems in the world. It was an incredibly humbling experience and I know I am very fortunate to be able to do what I do, and see what I see. I have an immense responsibility to use this opportunity for good for the planet, and I fully recognize that and accept it gladly.
What follows is something I wouldn’t call a lowlight – it was more of an immense learning opportunity. This was one of the hardest experiences of my life, and to put it in words requires quite a bit of vulnerability. I know when to set boundaries and what might be considered oversharing, but this does not fall under that category for me. I want to shed light on mental health awareness and show that its related illnesses manifest very differently for different people.
During what was supposed to be one of the happiest and most incredible experiences of my life, I moved through some of the most crippling anxiety and depression that I’ve ever had to navigate. That alone caused immense amounts of guilt; I didn’t see how anyone could understand why I was isolating or why my moods shifted, or why I was anything short of ecstatic to be doing my research on whales in the Antarctic. It still causes me sadness, but I know that more often than not, these issues are far out of our control.
These are things I’ve struggled with for a long time. I would of course hope that they don’t crop up for me with that intensity during another remote field season without my support system. I acknowledge that what I experienced was immensely difficult and that I disappointed many people when I wasn’t able to show up as my best self. I accept that. My job at that time was to survive and keep myself above water. I am stronger now and a better teammate, friend, and researcher because of that. And we still got the work done.
That was something I’d been wanting to say for a while. I am feeling inspired to work with someone in the future to create an immersive interpersonal skills workshop for teams deploying to atypical fieldwork situations to foster stronger communication and empathy. Our world needs it. Emotional intelligence and communication skills are, in my opinion, the most important skills you need to navigate this chaotic world with grace and humility.
2) Life update two: I’ve been accepted into and am joining Homeward Bound! This is a women’s leadership initiative with the goal of creating a global network of passionate, inspired women in STEMM who are working to create change for our planet. I am so excited. We’ve already had our first online meeting, which will continue bimonthly for the next year. The culmination of this program is a 3-week expedition to the Antarctic with fellow members of my cohort.
If you want to look at my spotlight feature on the Homeward Bound website, click here.
If you want to visit my Chuffed fundraising page to support me in this program (which is a large expense due to the overhead costs of this experience), I would be forever grateful. Find that here. Everything helps.
If you want to join my Homeward Bound-specific newsletter and follow my adventure in gaining leadership skills and helping fellow women to feel empowered, heard, and capable, sign up below!
3) And the third life update that I want to talk about more in an additional post – I just attended a really cool conference called the Global Ocean Science and Education Workshop, with a focus on Ocean Acoustics. It was held at the University of Rhode Island and featured a lot of incredible panelists. I was able to give a short presentation on my research during the student lightning round. This was my first presentation at a conference and I was pleased with how well it went!
Please recognize that all of our research is performed in accordance with our permit; drones are not permitted to be flown in the Antarctic per IAATO regulations.
Love from the east coast, where I’m spending the weekend with my friend Laura :) Stay tuned for more!
Loz
