Post: #1

Ok. Serious question here about what do with my life and how to plan for it.

I'm a Data Analyst with a B.Sc in Math, M.Sc in Statistics, Thesis had to do with Ensemble Kalman Filters, otherwise generic course selection. (Theory, Experimental Design, Regression, Bayesian Statistics, Spatial Stats) M.Sc is finally finished.

Married to a wife I'm no longer attracted to. 3 Kids under the age of 6. 1 Minivan. Rent a generous sized (2200 sq ft) place from my parents.

I'm at a point now where I need to consider the direction of my career and life. I'm 30. I make $58k/year in a low COL (for Canada anyway) area as a Data Analyst (staff side) for a University.

Working deeper into the city necessitates a pay increase to something like $90k to cover the cost of a second vehicle, 3h/day commute, and taxes. OR, it pays for the outrageous increases in price of food & rent while living within short distance to the work deeper in the city.

That kind of salary leap from what I understand is not easy.

So. I've got some options of where my career can go:

1.) My line of work is turning into a Business Intelligence Analyst. Not sure how to make the leap to being a "Data Scientist" - pay apparently is good for that line of work.

2.) Helping the above would be getting my position rewritten as a BI Analyst instead of a generic Analyst. Might be able to get a small pay bump for that.

3.) Do some sessional (or adjunct) teaching work in 1st Year stats. Look for a job at a small college as Faculty. Wouldn't mind this - possibly better pay & Benefits and being closer to prime hunting land.

4.) Work with some physics profs (friends of mine) at the institution who want to pick my brain and publish papers with me. Leverage this into ?????

5.) Take some physics courses/read up on electro magnetism. Invent something interesting. (long shot.)

5.) Start consulting - helping other Academics at the Institution get their stats straight. Have made $3500 so far this year doing that already.

6.) Use the data I sit on to publish papers about student outcomes and educational statistics. Could lead to more consulting or a faculty job at a small time college combined with #3. Not sure how else this could be leveraged.

7.) Learn French and use some combination of the above to work for Statistics Canada, Department National Defense, Finance Ministry or something like that. For the DND I've seen Operations Research Analyst positions have a minimum starting pay of $110k.

8.) Sell out and work for Big Pharma.

9.) Use my stats/BI experience work for a hospital.

10.) Some other Stats job, maybe with the Defense Industry. (Personal interest.)

11.) Write Actuarial exams become an Actuary. Pays well but jobs are scarce in Canada. Market is flooded with qualified applicants.

Thoughts? Advice? I'm scattered all over the place.

Life wise, due to 3 kids and possible temporary nature of my wife being "not attractive"... I'm wanting to maximize my income and independence. I want to be able to afford to have a divorce, once you're 3+ kids it's pretty expensive.

*Wife is on psych drugs that kill her sex drive, ability to maintain the house and make food I like. Pretty lethal combination in the worst possible way. She's nice. Kind with the kids. But I really want a new wife unless something changes. It might, she may only have to be on the drug for another year. Long time to wait, but I do care for my kids and want to be responsible.

Post: #2

The stats consulting option is the only one where you are your own boss.

Post: #3

>I'm wanting to maximize my income and independence. I want to be able to afford to have a divorce, once you're 3+ kids it's pretty expensive.

If you maximize your income just before divorcing her then you've maximized her alimony. Divorce now, while your income is low.

Post: #4

It's not cheating when you aren't getting any at home. Try having a few girls on rotation, you're free in the weekends right? This might help you get excited about life again. At least for me it did.

Careerwise, it seems like you have quite a lot of options. Have you ever thought of working in the Finance field? With your degrees and experience you could get into the quantitative analysis world, you'd make a killing. Remember however, money ain't everything.

Post: #5

Quote:It's not cheating when you aren't getting any at home. Try having a few girls on rotation, you're free in the weekends right? This might help you get excited about life again. At least for me it did.

Wtf is this advice...it IS cheating whether you're getting some or not. Especially since it sounds like she's a faithful partner but just can't hold her own because of the drugs..you cheating at this stage, with three young kids and a loyal wife, would be more or less reprehensible in my opinion.

Maybe suggest the idea of having an open relationship. Or just divorce her while your income is relatively low.


How much programming do you know? Math skills + computer science skills can go a long way in many industries.

BI intelligence analyst is alright but, like actuaries in Canada, there are too many of them out there which drives down salary. Don't go down these routes. If you're going to stay in academia, get a stats Ph.D man.

Leverage your advanced stats background and improve your programming skills to land a 'Data Scientist' role. Learn the NumPy and SciPy libraries in Python, get familiar with R, start working on data analysis projects on your own...kaggle.com is a fun competition-driven way to improve yourself and learn from others. Quandl.com has data sets of all sorts.

Data scientists that actually know their shit are very well compensated and highly sought in many prime locations. Some of the more legit positions (like working at Facebook, Linkedin, etc) will probably require a Ph.D. I would recommend this route since it seems like you have the smarts to handle the learning.

Post: #6

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Maybe suggest the idea of having an open relationship. Or just divorce her while your income is relatively low.


yes ,open relation proposal will make her really happpy

Post: #7

(01-07-2014 02:13 PM)thisisastage Wrote:  

Quote:It's not cheating when you aren't getting any at home. Try having a few girls on rotation, you're free in the weekends right? This might help you get excited about life again. At least for me it did.

Wtf is this advice...it IS cheating whether you're getting some or not. Especially since it sounds like she's a faithful partner but just can't hold her own because of the drugs..you cheating at this stage, with three young kids and a loyal wife, would be more or less reprehensible in my opinion.

Maybe suggest the idea of having an open relationship. Or just divorce her while your income is relatively low.


How much programming do you know? Math skills + computer science skills can go a long way in many industries.

BI intelligence analyst is alright but, like actuaries in Canada, there are too many of them out there which drives down salary. Don't go down these routes. If you're going to stay in academia, get a stats Ph.D man.

Leverage your advanced stats background and improve your programming skills to land a 'Data Scientist' role. Learn the NumPy and SciPy libraries in Python, get familiar with R, start working on data analysis projects on your own...kaggle.com is a fun competition-driven way to improve yourself and learn from others. Quandl.com has data sets of all sorts.

Data scientists that actually know their shit are very well compensated and highly sought in many prime locations. Some of the more legit positions (like working at Facebook, Linkedin, etc) will probably require a Ph.D. I would recommend this route since it seems like you have the smarts to handle the learning.

Nothing reprehensible about cheating if she doesn't find out.

If anything it'll improve their relationship since he'll be happy. Best for the kids that the parents stick together. In that case it'll be good to get some on the side discreetly....

Post: #8

Amen to that. If nobody knows it didn't happen. Think long term. A divorce will bring her down deeper into whatever she's dealing with right now, it'll crush her. In the end, it's your decision... JMO

Post: #9

Okay that makes better sense to me now. Well all I'll say is, if you're gonna cheat, do it WISELY!

Post: #10

Tytalus, regardless of any career moves, your #1 priority should be getting your wife off the psych drugs. You do not want the mother of your children to be a psych drug zombie, especially if she is a decent woman. Whether or not you will stay with your wife, you need to get her off the psych drug treadmill and on to more benign and effective treatment modalities.

I can make more specific suggestions if I know more. What drugs is she on and what is she taking them for? Feel free to respond by PM if you like.

Post: #11

(01-07-2014 09:24 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  Whether or not you will stay with your wife, you need to get her off the psych drug treadmill and on to more benign and effective treatment modalities.

So if something goes wrong on your treatment plan, does the OP get to sue you? How much skin-in-the-game are you willing to put in?

Post: #12

(01-07-2014 11:49 PM)Thomas the Rhymer Wrote:  

(01-07-2014 09:24 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  Whether or not you will stay with your wife, you need to get her off the psych drug treadmill and on to more benign and effective treatment modalities.

So if something goes wrong on your treatment plan, does the OP get to sue you? How much skin-in-the-game are you willing to put in?

I have seen too many zombified victims of the over-prescription epidemic of psych drugs, especially but not exclusively ADs. And there is a great deal of evidence for the superior modalities that I would suggest.

Not all medical advice is equal and not all of it is sacred. If it's an oncologist from MD Anderson designing your cancer treatment, then only a fool would presume to intervene or comment in any way. But if it's a psych doc blithely prescribing a zoloft based 4 med cocktail to some poor female who is not entirely content with her life, then I have no qualms trying to give some suggestions that would stop the zombification of another human being.

Post: #13

It looks like your problems are not career related. Career-wise you have a lot of options, more than most of us have. Regardless, this isn't the right forum to ask career questions about such a specialized field.

Your problems are with your personal life and the choices you have made so far. At 30, you have a wife on psych drugs and 3 kids. If you didn't care for the kids and were ok with them living off government assistance, I would say stash some money, get a divorce, party your ass off in Thailand for a few months to "reset" your brain, then find a job with a bank in Singapore or something. But that's not an option if you care for the kids.

You're in difficult situation. I'd rather not get laid for a year or more than be in a situation like that to be honest.

Post: #14

Thanks for the advice guys. I'll try to respond to the salient points:

1.) I'm ok with some programming, but I really actually prefer to look at data and analyze that rather than write code all day. Of course, getting the data necessitates writing code. That's fine to a point, just don't want to be BI developer making dashboards all day unless it pays stupid good money to do so.

2.) Have thought of a PHD, but it's really not on the table until my youngest (1yr) is in kindergarten. Simply not affordable without HUGE loans. And staying married (barring a dramatic rise in income/fortunes) . Couldn't afford child support +alimony on a PhD student salary.

3.) Finding advice from other statisticians is surprisingly hard to get. Holy shit I've never realized what a bunch of fucking wankers my professional association was until this point. endless blathering about how they're so wonderful but are too stupid to help new members of the profession actually get a job. Or Network or anything like that. No wonder only 30% of grads join up these days. Never thought about it until now.

4.) Wife is on the 2nd possible lowest dose for the drug she uses. I can't find the name (she's visiting family overseas this week with the kids), but it's basically a drug that makes her not care enough to actually be crazy. Has post partum depression and a mild mood disorder. Has a competent psychiatrist she sees, NOT just any old MD.

She's not a complete zombie. Just partially zombified enough to have sex with her actually become an unpleasant experience. She's doesn't say no. But she's rarely into it. Because she has no reactional desire sex drive. It gets to me after a while. Makes all my instincts go crazy, the only time a normal woman should act like a simulcra during sex is when she's screwing another man. (Ruled that out btw.)

5.) My life is improving, but I know I needed to cast a wider net to get advice.

6.) Absolutely realized I made a bad decision in a weak moment to marry my wife. Have regretted it for years but kept hoping things would get better. They kind of have, but I'm not really attracted to my wife anymore.

By definitions of the forum, she's all over the map. Let herself get fat and develop hygeine problems. (related to the depression and the drug she's on.) Yet at the same time, doesn't shit test much. Has a pleasant demeanor when she's medicated. Good with kids, gets along with my family. Good values, isn't a feminist. Open to red pill concepts. Just really not very feminine or useful around the house. (

Just a note FYI, I do post on athol kay's MMSL forums, so I go there for marriage advice. I actually physically, want to cheat and screw other women. Really I do. Mentally and spiritually I realize that's a pretty shitty thing to do, so I don't. But damned if it isn't tempting. I WORK AT A UNIVERSITY. EYE CANDY EVERYWHERE.