It's very useful if you have a commonly used name as it means your publications can be quickly identified. My university wants all academic staff to use it.

It's more whether the EPSRC allows it unless you plan to jettison their funding? Can't imagine your supervisor being thrilled though.

Please get some medical help urgently. That's the single most important thing to do.

You mention a thesis committee chair, which makes me think you're probably not in the UK. I can see for example if her grant funded your work, why you might be obliged to give her data and notes, and it might be that the university rules require her to sign off on your thesis in your system. But could you just forget the personalities here and view her as 'anonymous reviewer 2' - the one who you inwardly groan at when you get article reviews but under the annoyance has made a useful point? That way you get what you admit would be useful feedback. it sounds like otherwise you are headed for a battle with your thesis committee chair and that just strikes me as one you don't need the stress of at the moment. Particularly if you are in the US/Canada where letters of recommendation seem to have a massive weight on the job market.

If you have passed all semester 1, you probably have 60 credits or 30 ECTS already which if you did decide to walk away would get you a p/g certificate in marketing. If you could manage another semester but not the dissertation, then you'd get a p/g diploma. In other words, you wouldn't walk away with nothing. Definitely let a tutor know that you are feeling overwhelmed. You could perhaps interrupt your studies either now or before the dissertation to give yourself a break. But please don't feel it's a disaster - just ask for help.

I doubt the module variety would be an issue but lack of skills might be. I assume as you mention them that you'd need palaeography and codiology to do your proposed topic? If so, given how hard it is to get AHRC funding, it might be worth seeing if anywhere would let you do some stand alone modules to get the basics before you apply. This for example looks useful: https://www.history.ac.uk/research-training/browse/language-and-palaeography
I don't think the AHRC offer 1+3 studentships as that would have been ideal in this scenario. Do you have supervisors in mind that you could ask for advice? They'd probably know what others in a similar situation have done. I am taking it for granted that you will be applying for funding - if self-funding pick a university that teaches those things and audit the classes in your first year. But the way things are I'd avoid self-funding if at all possible (unless you're very wealthy).

Realistically if you were expecting major revisions (9 months) then the next worst outcome is not surprising. You'd already been told your thesis had major problems by your supervisors. There is nothing in your original post that actually evidences unfair treatment. You need to take a few days and see if the report actually fits with the criticisms your supervisors already had. Frankly if you're told to expect 9 months you shouldn't be shocked.

I'm not sure what you would be making a formal complaint about unless I'm missing something? A lot of this seems to be about you not following up on things like the MA dissertation supervision by arranging a meeting. I'd be inclined to chase up an undergraduate but I'd expect a postgraduate to be more independent than that. And for example to ask specific questions like 'where are funded PhDs advertised' rather than waiting for someone to tell you. Or is it that you dispute the fact that the other student had a higher mark than you and want to claim bias in the process? You do know that most people don't get any funding at all and that you were never guaranteed a funded place at the MA institution?

In terms of the tweet, probably not your most inspired move, as it made you look jealous of those who did get funding, which is never a good look. Probably it soon will be forgotten though. If you put in a rather unsubstantiated complaint though, that will be remembered.

To be fair any environment where there are more people who want to work in it, than there are jobs, is going to be highly competitive and feel very unfair to those who miss out. Academia is far from alone in that. I have a friend who is an actor - the horror stories he's told me make academia look cuddly.

Nesrine though I forgot to mention something. You said you hadn't any friends in academia although you had some highly placed supporters. Are there opportunities for you to network with your peers in your current circumstances either in real life or online? That was something else that I found very helpful in keeping perspective about things. Professional subject associations often have graduate//early career groups that can be very supportive (for my subject at least) and have resources / training / small amounts of funding too that can make a difference in keeping going.

Nesrine I decided to give it a full year to start with, and if by then I wasn't getting any interviews and there wasn't something amazing about to go on my cv, I'd give up. If I was getting interviews then I was going to give it a second year but apply seriously for non-academic jobs too. I had p/t teaching to keep my head above water but I was determined that I wasn't going to do that for more than a year, as it seemed like a low income trap that never got you further. About 6 months after finishing I got a one year teaching fellowship, worked all the hours possible to still publish and then got a lectureship. I had been a civil servant before the PhD so was open to those sorts of jobs again, which I think helped.

Nesrine I'm in another very overcrowded field where very few PhD graduates get a first step on the ladder. it worked out for me but it was an unpleasant time and I know it was luck as much as anything else. What helped me psychologically (it might not for you but it might) was feeling like I was a bit in control. I set parameters for the academic job search - how long I was willing to give it, what sorts of jobs I was prepared to apply for and where I was willing to move to rather than applying for everything advertised, when I knew deep down that some jobs/locations would make me miserable. The conversation with my then partner added further constraints. I then developed plan B and C for non-academic job searches and started to implement them. Oddly although I didn't get it an interview for a really good non-academic job did wonders for my self-confidence in general and I got the next academic job I applied for possibly because I was feeling less desperate.

I'd check the funding rules - I was only allowed to do 6 hours per week of paid employment as a condition of grant. Now I could have got away with more but your strategy of applying for work with the university seems to maximise the chances of getting caught. Particularly as you'll end up with 2 emails and so it'll be obvious if anyone searches for you... And what if you need to interact with your department as part of the job at a time when they think you should be working on the PhD?

If you have a university bindery their limits are probably on the library website somewhere, but science PhDs are rather short compared to humanities/social science, so I think you're still a long way off the cut off. Mine was 327 pages and was still one volume.

I agree this might not work well. If it's feasible with your home life and project, could you ask about the possibility of being a visiting student at her new university for as much time as you need with the equipment? I assume you prefer to stay put than move with her? You could of course ask for that if appropriate supervision is there too.

Yes.