I just wondered, is it normal to sit in front of a computer all year, typing and reading online papers? I have no idea if I am going about this the right way. It is rather isolating. Is a PhD just one of those tough things, like military bootcamp or being in domestic service, or am I having an odd experience of it? My supervisor says I am rubbish, but I just sit here working all year. Am I doing something wrong? Am I supposed to write papers for conferences or ask to teach or something? I have decided just to imagine I am some kind of indentured person with no rights and then focus on the things I can change (asking for the second supervisor I want, tell him what conferences I want to present at). Or is it the case that most PhD students don't do so well, don't complete on time, but it just doesn't bother them?

I should add, I am trying to find positive solutions. I am coming up to my annual review. I have booked an appointment with the university counselling service simply because I do not know who else to talk to and ask whether my PhD supervisor is too controlling. I would like to switch supervisors but I am afraid of it being used against me and that I may be failed or chucked off at the annual review venture. I don't know if I should say anything in my annual review. It feels like a work review, where you can't tell your boss that you find the job really tough.
My supervisor applied for the funding, so I do not know if it is possible. I find it hard to have agency in this environment, because I do not respond well to the "tough" bootcamp approach, and I don't know how to initiate industry partnerships and feel I have to ask his permission for everything. I also want a second supervisor who gets my research, possibly out of the environment. It would be so nice to hear a "yes, well done" at some stage.

Started writing, and did an extended proposal and lit review in a year. Have felt a little stressed, unaware of how to create collaborative relationships, not motivated about taking the research forward as the research questions do not emerge naturally. Have just written and presented a couple of posters.

Have 1 supervisor. Supervisor tried to influence angle of research heavily, in a direction which I did not feel that I'd signed up to. He changed second supervisor so that my PhD was no longer interdisciplinary. I kept working until one day I told him that I didn't want to take his angle; I cried and he got angry. I meet him weekly. He is very organised but he is very hard to relate to on a human level. He writes very, very abrupt emails and we hardly know one another. I am pretty scared of him, to be honest. Another student has him and feels similarly - she quakes and frets before meetings.

My own behaviour: I missed an important meeting once. I beat myself up about it but I just genuinely forgot and it slipped my mind because it didn't come up in my diary. Supervisor uses this against me, and says I am a bad student. I am genuinely trying very hard but I feel that nothing is good enough. I gave a presentation of research and deliberately simplified it for the audience, but got flagged as a "concern". Unfortunately got stressed and for a couple of months did less than 2-3 hours a day, because I was just sleeping all the time out of exhaustion. I am over that now, but my supervisor is more severe than ever when I told him.

Social: I have an office but the other students are not in often, so I have spent a year mostly working at a desk on my own. A few other students in the department, but doing technical subjects, in contrast to mine. Still have a friend network apart from PhD, as haven't really bonded with PhD students.