Well I was going to click "helpful user" or whatever it is for both of you but it looks like I've done that already!

As a contrast - I'm wondering how I have managed to get to four stars! I don't really feel very helpful, or that I post very often....

I got an email today advertising a poster competition in my university (across departments), with a competition for research students. The top prize is £500 with two runner-up positions, I could do with a bit of cash, as well as the obvious recognition etc., so I'd really like to enter and hopefully impress people!

I've never done an academic poster so I'm just looking for some advice really. I haven't started the actual empirical work yet (starting in the summer hopefully) so it won't include anything like that, I'm thinking along the lines of an overview of my literature review and methodology.

Thanks in advance!

Hi Cornflower, I haven't got any experience with this directly but will try to say something useful...

When I first started my PhD just over a year ago my supervisors and I had to cut quite a lot out from my original proposal just because there was too much and I wouldn't have been able to get it all done in three years. My supervisors always said to me, and still do, that my research career won't end with my PhD; there will be work to do afterwards and a PhD should also lead on to future work. So you could present this new idea and reading to your supervisor with that in mind, try to make it as appealing to him as possible by giving him a good rationale as to why you're so interested in it and he should be interested as well. That way, you should be able to include it as a side-chapter, but with potential. You would probably speak well about it in the viva if you're really interested in it, so ensure that your examiners are aware of this direction that the thesis has gone in, if possible.

I think that if you were self-funded and really wanted to change the direction of your thesis then you would have a little more freedom to do so, but I believe that keeping your funding body happy is more important in the grand scheme of things; get your PhD out of the way (trying to enjoy it at the same time :-)), then you can pursue the research that you find more interesting.

I hope that makes sense and is helpful, in some way. Good luck with your supervision.

Nx

Well I have at least two years left so might well change, if I can move all my references easily and risk-free. I do like Mendeley and never really liked the look of Endnote, although the not "et al." thing is quite annoying as well!

I just did it and didn't lose anything :-)

I'm not sure which version of Mendeley I use, just looked and it wasn't obvious, I don't think it's the Developer version though. It often asks me to update when I first start it and I always do, even though the "new features" they promise aren't always apparent!

Might switch to Endnote if this keeps happening...

Thanks Sneaks, that is good to know. Although I've been using Mendeley for over a year now and it's only just started happening. Do you think that if I close Word it would do that 'automatic file recovery' thing and I'd still have my work?

I am working on a large document and Word (2010) keeps freezing on me, which is very irritating. It last did this a few days ago, and is doing it again now. It froze when I tried to add a citation from Mendeley.

I always back my work up, but saved it last about 500 words ago so I don't really want to close it and lose what I've just done.

Any advice appreciated, thanks.

Hi Elsie, thank you for the reply. I've had a lovely weekend off (apart from a bit of essay marking) after the presentation and feel much calmer. Have caught up on sleep which helped! I've still got a lot on my plate but I do have a bit more of a perspective now.

The presentation went quite well, apart from a harsh grilling at the end, my supervisors weren't especially impressed with the professor who gave it. They were pleased with me and others complimented me as well, so I'm pleased that I impressed who I wanted to impress.

I will be doing hardly any paid work over the summer as most of what I do is teaching, my supervisors basically know this and don't seem to have a problem with it. I'm not especially behind at the moment either, I just worry about it quite a lot.

I hope you start to feel better soon as well,

Nx

Ps. have replied to your PM Ady.

Don't worry Bilbo, I know that you are trying to help. I am also quite hypersensitive at times.

Thank you for replying.

Just because I didn't explicitly say something in response to Jane's suggestion, doesn't mean that I didn't address it. I really appreciated everything Jane said and suggested. I am also fully aware of what the conventional hours are for a full-time job. Life doesn't always work out that way though. My supervisors haven't discussed it so I'm only thinking about it myself at the moment.

I know you mean well and I don't want to appear ungrateful, you probably know that I'm feeling ultra-sensitive and probably being melodramatic at the moment (suffering from long-term depression doesn't help either), but your post has made me feel even worse. But at the same time, your first paragraph especially raised some valuable points about speaking to my supervisors about this. I know I need to do it, I just feel like there isn't enough time, when my progress is more important than my feelings; this is how it seems at the moment anyway. And rightly so, probably.

I do love doing my PhD and teaching, but I do have these 'what if' moments as well.

Before starting my BA I was training to be a hairdresser, then my parents practically made me to go university. I'm very grateful for this as I was much better than I thought I would be and really enjoyed it, so decided to carry on! I still think about what my life would be like if I'd finished qualifying though and taken that path; I think I'd have more money but no job satisfaction whatsoever!

Another thing that I still think about sometimes is becoming a midwife, I always wanted to be a doctor when I was at school, then realised that I wasn't good enough at chemistry so thought about nursing/midwifery instead, and helped to deliver a baby during my work experience at a hospital! I seemed to fall into doing psychology though, and have stuck with it, for the time being.

Thank you both for replying, in some ways I know that what I'm feeling is normal, but I have so much pressure on me at the moment I feel like I'm going to crack sometimes. But I just need to get on with it, and would like to do that as positively as I can.

Jane - I live quite a distance from my university but I'm usually there twice a week so I do speak to other PhD students in my department and that really helps, as they do feel like this sometimes as well. My department is really friendly which helps, there is always someone to have a chat with.

I'm dropping a day's nannying in two weeks so that I can teach on that day instead, it means I'll be on campus for another day which is great. At the moment I am doing a fair amount of paid employment as I know I won't have any (or much less) in the summer months so I need to grab it while I can really. I'm getting better at fitting my research in around everything and I'm still enjoying the challenge of it all, I just don't want to burn myself out or annoy my supervisors by not progressing quickly enough.

I would speak to my supervisors about how I am feeling at the moment as they are approachable and understanding, it's just that I don't want to make the one who sent the email feel bad about it, like it is all her fault, because it isn't. I also don't want them to think that I'm pathetic for not being able to deal with it. At the time I told my supervisor that it was probably good for me to see it, in a way, so I put a brave face on that masked the fact that I was in tears when I saw it.

Thanks again, Natassia x

This is a bit of a general self-pitying moan at the moment, but things aren't going too well at the moment and it is starting to affect my work. My supervisors are generally fine and we get on well, but I have a feeling that they are getting frustrated with me at the moment, because they don't think my work is improving quickly enough, I started my second year this month. Before Christmas I accidently received an email (about me) that was only meant to be for my supervisor (from my other supervisor), it wasn't very nice and she apologised straight away. Of course I accepted that graciously and moved on, but my confidence has been ruined and I have no faith in myself. I can only see this situation getting worse as well.

I am constantly working and stressed at the moment, as I am self-funded I need to work alongside my PhD so I am teaching 2 seminars a week, I have four private A-level students and I nanny for two afternoons a week. I know I should probably go part time but I really don't want to, and I do like the challenge. But I just feel like I have no time for anything, and worried about my research suffering.

I have to do a presentation on Thursday as it is the research students' presentation day, this is an annual thing where we present our research (20 mins) to our research colleagues and quite a few staff members attend and it is usually really helpful. I had a quick meeting with one of my supervisors about it last week and he said that it was fine, but that I should cut a few bits out so that I wouldn't run out of time. As my other supervisor is my discussant I emailed it to her yesterday morning (after saying that I would after the meeting last week, she said this was a good idea), but she hasn't yet emailed me back. I said that any comments would be appreciated so I was expecting to hear from her. There were still some notes to be written, but essentially it was complete. I'm finishing it today but without hearing from her I'm really worried that she absolutely hates it and that Thursday isn't going to go well at all.

I just feel that everything is going horribly wrong and that I'm never going to get my PhD, I'm still interested and motivated, but I feel that I don't have the ability that others have.

Any words of advice/encouragement would be appreciated, I'm sorry that this is so long.

Fabulous, very well done Dr. Bond! Good luck with your new job as well.

Nx

Sorry I've only just seen this - congratulations Dr. Ady and very well done, I'm so pleased for you! Looking forward to reading your viva story. I think you're a real inspiration as you have achieved this, when you seem to be so busy with your family as well.

Thanks for all the advice you've given me over the past few months as well, things seem to be looking up for me finally.

Natassia xx