As Ann said ... try your hardest to get an academic reference (there will be some people still floating around your uni and/or picking up emails at home/work). This would be more suitable for a PhD reference, but if you really can't get hold of anyone, an employment reference will have to make do (although I hope they are relevant to your PhD is some way, shape or form).

If you have to then so be it, but I'd personally advise against Career Development Loans (before you know it, you'll be in debt up to your eyeballs ... and at some point in the future - when you'll probably need to be saving - this money will need paying back!).

If you can't secure funding, try to get a job that fits around your PhD (e.g. part-time lecturing if you can get it, or a job that requires no 'brain power' - i.e. stacking shelves/working in an office).

For a chapter (on average) one week max ... but it has been done even quicker than that!

Thanks for the info - yes I've put 'accessed' dates on and have kept copies of the articles!

Thanks Pea (yes, I'll be making it clear in the bib that the sources are online ones).

If you are citing quotes from a website, do you guys do page numbers (or just dates by the persons name and then quote as normal without page numbers)?

e.g. [...] as Bloggs (2002) stated 'oranges are good'. He further argued ...

Also, does the same apply for if you are using newspaper articles/journal articles you have accessed via the web (or are you expected to root out the original newspaper clipping and get the page numbers)?

Four months to write five chapters is quite ambitious (... although some people - who are usually academic 'freaks' can do it). I think a good pace to work at is 6 weeks (writing) for a regular chapter (i.e. not intro or conclusion which can usually be done quicker).

Just focus on completing your PhD (that was the point when you first started this 'journey' after all) ... papers will come after and you aren't expected to have these before the viva.

About 80, 000 words ... I'm kind of 'to the point' and (my supervisor agrees) don't think unnecessary 'waffle' is needed (i.e. if I wrote more, I'd be putting in stuff just for the sake of 'bulking out' the thesis).

If you are in the early stages, don't worry about things like word count. Just get on with writing the thesis!

Littlemissworry - just take one day at a time, you will get to this stage eventually.

Hi Juno,

BB is a nickname that I'm called my some people in the 'real world' ... and no, it isn't an abbreviation for anything.

Interesting point though, how did people choose their usernames?

PhDer - I know how you are feeling ... I'm about 2 months off submitting to! You should be feeling happy because (everyone says) you are on the 'final lap', but it still feels a VERY long way off (and of course, the concerns are now setting in about 'is my work good enough/what if I fail?', but at the end of the day, I can only trust my supervisors word on that). The only way to rationalise all of this, is that others have been through this and this is part of the 'PhD process'.

Don't feel guilty about eating lots of chocolate, go out for walks (as others have suggested), and keep 'pushing through' this final phase (I suppose those waiting to get this stage think it's the 'easiest', but as we know, it's actually the complete opposite!).

Keep at it (I'm also saying that to myself)! I want to see messages by both of us in a couple of months, saying we've finally submitted!

How do you guys manage to work with awful supervisors? Mine is fantastic (I just call them up if I have any problems). I honestly couldn't do/get through my PhD without their support - and I've told them that.

You might be interested in this then:

http://www.faststream.gov.uk/index.asp?txtNavID=71

...

I find writing a VERY painful process. For me, writing didn't get easier (as I thought it would), but got harder and harder!

Having said that (and I'm assuming your at the early stages of doing a PhD), as I said before ... just work consistently, get down to it, accept that it isn't going to be your 'life defining' piece of work, and you will get there.

Small steps!

PS I've still got a way to go yet to!

Littlemissworry - I'm bang on my 'official' 3 year mark at the moment, so by the time I (hopefully) submit the PhD will have taken me 3 years and 2/3 months. However, I've taken long breaks over every summer (i.e. 4-6 weeks of doing no work), and also made a point of taken 2/3 weeks off every Christmas (and that's not including the odd week of here and there - i.e. Easter and just when I feel I need a break).

Just work consistently (for each chapter I read - until I felt like my eyes were bleeding - for a few weeks, then locked myself away from the outside world and just got down to writing them). Luckily, I haven't got many amendments to make to my overall thesis, just inserting a few sentences at various points/sorting out referencing and writing the extra odd paragraph here and there.

...

Just got bored of it ... so I am now 'BB'.