I think you have made a sensible plan. Moving out doesn't mean breaking up - and it does sound impossible to work at home at the moment. I also think taking a break should be a totally last resort if you feel your health is at stake as it might be more depressing in the long run. Hope you can get this sorted out asap and get some peace.

Are you waiting for dept admission or funding or both? Dept admission should come through no later than June I would have thought. If it gets to end of May an email asking about this would be OK.

The main thing is make it clear that they would share authorship if anything was published as a result.

Sounds to me like you need to be living apart until this is finished. The welfare of this teenager (however annoying she is) and her baby are rather more important than you PhD - at least they should be to your partner. There must be some way you can move out - how was the rent paid before you moved in?

You don't necessarily (so I've been told) have to have a whole chapter that is just a lit review if you think it work better to spread the lit across several chapters.

I have a lit review chapter, but then I have more specific mini lit reviews at the beginning of each empircal chapter. It didn't work to put it all in the lit review chapter - but there was a heap of more general stuff that did go there.

1-3 months is standard here - 6 mo-1 yr is just waay too long!

I've been approached about essay writing too. There's a ton of people doing this. I've seen other sites offereing PhD thesis writing too.

I do wonder how the student would get through their viva if they hadn't actually written their PhD. This is why we still need vivas and hand-written exam pieces.

Don't tempt me ;-)

My supervisor has contributed so little I'm mulling over how best to acknowledge him.....

When you write the Acknowledgements - do you put people's job titles or adresses in?

My studentship ran out last Ocober but fortunately there are no fees here for your 4th year if you write up in that time. It must be very common - they just changed the official ordinances to state that all PhD students automatically have a 4th year to write up so basically don't apply for an extension (I think they were drowning in extension applications).

So now I'm still paying childcare with no income - I really am paying to work! This can't be right! I soooo want a job.

Congratulations on the postdoc coastman!

I'm afraid to say I don't think I've ever shared private accommodation where this didn't happen. If he is spending whole days there then I think it would be reasonable to ask for a contribution to the bills - problem from his point of view is that he is probably paying the full amount wherever he is supposed to be. Is his place a long way away - could he not just go home during the day? I expect you would me more comfortable if you didn't feel he was 'lurking' all day. I think these two should probably be thinking about moving in together properly - maybe they will in July.

''Their verdict was that though they each had points of disagreement with me, the thesis itself was fundamentally a sound piece of work that warranted a PhD.'' I'm so hoping this is how it goes for me. My external is on a very similar wavelength but my internal I expect will diagree with some of my thesis.

(up)

Fantastic! A couple of questions: did you work all your examiners references into your thesis beforehand and were you able to take your copy of your thesis with the postits into your viva - is that usual practice?

Major corrections are my biggest nightmare! No corrections would be such a joy!