In my subject 3-4 years is normal and the deadline is 4 years, but there is someone I know who has taken 6 years to finish.

There are usually a few university funded PhDs, you could ask about that. I'd bear in mind you may end up changing projects, I've done a different PhD to the one I applied to.
Taking a year out should not be a problem, it is the experience in the lab from your degree, or work that they would ask you about.

At my university you have to submit your thesis within 4 years, so you could have a viva after that. It can take months to arrange a viva sometimes, submitting is the important thing.
My funding body has information on this sort of thing, so I'd check any information you received.
You have still got 5 months to go, which is enough to write a whole thesis so you might be OK anyway.

I talked to someone in my lab once and he told me that maybe a quarter of the group had suffered from depression within the last two years. It can be more common than you think, and not often talked about.
I've had long-term depression myself. Sometimes books/therapy etc. helps, sometimes it goes on its own, sometimes it is more part of your personality. Don't give up, I've been on long NHS waiting lists for therapy and got nowhere so eventually found free counselling, and then paid for it myself. There are forums specifically for depression/anxiety and similar conditions which can be good. Sometimes just trying to relax, go on holiday and being nice to yourself can help, and treating it like a physical illness that is misunderstood, biochemical and probably not even your fault. I found realistic thinking rather than positive thinking helpful e.g. I messed up and I'm not the best at x y and z, but it doesn't matter.

A lot of work in our lab is started by one person and carried on in a new project.
My supervisor tells new people who to go to for help without warning them, and the next thing you know you are being asked for help on your protein without knowing anything about what is going on.
Sometimes supervisors are just like this is they are managing the projects, and don't consider you.
It's worth making sure you get credit, even an acknowledgement.

It sounds like it's still being considered. If it gets rejected you can try other journals or may need additional work.

I feel exhausted and felt pretty horrible early as desperately needed a rest. Now had a sleep, and my splitting headache has gone. OH despite staying late at work is back earlier than expected so is cooking for me.
Trying not to let the fact my supervisor will be rubbish at reading it get to me.

One last hurdle gone, only handing in officially and viva to go.... :-)
Can celebrate after hand in date (6 weeks knowing my supervisor ;-) )

Of course my supervisor is away this week as it is half term, and STILL hasn't read my chapter 5 from weeks ago. I know it's done though bar one or two minor adjustments.
Time to finally relax as worked through a lot of weekends and the bank holiday, and to think of a career.
Off to buy a nice doughnut or something for lunch to celebrate as it's not exciting to anyone else ;-)

Differs between universities

I created a keyboard shortcut as you add refs by insert/tables&indexes/bibliography entry. You then scroll down through all the refs which are in the order you put them in, not alphabetical.
If you type letters when the menu drops down it usually finds refs, but I had several authors with many papers and it fell down, and I just had to scroll, of course the PID would have worked better here, but then I would have had [P: 1252532532] as my reference.


Also...if you edit the database it will not go back and change the references that you have already added, and they will need redoing or editing by hand.

There is supposed to be a new version of OO soon, which will hopefully be better for this.

The whole thing made my life hell, I dreamt of lovely endnote, but unfortunately my partner does linux for a living, my laptop is broken and I was reliant on a linux laptop he borrowed from work, and the windows machines at work are very unstable and I wouldn't trust them.

I will try and ask my computer expert
he said you just follow the wiki but it made little sense to me
http://wiki.services.openoffice.org/wiki/Bibliographic_Hints_and_Tips

OO bibliography has been a huge pain. To do the bibliography I used
http://www.tutorialsforopenoffice.org/tutorial/Bibliographies.html

When the entries were inputted into OO from bibliophile the "short name" field is automatically inserted as the ref which from bibliophile was automatically a PID number. I went through and edited all the short name fields so that it said (Blogs J, 2007) when I inserted the reference. There may be a better way of doing it.

Similar to what Sue said, I've realised I can only talk about things like this in a superficial professional way in general. Once or twice it has worked though. You could rehearse what you are going to say to give you more confidence.Finding someone academic who will talk about work in a nice way occasionally is confidence boosting.
I've burst into tears in secret after lab talks and advisor's meetings. I've established now that my advisor is very critical, and it's not me in the wrong, and I just need to a) not actively seek him out or use him as an internal examiner(!) b) accept he is just insensitive but is totally oblivious to the effect it has and c) he's not neccessarily right-my supervisor often disagrees with him, and d) let the comments bounce off me so that I can get on with my PhD

Hope it went OK.
I'm in work as oposed to the comfort of home
Busy busy day ahead...

2 more days, then will dump thesis on supervisor's desk, clear my own desk and disappear home to relax
(until he probably gives me corrections )
hopefully minor *prays*

I'm glad my vague advice helped. Reviews are great, an expert basically does all the hard work for you

I'm still here, surrounded by paper. So much more of a struggle this morning
Anyone else suffering?