This is absolutely achievable. Knuckle down. Rest and treat yourself often (but not too often) and head for that golden light at the end of the tunnel. Good luck sneaks!!

Keeping going 4matt. As DanB suggested, try and develop a few social activities to do /join and sociable things will grow from that. Easier said than done, but gradual change will happen and you will feel happier.

I can sympathise with some of the way you feel. I am single and live a long way family (not that we would be sociable if closer) and spend a lot of time on my own. I am fortunate enough to have some good friends in the same city as me and I may see them twice a month or so for dinner or something. Most of my friends are in couples or settled with jobs with disposable incomes that I just do not have...so I am somewhat used to spending time alone. Which is okay, but since finishing the phd I find myself jsut wanting to crash in front of the tv rather than make the effort to get up and out (autumnal hibernation!). Last week I had coffee with a friend and that was my sociable thing for the week!! I joined the gym over a month ago as something to do and that helps me feel better. So gradual change and onwards and upwards....

Thanks for all your comments! I feel a bit better today, just embarassed really. I am going to sort out some sort of voice coaching. Maybe 2 or 3 sessions as I am poor, but perhaps they will help.

I have given a number of conference papers before and seminar papers, but I was very aware it was my first one post-PhD. I think my presentation has always been awkward - and it was just this chair being brave/consdierate to bring it up!

Thanks all for your suggestions and supportive comments. :) I am sure thing will get better in time (they have to right?) as I get used to doing this job.

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Today was my first presentation not as a PhD student and as a temporary lecturer. It did not go well. Apparently the delivery was the issue, not so much the material (the chair asked afterwards for my thesis and a paper. and besdies, the powerpoint was beautiful and the script reasonably polished). The chair came to talk to me afterwards and said that I should take acting lessons to project the voice and prevent the words getting strangled in my chest and control my breath and thus diction. I am so ashamed and embarassed. It must have been awful. I felt so dizzy and suffocated talking (and talk is precceeded by a headache and nervous trips to the bathroom)- and why the hell wasn't there a microphone! Anyway, the worse part is that my head of department and another colleague were there to witness this awful talk. So ashamed. The head did not look impressed and did not speak to me all day. I know it is not the collected elegant professional stance she would like (and I would like). Urgh. Just makes me think who am I kidding with all this. Feel really low. I've made myself look really incompetent and I worry I have now made the department look bad too - hence head is not happy with me.

I want to fade away!

:-(

Finally finished the conference presentation. Now off to shower and shave and dress - then catch train. Happy days. Good luck Teek - get some rest

Here I am writing a presentation to give tmrw morning at a conference, my first as a Dr. Oh dear, so unprofessional! :(

I have been going to the gym for a month and got a friend to sort out a routine for me. Really noticed some firming up :)

Twice a week I do 15 minutes rowing for cardio and warm-up and then 30 minutes of strength training/weights. Doing different muscle groups on different days.

Once a week: just cardio.

I really like the rowing machine and find the cross trainers to tough on the legs. But with rowing you get a great low-impact all over workout! :)

I am leaking like a untoliet trained puppy at the prospect of trying to find work in the Spring. Nothing is coming up and I have zero possibility of transfering to private sector or industry.

Thanks all.


The thesis is now being bound as we speak!!! Massive queue at the university binders full of crying MA students who have deadlines today or tmrw. And so had to go to a private binder (more expensive, less nice finish)...sigh....but it will be in. £60 poorer (plus print costs) but ..yay...it is being bound!!

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Ogriv...I too have had bedbugs

http://www.postgraduateforum.com/threadViewer.aspx?TID=4413

In the end, after several fumigations, I had to move.

You MUST wash all your clothes and textiles on a high temp and then dry them. Then tie them up in bin bags secure from air for a few days. Also, I purchased bed bug spray and sprayed all the books and items in my room (they can hide in the spine of books). It is the frame of your bed and mattress that need close attention - REALLY MAKE SURE. A new mattress might be prudent. Put a dustproof cover on it to prevent re-colonisation. Spray them. Take the bedframe apart and spray every joint. Seriously, they are persistant. The bedbugs in our bedroom meant that I slep downstairs with the (then) boyfriend for about a month on a sofabed. We broke up shortly after. They were horrible. And only wanted my blood not his!

Full sympathy!

Oh yes, indeed! Despite having, ahem, a Ph.D (recent) in cultural history, people have asked me about random dates and events in periods hundreds or thousands of years outside my speciality - sure, as a historian I have an awareness of the general outline of Western history, but urm, don't expect me to give you the exact terms of Prime Ministers or marriage dates of monarchs!!! sigh.

Well, this afternoon and weekend I am finally settling down to doing my post-viva minor corrections (yay!) and then getting the thesis printed and bound. Could do without the cost of binding and printing right now, but hey, once it is in....

Have spent the past few weeks settling into my new part-time job which starts in earnest in early October when the students come back. Ashamed to say that since I have had the viva I have spent a LOT of time just watching television especially The Simpsons, Family Guy, and American Dad. To be fair I have joined the gym in the last month so I am doing some activity. Mostly I am glad to just never have to do a PhD again. I want to erase the last PhD 4 years from memory. Of course there is a massive void and not quite sure how to fill it...

Should try and get these corrections done, it has taken me weeks to want to even look at the thesis again!!

To the corrections......

Oh this post is so very true - so many questions, such despair! So glad mine is over. So glad.

Manchester is easy for me. Any room for a late starter? I finished me phd last month (submit post corrections bound copy next week) so would that be okay (no longer a phd student)

Congratulations! Glad you made it too! I also completed this summer and the last year was harrowing!