Dear all,

Just wanted to update you guys. I was not failed nor offered an MPhil. GUESS WHAT? My examiners were great and appreciated my work and I have basically been given a PASS subject to major corrections.

I guess it all turned out well after all.

And the better news is that I have a teaching job as a part-time lecturer and also another job as a part-time researcher. So I feel really blessed.

Thank you all for supporting me when I needed your help and advice and kind words.

To everyone.

I wanted to say a BIG thanks for each person so far who has taken time to sit and read through my comments and advise me - regardless of whether I find the advice easy on the eyes and heart.

But really thanks so much!

Thanks Ian.

I am currently out of the UK but it is no problem. I will ring them on the phone tomorrow and ask them.

Trying to keep fighting :-)

Dear psychresearcher,

Thank you for your response.

I don't think I have the privilege to get my thesis retrieved and submit one with a conclusion. Once I submit my thesis to the Registry, I think that is it and there is not much that can be done.

With regards to the conclusion, I am under this impression maybe because my supervisor hardly ever brought it up with me and with lack of sufficient communication I failed to appreciate the importance of a conclusion. Now I realize its importance. Although I have gotten conflicting advice that the missing conclusion may not possibly fail me.

Ah, I know that I asked for honest responses/advice. But I must admit they have been very difficult to take and I am starting to feel really low.... Because reality hurts and this is my very sad reality.

Thank you for your time :-)

Dear Bilbo,

I am really sorry to hear about your condition but at the same time congratulate you on your resilience and determination. A PhD is not easy, let alone having alongside an illness or disease or condition to battle. You seem to have gone through a difficult time with a first PhD that you had to abandon. Yet you still went for another one, which is inspiring indeed.

To be honest, I always thought that my Introduction was sufficient to lay out the details of my PhD and why it is PhD worthy. My supervisor never asked me for a conclusion except once. And I had assumed it was not that detrimental to the outcome.

You and Ian seem to be of the opinion that a viva might not happen, am I getting your flow correctly? Is that even an option that the examiners can cancel the viva even if the university regulations do not make room for that?

I would love to have the option to resubmit. I don't have any other expectations. I just hope it's not an MPhil or a fail, both would be a shame because truly my thesis is PhD worthy (just needs more time) and is a contribution to a specific field of historiography. I am currently working on a my conclusion and editing my 4th chapter.

I would like to add that English is not my first language and that too was another burdensome shortcoming because sometimes it's hard to write down one's thought and ideas and analyses without having to sit there and think of a good way. Sometimes I would have to rewrite a sentence so many times and this is all time consuming.

I would be grateful if you could explain to me why you think there is a chance in my case for it to be cancelled. And if so, would that be the end? How devastating. This cost me money and time and effort and it upsets me to no end knowing that this is a possible outcome.

Thank you for your time.

Dear Ian,

I already had applied for extra time, which I did get. But it was still not enough because sometimes my depression was so bad I would go a whole month without touching my thesis.

I did not "lie" to my supervisor and she was told of my shortcomings in French and mental health. My supervisor is aware that my thesis is not the greatest thing ever but I don't think she is aware I missed to include a conclusion. I didn't even think it was *that* substantial until my friend told me. In defense, my topic is indeed novel and so are my sources used and my thesis is very promising and indeed a contribution. And that is something I believe I have demonstrated. It just needs more time. My supervisor will find out soon in the coming days when she reads the copy I left her.

I have gone through my university regulations and nowhere did I find a clause that allows for a viva to be cancelled or a thesis to be failed without a viva. So I am hoping that would basically save me. I am also hoping that the examiners wouldn't want to hurt my supervisor. I know a lot of politics goes behind these vivas.

I really think I have a good thesis and a good novel contribution and I hope the examiners will give me a final chance which potentially could make all the difference in my life. To them it won't make much of a difference, but to me it could either make or break me.

Thank you for your honestly anyways. I asked for honesty :-)

Dear Ian,

I have to admit that reading your comment was very difficult for me.

I don't know that the university has the right to fail me if I have submitted the thesis regardless of whether there was a conclusion or not. I may be untruthful with them about "forgetting to include" the conclusion chapter but I am not sure this is something I want to do.

I was simply thinking maybe if I showed them a conclusion and a reworked chapter 5 at the viva, they might spare me? I could explain that my clinical depression has been tough and also the fact that I had to deal with too many French documents and translate them was very time consuming and all lead to the position I am in today.

Do you think they can decide not to hold a viva for me? I mean based on what? At least it would be fair to give me the chance to defend myself.

Is there anything you would advise me to do please? I would be very grateful.

Dear cotton,

I don't know what to say to you.

I think this is something all PhD students go through.

But at the same time you have do some soul searching. If you continue to feel unhappy doing your PhD maybe you need to drop it while you still can? I am just saying this because I don't want you to reach a point when you haven't done enough work, for whatever reason but mainly because you are unhappy and uninterested, are forced to continue on your course of study JUST BECAUSE YOU ARR FORCED TO.

If I look back at myself and my PhD journey, I would have quit in year 2 because that's when I began to feel unhappy and uninterested and unmotivated, not to mention the realization that PhD's will not get me a better career or a better salary. Instead I continued into my PhD program and ended up submitting an incomplete thesis and now hoping that my viva give me another chance to resubmit and atleast come out with a PhD after all of this.

But again, you might be going through a phase. That's why you need to do some soul searching. The only way you can get through this is if you really and truly love your PhD.

Also my nickname is Hopeless, so you need to take advice from me with a pinch of salt.

Best wishes.

Dear Pineapple,

I also wanted to say thanks for your ideas and advice. You are definitely an inspiration. I am trying to get myself together these couple of days and work on writing the missing parts of my thesis in order to take with me to my viva.

I have not yet heard from my supervisor. I am assuming she is not happy with what my thesis as I submitted it. Or maybe she hasn't seen it yet.

I feel so much under pressure. Some friends have started calling me doctor and I keep explaining to them I am not a doctor yet and we have to wait for the viva. But they don't listen to me. I feel to pressured.

Dear Nick1,

I don't know if I am in any posotion to advise you on how to go about things. But five months is still "enough" time if you put your mind to it. Trust me, I wish I would go back in time to when I had five months. You need to deactivate Facebook, twitter, and just lock yourself up for most days just working on the PhD. Do take breaks every now and then in order for you not to lose your mind, but for the next five months dedicate your life and time and soul to the PhD. I just don't want you to find yourself in my same situation. And hopefully you will not.

With regards to you being exhausted, I know that feeling. There is a point when you start hating your thesis and the topic and even writing one sentence becomes very time consuming and energy draining. But remember this is something you loved at one point and you made a commitment to see it through. My advice is take a complete week off and then do what I told you in the first paragraph.

I just don't want you to be in my situation or Dr Pineapple's although in the end she had succeeded.


Maybe sometim soon I will change my name from Hopeless to Hopeleslly Hopeful.

Dear Nick1,

Thanks for your response.

I am not sure my supervisor knows about me not including a conclusion but she will find out in a few days. However she knew that my thesis was not up to par in the sense that the chapters still needed work.

My excuse is that I had to deal mainly with French archives and French is not a language i speak or read. That's why translating documents was such a tedious and time consuming job. And I wish to bring that up at my viva. I hope it could be a valid point to be taken into consideration.

Do you mind telling me about yourself a little as a PhD student?

Dear Pineapple,

First you are amazing for responding so promptly. Thank you!

I cannot explain to you how down I feel. It is really hard to not be beating myself over an incomplete thesis *without* a conclusion.

I don't know how vivas go, but would I be allowed to refuse an MPhil and argue/defend my way into a resubmission? I was thinking of continuing work on my thesis and writing a conclusion and cleaning up chapter 4 and reprinting it and taking it with me to show them that I have been working on thesis during wait for viva and that I am dedicated to see it through.

Another idea was actually taking a letter from the doctor that proves I did suffer from clinical depression. But I don't know if that is allowed or too much?

Other than that I feel too ashamed to defend. What can I possibly tell then to excuse an incomplete phd thesis?

Sometimes I feel very down about this, very down.

Can I ask you a question? *How* incomplete was your first viva?

Thank you.

Hello everyone.

This is my first time here. I really need some advice and help.

I just submitted an incomplete PhD thesis. Meaning I submitted an introduction, 3 good chapters, a 4th very bad draft chapter and no conclusion. I just did not have the time. I did not sleep during the last 48 hours before submission. I submitted for the University of London. I have suffered from clinical depression and anxiety and in the past this has slowed me down in my work. And I have had an extension based on that. However I still failed to complete the thesis on time.

However I know I can do it if they give me some more time and another chance. I'm in a better place in my life. I just don't want a fail and an Mphil. I wouldn't mind a Not Pass with option to resubmit.

What are my chances of a re-submission (referral)?
Would they pull off the viva before it happens? If they do, what does that mean?
Anything I can do or tell them to argue my case or defend myself at the viva?

Please I would appreciate any advice. And don't worry about my feelings. Brutally honest is welcomed.