Hello,

I hope some of you have any idea what's the best solution in a situation like mine. I am on my first year of PhD. The beginning was really great and I've enjoyed a lot my project ( really fit to my interests). Unfortunately after few months I've found that the attitude of my supervisor had changed dramatically and from the nice guy he started to be my nightmare. To make a long story short - he pushed a strong pressure on me, required work which was impossible to do in the time he gave for doing it, he started to control when I arrive to work and so one. One of the hardest thing was also cessation of giving me any constructive feedback about my work. Our communication started to be limited to the results I have obtained in research and whatever I have presented him he looked and talked to me like I am the most foolish person he have ever met . As a result of that situation my meetings with him brought me to the strong frustration, a lot of stress, health problems and feeling of helplessness. My PhD is not in my country, so besides the situation with the supervisor I have got really hard time in a sense of loneliness and lack of understanding.
Now, after more than half a year of my PhD I am completely out of strength to continue it, but at the same time I know that is a great project, which I always dreamed about. Really don't know what to do. It is pretty sure that I can't change my supervisor (he is a director of the project) plus I am worry about consequences of my decision (do you know how look the situation with the funds for the project - can they required from me to give them back the money I have earned?)
I would be thankful for any advice!

Oh my Gosh, Karika - U R not alone!!!

Supervisors from hell are all over the place! I had by myself a supervisor from the hell and currently one of my friends has one who does not provide any feedback. First my suggestion is to calm down about the feedback, train yourself that U R not the person your supervisor thinks at the first place. However, U situation is dangerous. Having bad relationships with a supervisor will diminish any significance of you being at graduate school. So, looking for another lab/supervisor could be a good idea, but there is no guarantee u will not run into another vile creature. Look for mental etc help in your university, talk to other students (but not labmates!) and better to your university counselor (if your university has one). Do not afraid - go to other "higher" people and ask for their suggestions and help. They will teach you how to avoid conflicts - ultimately destroying your future. Unfortunately, there are no laws PIs have to follow so they just unpunishly harass and will harass their students.
In my case I had much more advanced evil happened. My PI wanted to punish me for not wanting to work for her for free (she wanted me not to graduate, but work on additional project for her PhD student - I was a MS and was paying for myself). As the punishment she took the unfinished project I have conceived to another student, then tried to took my authorship at all.
My PI became mean the same as yours after some time I have worked in her lab. In our lab we had another student similarly "destroyed" by our PI. At first I did not believe it and thought that that student did something wrong. Now it is obvious for me that the PI played the same dirty game with both of us and we could not really do anything about. Yet, I was not experienced, I thought I could explain my PI that she is not right, I expressed my disagreement. Stop! Do not try to do it, do not reply your PI with ANYTHING! PIs from hell consider students to be their slaves, they do consider students not having the right to talk and especially having their own opinion. Go to other people above the PI. Do ask to help you and teach you how to avoid conflicts and survive till your graduation. If U express at least some disagreement to your PI this will give your PI the right to blame you for being uncooperative and a conflict person. On this basis she/he may reject to write a recommendation for you or write in the recommendation that you are not the "team player" (and totally forget that u did something useful in the lab). This is the true story. Be aware. Good luck!
(down);-)

Hi karika,

You are not the only one who is suffering. These advisors are psychopaths. In my case, the supervisor was pretty good in the beginning, later on he started to blame me that I dont spend much time in grad school. Most of my research doesnot require me to go to lab, but I can do it by myself at home, but he will always complain that I am not a good student . Now I am in 2nd yr of my school and he has threatened me to remove me out of the program if the committee members don't accept my proposal by 1 month, which is not legal. I am wondering how to deal with such mean advisor.He blames me for everything and doesn't teach me anything.

Hi Karika

You have been unlucky getting such a bad tempered supervisor.  But that is his problem. It is not your fault. I would not let it put me off doing the PhD. 

Are there any societies at the University or town/city that you are living in that you would be interested in joining. EG If you are from China, are there any Chinese societies locally that you could join? What about sport - eg swimming.  Would you be interested in taking up a sport? This could provide you with a new group of contacts, away from the high pressure graduate program.  It would also help to maintain your health.

If it is a great project I would do my best to stick at it. He is only one person, and is probably bad tempered with other people as well.  It will not just be with you.

Best regards

Angelette

Hi Karika,

Hang in there!  You'll get there and you'll be able to say you survived!

That sounds familiar unfortunately and there are an awful lot of awful supervisors out there!  As you enjoy your project and research just keep going regardless of your supervisor as it'll show them in the end who is the stronger one!!!!  Follow your dreams! It'll give you the satisfaction of doing it without him and the you'll gain the upper hand when he comes running to you about publications when you finish!  Funny how they didn't show any interest/remember that you exist but when you finish they are suddenly keen on publications!!!!

It's an awful situation to be in but you are not alone as there are lots of useless supervisors around so unfortunately you got one and there isn't anything you can do about it especially as he the is the leader of the project.  I think they just enjoy that sense of power!  The department often turns a blind eye to this (they let him get away with it as he is bringing in the research grants/prestige so despite the fact that he can't supervise or teach he gets away with it!!!) This is a very frustrating situation to be in and the odds are stacked against the student and will increase your sense of loneliness, helplessness, frustration, stress and will probably make you an emotional wreck!  :-s  They do say doing a PhD is character building and you'll get past it and move on and be stronger for it having survived the process!!!

Ideas that may help:

1)  Can you look for other people who can help - have you a 2nd supervisor or another academic(s) in the dept or external if you know someone else who is willing to help. Often people are willing to help as they know what this person is like - academia is very small!!!!  Though I wouldn't go randomly asking external academics to help unless they are already involved in the project as that may create further problems by seen to going behind your supervisor's back.  It depends on the politics of the dept/project as these people are often petty and hold grudges (they are usually quite insecure people despite being successful in their field but have no people skills so hard to work with!)

2)  Have you a postgrad tutor/welfare officer or somebody who has that role that you can talk to about your concerns? I would suggest that you don't make personal as that puts that person in an awkward position but say that you are not getting the supervision that you need and need some support to sort out the issue.  If you don't have a second supervisor maybe you can request one?  

3)  Do you know a friend in a similar position as talking to them can help as they'll understand what you are going than people with decent normal supervisors.  That way you will find that you are not alone and see how ridiculous your supervisors are being. It doesn't even matter if they are in a different country as it'll be the same!  Has your supervisor other students - talk to them but be very as they will either agree with you which is great or be in denial which is a more delicate situation which can be frustrating!  This depends on the politics of your group/dept.  As you may have notice alot of this is to do with politics which is very annoying when you just want to get on with the research but unfortunately there is alot of that around in academia and people are very protective of their patch/interests so be wary of that! But saying all that it can be a good environment - it just depends on the altitude of the dept/those you work him/your supervisor etc... as it can be very rewarding as few people get to do what they like and research their chosen subject! 

4)  As other people have suggested you need to take a step back from it all sometimes and take and break and doing something else not related to your PhD so you can relax and come back refreshed.  It's not healthy to spend every minute doing it even though t

The rest of the sentence got cut off ... here it is ....

though that is what it takes especially if you are doing a lab based project which never goes according to plan!

Try talking to people who understand your situation even other postgrads though everyone seems to be tied up with their own problems with their projects so collective moaning is sometimes good and you don't feel so alone! It's not so easy talking to non academics as they won't understand what you are going through and may frsutrate you even further! This forum is a good place to get support too!

Above all have confidence in yourself even if you don't feel confident or like you have the strength to get through! You can do it (think positive thoughts) and you have the mental strength to do it (willpower and determination). You've come this far so you can definitely do it and then show your supervisor that you can do without his help. Your supervisor doesn't sound like he's very communicative which makes things difficulty but just send him work anyway and see if he replies! You never know when you might catch him on an off day when he decides to be helpful! My own supervisor gave me the title and that was about it apart from some random ideas and rare meetings but I survived and they are now going about papers which I find quite funny considering the amount of input they've had!

Look after yourself, eat (mince)(sprout)(turkey) and sleep well and get out and about! Things don't seem so bad after a good night's sleep as small things which wouldn't usually be a problem tend be worse if you're tired or stressed! A good skill to learn is supervisor management - have you called his bluff? As in stand your ground with him - some people are all hot air so if you actually stand your ground and tell him that you are working (so that he doesn't need to feel the need to control your working hours but he just do that anyway) it might work? That depends on the personality of your supervisor which might be scary as they like to throw their weight/status around and make you feel very small but if you stand your ground and show that you are not going to put with their nonsense it might work. Though I'd be careful how this is done as it needs to be carefully so you not make the situation worse! He doesn't want to feel managed but if you can sort of get along with him and show him that it's going fine he might be less of a control freak but he might be that anyway (could just be his personality!) Just remember that it's his problem, not yours - you just need to work with it!

Anyway hope this has helped and something will get sorted.

Good luck (up);-)8-):p

Thank you all for the support and advices. It's really nice to know that I'm not alone:)
Every workplace has advantages and disadvantages, as well as own politic. In my situation it's quite small place, everybody knows each other and I know that some people think the same way as me, but they don't want to make problems, conflicts, etc. Of course it's much harder when you are just a PhD student. Besides that it's hard to say who can I really trust and tell about my problems; once again small place and my observation that people like to talk about each other behind one's back.
I tried to keep distance to him and the situation, but sometimes it's just very hard, especially when I put a lot of effort into my work and he doesn't read it or say that is something very easy to do and I've spent to much time on it (even he has never worked on that problem, method, etc.).
The ideas about good food and taking a rest sound nice and that's true that it helps:)
I'll observe how the situation evolve, but to be honest I am thinking very intensive about looking for another position.