Im getting very anxious over the entire thing. Today is saturday, and on monday i will be telling my advisor of my decision to quit. It will seem like its a sudden decision from me as i am good at keeping my problems under wraps (poker face). But the truth is i am overwhelmed and am no longer enjoying my work.

And it may anger my prof as my project is something that i came up with. That is nobody in the lab has the expertise to carry out my set of experiments. Thus continuing on the project after my withdrawal will be a hard thing to do.

Has anyone here gone through the process of quitting a graduate program before? How did you do it?

Hi, iwan,

Your decision to quit is not completely unexpected given all the issues that you have been facing since the start of your PhD in 2016.

You have invested a lot of time and effort and sufferred much anguish over your PhD project.

Do what is right for you and let your professor sort out the rest of the issues after you have left. If your project has been a big interest to him, he would have given you far more support than he had. And he is a "professor" after all... He has the brains to sort things out.

How to quit? Hmmm, tell him in person, send an email immediately after to have it in writing, cc your postgrad coordinator/school administrator/grad school officer, if there is a form - fill it, pack up your stuff in your lab (shouldn't take too long, max 3 days if you really do have that much crap), and leave and never look back. Oh, and don't badmouth anyone.... Just go.

Note: Expect the brainwashing to make you feel guilty and absolutely worthless as a PhD student to have quitted your project. In all honestly, you don't owe them anything when you have not been supervised properly and have been treated poorly, so do not succumb to their tricks....

Oh, and take a nice break somewhere... You need to detoxify. Take good care of yourself from here onwards...

Just wondering, can you change supervsior (might be too late?) or write up as a master degree? The thing though is that if you decide to write up a master degree, there is potential bad treatment that will be thrown your way during the write up period... and you may also need to get his reference if you decide to do a PhD again in future. By just leaving, you don't have to get his reference and actually, no one ever has to know that you left a PhD unless you volunteer that info.

You have already made up your mind.... just follow it through despite the backlash you may receive

Then leave and be at peace : ) All the best with not having to pay back any $$!