Six Months Later...

And I have to say, life is amaaaaaaaazing!!!!!

This is the first year I have had where I haven't been doing the PhD or a related course for six years.  My life is so much more balanced now!  My evenings and weekends are spent doing naff all but reading, crocheting and watching tv :)  I have no heavy guilt when I am sat about.  I swim twice a week, for as long as I like - I don't feel like if I have time to swim I have time to work.  I even swim in the evenings when before I never would have, I was too tired from working and looking after my son. 

I have received my wonderful massive tome as well!  I have a HUGE leather bound thesis on my bookshelf.  I adore it.  It is my baby.  It is a lot of work.  I do also feel a pang of guilt when I see it too though, because I haven't disseminated any of my findings or shared my knowledge.  Which makes it all feel like a rather selfish endeavour.  In my defence I was *offered* the PhD position and funded, so would have been daft to turn such a wonderful opportunity down.  But still.  One day I hope that my knowledge will be used :)

In the meantime I have parcels that arrive for 'Dr' me (only parcels, am very childish and love ordering stuff for me as a dr but haven't changed anything official yet) and is all very fun.  I have two children who I can bring up to care about the world and humanity and hopefully have a healthy scepticism of big corporations and political speak.  I won't listen to any bigotry or nonsense about immigration to Britain that abounds in our culture under the Conservatives and use my knowledge and education to inform others.  I want to volunteer for a foodbank or refuge and do something useful and mostly spend my life standing up for us little guys.  I have stopped shopping at Amazon and large supermarkets, stopped buying clothes from retailers that use sweatshops (all of them.  Am a charity shop shopper these days) and buy furniture etc from charity shops, auctions and out of the paper.  I love it - but then, at the moment, I have the time as am still on maternity leave. 

Truly, doing the PhD was an amazing achievement and if you are on the way to getting yours, keep on going :)  The hardest bit I found was writing up.  So many people don't write up as I discovered when I heard the term 'ABD' - All But Dissertation.  It is so common to stay at this point there is a phrase for it.  Writing is tough, largely unrewarding and makes you feel glum as anything.  But treat yourself kindly and listen to your supervisor and it will be ok.  One day you will add the final edit and submit it for remarking by the VIVA peeps, it will be accepted and there you are.  You have finished.  WELL DONE!

Am off to eat some toast and play with the children.

Take care y'all.

x J

Why do a PhD? Haha, still a bit obsessed :)

Ahhh thanks for the kind comments friends!

Was talking to DB last night and am thinking of conferences I might like to go to in Sept/Nov and writing a couple of journal articles...

Next year (when little bubs is one) I might approach the local uni and see if my dept has any need of me...

I think I love my field too much to leave :) :)

A poster asked what the merits of doing a PhD are, particularly if one doesn't want to go into academia...  In answer I can only say that to do a PhD you have to really want one.  You have to want to study your topic (research proposal) soooooooooooooooooo much, it has to be a hobby.  Extrinsic rewards are, obviously, the kudos of being a 'Dr', and the payrise likely to follow completion.  If you don't want to be an academic then there are a multitude of transferable skills that would be brilliant on any cv/resume:  completion of a project (you are a starter-finisher) over years, project management skills, research skills, communication skills, writing of a thesis, dealing with people from all walks of life, presentation skills...  just broad brushstrokes for starters. 

However, basically you have to want to do it because you think your topic is brilliant, really interesting, and because other people (partners and supervisors) really want you to do it too.  Support for the dark times is essential.

Apart from that, I think doing a PhD is a very personal experience and something that, until you do it, you just cannot predict whether it would be a good idea or not (not helpful I know) :)  And I could not tell someone whether it would be a good idea for them!  I do know that I have a friend who is going to do a PhD after he has done his MSc and I do think, when he talks about it, how happy I am I have done it and sort of cringe a bit for him at the hideous mountains he has yet to climb while studying so bloody hard. Ug it is hard work.

However, I am so proud of the knowledge I have and actually feel a bit useful now I am out of the PhD process.  And because I have my title and thesis it won't go away - I will always be able to know that I did something amazing once :)  And this is turning into a new confidence - I feel independent and 'grown-up' and actually, now the pressure is off, quite want to do conferences... and write a couple of papers and, who knows, I might apply for a job or two and see what happens...

:)  Watch this space!

x J

I Did It!

Just found out that I am down to graduate in July so that means that I have been accepted as a dr :)

Will send my thesis off to be bound and then am all done!  Wow weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

And so this marks the end of my mammoth journey.  Am quite emotional.  Thank you kind followers for keeping my company on what can me quite a lonely journey.  I shall miss writing my blog!

x Dr. J

Still waiting!

Arg.  Sent a follow up email just now. as heard nothing yet.


Had my baby boy Friday morning :) :)  just want to know if I have finished or not!

x J

Friday...

I'll hear about whether I passed or not by Friday apparently.

Am not too confident as the internal examiner has told me she has sent it to the external for a final check.  This is NOT necessary so I have decided she is doing it because there are bits she doesn't like and wants to check with the external that these are worth bringing up with me.  Otherwise surely she would just say it' fine?

Am pissed off with waiting!  I still actually haven't even got the report so still have the full three months for writing revisions!  Mad.  In the meantime I have been invited to graduate etc so is all a bit weird and abstract.

Is a killer waiting.  I can't put my work away or return my books to amazon until I have heard...  or have my baby and he is overdue now! 

So...  'Till Friday... 

x J

Still Waiting!

Arg this limbo is getting to me now!

I handed in about two weeks ago and am still waiting to hear about whether the corrections are ok or not...  In the meantime I have been invited to graduate in July, subject to final approval, which is very exciting but hard to organise when I don't know if I really am graduating then or not! 

Am now starting to think about it all a bit more and analyse why I haven't heard yet.  So silly, as the reason I haven't heard is simply because my examiner is an insanely busy and important professor who travels the world on peace missions and is in incredible demand :)  But no, in my head I have definitely concluded that she has taken a brief look at it, sighed a huge, frustrated sigh at its shitness, and put it in her in-tray for when she has time to deal with such nonsense.

And so I sit.  And wait.

Oh, and the baby is not coming out either apparently.  He is most comfortable!  Due on Tuesday...  I can't help but feel that I can't relax and have the baby until I know whether I have finished uni or not... Nah, come on baby!

x J

Sent Off...

Ahhhh!

I am biting my nails with fear but the thesis has been completely and utterly finished with corrections, all new formatting etc etc...  and I have sent it to the internal examiner!

eeeeeek!

I hope, hope, hope it is ok.  Hope, hope, hope.

Crikey knows how long she will have it for, she is veer busy so could be weeks until I get it back, during which time the baby will be born!

Baby is doing fine, after thinking he was breech he is not, and I have finally found a nursery for Bean to go and have some fun at over the spring and summer :) 

Everything is starting to finally, after months and months of being up in the air, fall into place.  OUr new life begins :)

I just HOPE the thesis is ok.

I wait, and wait... 

Eeeeek!

x J

So nearly there :)

I have practically finished!

All the main points have been addressed, am waiting to hear back from Sup on a couple but am not too worried.

I have sorted the pagination, re-formatted it, checked and double checked that it is all laid out to the uni specifications and sorted the translations properly :)  So I am literally just waiting for sup to get back to me on those points and for the actual Viva Report.  Once I have that I can send it all off to the uni copyzone to be officially bound and sent to the library!

Can't believe it!  Maternity leave - and the rest of my life - awaits!  So close I can smell it!

x J

Sun, sun, sun!

Oh it is a beautiful, beautiful day!

But what am I doing?!  Bladdy working that's what!  Grrr.  My husband and child have gone to some local gardens by the coast for a picnic and I am here, alone, bahhhhhhhhhhhhh.  Am SO unimpressed.

I have to work tho, there is no getting away from it!  I have to have this done asap then every day will be mine :)  (as my sup reminded me yesterday.  This is such a short period of my life, literally one or two weeks...  and then it will all be over!)  The baby is making inklings that it might want to appear sooner rather than later too so I really have to get on with it!

I have got the Saturday paper that I love and some nice food for lunch.  So will work for a while and then sit outside for a reward. 

I will have this done for Tuesday!

x J

knackered

Oh I feel old and worn out :)

have worked my socks off to get as much done in these past couple of hours as I can and think I have cracked it.  Tho it could be garbled, hyperactive nonsense.  I have sent the work off to Sup and hopefully won't have to do too much more brain work.

I do have to re-format the bugger, check the refs as endnote will have naffed up my bibliography, check the refs through and sort out the translations so they are in proper English. 

This I shall do over the weekend then send the final draft to Sup. 

Then I shall hopefully have finished, finished, finished :)

x J

Getting there

Am so nearly there :)

Just got back from my last ever meeting with Sup, and last ever visit to a Uni - certainly as a student!

We went through the list of corrections and I have little bits to do here and there...  the translations and formatting will take the longest rather than brain work.  He helped me cut a few corners so I didn't get too bogged down in reading and is confident I shall have it wrapped up in a week or so (by Tuesday in my world!)

Then I shall have to wait on bureaucracy.  I can't send in my revised thesis until I have received the formal report - apparently what I have is an informal email just to help me finish this beggar before I pop a sprog :)  (very kind of them).  And then I can send the thesis for binding, and then hopefully someone will take the thesis from the copyzone and walk it over the hall to the research admin  hub where they can then formally accept it.  However, they may not want to do The Walk insisting instead that I do it myself, or I might need to sign some release papers, or have someone pick it up by proxy... 

So whatever happens, Tuesday will not be the End as such, but it will be end of any serious brainwork (unless the thesis is sent back to me for better corrections tho Sup thinks this is unlikely) and then is just a case of sending it off at the optimum time, to the right people. 

Exciting times!

So better get on with the last bits while I still remember what they are.  Have until 5 today to work, then am working tomorrow while my family go out for a picnic at the beach (sob).  Will chill out tonight as am shattered - baby not letting me sleep!

x J

Got the Report; Am Nearly There

God I can hardly dare to believe it...

but I got the corrections report and it stresses that there are 'very minor corrections' to be looked at, and I have nearly completed the list :) 

I have had the work back from Sup that I sent (poor thing, the whole bladdy thesis was sent to him for him to trawl through) and he says it is looking really good, am really nearly there with it all :)

I have today to work, off to see sup tomorrow and work in that city's uni library, then working over the weekend and on Monday afternoon.  I really hope to have it done for Tuesday. 

By 'done' I mean as much as I think I can do for now.  One thing I have learnt with this PhD is that it is never really over.  I can't imagine when sup will actually agree I can send it to the internal examiner for re-assessing.  And then obviously she has to say it is ok - but she won't tho...  it will get sent back to me again, and we shall go through the whole rigmarole until my children have left home having completed their own degrees and I will be a mumbling shell of a person.

But it could be over.  It could.

Gotta work!

x J

Conclusion chapter all done now!

Sup has emailed with some teeny corrections for the concl which I have done while Bean plays 'washing up' (drowning the floor in water in the process. I am, ahem, studiously ignoring it).

He thinks I am doing well to have done all the work I have but to be fair, he hasn't looked at it yet :(  It is rough around the edges to say the least.  Is so hard doing this while up against such a deadline.  Am terrified am going to go into labour at any time which is upsetting enough because, obviously, I want to be able to look forward to meeting my newborn not be bloody stressing about fecking up the PhD!

Ho hum.  It will all work out.  DB has really kindly offered to do a shorter day tomorrow and is taking Monday off so I can work. 

Am just so tired and don't feel well.  I know my body is telling me to stop, stop, stop.  Brain is knackered!  But I can't and bah.

Corrections report is in the post.  Am dreading it, can't bear to look at what I have missed and have yet to do!

Am really whiny, sorry.  And I got myself into this pickle! :)  I suppose I had no idea that after submission everything would drag on for so long!

Great news is that a lovely local nursery have managed to find room for bean to start next week, for one day a week.  Ahhh!  Bliss!  he will love it, and the routine will help him (us) settle down into our new lives I think.  He is not happy at having moved house at ALL.

Am not working now, but will be back at around 6ish to spend the evening doing my translations.  Hurray!

x J

And Sleep

Arf I have worked my brain dead socks off today.

I still have so much to do but have made a proper dent in it today. 

It is strange now how I happily work with the entire thesis in front of me.  Chapters feel very small!  I can dart around the whole thesis and know it and my 300 references inside and out.  I know each paragraph and argument and can navigate around it quickly - which sounds like it should be obvious considering I wrote the damn thing for years but actually, when you finish it is surprising how the thing as a whole is still daunting!

I think I have done some decent amendments today.  Some stuff like not being too dramatic in my phrasing and toning down some of my arguments (I can come across as rather over zealous apparently :)), or at least putting the alternative viewpoint(s) in there so readers know I am aware of them have been ok.  Is a lot of highlighted stuff which is what shows I have made changes. 

Still I know in my heart of hearts I am working as fast as I can to get the bare minimum standard met.  I am not flourishing about, I am not reading more than I should and I am literally working to save my ass rather than impress anyone.  I don't know how this will go down.  It might be enough - lord knows my Sup has been keen to impress on me that I am NOT re-writing but making minor revisions/re-writes...  And I can remember now more clearly what the points were in the viva so can address them as I go along and see what mistakes I have made (lots!).

I think being able to see the mistakes is really pleasing, it shows that even tho I was working so much before I submitted I really have learnt how to write so much better.  I can self-correct now I know my tics and writing does feel a lot more fluent.  I can concentrate so much more on what I want to say rather than how to say it in an academic way :)  This is really pleasing and makes me feel Very Grown Up.

Still lots to do though.  My brain/back/ankles are getting tired but I can't really afford to stop!  Will carry on for a bit longer and then will have to be patient and do some more tomorrow night.

x J

Got today and Friday

To do LOTS of work!  Oh, I shall try and grab time over the weekend too :)

Today I am reading and writing up the extra lit I need to add.  Am worried that my brain seems to have gone on holiday today but hope that I shall just push through it!

Not much to say really, just have to get on with it...

 x J

back, thank goodness

Ah.  Today I have a lot of time to work, thank goodness.

I have so much to do, and yet so little.  not enough to warrant putting it off for a year but then enough that without childcare etc I am worried it won't get done in time.  This worry is making me less than sociable and I keep crying at DB about the pressure of being a stupid housewife along with being heavily pregnant, not sleeping, having numb fingers (makes typing and writing notes interesting) and looking after Beanie AND trying to finish work when NO BUGGER (him) will help me out.

So he is helping out :)  Gave me a big cuddle and everything even tho I clearly said that being married sucks if it means I am basically a cleaner (but then, true if you do as much cleaning as me).

I have to get some breakfast as I am starving, and get on with reading this article I need to address in the intro (prob the lit review bit) veer quickly. 

yesterday I knocked two points off my to-do list which is GRAND and added about 1000 words to the thesis overall.  As far as I am concerned the conclusion is now done, but have sent to Sup to confirm.  I also tackled the stuff in the methodology the examiners wanted me to expand on (which I HAD done then sup told me to take it out...  so I put it back in with a bit of editing).  It really is so different working on it now to a few years ago, or even last year.  I now read not to learn so much as to just pillage what knowledge I can as quickly as I can.  Like an editor would I suppose.  Good practice for marking essays I guess...  (not that I will ever do that!) and writing papers without spending HOURS on it etc.

Today I am going to just work as fast as I can to address as many points as I can.  Want it FINISHED!

x J

Back to work!

Right.  These next ten days I am hoping are the final push, starting today.

I can rarely work for very long and hope that Sup's comments and indicators will help me focus on what needs to be done rather than nicer flourishes.  I am now 35 weeks pregnant and therefore liable to pop a baby any time 10 days from now (OMFG) and really need to know that can happen without er, fucking my life up.

So I have about an hour now, then we have to go to my nieces birthday party this aft.  I would like to work a bit more later while DB is doing Bean's bedtime, then I shall zonk!

Tomorrow I hope to work while DB is out with Bean buying things for this baby (Bumpy).  This should be a few hours :)  It is crackers how pleased I feel with myself when I have managed to work for half an hour while Bean is playing with a sleeping bag...  I needed to find notes yesterday so did this while he played.  The thought of a few hours alone to concentrate seems like bliss!

I shall also see if grandma can look after him a couple of afternoons this week.  That would be amazing.  Those hours and then working through bed/bathtimes and I can get this done - only the bare minimum sadly - but done.

Better get on. 

x J

Apparently I CAN do it!

Sup emailed back and apparently I am being rash and it is all fine?!

Am stunned.  Really, the last email made it sound like I really needed to pull my socks up but apparently my revisions to the conclusion I did earlier in the week are fine and so, apparently, that chapter is finished?!  The remainder of the work, he assures me, can be done just fine.

Hmmm.  I am working on it now as he really has put in so much effort for me to get me finished that it would be rude not to!  And the thought of completing and having the baby and just ahhhhh having completely finished is very motivating.

I just honestly thought I didn't have enough time.  If I do, I will do it - even if I have to work in the evenings like now, when I feel like death and just need to sleeeeeeep :)

Hmmm.

Well.  I shall get on with it until 8.30 then stop and have some evening for myself before sleep...  I have three full days of being a veer pregnant single mum in front of me!

x J

I feel so blue!

Oh eck.

Just got the guts up to email sup and say I am going to defer :(  I feel like such a loser.  DB says that I felt like this when I was organising maternity leave for beanie too, I don't remember and don't know why I would feel like that tbh!  It is my legal right!  I can't help being the lady.

Anyway. This time I feel it has gone Too Far!  What with sick leave last year etc :(  I feel like such a pain.  I wish the work would just be DONE but there is just too much to do.  The two case studies and extra literature for a start...  am due to have a baby any time after two weeks which is a momentous thing; I mean, I have to push the beggar out and haven't given it any thought because work is taking up all my brain.  I can't go to any evening preggers classes because I am committed to working instead.  But I can't even sit at my desk for long because my ankles swell so badly and I get pins and needles/numbness in my hands when typing.  It's not cool.

In myself I am perfectly happy with my decision.  Now I have realised I can't finish before the baby comes I am looking forward (in a way) to coming back to it and it will give me something to sort of work towards in maternity leave - rather than just being a SAHM for the foreseeable.  I am knackered and know that in a year my brain will be back and itching to think about something other than baby puke.  I have the thesis written, have even done the viva (phew!) and will have a comprehensive idea of what needs changing.  And I will have the three months to do it in - not just 2/3 weeks like I have now :)  That would be great :). 

Just feel terrible telling Sup, and terrified of telling Uni.

If only DB could have got pregnant with this baby!

x J

Erm... have to defer for a year!

Oh my crackers.

Sup has sent me a very kind but firm email saying that I have a lot of work to do that normally would take three months (as is normal for minor corrections) but I have only one month...  so without stating the obvious he wants me to crack on with it all smartish!

Only problems are that erm, I am going to have a baby in a few weeks (two to five weeks)...  and I have no childcare for bean (nurseries are full until September and even if I could get him in there would be a two week settling in period for him)...  and I am too tired/poorly for evening work.  Even if I had no child or pregnancy I would be up against it.  I have realised that to do these corrections (or, as Sup put it, not insubstantial revisions/rewrites) properly I need to actually WORK, not do a bit of plaster sticking here and there.  I can't hand something in that the examiner then says 'eh?!  this is shit, redo it!'

So I have decided to pack it in for now, go on maternity leave and come back in a year and finish it all off in the three months.  I don't have a choice, but actually I don't even mind.  I am not going to 'need' the doctorate over the next year as obviously I will be looking after the baby.  The work I am coming back to is straightforward, just time-consuming, no massive brain work as such.  I have written the thesis so can easily catch up with where I was, I will also have the viva report by then too (I haven't even got that yet!).

Uni will be cross with me, and so will Sup :(  I feel shit about that.  But I actually love the idea that I can stop worrying about work so much (at all!), spend these last few precious weeks with Beanie before our lives implode with a new addition, go to pregnancy yoga to prepare for the birth (eek!  I haven't gone so far because I think 'if I have time/energy for yoga I have time/energy to work!) and, for once, put the baby before work.  And then after a year I shall come back, concentrate and just blitz this in the three months... and then get a job :)

Is weird to realise I won't finish properly before the baby is born but...  needs must!

x J

Back Again

Just looked over the work I did yesterday and edited for a bit, but generally am very pleased with it.

Will send off to Sup now tho there are a couple of points I haven 't addressed yet because I am waiting for the books from Amazon.  I am a 1.5 hour drive away from my local uni library so, without childcare for Bean, I am buggered without amazon!  I spent about £30 on books to finish the reading I need to do which is annoying BUT I can send the more expensive ones back or at least trade them in and get some of the value back.  It is worth it really to get the work done!

Sooo I think I will slope off for the day now and come back later and do the easy stuff (translations) in front of the tv tonight when Bean is asleep. 

I am glad I am getting work underway.  It is like a mildly irritating but comfortable marriage really.  Am not best pleased and think rather too often that I would like out, but then when we come together it is rather pleasing in a grumpy way.

Beautiful sunshine, beaches and spring loveliness beckon!

x J

Working away - it's all rather fluent

Well, well, well.

I finally got down to some work and after a few hours of sort of working and sort of not working I have been working away.

And it is really interesting and brilliant, actually, how easily my brain has got back into thinking about it all again.  In fact, even though I have had some shitty work to do it has almost been pleasing.  (Almost.)  Like, Sup wanted me to look at two other examples that correlate with my case-study, which basically means reading reports about, understanding and then regurgitating two more case-studies when I have been studying this one for FIVE years.  I hated reading the reports for this PhD!  (Who likes reading reports?!)  It took me ages!  So much reading!  So much paper!  But today I managed to filter out the actual reading I needed to do, rather than reading everything (it is for a purpose - to be referenced!  If it won't be referenced, don't read it!)  I grabbed the quotes I wanted straight away and wrote them into the chapter, then referenced them in endnote straight away.  In the end I have added 1000 words of analysis and explanation from about 4 good references - I might need more refs but they show what I need to say so why not just leave it at that for now.  (I wish I had a couple more refs but actually there aren't any more online to be found for now.)  But it looks like I know what I am talking about and that I have a point to make, the same as if I had reams of notes I hadn't used under my desk.

I have written no notes and not done my usual read, write, think, regurgitate into chapter. 

I think this is very interesting and shows that I have come a long way from when I started out on the PhD, when I was researching and would read everything, and have tonnes of notes.  It means that I have enough background knowledge now that I can work with surface information in a more in-depth way - I am using the info to back MY ideas up, ideas I have had for years, rather than learning everything anew.  This is interesting and a real development.  In this sense I am glad I had corrections to do because I didn't know that I had learnt to work like this...  I thought being an academic would mean starting from scratch with notes etc but actually, it would be working on what I know and I seem to know more than I think.  I do feel rather grown-up about it all, like writing a paper about what I know - which obviously I would do - from the PhD wouldn't necessarily be arduous and take forever.  It is about my thoughts and then I think 'ah!  so-and-so writes about this let me see if I can get a quote' and on we go.  Typing is quite fast in comparison with when you start out and don't know what you want to say/how to say it/who to use to back it up.

Very interesting!  And motivating!

x J

ok ok, time to focus :)

So, so far I have read various websites (revelling in my freedom to read on my laptop!) and nipped out to get some heartburn prescription from the drs

This, my dears, is apparently the working habits of an actual Dr.  You could be like this one day!  (joke.  I presume you will be an actual professional!)

SOOOO back to the drawing board for me!

I am going to make a coffee (hehe) and then, then, I shall start my clock and work for ten minutes, then have ten mins off.  I shall continue in this vein until I get into the rhythm of working more than not!  Such a bad rabbit.

x J

yay I have a WHOLE afternoon

I am so happy that I have a whole afternoon just to work. 

I have a lovely, bright little space to work in which is very temporary but I have two windows to look out of which is most pleasing.  I have an enormous bump to work around and which is really sat in my lap and is rather amusing if uncomfortable!  And the house is peaceful.  It is so quiet.  It is a rare moment that I am home alone without (a very noisy) Bean atm :) 

So I have to make sure that I get lots done! 

I have had an email from Sup about my conclusion chapter so will work on that first.  Then I will get my translations sorted out.  I think that is probably all I will have time for, but if I have more time then I shall start reading the literature I have got on my kindle.  I am going to speed read - I have done this area of lit before many a time, but am not conversant in it properly - and just focus on intros and conclusions.  Get an idea of the key issues, how they relate to my work, how they DIFFER from my work (the key point) and then regurgitate that into my thesis.  Probably in my lit review.

So, onwards!

x J

Deep breaths and carry on

I had a small meltdown this morning...

DB was in a foul mood with his work yesterday and basically took it out on me all day and when he said that my meeting with Sup today was causing him angst I cancelled it.  Sup was fine about it, it is the only time I have ever not made a meeting so I don't feel too bad, just wish I could have gone!  All that knowledge I could have! 

But anyway, hopefully DB will realise that his whining does have an affect and I just won't take it any more - if he has an issue with me working he should tell me and I will sort it out.  I can't ignore it and just meekly bow to all his grumpiness - it does have an effect, in this case, me cancelling my appt.  I know he feels shit about it now but we will just have to move on.  I hate, hate, hate the negative affect taking time out to work has on the family :(.  Having kids and doing a PhD is so tough!

So anyway, I was very upset this morning about having to cope with late pregnancy (am so so so so tired), Beanie playing up and work demands with absolutely no bugger to help me.  I know we did the right thing by moving so I can't regret it - if we were up north still I might well have childcare but I would still be waiting to move down and still would only have one friend...  It feels right to be down here now.  I have had a second to think tho and have realised that I need to get back to work basics.  Basically I have had three months off and so getting back into it even if it is only for a few weeks will be tough and I must play it cleverly!

SOOOO:

• I will need to get a temporary desk (I know!  I don't have one, it is the dining room table now!)  I have a work area sorted out that I like so that is good.

• I will need to work in ten minute slots again until I get back into it.

• I will need to commit to working properly.  Even tho they are 'corrections' and the body of the thesis is written, effectively I have been told it isn't finished yet and there are some holes that need serious attention.  I must attend to these holes with said serious attention, not flighty or sulky half-measures.

• The literature I need to read I can download on my kindle and return to amazon within a week and not have to pay for it.  Take advantage of this!  Otherwise, buy the buggering books.  I will read about 10 books on this literature to get a broad but strong sense of themes without being bogged down.  That should suffice and at least is a baseline to work from.

• Don't think/worry about giving birth!  Just get on, you have at least three weeks to be starting with.  If you have the baby then apply for an extension or some form of maternity leave, am sure it will be fine (they wouldn't fail me at this stage would they?!?!).  Realising this has been a huge step for me as the stress of having to have it done NOW so I can relax and prepare to have a baby was getting on top of me.

• Work a bit every day.  Ask friends to help out with bean for an hour or two when possible and take every snippet of time you can.  Is not for long!

• Get over the fact that you thought you had finished all the hard work!  Just read through the notes Sup sent, your own notes from the viva and get your head down.  Every ten mins worked is another ten mins closer to the finish line.  And if you work properly now then hopefully it was be accepted by the examiner and you will NEVER SEE IT AGAIN.  Oh what a day that will be to know I really have finished it!

• Work on it as a monologue to start with then feed it into the thesis when you work out where it should go!  This prevents the stress of messing about with pagination etc and fecking up the thesis as it stands.  (Am very nervous about doing this so best to keep the new work away from the old, established work for now!)

So think that is that.  DB has taken DS out for an impromptu tip run (exciting times!) so I have had this time to garble out my thoughts and start breathing again.  In fact, I almost feel good about it all.  I have also booked a haircut for tomorrow night which sounds crackers but having not had it done for nearly a year I look a total state and it is depressing.  Am actually looking forward to going out to have something done simply for me :)  I am not blooming in this pregnancy, my skin is sallow and a total blotchy mess so having nice hair will sort my psychological state out a treat.  Bean was much happier this afternoon once I sorted out my mardiness about having to work and now I have written this and made a plan all seems much better with the world!

I think, to be honest, the shock of how much work I have to do (not looooads - but I am 34 weeks pregnant so have a very real deadline.  If I didn't and had the whole 4/5 months or so it would be a breeze!) and the fact that if I don't have it done I will have this work to do AND A NEWBORN BABY terrified me into a panicked, weepy, snotty corner.  Plus the fact I don't want to work (I want to sort out cots and eat fish and chips and sleep) didn't help.  I am over my sulk now and ready to meet the challenge.

So am off to amazon to get some books.

Laters!

x J
 

Arg!

I opened my uni email and Sup is on my case...

This is obviously a good thing, I am so fortunate to have a Sup who cares and is a workaholic enough to be emailing me over easter with suggestions of how to get cracking (hehe!) on my corrections...  But ARG too.  I read what he had written and my heart went into my boots.  Nearly had a weep and got on with it.

In the end it turned out that basically I needed to write into my conclusion what was said in my viva - particularly the answers I gave to questions.  At the time I was answering with my fist in my mouth and kind of felt like I was making a lot of it up...  Am not a brilliant academic and don't really know that much.  I definitely need to know more.  But I am at a stage now where I am sure I am not meant to start doing swathes more research?  Nah.  I know I have one area of lit to read up on but mostly they were keen to impress upon me that what they were saying sounded like a big deal but really actually wasn't.  I shall hold onto this.

So I have stuffed myself with lunch and, armed with easter egg choc, am back at the laptop with the wonderful great british bake off for company :)  Am sure my family will be home soon so need to get on with it.

I have managed to do most of the corrections Sup sent me but haven't started on the translations yet. 

Am so sleepy!

x J

In a pickle

I am putting my head in the sand completely about the fact that I have this work to do and NO childcare and NO energy!

Eek!

Grandma is my childcare and she is off on holidays for two weeks, so when she gets back I will be one week away from possibly giving birth.  I definitely want to have this work done by then.  DB is away next week on a work trip.  So I shall be at home all day with Beanie and, I guess, will have to work in the evenings?!  OMG that will be hellish - I am asleep by 9pm of an evening I am so knackered.

I am just having a whine, of course.  If I need to work evenings then that is what I will do.  I guess I will have a better picture of timings when I have seen Sup on weds...

Today I have the day to myself as DB has taken Beanie to visit his great grandma with the rest of his clan.  I am excused on the grounds of late pregnancy!  But I am working - or trying to.  The work I have to do today is easy peasy - I have to change my translations into proper English and re-format my thesis into the style preferred by the uni for final publication.  The more complicated bits I will need to sort after weds but I really do hope that with some concerted effort I can get it done in two weeks.  THEN I will get to start maternity leave...  unless they send it back to me for more corrections :(

Ach.  We'll see!  My sup is being, er, super and is very keen to help me finish it up :)

x J

Post viva sup meeting!

Erk I have a meeting with my Sup on weds!

I have been waiting for a report from my viva which outlines clearly the corrections I have to make and was under the impression that the 3 month deadline doesn't start until I receive this report.  I do believe the latter understanding is true...  but apparently the report won't come for weeks yet!  Eek!  I will give birth in a matter of weeks!!

So am off up north (only an hour up the road) to meet with Sup so we can go thru the corrections and how to tackle them.  It is the first ever meeting with him that I will not be nervous about!  I am not joking (well, if you read this blog then I think you would know I always get very stressed about supervisor meetings!).  Will be great to know what the corrections are properly because I was in a very stressed-out fog in the viva and nodded at everything ;0)

Sooo, am still in the game until I have sent my corrected edition off to the internal examiner (a scarily intelligent and exacting lady) and it has been approved.  This in itself may take a couple of weeks depending on her availability etc so I have stopped thinking I am going to get this PhD completely wrapped up before the baby comes.  But I don't have much to do - nothing that a week or ten days of a good blitz of working won't sort out. 

I am not really tackling any of the corrections now even tho I could.  I was doing an hour here and there in the evenings but am so tired and just don't care!  I have allll day Monday sans Bean and DB so will just get my head down and get on with it all then.  Before I see Sup I can do the corrections that the copyzone need me to do before it can be officially bound (pagination bla bla) and in the viva they said they wanted my translations to be in proper English, not 'indian-english'.  So that is straightforward enough.  There is deleting of repetition to be done apparently near the end and a sentence doesn't make sense - but there are virtually no typos or grammar issues :)  I have to add some literature that I haven't so far which is fine and I hope it shouldn't amount to more than a day or two solid in the library...  and the internal said that she will give me a reading list (because this lit is huuuuuuge and I didn't know where to start with it!).

Anyways.  Am not off anywhere quite yet, still plugging away altho the pressure is certainly off (apart from the whole newborn baby bit!).  I am looking forward to weds because it will be good to know how much I do have to do - and start doing it!

Oh -and THANK YOU for the congrats everyone!  So lovely :)

x J

Did my Viva :)

And passed with minor corrections :)

Just a few bits and bobs to sort out, nothing too major and on the whole they said they really liked it! 

The viva was hellishly awful tho, I was exhausted and trembled my way through it all - I never relaxed into is as I hoped I might.

Will be back on later and write up properly what it was like and try and offer any advices at all on coping./preparing with it!  Have only just go broadband from moving in three weeks ago hence the radio silence.

Can't believe I got my doctorate tho :) :) :)

x J

Good Viva Prep Info

Just found this, it is really good viva prep information from leicester uni:

http://www2.le.ac.uk/departments/gradschool/training/resources/viva

x J

Confidence plummeting

Oh there is too big a gap until my viva to dwell!

I can't stop thinking about it and am getting really worked up about it.  I am going to have to get out my thesis tomorrow I think and look through it, then if it is that bad at least I know what I am working with...  but actually I hope that looking through it will be pleasantly surprising.  We shall see.

I had a bitchy email from the uni hub yesterday too saying that I had done the thesis wrong - the pagination was not to uni requirements and the front cover needed to be re-done.  I am really sad about this.  Gutted actually!  They said they would send it to the examiners anyway (wtf?!  Only now?!  I handed it in over five weeks ago :()  but when I hand it in proper I will have to have it done properly.  There was a link in the email to a page that said how the uni want the thesis to be done, which I could really have done with before I submitted but no bugger showed it to me.  I feel let down and just pissed off.  I had info from last year about how to submit which I don't think I was expected to know was all of a sudden out of date.  I only had that info because a friend (who submitted last year using these guidelines) sent it to me.  I searched the uni website for something like this to no avail.  I searched in the research handbook, nothing.  I asked the uni admin, nothing.  My sup was pretty chilled about how to hand it in and even had me changing the margin and my front cover from the requirements I had, which made me think that it must all be 'guidelines' rather than 'requirements'.  In the end I had two front covers, and the one that has been criticised I didn't even design!  I have never seen it before!

On the one hand I am berating myself for not knowing this info.  Why didn't I find it?  I have written a PhD thesis ffs, I should be able to format it properly!  how lazy/slack of me not to have done it right :(.  But on the other hand I am aware that if I looked for it, but didn't find it, how could I have known it was there?  Maybe someone could have pointed it in my direction?  I guess this is what happens when you are out of Uni for a long time.  I dunno, but I can't help but feel like I have been ticked off and it sets a grim precedent for the viva :(

Generally I am grumpy and stressy at the mo, with moving house etc, and am terrified of the viva and all the work I will have to do afterwards.  Hopefully when I am in the new house and mostly unpacked I shall be able to breathe out and focus on the viva stuff for a week or two with a clearer head... 

I really really want it over with now so I can get one with the corrections and my life :)  Oh that would be marvellous!

x J

Viva Chat with Sup in March

Righty, I am meeting Sup on the 1 March at the uni he works at for a viva pep talk.

This will be a Very Important Meeting and am convinced I will come out near tears with worry.  I don't think my PhD is that good, (is good enough but not wow!  Great! and I don't like less than great tbh) and think there will be holes to fill during the defence.  I am dreading a face to face meeting where sup tells me it is a bit crap :(  Ach well.

In the meantime I am packing to move house which we will do in less than three weeks...  we will have moved in for less than a week when I meet with Sup and then I shall have just over two weeks to use his advices to prep for the viva.  Then I shall do the viva and have about 3 weeks- 1 month to sort out corrections before I go into labour.  Eek!

Bean has had terrible tonsilitus and altho it has gone he is so wiped out he can only do half a day of active anything then zonks on the settee all aft.  I am sad for the poor mite but cannot tell you how happy I am that I can look after him completely and utterly, without any feelings of guilt or insane stress about how I shall miss a work deadline.  My stress levels are immeasurably improved!  Am so very lucky :)

However in my normal life I am now reaching a point where I am thinking or dreaming about moving or viva meetings/prep/nerves/imaginings too much and can't really concentrate on anything else. I have a great book I am trying to read but keep drifting off to be worried!

Other than that I can honestly say that I am still very happy to have finished it! 

x J

Doing a PhD Viva

18 March it is then.  Hurray!  What a great date.

Will be from 10am - 12pm...  So not too long and should whizz by.  I am sure going into the room will be the worst possible bit, then once we get talking it will be ok, even if I don't like the questions.

I am starting to worry about it a lot now so have emailed Sup to see if he has any tips for preparing.  As far as I know I will need to:

• re-read the thesis
• note weak points
• summarise the thesis and each chapter
• remember why I did the thesis: what my motivation was, where it fits into scholarship, how it is er, good and useful
• re-visit (possibly) major texts
• catch up on latest lit
• read up about examiners and latest papers

Doing all this should take about a week of proper work (ie if Bean is in childcare) or 10 days of bits of evenings and weekends here and there.  we shall have to see how moving and nursery works out!  I don't want to get into it too much but enough so I feel like I have prepared myself in some way.  From what I read it seems that this is how everyone prepares but afterwards people tend to say that you couldn't have prepared really and to expect the unexpected! 

Passing and awards etc are generally as thus:

1 - Straight pass, perfect thesis, no corrrections necessary.
2 - Pass but with minor corrections (grammar, spelling, refs) to be done within three months.
3 - Pass but with more corrections, bit of re-writing, to be done within six months.
4 - Pass but on condition of serious rewriting to be done within a year.
5 - MPhil-worthy but not-PhD worthy (my greatest fear as my thesis was quite short and now feels very simplistic!)
6 - Fail, fail, fail.  Extremely unlikely, your sup would probably be in Big Trouble if you submitted and failed!

You go in, have the chat, they tell you to leave and chat about what to do with you and then most likely you will be congratulated and said you are a Dr BUT need to do some corrections.  You would be told what these corrections are and then go off and do them.  I am dreading this so much!  I cannot face re-visiting the thesis to do anything serious.  I see shoddy refs and that is fine.  But rewriting.  I am still paranoid about my crap lit review, intro and conclusion chapters.  I suppose tho, if I re-write it will be to a template of sorts as they would have told me what to do, which would be ok (no it won't!).  I will have a month before getting too preggo/popping to think so that is a good amount of time. 

Unless you fail-fail you don't have another viva and one or both examiners will just check the corrections to make sure you addressed the issues ok.  Then you get it bound proper and leave the begger forever!

Am worried about it but not as worried now I have resigned myself to having to work again soon, then again afterwards.  It was a nasty shock to think I will have to go back to PhD-land to be honest but is not for long now.  The viva itself I am feeling quite sorted about in a 'just let's get it over with' kind of way.  Is not like a presentation or anything awful, I really have no idea what will happen.

I must be prepared:

• To be blindsided by questions I hadn't thought of and to take my time answering these!  NO BLUFFING!
• For the examiners to come accross as unfriendly even if this is just an act (I had a job interview like this once - the interviewers were very rude but I got the job and apparently they loved me?!)
• For the examiners to want a good debate (I do not want a debate.  I hate debating, it is too confrontational for me!)
• To be confident.  I MUST act confidently.
• To be loyal to my thesis even if I do think it is a bag of shite.  I am there to defend it not hang my head and say it is shite.
• To have a lunch thing afterwards :(  I am truly more concerned about this shebang than I am the viva.  I HATE lunch things.  I cannot do small talk and will just want to run off to nandos with DB and relax!

So there we are for now. 

x J


 

Fingers crossed...

The 18 March has now been mooted.

Oh please, please let this be the date!  I can totally make that; I will be 31/32 weeks preggo instead which is totally manageable.  I will have weeks to do corrections too. 

Please be the date!  A room has been booked for 10am so I really am hopeful this is it :)  I have my birthday on the 21st, then my bestest friends are coming to visit me from London in my new abode before I pop another childer and become a complete recluse...  and so we decided to also have our housewarming that weekend.  So will be a big celebration of loveliness (even tho I might have lots of rewriting which would be depressing.)  But then it could be nice to celebrate not having to do another viva?!  I guess I only have the one, and then do the corrections and get the degree?

Lordy, I don't actually know!

x J

Aw

Had an email from Sup, he is trying his best love him and has said that he is making it clear to the examiners that he will not let me undertake the viva at a time that is medically unadvisable or when I simply don't feel comfortable. 

I feel bad now.

Still a crappy situation tho :(

x J

viva shit continued

Apparently I have to do the viva at 36 weeks preggo or wait until June (when I have a one month old baby WTF) or September (with a four month old.  Still massively WTF). 

A) I will have to take my baby into the viva at that stage to breastfeed.  Getting my boobs out in front on staring stranges and my Sup, however discreetly, is not an option.  (especially with a one month old still working out his latch!!!!!)  B) I will have had no sleep since May.  C) WTF?!  It makes me sad no-one seems to think about how having a baby is a life changing event.  Like, I can't seem to be abel to say 'No, I can't do the viva in April or May because I am HAVING A FUCKING BABY.'  I don't have a nanny and I AM the bloody lactating mother so can hardly hand the baby over to someone else for a day or two.  It just isn't an issue in male-dominated aca-fucking-demia.

I know people could say 'oh well, you got pregnant it's your bed' bla bla but actually it is not typical to have a viva nearly five months after submission.  I was told the viva would be in feb/march - 2-3 months after submission which is pretty normal and I could ballet dance to that in this second trimester of pregnancy.  Nor did I baulk at doing it when 34 weeks pregnant (altho that would be shit too but far more copeable, with time to do the corrections before needing to focus on the imminent hell that is labour).  Now I could be facing a viva 6-9 months after submission which in itself is shit.  9 months after would be awful wouldn't it - you can't get on with your life while it is still there, waiting to be done :(  I couldn't enjoy my new baby and life.  You would forget what the fuck it was all about and feel a need to keep working a bit here and there to keep your hand in :(.  More lit would have come out so there would be that much more catching up to do beforehand.  And, tbh, by 9 months wouldn't anyone have lost enthusiasm for it?!  I am looking outside of uni now and even dislike going into my study for the stressy memories - and I only handed in a month ago!

FFS.  I am so gutted.  So I have had to chipperly say let's go for the April date.  It is the best out of a bad bunch.  I do NOT want this PhD anywhere near my baby.  It was so stressful last time with Bean and trying to bloody work and act like I hadn't even had a baby.  It really fucks me off.

I know this is tantrummy but then again, that is what this blog is about really.  I honestly don't bloody care about it, it is just getting on my bloody nerves now :(. 

Grrrrrrr.

I must think.  Could later be better.  If I go in April and come out with loads of corrections then what, exactly, was the point of going in April because I shan't be able to do them.  Tho I might be able to make a start and organise myself some to enjoy the newborn bit (or at least relax into the hell of sleepless nights).  I think knowing what is in store would be useful.  And yeah, Sept would not be cool.  I wouldn't be able to think about a viva until bubs is about 6 mths and life has settled down a bit.  My friends who have two children have been dribbling, crying desperate wrecks until about 6 months and they are on maternity leave!  DB and I have argued so much since having Bean about each having time to work.  I cannot and will not go back there (life is MUCH happier since finishing the PhD!)

Oh FFS.

x J

New viva date: nightmare

Oh bloody hell.  Now it seems my viva date is the week of the 15th april...  when I will be 36 weeks pregnant :(

I am insanely unhappy about this.  I had Bean when I was 37 weeks!  At 36 weeks I was pretty immobile and definitely very very stupid, absent minded, hormonal and in huge nesting mode.  I hated going out of the house let alone to the other side of the country,  For an exam.  With strangers.  This means I will have to travel 7/8 hours on the train, I will be huge and stressed and, if last time is anything to go by, in serious pain when walking :(  PLUS this means I will have no maternity time and might be doing corrections with a newborn.  My whole bloody fucking pregnancy will be about graft - finishing the PhD, moving house, hospital appts, and now the viva. 

Well, I shan't be doing corrections with a newborn and a preschooler.  The thing is I can't say this.  As a stupid bloody professional I have to pretend my life doesn't exist so I have to say yes, I shall do the viva, yes I shall do the corrections.  About to give birth or no, newborn or no. 

Bah shit fucking wank tits.  If my toddler wasn't in the room I would fully sob. 

x J

 

Viva Date

I have a Viva date!

It is on the morning of the 5 April :)  Ages away which gives me lots of time to move house and settle in and prepare which is great.  Does mean I will be 34 weeks preggers tho eek!  And if I have lots of corrections then goodbye last few days of 'maternity leave'.  Sup said it will be over by lunchtime which I know is pretty standard but does give me hope that it won't be a four hour grilling of how shit it all is.

I got the bound thesis through the post the other day too, it is HUGE!  I can't bear to look at it and spot all the typos and horror within, tho I know I have to.  Not for a good month yet tho :)

Anywho.  I love my new life without my PhD!  Moving house is so easy without feeling like I need to work all the time too like previous moves.  I just get up. dither around with Bean and pack some boxes, eat some chocolate, dither a bit more and then read my book and sleep.  It is rather pleasant :)

The viva is definitely hanging over my head tho, and the threat of corrections is terrifying!

x J

Viva

Dear Sup

Please stop talking about my Viva.  I am pretending, for a few blissful weeks, that the PhD no longer exists.

Thanking you

x J

Life post-submission update

We have pretty much got the house in the South so will be moving away from studentville for proper next month!

is crackers and exciting and strange. 

But mostly I wanted to say that now I have been finished for a couple of weeks, I feel differently than I thought.  Because people ask me 'ah!  Do you feel much better now you have finished?!'  And I say, 'oh yes'.  But actually, I don't feel 'better' as such...  I feel sane, my brain feels cleaner and I am a lot happier to be around.  I really am much better company.  But mostly I feel NORMAL and wonder how on EARTH I ever did my PhD and live my life as I do now!  :)  I am knackered after looking after Bean all day, how on earth did I do this and then work in the evening?  And at the weekend?!  How did I do house stuff and watch Beanie and worry about him like I do, and worry about work at the same time and not go crackers?!  I honestly don't know how I did it.

And I thought i would miss the time to myself that I had as part of the PhD, while beanie was with the childminder.  But I really don't.  When I do have time to myself I do relish it/wonder what to do with myself but in the main I am really glad I don't have to take him to the childminder any more.  I love taking him to nursery (he started preschool this week, his first 'institutional' daycare experience) because he loves it, and it is all about him - not because i have to work when I know he would rather be with me...  But I am loving my freedom to try different groups with him and take each day as it comes.  It really is lovely.

But yeah, rather than being grateful to NOT be doing it, mostly I wonder how I ever did do it!  If anyone said to me now - work on a PhD and do what you do now - I would baulk and say absolutely no way could I do that!

But I did and thank GOD it won't come back.  even corrections cannot be the same as writing the bugger :)  Finishing is brilliant! 

x J

March Viva and Other Things

Soooooo!

My Viva is looking likely to be in March, which is great as Feb feels too soon (!) and gives me confidence of a sort (that is most likely misplaced) that I can't be up for too many corrections...  Sup knows my baby is due in May so I doubt he would send me to a viva in March that needed lots of work...  or would he, I don't know.  Arf.

Life post-submission is delightful :)  Well, in theory it is.  I don't have to work, I can watch tv all night and not feel guilty and every day is saturday.  I do feel a bit worried but now I know the viva won't spring up on me next week I feel better.  Like am on a long holiday.  Am not worried about the viva now as I have asked around and really there is nothing I can do about it now, and a few people even said that try as they might they couldn't read the thesis or books or do ANY more work between submission and the viva... so went in and just dealt with the questions and realised they knew it all anyway.  I feel this.

In real life tho it has been a busy and sad time.  My PhD friend died last week from a shitty cancer tht she was only diagnosed with last feb.  Is so bloody sd and am incredibly pissed off about it.  Is hard to think that this time last year we were both admitting that we had shed a tear on New Years Eve thinking about how this will be Submission Year...  then she got cancer, left uni and bloody died.  I submit, she passes away.  We were meant to submit and graduate at the same time.  Is awful :(

In less dreadful news we have applied to rent a house in the South and should move next month.  This is also a mixed bag of news...  it is wonderful to be moving closer to friends and family so we have help with our young family and be near the sea.  And we aren't yorkshire folk so it makes sense to move now uni is finished.  But at the same time we have lived here for about 6/7 years now and live in a fabulous village and we just love it.  And it is all our son has known.  After a trip South to see the houses this week he is clearly delighted to be back in his homeland, so taking him away from it all will be a wrench.  But this is the stuff of life eh?  And it will be sad to leave where I knew my PhD and my PhD friend.  Quite a few endings at the same time.  I will be back tho, for the viva and (fingers crossed!) graduation, so maybe it won't be too harsh an ending.  And we will have a new baby and a brilliant new home and life to be getting on with.  I just have to deal with the ending first, to move into the new beginnings.

Hehe, I have had a dilemma this week as I had to fill in the application for the house and I was ITCHING to tick the 'Dr' box :)  So close and yet so far!  As it stands I am an unemployed housewife.  Not much of a prospect when it comes to applying to rent a housey.  But if I was an unemployed housewife that was a Dr, well, that means I did something doesn't it?!  It means I worked so hard, and yes, I look after my son now, but I worked once and will again.  It is so prestigious, it definitely brings the snob factor out in people and lends a certain amount of security to me as a person (or non-person as stay-at-home mums too often are) and will give me such a leg-up when I re-enter the job market in a few years time :)  So much better than a Masters, because they are only useful for a small window of time.  A PhD shows so many skill sets and, over all, a determination and will to succeed working on a project for a loooooong time (they don't know how I whined and dithered my way through it ;)).  Do it peeps, stick at it!

Anyways.  Am glad I know when my viva is likely to be now and that my submission made it to the office!  Now, erm...  off to make bagels and spend my day feeling pleased, lazy and completely surprised that I really had the determination to complete :)  Do it people, life on the other side really is all you think it will be!

x J