Grad School- The Beginning of the End

I’ve spent a week writing and rewriting this post. I didn’t want it to sound like I’m whiney, but I am still bitter about how I was treated. However, if I remove the whininess, the post reads as cold and uncaring. So please pardon the whininess.

One of the first steps to writing your dissertation is to write your literature review (lit review) section. This section is supposed to demonstrate the state of the field when you began your research (and also demonstrate your ability to read and discuss primary literature). Some universities have detailed guidelines about the content of each section of your dissertation. Excluding font, font size, margins and table of contents requirements, my university really doesn’t have any dissertation guidelines at all. Pretty much, at my university, your dissertation committee tells you what they want in your dissertation- especially for your lit review chapter. So I submitted an outline of my dissertation to my committee prior to receiving permission to begin writing. Said outline was approved with a few minor revisions (a few topics added into the lit review). I then wrote the lit review and submitted it to Prof Sunshine on March 17. I expected to have a lot of revisions on the lit review because I was writing it while finishing my experiments, so my focus was a bit split. However, by the time 3 months went by and I hadn’t received any feedback, I thought I might have done a better job than I initially thought (I do tend to be a bit of a perfectionist). WRONG! On July 2nd, less than 24 hours before I left for home so that I could spend 6 weeks out of the lab writing the remaining 3 chapters of my dissertation (materials and methods, and one experimental chapter had already been approved), Prof Sunshine then gave me his required revisions on the lit review. Essentially, he wanted it expanded by 100 pages. This made my already tight timetable even tighter. Me being me, I attempted to re-write my lit review and write the remaining 3 chapters (2 experimental chapters and 1 “what does this mean in the grand scheme of things” chapter). I was so nervous about getting my dissertation done that I couldn’t keep anything in my stomach but watermelon and toast. I was also running 3-6 miles a day in at least 80F heat. With this level of exercise, a diet of watermelon and toast just doesn’t cut it- there aren’t enough calories. I didn’t sleep at all the 2 weeks before my dissertation was due. I’d go to bed, but my mind would be racing, so I’d end up getting up and working some more on my dissertation. The one time that I actually fell asleep in this period, my phone rang- it was Prof Sunshine telling me that he wanted more revisions on the chapter he had already approved! Needless to say, I came very, very close to making myself extremely ill. 2 days before my dissertation was due to my committee, I opened up one of my experimental chapters and found the last section I’d worked on written in French (and not very well I might add). At that point, I realized that I didn’t have enough time to fix everything before my defense, so I called the university and canceled my defense. I then shut my phone off, handed my laptop over to my dad (so that I couldn’t work), took 2 Benadryl and went to sleep. I slept for exactly 4 hours (normally 2 Benadryl knock me flat for at least 8 hours). I then returned the pissy phone call from Prof Sunshine letting him know that I wasn’t returning to the university until I’d had at least 12 hours more of sleep. I don’t really remember that conversation (can we say Benadryl hangover?), but I’m sure that I was a complete and total bitch. Actually, as I’m writing this, I’m realizing just how sketchy my memory is of this time- which tends to make me think that lack of sleep had me in a borderline (OK, probably not so borderline) psychotic state.

I returned to university to face the consequences of canceling my defense. Prof Sunshine was furious. He had been counting on me finishing so that he didn’t have to pay my salary and tuition. After talking the entire situation over with Prof Sunshine, my program director and my department head, I decided that I would take a leave of absence. This would free Prof Sunshine of having to pay my tuition and my salary and allow me to set my own timetable for completing my dissertation (it would also allow me to recover). It seemed like such a good idea to my sleep-deprived mind. So I took a leave of absence, packed up all my stuff and moved into my parents’ basement with my husband and our Great Dane.