(I’ll warn you now – this is a LONG blog post, so grab a coffee)
From Start to Finish
The question I’ve been asked SO many times by fellow PhD students (online and in person) is ‘how long does it take to write up?’. Unfortunately, there is no right answer. This is something only you and your supervisor can determine between you.
One thing that may impact your writing time, is how much writing you have done along the way. Thankfully, my University had annual progress reviews which encouraged writing from the beginning. Knowing this at the start of my PhD, I chose to write a huge literature review in my first year, which I added to each year. This massively helped my thesis writing process, because it meant that I just needed to add updated literature and rearrange some sections in my introductory chapter; I then had more time to focus on my results and discussions for my thesis.
Setting yourself a deadline also goes hand-in-hand with your timeframe of writing. I genuinely think that setting my deadline early, and sticking to it, was what pushed me through. If you don’t have a clear deadline that your supervisor is also aware of, it is really easy to procrastinate and elongate the process. Work with your supervisor(s) to manage expectations for the both of you, and set checkpoints for sending them regular work. Getting feedback from your supervisor(s) is SO important to build your thesis up – I chose to send individual chapters to my supervisor so that I was able to work on other chapters while waiting for feedback. Research is of course very unpredictable, and every student experiences this in some way. But, you can account for this within your planning, or be adaptable to any curveballs.
To give you some context of how long it took me to write-up and submit, I began planning my thesis and writing small bits in late November. I aimed to finish data collecting in the lab by Christmas - however, due to some unforeseen circumstances, I was still doing experiments in the lab until mid-February. Alas, these experiments didn’t even work… but my mentality was ‘onwards and upwards’, and I tried to make the best of the data I already had. From this time onwards, I was full-time writing until 1st May. I would say that overall, it took me 6 months of writing, but that’s including time still in the lab, and time allowed for some unexpected eventualities within my project.
Personally, I think I initially underestimated the magnitude of work involved for writing up a thesis. This was not to say that I was unprepared (as I had planned ample time for every task/section), but weirdly I think it helped my mind-set. It meant that I hadn’t built anything up in my head, or catastrophized the entire process into an unreachable goal. Instead, I forward planned as best I could and took everything as it came.
My Routine
I do appreciate that as you’re reading through this blog post, you’re probably thinking that I was a hyper organised control-freak. And you’d be exactly right. From the offset, I planned, tried to work as efficiently as possible, and was also strict with myself without being too obsessive. For the most part (aside from a few wobbles) I was confident in how much time I had allowed myself, and the progress I was making. Each day I was writing, I set a target for what I wanted to achieve that day. I know myself, and I knew that if I didn’t set firm goals I would fall back, which would affect my motivation and land me in a negative cycle.
I very quickly got into a routine that I was comfortable with. I personally found working in the office was the best for me as it gave me structure and meant that I didn’t isolate myself at home. Generally, I made sure to go to University from about 10am – 6.30pm every week day. Once I got home, I would have dinner (watch an episode or two of the Office), and then finish up the work I was doing for the day. I then made sure to wind-down a bit before heading to bed around midnight. For most weekends, I made sure to have one day completely free, but as my deadline approached I found myself working across the weekend. This was not to say that I didn’t leave my house and didn’t socialise – I just tried to manage my time.
Another thing I found helpful was just listening to myself each day – if I felt like I was burning out, I’d adjust my day a bit to allow myself to relax. Or, if I felt too mentally foggy to write, I would work on other tasks – such as analysing data, making figures, or literature searching. This way, I could keep feeling relatively balanced whilst staying productive.
Preparing for Submission
From the very beginning I saved the final week before my deadline for any overflow. I would really recommend this to save on any major stress before you submit. However, this last week was really mentally HARD. Although I had spent 6 months working reeeeally hard and trying to be as thorough as possible, imposter syndrome and ‘analysis paralysis’ hit hard in this time –
‘What if I’ve missed something major in my field?’
‘What if I’ve missed lots of mistakes?’
‘What if I’ve analysed some data incorrectly?’
‘What if it’s not PhD standard?’
However, I feel this is totally inevitable for anyone submitting; you’ve poured years of hard work and consideration into this thesis, and you CARE about it. This is a pinnacle moment. So, although my mind was racing in this week… and I did scroll through my thesis about 100 times before printing it… there came a point where I had to draw a line and be content with the work I had produced, otherwise I would be completely paralysed striving for perfection and would have never let it go.
Wrapping-Up
So there you have it! I have to say, as challenging and demanding as this process was, writing was actually my favourite part of my PhD. I think this was the most formative time for me, allowing me to really grow as a scientist, and gain confidence. I also really enjoyed the feeling of accomplishment after seeing everything come together! Now, I'm working on some other bits over the summer and waiting eagerly for my viva! Wish me luck!
I hope you've found this post helpful! If you have any questions, or would like to share your experience, why not leave a comment!
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