Epel

I wish I had some more time too myself...It just feel like I have blown all my chances away at the moment. Good luck with your thesis though!

Hi All, I am completely new here as a member, even though I have been following this forum for a couple of years now. I am currently in my 2nd year of my 2-year MA program. I am supposed to submit my thesis next week. However, I believe I am far from done, and I can't really see the end of this anytime soon. First of all, I should admit that I do find the subject exciting, and I was really fascinated with it when I first started planning it. Last winter, I did an internship at the place on which my thesis is about (a UNESCO world heritage site)-I had been trying to get that opportunity for about a year before that, as they have too many applications each year and they are only considering a few each time. However, I feel like I am trapped now-I had started with a pretty vague concept, which I tried to narrow down during the semester, but I believe I was just lost in the subject and the literature. When I was done with the research part and sat down to write, I think I had too many little issues to deal with, that I could not connect with the material I had. Even on the rare occassion that I could finally find a connection between a theory and my material, my supervisor would dismiss it as irrelevant or that it doesn't make any sense to her. Desperately trying to find that one theoretical framework that could work on my case, I ended up with 200+ articles/books in which I was completely, absolutely lost when I was trying to write. My supervisor was also part of the problem; when I submitted a draft of my paper, she said that while my empirical material is very interesting, I had problems with being explicit about what I was trying to say, and had told me that she was really surprised by that because from previous dissertations she knew that I was a strong writer...however, every time I was expressing my concerns to her, she would just propose some more books/sources on the topic and not much constructive comments on the paper itself. I now feel absolutely stuck. I have taken two years to study abroad, in an expensive country where it is nearly impossible for an international to get a simple job and in which I have no close friends or family to turn to for emotional support...the funny thing is that when I was beginning with my thesis, I was thinking that "going underground" with not much contact with people would be great, so that I could concentrate on my work. The result was quite the opposite; I felt isolated and lonely, and most of the semester I was feeling like I was on the verge of having a panic attack/meltdown... What I am facing now is this; since I am going to use up my first submission attempt, I will be given an additional 3-month period to complete and re-submit. During these 3 months, I am also required to make a new supervision plan, which means that I will need to make changes to my thesis statement to begin with (even though I'll have to stay within the same subject) and have the same supervisor that I have now (who, by the way, I am almost 100% sure that is going to be really disappointed with this whole thing). The thing is that I am not sure if that's enough time for me to try and finish it up and still have a relatively good paper at the end, or if I should just drop out and go back home with no degree...I just feel extremely guilty towards my family, who has been highly supportive of me throughout my studies, and I feel like I'm letting them down now. I'm even thinking of not letting them know at this point but only if I submit my thesis on the new deadline, by the end of October... Does anyone else here have had a similar experience? What would you advise me to do?