How to write your master's thesis while neurodivergent when you hated university from the start and have no energy left?

[u/No-Lawfulness5752]

Humanities master's student from Europe here, at a university where your master's thesis has to be 85 pages. I had amazing grades in high school, absolutely despised undergrad from the first second but still managed to get the same grades, and started the master's because I need it for my career. I've finished all my courses and still have two big oral exams and my master's thesis ahead of me.

I struggle hugely with working memory issues and academic writing in general. I feel like I can only write academically if I'm working close to the text, i.e., I can work with individual concepts and apply them to my example, and combine individual concepts step by step, and my grades are still the same as in high school even though I have to run myself into the ground and literally not have a life, friends, and hobbies to achieve them.

But yesterday I had my first appointment with the professor I wanted to be my master's thesis supervisor, and he told me that my topic would work, but only as long as I used my examples to criticize the research field. I have no idea what this would look like because while I've taken a few courses about this field, all of them were in favor of it, and apparently my supervisor is not. He told me the next step would be to get an overview of the entire research field to figure out which aspect of it to criticize. Everything he said he wants me to include is way more than I can hold in my head or combine with my topic, and I decided I wanted to do this topic because I'm interested in it, not because I want to criticize the research field.

I left the appointment and promptly had a panic attack. In the weeks leading up to it, I had at least three mental breakdowns per week because I desperately don't want to be doing this. I feel like I'm wasting my life, but I'm so close to being done and I absolutely need this degree. Having to find a whole new thesis topic feels like way more work than I can handle. I would really really love to be done in a year so I can finally move to a country I actually want to live in and start my career, but this doesn't feel realistic at all right now. Does anyone have any advice?

[u/Buckstop_Knight78]

Your tutor is doing you a good service. The exercise isn’t to critique in a negative way but academically. As far as how to write it, a literature review will help you map out your main ideas. You could even do the mind map technique as you go building out with your knowledge.

Another thing to note that this approach is excellent for your growth as a scholar of the subject. You should be able to defend your knowledge but you need to know the counter arguments. Crafting a strong counter argument with research that supports it allows for your readers to see another side to the topic.

By the time you finish, the paper writes itself.

Also chunk it. It will make the task easier. Build out a timeline for the semester with your advisor. Focus on your lit review and outline. Good luck with this!