u/Resident-Yogurt-6798

I am based in Europe.

I am 3 years into my PhD and my supervisor sent me a string of messages that have left me genuinely shaken and scared for my future. I don't know how to feel or what to do anymore.

Some context: We are working on a paper. I was trying to help with proofreading the manuscript and made some mistakes. This was his written response to me:

- "That is f***ing correct!"
- "How can you be incompetent and convinced of knowing things?"
- "I am outright angry in case you have not recognised it yet."
- "Learn to be diligent. You have used up most of my patience."
- "Seriously, I am not sure if I want to continue carrying you to a PhD since you cannot walk there on your own... I really need to reconsider."
- "Do never ignore my orders anymore."

I stayed completely calm and professional throughout the entire exchange.

This is not a one-off bad day — he has always been like this. I have no co-supervisor and feel completely alone in this. My contract is coming up for renewal and I am terrified he will cut my funding over this.

Has anyone dealt with a supervisor like this? What did you do? Is this just the reality of academia or is this crossing a line? Should I be documenting this, and if so, who would I even take it to?

Any advice is genuinely appreciated.

Edit: I have this as a comment but it’s lost, I am adding it here:

Thank you everyone for your support! Before taking an action, I am collecting and documenting evidence as well as talking to the people.

As I could not reply to everyone, here are some answers some of you were looking for:

1. ⁠How can I be in a such a place for 3 years? Initially, everything seemed fine, I had regular meetings, however, things did change slowly, I was treated harshly over mistakes (formatting, not following his instructions exactly). I thought it was about being perfect. I used to look up to this PI because of his achievements. We have had some good technical discussions.
2. ⁠I got to know from other PhD students about his behavior, and I am planning to talk with more people in the department soon. There has been fights with the prof as well. Some students left already or were removed. I am not sure how they were treated or if they were given harsh treatment.
3. ⁠I wanted to quit many times but I did push through, I was being naïve I guess. I thought I would finish it by next year (2027). I understood that it was not going to happen as he is not letting people graduate. Some students are almost done but I think he didn't accept their thesis yet.
4. ⁠Changing supervisors? It is not so easy. The work I am doing is mainly related to his field. Quite a niche, at this stage even if I change to someone else I do not know how it will turn out for me. I want to be sure.
5. ⁠I am planning to take an action, but I need some time. This guy may be tenured or something. I WFH mostly, hence those messages, I have had similar kind of messages from him maybe less aggressive than this, I am saving all.
6. ⁠Some people in the comments talked about what I may have done to cause this escalation? It is true that I have made mistakes in the past (mostly in writing part I guess) and I have apologized immediately, took responsibility, felt guilty and corrected it. I am not perfect, I make a lot of mistakes. I try to correct them, too. Again, if I do not learn how will I progress? Sometimes it is really difficult for some people to follow exactly as said, I could not follow line by line.

I never thought it would this end way...

Again, thank you all so much!

(Disclaimer: I used an AI assistant to help draft this for brevity and anonymity. I am a PhD student in Europe.)
I’m the corresponding author on a revised manuscript due tomorrow, and I am in a trap.
Yesterday, my supervisor and I were both editing our shared LaTeX file. He got angry about my edits, called me incompetent, and sent a message demanding I roll back the version history to an earlier timestamp to undo them.
Here is the catch: he had continued working on the file after my edits. If I followed his exact instruction and rolled it back, I would have permanently deleted his newest work—and I know he would have blamed me for that mistake, too.
To protect his work, I didn't roll it back. Instead, I used reviewing mode to mark my changes as comments, and I sent him a professional email explaining that I did it this way so I wouldn't delete his latest progress. I left the final review to him.
Now, he is giving me the silent treatment.
Because the deadline is tomorrow, I am supposed to be the one to press submit in the portal. If he completely ignores me tomorrow, do I submit the paper without his explicit final approval (and risk being his scapegoat if he hates the final version), or do I protect myself and let the deadline pass?