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Dragnskull t1_j8agnht wrote

I only sort of agree with this.

I'm in my late 30s, I have a full time job and run a side business while also putting myself through college. I am the sole income to a house of 3, my younger brother lives with me and shares caregiver duties with me for our heavily disabled mother. He watches her and does most house duties while I work.

I work hard and have almost no social life now since this situation started with my mom over 2 years ago. I do this willingly because I love my mother and she is the only person I've ever truly been able to count on. I do this for and with my brother because I love him as well. After the situation with our mom changes one way or another we will have to work on getting him operating as a self sufficient adult sgsin, we both know that and we both understand it won't be instant and will take more work.

If I die today I will not have any regrets for what I'm doing. These are the people I love and I would walk to the ends of the earth for them.

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fungi_at_parties t1_j8cbul8 wrote

I totally feel you and many people have no choice but to hustle endlessly, but I worked myself into a mental hospital and almost to death. I couldn’t juggle it all anymore and I broke down. It was a bit more complicated than that, but sleep deprivation and constant stress really damaged my body, and my brain isn’t quite what it was before my break. You can seriously burn yourself out if you burn the candle at both ends for too long and eventually find yourself unable to work effectively. Pure frustration, to have trained at something for years and years and to struggle emotionally to do it at all anymore. The depression was intense.

I know a guy who gave himself diabetes by dealing with his work stress through sugar, and another has chronic health issues- it can seriously damage you physically to push yourself too hard at work. It’s important to sleep and have hobbies outside of work to at least avoid burnout and exhaustion. Breaks and vacations help output in the long run, turns out.

But there’s still no shame in working fucking hard to support your people. This is just the system we live in.

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Dragnskull t1_j8cg8rw wrote

i understand what you mean but I think running non stop is what's keeping me sane. If I wanted I could just work my 9-5 and be fine financially, but that's just not who I am.

I wasted a lot of time partying in my early adulthood but also developed an entrepenuriel spirit. I wound up self employed in my mid 20's until my life reset from an extremely nasty breakup involving being lied to and left for another man. This was my second serious relationship to fall apart in this way and it did some real damage to me mentally.

to be honest it created serious emotional damage, to the point that I've been single for 10 years now. I'm incapable of connecting with anyone beyond superficial levels and at this point I've just kind of accepted I'll have to get by with casual flings that burn out from here on. I honestly don't see a wife and kids in the cards for me anymore despite being something I'd like to have.

Anyway, I used this life reset to change something: I always regretted not going to college and I decided I might as well make something good out of everything, so I signed up to college and got a "real job" to aliviate all the stress of being a 1 man army while in school. Thing is I was used to it and never fully stopped so over time I just kind of naturally built the entrepenure thing back up into a decent chunk of additional income.

Then the mom thing happened.

I don't have a girlfriend or wife, no kids, and frankly I'm already an emotional mess. I realized I think I kept doing the entrepenure thing because I can't tolerate more than 4-5 hours without being focused on something or else I start focusing on all the bad. Keeping myself going keeps the bad out, so I guess that's what I do.

Not to say this is something I'm strategically doing, but I notice I like to keep myself busy and the times I don't I start going into a pretty negative place.

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fungi_at_parties t1_j8edgsh wrote

I get that, distracting yourself with the work. I’m non-stop running too, I just make sure that some of that running is for things I WANT to do, not just the corporate bullshit I have to do. Even in my burnout I was still working, it was just painful. Took 3 years or more to even start to recover, and even now I’m still struggling. Having a spouse and multiple kids also makes it very difficult to work outside a 9-5, but even one kid can add a lot of stress. Sounds like you went through a lot of the trauma and stuff that causes people to shift earlier than most, but I’m glad you have a balance that works for you. Just please don’t push yourself too hard and I hope you take the time to enjoy some of your life. Otherwise what’s the point of being here?

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