I’ve been working 7 days a week, for the past 2 years. Five days a week for my 9-5 career job and weekend nights with my parents at our family restaurant. I haven’t taken a PTO since Hannibal crossed the alps, my anxiety at work has been debilitating to the point where I’m shaking at the desk at the idea of doing work, and I can’t sleep because I’m thinking about how busy the next day at work is going to be. I have become the stereotypical cog in the machine that works for the weekend or holidays and even then I have no real plans besides just doing nothing. All that plus I have to move to another city for my job, which is going to add to my financial burden, I can’t seem to find a place to live either. I also think that I’m having women problems as well, which is strange to say as I haven’t had to deal with those in awhile (that’s probably another article). I also worry that without me, my parents are going to have a hard time running the restaurant. I am stressed.
I never realized that I was stressed until the people around me – coworkers and friends would tell me that I seemed down. To be honest, I’ve had the shakes for the past year and I haven’t done anything about it. I’ve just been working through it as I can feel my hands having a panic attack as I type. For the past year, I’ve felt pressure in my wrists, shoulders, and in my chest. I am having a hard time focusing but I push through and do the work. I can’t really describe it besides that I just feel restless for ten hours a day. At my bedrock foundation, I know that I am confident in myself to get the job done. But I don’t know if this is sustainable because I literally don’t enjoy things anymore. I feel this restlessness everyday, whether I’m working or not and I don’t know what to do about it.
When it comes to my professional career, I feel like I have imposter syndrome because with nearly a year with the company that I’m currently working with, I don’t know if I’m even doing a good job – my seniors tell me that I am but I myself, feel like I could be doing so much better. Not just doing better, but doing more. I wonder if this career is the one for me and I can’t tell if this indecision is based on 1. a lack of interest in the field, 2. me not being good at what I do, leading to discomfort, or 3. I’m in something new and haven’t gotten to the good parts yet. I have a job that pays decently, gives me great exposure, and it provides me great benefits – but I still can’t tell if my job is a career yet. And with all that said, I still feel important to the company and that my role is needed, even if I don’t think I’m any good at it. I feel like the day I start taking vacation is the day that things will start falling apart. I’m like the bottom piece of a Jenga tower. I’m at the very bottom, just like I am in the corporate ladder but at the same time, if I’m not there, it feels like the whole thing is going to collapse because only I do what I do.
On top of all that, I have recruiters reaching out to me like every other week, asking if I’m interested in joining their company in a promoted role, which makes me think – do I move on? Will I find something better with another company, even though I find very little enjoyment in the role that I have now. Is the grass greener on the other side? Is there something missing at this current company that I can find at another company? A lot of these recruiters are making it sound like whatever they got, is hot shit compared to what we got. At the end of the day though, no matter the offer – I will not jump ship. I am loyal to the people I work with. I might be shit at my job but I have integrity.
Perhaps the best route would be to see a professional but I don’t even know if that is sustainable for someone like me because when it’s 3 a.m. and I’m fidgeting in bed. There isn’t going to be a professional that can help me get over the thoughts racing in my head. I don’t drink anymore and I don’t do drugs – but sometimes I feel like I need something like that to slow down my thinking. However, again – this is not sustainable and will not be a route that I will be taking. Maybe this is a call for help, or it’s really just me venting, but these past two years of achieving all my goals, have really just made me realize that I can have it all but at the same time, be in an awful state of mind. Solve all the problems you want, but there will always be another problem.
