it's all downhill from here...?

[throwaway4372]

[reading this back it sounds like I'm gonna find a cliff and jump off it, but I'm not, just being honest to try and get helpful responses, don't worry]

[software dev approaching 40]

I had a great job for most of my career, then it came to a natural end.
I've had a few wfh jobs since, but they've all made me miserable, people are so cruel to each other.
I'd find myself sitting at my desk in the morning and feeling deeply sad and fearful before I even turn the laptop on. So yet again I quit my job, I deserve better than this.
I realised how much my professional and personal identity was tied to that initial good job.
I don't have wife/gf/friends/kids. Mum's still about but won't be forever, but if I relocate to spend time with her it would make finding jobs much harder.
I have no drive to keep rolling the dice on these terrible jobs. Seems like it's all downhill from here...

I've done well so far, mortgage paid off, good savings and investments and pension.
Just need to find a way to get through another 10-15 years of it so I can retire.
But what's the point of any of that when mum dies and I've spent no time with her, and then I'm just a guy with nobody in the world who knows I exist.

Has anyone ever felt similar and managed to turn it around, both personally and professionally does any of this ring a bell, and if so, how did you do it?

It kinda reminds me of getting bullied at school, and telling myself I just needed to tolerate x more years of school then things would get better. Seems like it doesn't actually get better lol.

 

[throwaway4372]

I have looked at contracts before, it seemed roughly equal money so I tried to get stability of a permanent role, obvs stability is a lie so I won't rule it out this time.

Office is north-facing, all the rooms I spend daytime in are north-facing. I'll be out walking every day as I'm not working now, see if it makes a diff. Need to work the walks into the routine when I am working again, jobs just haven't backed off long enough for me to get out the door at all.

 

[throwaway4372]

You’re in a great position in terms of having your mortgage paid off. That’s a lot of security. It sounds like you could do with a change of type of job, do you even need the salary of the ‘good job’?

Good question. At the moment the goal is to retire early, so the more money the better, I still need to do the math on that to get a better grasp on what's really required. Of course the flipside of that is if the career was more pleasant it might be okay doing it a bit longer. I don't see me starting over doing something else completely different, not yet anyway, but there are different roles in dev work I could try if the struggle continues. I'm trying to at least get my NI years pushing for money as best I can, I think then I'd be in the position to retire if I wanted to, so cutting back hours or taking an easier role for a bit is an easier trade-off to make.

 

[throwaway4372]

[prioritise happiness and health]

Thanks for your comment, and the post you linked. I lost 3 stone as my good job ended, trying to prepare myself for the future positively as you describe, actually got into great shape. However the ongoing work troubles, and being during covid on top of that, gave me a bunch of feelings I responded to with food, need to lose 5 stone now.

At about 22 I got cholinergic urticaria, which basically meant I couldn't do any physical activity (just walking to the corner shop would have me on my knees in pain, think "being in a bath full of ants"). That made it easy to focus on work because I couldn't do anything else, and at the time that had to be the priority anyway to get on the housing ladder. Saying that now it's probably how I ended up being so work-focused. It's a lot better now, so currently I'm able to be active and should make the most of it. The psychological impact of it all is hard to shed though, and it'll never completely go away.

 

[throwaway4372]

Did any of that even make sense?

Yeah I get your point, thanks for sharing.