Burnout and Depression Among IT Workers? 216
Cultural Sublimation asks: "All of us working in IT seem to be
especially prone to problems like
burnout and depression. Could part
of the reason be directly related
to our professions? Recently, there
have been a number of interesting
features on Kuro5hin which have focused precisely on this issue. From people claiming that "
The Internet Is Driving Me Crazy",
to an in-depth two-part series trying to
demystify
depression, the message is that too
much information might be making us sick.
What are the experiences of fellow
Slashdot readers on this topic?"
ADD via the Internet (Score:5, Interesting)
Television, radio, and even my favorite hobby of listening to music seem to need to be supplanted by something else. I used to enjoy sitting down, putting on a CD or record and just listening. Now, I get bored too quickly - and that makes me somewhat sad (but not depressed).
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:ADD via the Internet (Score:5, Interesting)
On-topic, my guess is that a big piece of it is that tech workers tend away, habitually and culturally, from physical exercise and good eating habits. I started doing yoga (cap?) a month and a half ago, and err... yeah. Speaking of changes in attitude and life style... Wow. My suggestion if you're feeling like crap is to go find a physical activity you enjoy (rock climbing, yoga, swimming, sex, etc.) and egage in it regularly. I suggest, as well, that it become rather easy for you to participate in, (which automatically excludes certain options for most people who spend enough time in front of a computer) so that you don't have to FORCE yourself to do it.
As an aside, I love Yoga, and my pot belly is going the way of the dodo, slowly.
Most of all, remember that being athletic and doing something physical every few days at LEAST is something that will make you feel better after a month or more of dedication. Funny how you can spend six months perfecting a rocket jump but be frustrated when you don't feel any change in your body after eating right for a few days....
And if you get that mental point where you think, "Jesus, I've been doing the same thing for ten seconds now and I can't stand it," physical activity will show you, eventually, that standing it is completely possible, and you will enjoy it later.
Re:ADD via the Internet (Score:2)
Are you talking about activities or dreams?
Re:ADD via the Internet (Score:2)
Takes sex off the list for many, unfortunately
Re:ADD via the Internet (Score:2)
Re:ADD via the Internet (Score:2, Insightful)
It's people like you that cannot realize that all of their problems are in their head, and are usually their own fault, and can also be easily fixed by finding a creative outlet. (your mileage may differ, talk to a therapist if you need to)
Stop fucking blaming others. Atte
Re:ADD via the Internet (Score:3, Insightful)
I personally think that recreational drugs should be leagal. People should understand what the drug can do to them and understand the potential consequences of them. I think we are learning that there can, in some people, be a side effect from using the Internet
Re:ADD via the Internet (Score:2)
Re:ADD via the Internet (Score:2)
Take responsibility for your life.
Re:ADD via the Internet (Score:3, Informative)
Losing my mind... (Score:2)
Re:Losing my mind... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Losing my mind... (Score:3, Insightful)
Been there...my condolences.
If you expect recognition from your employer, you will always be doomed to disappointment. At the end of the day, you just gotta do it for yourself.
Re:Losing my mind... (Score:2)
Re:Losing my mind... (Score:2)
Depending on your skillset, if you're in Seattle I might be able to hook you up with a decent employer.
(Unless of course you've taken this as a sign that you should start your own business.
Re:Losing my mind... (Score:2)
Thanks for the offer. I live on the east coast right now and the wife isn't interested in moving again for at least 5 years, so for now I will pass on the offer.
It's funny but since I was laid off, I am contracting to do the same job I did before for 50% more money. I think this is mostly because there are no company benefits included but that is OK, I'd rather pay for my own benefits (health insurance, retirement, etc.) anyway.
And to top it off, I'm currently working for the company that makes
Chicken or Egg? (Score:2)
Here's the question that pops into my mind:
Re:Chicken or Egg? (Score:2, Insightful)
I'd say the first one for most people. I switched into Comp. Sci in college and loved it. I even enjoyed my internships during the summers. Then, I had to get a real job after school. Where I lived, basically the only jobs were government contracting, and there were reasons I needed to live there (family, etc.). I got a decent job with a major contractor, enjoyed learning the ropes for the first year or so, but all that gradually wore away the second year and was all gone after the third. The politics
maybe (Score:2)
Info Overload + Abuse (Score:4, Funny)
Information overload is part of the problem. The other part is the abusive lifestyles we lead - in part by choice and in part because the industry expects it of us. The more strenuous brain-work you're having to do on a daily basis, the more sleep you need to avoid clinical depression - yet we're expected to, want to, and are driven to sleep relatively little.
The answer is to do you magic during an 8 hour work day, and spend the rest of the day being relaxes, and get a good 8-10 hours of sleep every night - good sound sleep. If you're already suffering clinical depression of some stage, you need even more sleep to recover from it. A good diet and a healthy level of exercise also wouldn't hurt. Be sure to read the linked kuro5hin articles though on the caveats of exercise for the clinically depressed.
Re:Info Overload + Abuse (Score:2)
Come on mods. You know that everything you need is a lot of alcohol!
Well, ok, it won't solve the depression problem, but atleast you don't know when exactly did you die of over exhaustion.
Re:mod parent funny!!! (Score:2)
easy solution (Score:3, Funny)
For an early introduction into what you *could* become, take a look at the poor fuckers on the mother site [rotten.com]
Should Be On Main Page (Score:5, Informative)
Anyway, some resources. If you are taking/thinking about taking meds, I highly recommend http://www.crazymeds.org/ [crazymeds.org] The site isn't run by a doctor, but having checked his information from a number of different sources, he definitely seems to get the information right. Plus, the site is irreverant, which I appreciate.
The first course of therapy for depression is cognitive behavioral therapy. There is a standard book that explains these techniques. Feeling Good, by David Burns. Amazon link here: http://tinyurl.com/7dxos [tinyurl.com]
I've read a lot of books on depression over the past 18 months, and the best, the most informative, I found was The Noonday Demon, by Andrew Solomon. Amazon again: http://tinyurl.com/99neh [tinyurl.com]
Finally, the links in the post were good, and a good start, but I definitely disagree with some of his advice. Everybody is different, so take the time to hear different viewpoints on diagnoses, symptoms, and cures.
If you're wondering, treatment has made me better than I was, but I still have room for improvement. This is important. Depression may never (or it may) be "cured" for you, but in nearly all cases, treatment will decrease its severity. But not necessarily right away. Treatment is a process, and it takes some time to get there. Be patient.
Re:Should Be On Main Page (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Should Be On Main Page (Score:2)
Puts me in mind of Peter's conversation with Dr. Swanson in Office Space:
Huh? (Score:2)
And your point is what?
* I threw in the towel for good on that site when one of their recurring flamewars about t
Re:Huh? (Score:2)
I threw in the towel for good on that site when one of their recurring flamewars about the Middle East devolved into a dispute about whether Israel is or isn't in Africa.
And yet you frequent Slashdot. Odd, that...
kuroshin, -1 (Score:2)
One should take into account more variables. (Score:5, Insightful)
Information overload will only affect certain personality types. There are those of us who inhale Google daily. Recent example: "I went home last night, discovered Hibernate, learned it, and converted our 70,000-line service center app to use it. Want the diffs?" Yeah, there are people who do this; we had it happen at work about a week ago.
Others simply cannot absorb and process information that quickly. These people are potential info-burnouts. Tends to correlate, in my experience, with a general unwillingness to learn new programming languages or adapt to new systems. They're not being sticks-in-the-proverbial-mud -- they understand that they simply can't cram it into their brain quickly enough, and it often makes them anxious.
There are a lot more types of programmers than that, but you get the idea. In my case, I was trained from an early age to work around my ADD by constantly juggling large amounts of data. (My parents are ADD programmers too.) I have the opposite problem: my productivity declines as my tasks get simpler. It becomes too easy to become distracted.
My point: don't reduce the problem of burnout. There are a lot more variables than just information.
I suspect work conditions have far more to do with burnout and depression. Programmers tend to be expected to work long hours, and at least in my experience, a surprising percentage of programming shops have hostile, competitive, or abusive environments.
Re:One should take into account more variables. (Score:4, Interesting)
Wow. That is exactly my problem. Complex tasks are engaging enough that they consititute a world of distraction in themselves.
Perhaps this is why I have a lot of unfinished projects. Once it's obvious what needs to be done, and the real mysteries are cracked, you leave the rest as an exercise for the student.
If only I had a student.
Re:One should take into account more variables. (Score:4, Funny)
That's funny, because it's the same for me. I'd be most relaxed at a gun-fight, particularly if automatic weapons are being used on either side. At least I could stay focused and I'd have a well defined, single goal.
The simple crap, like paying bills
Re:One should take into account more variables. (Score:2)
Perhaps this is why I have a lot of unfinished projects. Once it's obvious what needs to be done, and the real mysteries are cracked, you leave the rest as an exercise for the student.
Let me guess. You're an INTP [intp.org]Re:One should take into account more variables. (Score:2)
Wow. That is exactly my problem.
And mine, I mean I should be programming a boring stuff right now. And what am I doing? Reading
Exercise (Score:5, Insightful)
If you exercise regularly, your mind will be sharper, and you'll write better code. This I guarantee.
My polar HRM is of course gathering dust. I need to take my own advice.
Re:Exercise (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes we sit on our butts all day. Believe that coke, pizza and snickers bars are a balanced diet, and what is worse do not spend enough time with our family.
I think that has got to be the biggest one. Find a good spouse and get married. I did and I have dropped 60lbs, eat food that does not go f
Re:Exercise (Score:5, Interesting)
What is this 'zone' thing of which you speak?
No, I'm not being facetious. Some of us don't have one. I don't, for example; no matter how much I do, no matter how I do it, I find exercise very uncomfortable and utterly boring. I don't phase out, I have to keep concentrating every moment.
I'm not unfit; I'm about 75kg or so, right at the median for my body size, I cycle to work and back each day, but the simple fact is that continued anaerobic exercise is hideously uncomfortable and remains so. I used to go to the gym and doing things like running a kilometre without any practice before hand isn't a problem. I just hate it. I gave up going to the gym because I really wasn't enjoying it and I kept finding myself making excuses not to go, and frankly, life's too short.
(I have experienced the endorphin rush that I think you're talking about a few times --- but it's never been with anaerobic exercise; always aerobic. Hill walking, actually, which is at least interesting, unlike running on a treadmill. Alas, there are no hills near where I live.)
Re:Exercise (Score:2)
Since he mentioned using a heart rate monitor, I presume he's talking about the aerobic zone [slashdot.org].
I find exercise very uncomfortable and utterly boring.
Those two things may be correlated. Once I got a heart rate monitor and made sure to keep my heart rate from getting too high, I enjoyed exercise a lot more. It turned out that I was pushing myself too hard a lot of the time, which made me feel awful.
As you point out, it's also better to do things you enjoy. Luc
Re:Exercise (Score:2)
Basically it's 220 - your age. Pretty easy. The HRM makes it so you don't have to STOP and take your pulse and count and all that rot, you just glance down. Actually my polar beeps, so I don't even have to do that.
Now if I had a "zone" in the sense like the fitness junkies talk about, I'd actually be using the damn thing. So yes, I hear you. Hiking always interes
Re:Exercise (Score:2)
GREAT!!! I am in the "zone" constantly, that's my resting HR!
Re:Exercise (Score:2)
Oops! Yes, you're right. Good thing I have my monitor instead of relying on my memory!
Re:Exercise (Score:2)
Sounds like you need sport, not exercise (I'm the same - hate exercising, love playing sport). I would suggest trying a few sports that are fast and/or complex, with many aspects that need to be tracked simultaneously and/or require very quick analysis and action. I'
Re:Exercise (Score:2)
Oh, god, no. Competitive sport is something that I will run screaming from. (Relic of a childhood spent at a school with compulsory intensive sports --- they systematically, but quite unintentionally, tought me to associate all forms of sport and exercise with being jumped on by thugs, seen through a short-sighted blur, while being told repeatedly how useless I was. I don't want to go there, ever again.)
I know
Re:Exercise (Score:2)
It doesn't *have* to be competitive. I used to play a lot of (very) competitive sport at school, but I've since grown out of it. Now I play sport for fun, and while being "in the zone" on the field can result in some otherwise out-of-character single-mindedness, it all just drops away at the end of the game - I no longer care whether or not I'm on the winning or losing side, merely that it was a good game.
In particular, I've fou
Re:Exercise (Score:2)
Unfortunately, what you're describing is a competitive sport. It's a zero-sum game, where if you have
Ultimate Frisbee (Score:2)
I haven't played in a while (been cycling mostly) but way back t
Re:Ultimate Frisbee (Score:3, Informative)
Wind is much worse-- it takes a lot more skill to throw a disc in the wind than in the rain. It was pretty tough sometimes playing in the plains.
Here's the UK Ultimate Federation page:
http://www.ukultimate.com/ [ukultimate.com]
they might have links to clubs.
There also tend to be a lot of invisible ultimate groups, because of the lack of formality to the wh
Re:Exercise (Score:2)
*nods*
Actually I'm thinking of Tai Chi, as it's considerably less martial than most of the others (at least in the common form).
But as you say, that's less about fitness and more about moving to a healthier lifestyle.
Re:Exercise (Score:2)
I don't know if I am misreading this or what but for me it takes more like 10K to really get in the zone. And I will admit that when I was first starting out, even short distances (1K) were difficult and there was no zone to be found.
Nothing like working 80+ hours a week (Score:4, Insightful)
This whole "Salary" means 50+ is bullshit. White collar workers make less then union construction workers not even counting in overtime. The union guys at our work pull 6 figures with massive OT, but we get to sit a nice comfy desk why our Boss yells at us why are 10 million customers out of service because of an outage we dont control.
Ya, no stress there, goto work at dark, come at dark, wife is mad at all hours, you want to provide a good home, but thats not good enough.
Really, its come down to 2 parents working to make a living so you can spend time with the family. Good jobs require you to put in more hours, ding ding, problem here...
Humm, ya, unions suck dont they. Thats why companies merge and lay off thousands of workers, oh wait, unless they are union. The IT workers are dropped quick, the union workers sue and get their jobs back.
Americans are idiots, they refuse to realize unions where created for saftey and fair wages. So, who needs a union, the big old corporation will take care of you right? This isnt the
Lets just blame depression, heres your happy pill.
Re:Nothing like working 80+ hours a week (Score:5, Insightful)
They are brainwashed into thinking they must consume and therefore must earn a higher wage. A bigger house, a bigger car, a bigger Television, a bigger diamond ring, and it never ends.
Because they have only time for working there is no time for walking or bicycling (and American isn't really designed to to bike to work every day like I do), so if they do twig that exercise is required for wellbeing they sign up with a health club, which is yet another expense!
Worse still: All that time working leaves no time for preparing meals so fast food or preprepared are the order of the day.
Now back to you points about the American work place (which I have worked in for no small time) the whole system is designed to get most out workers for the least salary (AKA market value) so it's really common for less than scrupulous managers (or really under pressure) to resort to unreasonable methods to achieve this. (My experience with this was during 'review' time.
So 6 years ago I began to demand different things... For four years when I went through my review and they said "oh pay raises are capped to 2 or 3 percent I said "No problem I'll take the 2% and the balance as holiday time" for a total of 11 weeks per year. They said we're closing the factory and moving to Europe and I said "No Problem, I'll come with you"... So now I bike 10 minute each way to work (I've lost 35 pounds), I only work 25 hours a week so my family and I spend many times more time together and are much happier, We bike down to the local farmer market 4 or 5 times a week for food and eat healthy meals (which has had the side effect of teaching my girlfriend & daughter to cook), we go on a one or two day hike once a month (another thing that's difficult in the US), and we travel twice a year to somewhere we've never been for holidays.
The problem with American Unions is that they are abused and don't apply to all workers, so that there are a relative few being vastly over paid for what they do. And that in turn reveals a problem with American society and with the concept of "corporations"...
Just my 2 cents as a very, very refugee from the insanity called "The United States of America" And I have to wonder just how many whacked out slashdotters will read this and think I'm some granola hippy who still thinks he's touring with the 'dead. Word to the Wise: High Tech does not mean "unhealthy" or "wage slave" nor is anti-human or anti-nature.
Re:Nothing like working 80+ hours a week (Score:2)
I have to disagree with you there. While there are plenty of unions still around who still do what they were originally intended to, there are also quite a few unions out there who screw themselves out o
Re:Nothing like working 80+ hours a week (Score:2)
The alt.sysadmin.recovery FAQ covers one angle of this; essentially, if you're a natural sysadmin-type, no matter what job you take, you'll end up fixing your own computer, then other people's, etc. until you've suddenly become a sysadmin again.
I've been pondering going into auto mechanicry or electricianing (both of which I have some aptitude for), both to escape the offshori
Re:Nothing like working 80+ hours a week (Score:2)
Yeah, sys-admining can be a dead-end job (one of the reasons I'm not doing it anymore). Strangely enough, my last sysadmin job was in operations and not IT. After that gig ended, I wound up in IT. I'm wondering how long I'll last here before I burn out. I'm
Re:Nothing like working 80+ hours a week (Score:2)
I agree, unions are not the answer. From my experience, unions have always done more bad than good.
Re:Nothing like working 80+ hours a week (Score:2)
In all fairness, It think it really starts to chap peoples' asses when they see the executive management walking away with either huge salaries (regardless of profitability), or HUGE golden parachutes if they are replaced. In fact, I'd posit that this, at least to s
Re:Nothing like working 80+ hours a week (Score:3, Interesting)
So many people get caught on this exercise wheel they don't realize not running is an option.
You don't have to live there. You don't have to work for a megalocorp. Your wife can stay home with the kids. It's a matter of identifying the really important priorities in your life and doing what it takes to achieve them.
Sure, you probably
Re:Nothing like working 80+ hours a week (Score:2)
A simple bill that ensures that all exporters to our country must have labor standards equal to or better than our own would eliminate unfair advantages.
You'll see each and every IT job go to a country with more rational labor laws.
If that held true, no one in some of the more socalist counties of Europe would hold a
naturaly (Score:2)
The IT field as it is will most likely make us susceptable to this,IE: working that extra couple of hours to get a project finished. If we deny ourselves proper rest and relaxation we a
Burn out is putting it mildly. (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm the sole developer on a fairly elaborate project. Everything tech related is my responsibility. Site design and architecture, development, support, training, hardware, software, security, everything.
Early on, it wasn't so bad. Then a year went by. Then two. The third has now completed and I'm entering the fourth. Some days I sit at my desk staring at the screen. In my mind, I'm running through everything I should be doing, but I can't seem to get my fingers to do the typing or my legs to move me to the other side of the room to the desk where I work on hardware.
I almost didn't bother typing this... but it's kind of theraputic in a way.
Anyway, lately I seem to find all kinds of 'filler' activities to consume my time. Reading up on the latest changes to the various software we use, keeping up with
Sure, I can probably remember most of the topics on
I've never really thought of myself as someone who gets depressed. Maybe that's denial talking. How does one check for that?
More importantly, how does one go about kick-starting their motivation again? I've tried little side projects that are related to what I do already, in the hopes that will gain me some momentum and I can then change lanes and keep working, but I can't even seem to build up any steam.
Even as I type I'm getting bored. Could be because I figure nobody will even care what I'm typing in the first place. Then again, if it helps someone else, or someone with insight can explain it then maybe it was worth it.
I wonder if there's anything good on tv right now?
Re:Burn out is putting it mildly. (Score:2)
I've been at my current IT job for almost 3 years (in the field for about 5) and I'm going through the exact same thing. My girlfriend is a graphic artist and is in the same boat as we are. She thinks it's because all the tasks we're given don't challenge us anymore, and the tasks that would challenge us either get outsourced to a consultant or wouldn't be pratical to implement. My current project is implementing a network-wide SNMP monitoring tool
Re:Burn out is putting it mildly. (Score:2)
1) Exercise.
2) A Plan To Get You Happy.
(1) is hard. You need to find something you enjoy doing for exercise. But if you're in a decent IT jo
Don't replace it - augment it! (Score:2)
Computers will always be my "hobby" - I personally can't see anything replacing that. Consequently, I fear if ever a day comes where I can't have a job (for whatever reason) that involves computers. At the same time, I entertain a fantasy of seeing the day when advanced AI makes my job unnecessary...
After work, I tend to do different things - sometimes I just kick back and relax. Sometimes this involves doing nothin
Re:Burn out is putting it mildly. (Score:2)
You seem to have hit upon something that has bothered me. I can recognize when I'm acting apathetic or lazy, but I lack the motivation to change that, since I'm acting apathetic and lazy. It frustrates me from time to time, and I find it best to just ignore it and move on with what I was (not?) doing, but its one of those great chicken-egg arguments. I know enough to know that something needs to break the cycle, but again, being lazy or apathetic, I won't actually do anything to break the cycle.
I wonde
Depression an occupational hazard (Score:3, Interesting)
Programming and IT are racing to the bottom awfully fast. If these industries are what you experience most of, you can (fallaciously) extrapolate that to other industries. For example, in my dark moments, I've wondered why cars don't yet require subscriptions to keep driving. I've also wondered when restaurants are going to make you start signing waivers before you eat there.
Likewise, we can fallaciously extrapolate the dismal quality of software to other industries. (See the old "if cars were like computers" joke). I spent a couple years in support at my company; some customers actually like our product, though, after my experience, I'm surprised that our boxes ever boot up at all, much less occasionally do something useful. I can recognize now that that's a warped perspective.
Slashdot! (Score:3, Interesting)
Reading Slashdot for long enough, you start to wonder when corporations are simply going to take over the government, make slavery legal again, and start charging lifetime subscriptions for products you can only use for a year.
The fact that all the depressing things reported here are true doesn't help. Knowing that you / your industry / society / etc. is heading towards a race-to-the-bottom cliff, and not being able to do a damn thing about it, is awfully depressive.
Andrew Solomon (referenced above) mentioned in a "Bush Survival Guide" of antidepressant tips I got for Xmas:
It is a hard place to work (Score:3, Insightful)
Plus you have to understand the type of person who usually heads into this field is usually a geek....this is more than just their jobs and usually the geek life is one that is defined early in school life......maybe we should be looking at this from that angle.
I need more sleep...excuse me
Serious Question (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Serious Question (Score:2)
Stop.
Take a year off. Be a lumberjack. Do a lap of your continent on your bicycle. Flip burgers. Join the Peace Corps. Do something, anything, else for a while. Your brain and body will thank you.
happened to me (Score:2)
Before you blame information glut... (Score:4, Insightful)
(1) Self-care. The style that we encourage in CS courses, with our image of hackers working for days at a time and living on the four programmer food gorups ("caffeine, grease, salt, and processed sugar"), is not something that people can generally physically deal with even into the middle twenties. Sleep and periodic meals make a big big difference to mood.
PHB's who think that you can actually do more in an 80 hour week than in a 50 hour week just add to this, which leads to
(2) Feelings of helplessness. We start out with the frustrations of programming, where we're doing perhaps the most complicated intellectual task invented by humanity, doing it with a body of knowledge that's really only 50 or 60 years old, and dealing periodically with apparently inexplicable problems. Then add the canonical Dilbert moments: PHB's, "flexible" schedules, expected overtime, "offshoring", our own inclination toward being obsessive-compulsive (which we either start with or are trained into by our tools and techniques), and then dealing with a whole lot of people who don't understand the intellectual challenges or share the style of rigorous thought and obsession with detail that go with our field. Depression and burnout are very much related to feelings of helplessness.
(3) programming tends to involve people who are less extroverted and less social. People who are bright, introverted, and unsocial tend to feel isolated and alone. Depressing.
In fact, a lot of us would test pretty highly for Asperger's Syndrome [udel.edu], which is akin to mild autism.
The point is that you don't need some new "information glut" syndrome to explain a prevalence of depression and burnout.
Re:Before you blame information glut... (Score:2)
Re:Before you blame information glut... (Score:2)
to do again (Score:2, Funny)
WoW cures all (Score:2, Funny)
Now I am an overweight happy nerd sitting at the computer playing WoW, getting angry and frustrated at all the n00bs who can't play as well as me.
Things tend to work themselves out. =P
I know what depresses me (Score:2)
Everyone's burnt out, not only IT... (Score:3, Insightful)
Not the profession, but some of the places we work (Score:2)
A year ago, I was so miserable in my then-new job that I hated getting up in the morning and so consistently irritable that my boss was convinced I had an anger management problem. But that's largely because I was working for a boss whose first instinct when he saw a new employee having difficulties was to diagnose
Burnout & Depression (Score:3, Interesting)
For me, basically my whole life was wrapped up in the computer. Programming, projects, hobbies, my identity - how people recognized me and interacted with me - and often what they interacted over.. all of it was dependent on the computer (and none of this was in an unhealthy obsessive way - for example the antisocial EQ addicts, I was nothing like that - technology was just my drug that got me high and made me my real world friends).
When I finally burned out, I had very little else to 'me' that didn't involve computers or programming or technology in some way. Major depression ensued. Fortunately for me though, because I've never been the antisocial type, I had a pretty good support system around me that kept me from really offing myself over everything. I've found new hobbies, I've restarted my 'life' and learned from my past mistakes. No one aspect of what I enjoy or what I do defines me anymore.
Kind of a rambling of thoughts and not to coherent, but I've definitely been there. For those of you afraid of having the same thing happen, start branching out now. Make friends and hobbies that don't involve binary. Learn to spend time away from the comp and not feel like you're missing something terribly crucial.
And get A LOT of excercise.
Well, naturally -- burnout is the IT malady. (Score:5, Insightful)
1. Management doesn't like you. They consider you a big sunk cost, a drain on their precious profits. It won't matter whether the product YOUR team developed is the only thing the company has to sell, it won't matter if your skill in setting up their network made them leaner and meaner than the competition, nothing you do or say will change anything. They consider you an anchor around their neck and they resent you for it.
2. You are painfully aware that management (the guys from #1 who don't like you) keeps investigating various outsourcing options. From time to time, you see the CEO having warm conversations with guys in suits, who you know from a conversation in the elevator are with a large outsourcing firm.
3. Although all the guys in Sales are out the door by 5:01PM, and in the bar pickled by 6:00PM, YOU're stuck at work until 9PM every night trying to get a product release out the door. You're working your guts out because your idiot project manager doesn't care (he's drinking with the guys from Sales). And no matter how hard you work, your only thanks is going to be "Damnit, Bill, you're a week late on this! This is going to go in your performance review!"
4. Because you live at work, and therefore are a pasty, nearsighted, vaguely unhealthy dweeb, you haven't been laid in a year. But you have to listen to the sales guys bragging about all the pussy they're getting when they're drunk in the bar you never make it to. Once in a while, one of them catches a venereal disease and you get to enjoy a minute of Shadenfreude. Then you go back to your compiler. What the fuck! It was compiling fine a minute ago... How the fuck did that... Oh. Right. Never mind. (Type, type, type).
5. The ONE NIGHT you go home early (at 6PM) because you're dead exhausted, you run into one of the suits and he quips "Half day, Bob?" The rest of the elevator ride is you fighting the overwhelming urge to stab him in the neck with the pen your father gave you for Christmas. The reason you DON'T is, you're afraid the police won't return it after the forensics guys are done with it. It really IS a nice pen.
6. Every day, on your way in to work, you walk past Smith, who is some vague middle manager or something (you don't know what his actual function is, but he seems to be always present). If you're even a minute late, he makes clucking noises as you pass. If you forgot to shave, he rubs his chin and shakes his head, smiling. The one time you spoke, he got snotty with you, implying that you were a hippie freak.
7. You can't work for more than ten minutes without somebody ruthlessly interrupting you to ask you a question they could have answered with Google in two minutes flat. You briefly consider buying a spray can and filling it with cold water (it worked on your ex-girlfriend's cat). Then you think, nah, better use battery acid. THEN you worry about why you thought of that, and THEN, you worry that you're a big pussy because you worried.
One day, you realize: THIS IS MY LIFE. I picked this on PURPOSE! And just like that, you become a burnout.
DISCLAIMER: When I figured out I was a burnout, I left the private sector and found much happier environs. I feel a whole lot better now.
Re:Kuro5hin? (Score:3, Insightful)
There is no such thing as 'real news' anymore.
The Internet killed it.
Re:Kuro5hin? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Kuro5hin? (Score:3, Interesting)
Some would say that the 24 hour news cycle (created, or at least lit by CNN) is responsible.
Re:Kuro5hin? (Score:2, Funny)
Real News? (Score:2, Insightful)
I'd rathter read comments about comments (ad inf.) about real news, than read unsubstantiated anonymous rumors passed off by the mainstream press as real news. It's not that blogs are so journalistic or reliable, it's that mainstream media news is so unreliable and devoid of journalism, that blogs make better news sources these days.
Re:Kuro5hin? (Score:2)
K5 is not a blog.
Re:Depressed... (Score:2)
Re:The Malaise of the Middle Classes (Score:2, Insightful)
Sure wish he'd post his name so we could find out *shrug*
Re:The Malaise of the Middle Classes (Score:2)
Pick up a book about the neuropsychology of ADD from B&N some time, complete with CAT scans. They tend to be written in plain english and using good structure.
While I agree that some ADD is diagnosed to make an unpopular behavior into a medical problem, there is a non-trivial portion, probably even a majority, that is in fact organic in origin.
Stolen comment (Score:3, Informative)
Two words. (Score:2)
Explaination in "plain english": Obviously Bill, Lisa and Amy had more pressing things to do with thier time than to wait on you hand and foot for minimum wage & tips. Just because you have spent you whole life "working hard" at chasing money, that does not mean the whole planet should do the same regardles of what else is going on in thier lives.
These famous dyslexic people [dyslexia.com] are all to stupid to read? Granted Tom Cruise is on the list but among the others are Jefferson, Edison
That's a Troll, mods. (Score:3, Insightful)
All the dyslexics I know are very smart. One was a civil engineer who went back and got a B.A. in English Lit, Honours. He took three times as long to read everything, because the page distorted into strange patterns for him. His essays were brilliant.
Another is my stepbrother, a respected geomorphologist. I helped him overcome the reading barrier, as the letters rearranged themselves into non-english. He improved. His parents were both h
Re:The Malaise of the Middle Classes (Score:2, Informative)
"Depression, of course, is the failure of society to admit that with our 'up' moods must come 'down' stages. If we're never down how can we truly enjoy being upbeat and happy?"
Are you really that stupid? Depression is a known medical illness. I'm not talking about "man today sucks" depression, I'm talking about Clinical Depression. Again, slashdot readers, if you're not a doctor, perhaps you shouldn't be commenting on things you have no clue abo
Re:The Malaise of the Middle Classes (Score:2)
Re:The Malaise of the Middle Classes (Score:3, Insightful)
Don't take this the wrong way, but only a few decades ago, homosexuality was a "known medical illness." So was female sexual desire.
Perhaps a "diagnostic and statisical" manual with its origins in the military's quest to figure out who was too crazy (or not crazy enough) to be made a soldier [psych.org] is not the best way to define who's "ill" and who's "healthy". I have little doubt that we are in the midst of what people centuries from now will regard as a dark age in c
Re:The Malaise of the Middle Classes (Score:2)
You would probably be wrong, today with tools like PET Scans and Functional MNR we are actualy beginning to see the chemical/physiological differences between healthy brains and mentally ill brains, drugs are increasingly targeting the chemical disturbances in the mentally ill brain.
Eventualy this will lead to better diagnosis and more accurate medication.
Re:The Malaise of the Middle Classes (Score:2)
Re:The Malaise of the Middle Classes (Score:2)
Re:The Malaise of the Middle Classes (Score:2)
Don't bother. Trolls (terribly unoriginal ones, no less [adequacy.org]) aren't worth it.
OP: come on, that's four years old! can't you come up with some new material?
I guess Adaquacy trolls shouldn't come as a surprise in a story linking to something on K5.