Ask HN: About to have a child, completely burnt out at my job, what do I do?

The good: You will have the power to make your kid's life a good one. You'll make a difference that no one else can make. Probably the decisive difference. Even if no one ever acknowledges it, you'll know it.

What to do: Think about what you have to do to keep reasonable income coming in. But also, think about what you can do to cut unnecessary expenses to the bone. No new cars. No getting hair done. No eating out. No vacations. Etc.

Within that framework, consider changing jobs. If you're living in an expensive city, leave. This is the golden era of remote work. If your current job makes you want to step in front of a train, find a new one. You can program, and there will always be someone willing to pay for that.

Your kid is everything. Start with that principle and work the problem. Godspeed.

Imagine someone terrified of having a car accident every time they drove. "Have you ever been in an accident?" "No, never."

Or someone constantly worried about having left the oven on at home, so much so that they have to check it multiple before they leave. But they've never actually left it on.

This isn't an attack or a criticism, but sometimes it can be difficult to notice our own unhelpful patterns of thoughts, even though we'd notice them straightaway in others.

As someone who comes from a country with single-payer healthcare, this sentence made me feel really sad. I knew some people around the world have to pay for hospital trips, but for some reason I never even considered that having a baby could cost the parents money.

When you talk about being a dad in your post, it sounds like you're focused on your career but right now that's less important. Being a parent is your number one job. You have to clothe and feed and change and love this new person and they are going to look up to you as this amazing person who makes them feel comfortable, happy, and safe.

(Don't forget your partner here either. They're going to be recovering from giving birth and needing your presence and support.)

Take all the parental leave you're legally entitled to. And if the company offers more, take it!

I remember when my little bean was born and I'd spend like half an hour bottle feeding them in the kitchen bored off my butt. So I started responding to Stack Overflow questions other people were ignoring. And I would talk to my kid about it and why it was so important to help these people, and a little about the technology, and why I chose this career for myself. Babies don't understand any of that, but I was giving them my attention, I was making sounds they eventually learned to copy, and I think the best part is they got to see Mama excited about something.

We would spend hours cuddled up on the nursery floor with a pile of pillows, some Tangerine Dream albums, and stories about people I've met and things I've done.

Parental leave is a great opportunity to look at things through new eyes. I feel like I learned so much about being a manager by trying to explain it to a newborn. I hope you find it to be a positive experience as well.