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Ask HN: What's your spectacular burnout story?

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Re: Ask HN: What's your spectacular burnout story?

#91

Post by drdeadringer »

AnonyBrah wrote: post #28

Quit my first job (software engineer) after 5 months. I was burned out, not only from the work, but from spending my entire life following orders - from school to the workplace. So I quit my job after 5 months despite the fact that that's considered sacrilege, with maybe $13k in my bank account. I spent the next 3 months pursuing nothing but my hobby at the time (music production). The first month was possibly the be…

Can you talk a little more about "the prison of an office" and why you consider an office this way? You say that you're tired of taking orders, and I can relate to this... but do you feel so oppressed from above that you absolutely must be "butt in seat" at 9:00 AM Or Else Death? I felt this way when I was younger fresh out of university and not so much anymore, and I don't believe I've become Institutionalized to such a Prison.

Re: Ask HN: What's your spectacular burnout story?

#92

Post by dlet »

rikkus wrote: post #71
dlet wrote: post #53

I had just finished the writing exams after my two years of preparatory class (a specific program we have in France to join the best business and engineering schools). During the 2 weeks of exams, I was sleeping 3 hours a night on average. When I woke up one morning, everything seemed really blurred. I could not precisely get where I was in the room and, when I tried to talk to my parents, they seemed really far away…

> When I woke up one morning, everything seemed really blurred. I could not precisely get where I was in the room and, when I tried to talk to my parents, they seemed really far away. I was also deeply tired and just wanted to sleep. Things seeming too far away is called Teleopsia. I experience Alice In Wonderland Syndrome[1]. Last time I managed to get an audience with a neurologist - the top one in this hospital, b…

Whaou, really interesting. Sounds really like what I experienced. So maybe it was not a burnout. Thanks, you are better than my neurologist :p

Re: Ask HN: What's your spectacular burnout story?

#93

Post by dragonwriter »

kirse wrote: post #86
middle334 wrote: post #46

Drank for the first 25 years of my career. High-functioning alcoholic, I guess. You've definitely heard of the products I have a bunch of code in, and the companies I worked for. I don't know how I managed getting blasted every night and still write all that code. As things got worse I started working for smaller and smaller companies, and wound up essentially jobless and alone and drinking off of my savings in a Sil…

[AA is controversial, I know] AA is controversial among a tiny minority of anti-religion internet blowhards. For the vast majority of reasonable folks, it really isn't. Glad to hear it has worked for you.

AA is controversial not only for it's religious content, but also because it's empirically both far less effective than it claims and less effective than alternatives. See, e.g, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/04/the-irr...

Re: Ask HN: What's your spectacular burnout story?

#94

Post by BlackjackCF »

atdt wrote: post #7

I am in the midst of one. It has been about a year and a half, plus or minus, and it has taken a tremendous toll on my well-being. I find it especially difficult to deal with the mismatch between my sense of what I can do, which is calibrated to my former self, and what I can actually deliver. I desperately need to believe that what I am going through is a temporary perturbation, so I keep trying to "shake it off", a…

Oh god. You're describing exactly what I'm feeling. I felt that way about being in lighting design after a while. I had worked 60-80 hour weeks consistently, and towards the end I completely lost interest and felt that I can't deliver.

I swapped into software engineering and I've been pounding the pavement for almost 3 years, and I'm hitting this point. It's not like I don't love what I do... I just sometimes feel like I get stuck, and suddenly - I feel like I'm really not competent. I'm starting to worry that I just can't deliver.

Re: Ask HN: What's your spectacular burnout story?

#95

Post by jacquesm »

middle334 wrote: post #46

Drank for the first 25 years of my career. High-functioning alcoholic, I guess. You've definitely heard of the products I have a bunch of code in, and the companies I worked for. I don't know how I managed getting blasted every night and still write all that code. As things got worse I started working for smaller and smaller companies, and wound up essentially jobless and alone and drinking off of my savings in a Sil…

My sincere congratulations. As the son of an alcoholic I am totally impressed with you being able to get out of that and turn your life around.

Re: Ask HN: What's your spectacular burnout story?

#96

Post by codewritinfool »

kolleykibber wrote: post #73
codewritinfool wrote: post #16

This might not be a normal burnout story, so sorry ahead of time. I'm not mentioning any names of individuals or companies, so please don't ask. They are all well-known, though. I partnered with a proven businessman for a project that took more than 5 years and about 8 hours per day, every day (I was already working 8 hours per day at my daily job). The deal was 50/50. We had great early reviews from media but only a…

I can relate. I'm five years into a similar situation and trying daily to recover my attitude to risk. It's no surprise that I've discovered an interest in academia. What do you think it would take to get you to get excited on a side project again?

I honestly don't know. I do embedded for work, and have no problem there, maybe because it is very low-level and doesn't have a UI or run on a PC.

I have had ideas, but when I'm home and I open the IDE, I sit there a while, stare at it, and then close it.

Re: Ask HN: What's your spectacular burnout story?

#97

Post by codewritinfool »

dnautics wrote: post #34

A buddy of mine was working in the lab of the scientist who "invented" unnatural amino acid technology (rumblings about how it was taken from the postdoc in the lab across the hall). That was the sexy project de jour of the lab; but my buddy was working on a less sexy project - catalytic antibodies. This is where you take the concept that antibodies can be adapted to fit any molecular shape and try to make it fit som…

Sorry, I want to get this story but I don't. How did the buddy end up? How is he now?

Re: Ask HN: What's your spectacular burnout story?

#98

Post by hyperpallium »

bonniemuffin wrote: post #9

About a month before my dissertation defense, I had already accepted a postdoc offer across the country, put in notice on my apartment, signed a new lease and arranged my cross-country move, but I had an absolutely impossible amount of work left on the list of things my dissertation committee claimed I needed to do before I could graduate, and my experiments just weren't working. It was clear that the work was imposs…

They get funds when you graduate.

Re: Ask HN: What's your spectacular burnout story?

#99

Post by throwaway26960 »

nugget wrote: post #90
throwaway26960 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The code change was requested by an employee and it wouldn't have caused any damage. Feature, not a bug. Imagine trying to explain this to someone who doesn't know what "code" is. It's just people making up a story to blame you. The point is that you can be blamed for anything you do and become involved in a frivolous lawsuit.

Usually in the US you can only be sued for actual, provable economic damages that are suffered as a result of your actions. It sounds like there may have been more to the story here.

They claimed to be damaged all throughout the complaint, yet didn't provide any evidence. Imagine explaining this to someone non-technical like your grandmother. You can make up a story and that non-technical person is going to have no idea if you are telling the truth or not.

Re: Ask HN: What's your spectacular burnout story?

#100

Post by dnautics »

codewritinfool wrote: post #97
dnautics wrote: post #34

A buddy of mine was working in the lab of the scientist who "invented" unnatural amino acid technology (rumblings about how it was taken from the postdoc in the lab across the hall). That was the sexy project de jour of the lab; but my buddy was working on a less sexy project - catalytic antibodies. This is where you take the concept that antibodies can be adapted to fit any molecular shape and try to make it fit som…

Sorry, I want to get this story but I don't. How did the buddy end up? How is he now?

He got on the mainline sexy track for the famous lab he was in, suffered through a seven year postdoc but finally got a faculty position at a mid tier University.
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