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Ask HN: How are you holding up?

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171–180 of 398 posts

Re: Ask HN: How are you holding up?

#171
Astoundingly poorly. I'm (as far as I can tell) older than the median HN poster, which means I've had more time to make good decisions or poor ones and have the cumulative weight of them bear down on my life.

Career-wise as I've posted previously my job is in peril. Finding another role that pays as well at 50+ can be a challenge in IT, I believe the current economic strife will amplify the difficulty.

Personally things are far worse.

Re: Ask HN: How are you holding up?

#172
post #76
post #16

Really badly, but could be worse. I am entirely sure that I have moderate-serious depression since the lock down started. I rely entirely on external structure and physical separation of spaces to keep myself sane. So WFH has been disastrous for me. I have been eating worse, not working out, stopped pursuing hobbies/side projects and have been incredibly unproductive at work. Thankfully, a year of good results prior…

Consider the alternative: Social/political climates and the "cancel culture" always has something to target. If you look, at any given time, this is something that has been going on since we could communicate in a public sphere. There has always been and always will be a tension in the public conversation. I wouldn't say "cusp of actual war" though. There are many people however who are hoping and actively counting o…

> cusp of actual war

Yeah But, India and China are quite seriously considering war right now. No joke.

Re: Ask HN: How are you holding up?

#173
post #33
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the UK we have a rent/mortgage holiday to protect us from these unprecedented times. I'd probably blame everything other than myself if I went from being a professional living in Manhattan to unemployed and unable to pay rent. Sometimes the carpet can just be pulled out from under us and it sucks.

It was pulled out from under the landlord, too.

The housing market is terrible at the moment - if you were to kick the tenant out you'd probably still be waiting until this is over before you're guaranteed to get a new tenant anyway. Plus the usual estate agency overheads. I'm slightly too financially conservative/liberal to say landlords are in the wrong to kick tenants out during this crisis, but only slightly. Which is saying something! I'm glad that in the UK we have some government support to help both tenants and landlords.

Re: Ask HN: How are you holding up?

#174
post #72

Keep expecting it to get easier but being stuck with a toddler and two older kids with 1.5 jobs between me and my wife has been tough. It's exhausting, there's basically no downtime, and we end up in spirals of shame and guilt at being terrible parents, partners, employees. All of this to a constant backdrop of fear and uncertainty, trying to balance sanity with following the rules and the science, trying to mediate…

This was also my experience. It's easy to reflect on the day, or the week and feel like there was no joy, no break, no time where you got to do something you wanted or just relax. Our days were very long, as we did a staggered schedule with one of us starting work before 5a and the other ended around 7p so we were able to minimize unsupervised iPad time.

We finally decided to send our toddler back to daycare last week. She is an only child who loves playing with other kids and we felt the health risks were small compared to the social development and mental health impact.

I would say life now feels much more like a normal WFH situation. On reflection however, I realized my exhaustion prevented me from appreciating how much quality time I spent with my daughter, how much we were able to go outside and play every day, etc. Not looking to go back to that, but I would say just try to find time to take a deep breath, think about the good things that happened today, and give yourself a break on the compromises you had to make as a parent, spouse, or employee.

Re: Ask HN: How are you holding up?

#175
post #16

Really badly, but could be worse. I am entirely sure that I have moderate-serious depression since the lock down started. I rely entirely on external structure and physical separation of spaces to keep myself sane. So WFH has been disastrous for me. I have been eating worse, not working out, stopped pursuing hobbies/side projects and have been incredibly unproductive at work. Thankfully, a year of good results prior…

Hey screye, mid-March to mid-June was shit for me, too. Nearly 2 months of not being able to exercise outdoors. Stress eating & drinking. I had multiple meltdowns, some of which bled into my work. I somehow managed to not get fired. In my own way, I'm right there with you. If you need someone to listen w/o judgement, and to tell you "yeah, that does indeed suck", feel free to reach out. I had some people to lean on and it really helped me.

Re: Ask HN: How are you holding up?

#176
post #16

Really badly, but could be worse. I am entirely sure that I have moderate-serious depression since the lock down started. I rely entirely on external structure and physical separation of spaces to keep myself sane. So WFH has been disastrous for me. I have been eating worse, not working out, stopped pursuing hobbies/side projects and have been incredibly unproductive at work. Thankfully, a year of good results prior…

It never ceases to amaze me how different people are. For me, all effects have been the exact opposite. Less going out, so more cooking and healthier eating. Less tired from open office noise, so more energy for sports. More free time without commute, so I picked up some long forgotten hobbies again. This means my advice might not apply to you, but if I may still recommend one thing: ignore most of the news for a whi…

> the US

India :(

(though I stay in the US)

We just had a minor skirmish with China with around 60 deaths total. The messaging from China is very similar to the run-up to the 1962 war.

Re: Ask HN: How are you holding up?

#177
post #16

Really badly, but could be worse. I am entirely sure that I have moderate-serious depression since the lock down started. I rely entirely on external structure and physical separation of spaces to keep myself sane. So WFH has been disastrous for me. I have been eating worse, not working out, stopped pursuing hobbies/side projects and have been incredibly unproductive at work. Thankfully, a year of good results prior…

> I rely entirely on external structure and physical separation of spaces to keep myself sane. I think this will resonate with a significant subset of the HN crowd. I really thrive on externally-enforced structure (didn't take long to discover I made a terrible entrepreneur, but found a good niche as a startup employee). I've set my life up around having different events and places I need to be: classes at my gym, to…

> I really thrive on externally-enforced structure (didn't take long to discover I made a terrible entrepreneur, but found a good niche as a startup employee).

How did you find that out? Really interested whether I fall in the same group. I feel like I agree with you; I haven't been exercising as much because I can't go to a studio/gym to exercise, and the deterioration of both physical health and mental well-being is very apparent now.

Re: Ask HN: How are you holding up?

#178
Pretty terrible. I have no prospects, my startups all failed, I've lost most of my money (lost about $2m that I saved over 10 years and earned from previous startups which I managed to cash out). I tried to go the VC route, but no investors wanted to talk to me, so I spent my own money instead and now I'm broke.

I need to find a job, but because I'm highly experienced and older (35 y/o), most companies see me as expensive and difficult, thus don't want to hire me. Plus, I'm unlikely to put up with BS. I suck at interviews/coding challenges so I can't get hired at something like Google/FB in spite of having a stellar resume and long list of popular GitHub projects I created myself with thousands of happy users. Experience is a double edged sword: I can get things done much faster than most people, and I've pretty much done it all in computers by now, but I'm also jaded and can see through all the BS.

I'm seriously considering suicide. I'll run out of money soon, I own nothing, have no family, can't afford rent, and am not eligible for any government assistance because of the stupidity of the laws. I've read a lot of philosophy over the years, and I've decided that suicide is really not a bad option.

I'm so tired of being a peasant and working hard while someone else gets rich. I don't want to be someone's little worker bee anymore. I think the good opportunities are gone, and I don't want to contribute to bad companies doing bad things (i.e., most of big tech, and big cos in general).

Re: Ask HN: How are you holding up?

#179
post #51

I feel a touch of shame considering the tenor of this thread, but amazing. I just said to my wife I don’t want to go back. And I have a pretty spacious private office. We had our first child on Halloween and we both had only returned to work for a month before being forced to wfh. We both still are. It’s great watching my son every day grow. My wife’s job leaves her twiddling her thumbs a lot so she gets to spend a l…

I'm with you. For us it has been pretty much fine. My spouse and I stay at home for the most part, except for the occasional shopping trip. Working from home. Luckily we haven't got on each others nerves much :)

Re: Ask HN: How are you holding up?

#180
One of the best things I did right before lockdown was to buy an Olympic Bar and learn how to slow-cook cheap cuts of meat. Despite being mostly sedentary (and broke), I'm in the best shape of my life simply from eating once or twice a day and doing ~10x 50kg squats every 2nd or 3rd day.
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