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Never waste a midlife crisis

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Re: Never waste a midlife crisis

#231

Post by ctrlp »

p1esk wrote: post #213
ctrlp wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they are performing according to the profession's own standards, then they spend their working days involved in other people's problems, delusions, traumas, grievances, morbidities, obsessions, suicides, etc, (not to mention various mental disorders). This probably accounts for high rates of burnout among them. But, ask yourself, what about the ones who don't burn out? What is it about them that allows them to do…

I bet a lot of people will find that more interesting, meaningful, and fulfilling than what software engineers do.

Undoubtedly. Software engineering is a niche activity that takes a certain aptitude for abstract reasoning. Right away you eliminate a lot of people from the candidate pool. What's your argument?

Re: Never waste a midlife crisis

#232

Post by EspressoGPT »

JakeAl wrote: post #205
tayo42 wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What exactly is a panic attack? Like your just watching TV and suddenly convinced you'll die? Or was it like at work, something woukd happen and you freak out?

It feels like when you're on a plane and it suddenly drops due to turbulence without warning. Only you could be anywhere doing anything.

The good news is that you can learn to cope with and ultimately control and suppress panic attacks, as opposed to turbulence drops on an airplane.

Re: Never waste a midlife crisis

#233

Post by dmje »

My midlife crisis at 40 was more like a midlife epiphany. We moved from a perfectly good and totally beautiful city (Bath, UK) into the arse end of nowhere in Devon to live in a shack in the woods with no running water and to be near the sea.

We went with two small (8 and 5) kids (responding to those here saying it's not possible - it is!) and downsized from a busy city life to a quiet rural one.

Our intention was to stay a year. After two years we mentioned going back to the kids and they put their feet down - the most relaxed kids in the world decided they knew what was good for them: splashing about in rivers with sticks, fires on the beach, mud, a tiny school, more present parents, late nights lying on a hill looking at the stars. So we listened to them and stayed.

We're still in the country, by the sea, and our kids are now nearly grown up. We're having a blast. We're here for them. They're here for us. We'll never be rich but we're a great family unit.

If we hadn't had the guts to do a crazy thing (I give all credit to my wife for having the idea!) and decide pretty much off the cuff to follow our "crisis", we'd never have discovered our new life.

We've been very fortunate with our circumstances and I never forget that - but fundamental to all of this has been making the leap. Fear of the unknown can be countered by just doing it, knowing that crazy looking decisions can create amazing futures. Doing things is often better than curling up in fear and not doing them.

Right. I'm off for a surf :-)

Re: Never waste a midlife crisis

#234

Post by roeles »

sph wrote: post #27

Good advice, from a 36 year old middle aged man 3 years into a midlife crisis after a massive work-related burnout event. A couple more pieces of advice from me: * A midlife crisis has its own glacial pace. Be prepared to be upside down for a long time. * Be prepared not to be the same person you were before. Be prepared to learn there is no turning back. * If you're in a midlife crisis, your previous life was simply…

Thank you so much for sharing. This makes a lot of sense right now.

Re: Never waste a midlife crisis

#235

Post by dorkwood »

flir wrote: post #194
tayo42 wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What exactly is a panic attack? Like your just watching TV and suddenly convinced you'll die? Or was it like at work, something woukd happen and you freak out?

I'll attempt an answer: it's your flight-or-flight response kicking in, without any obvious reason for it to do so. Oxygen intake goes up, muscles tense up, adrenaline production kicks in, but there's nothing for your body to "spend" these physiological changes on (like running for your life), so it just sloshes around causing panic attack symptoms (eg sweating, trembling, shortness of breath, chest pain, nausea, det…

I’ve been walking around thinking I’ve never had a panic attack before, but after reading this I think I’ve actually been having them all my life.

Re: Never waste a midlife crisis

#236

Post by scarface_74 »

p1esk wrote: post #157
scarface_74 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My wife and I at (46 and 48) went all out 2 years after our younger son graduated and two years after Covid. TLDR; we downsized from an our house in the burbs and our cars bought a vacation home/investment property in a resort in Florida where we live half the year and we nomad the other half flying across the US. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36306966

Do you still need to work?

Yep. I work remotely in the cloud consulting department at $BigTech as of mid 2020

Re: Never waste a midlife crisis

#237

Post by ozim »

sph wrote: post #83
OO000oo wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

38 yo male now starting to think I don’t know what a midlife crisis is.

A midlife crisis is quitting your desk job to sell ice creams on the beach in the Caribbean. Getting to the point of doing it, not just thinking about it.

I thought it is dumping wife of 20 years for silly blonde and driving red convertible one bought with use of shark loan because “you need to have it because you always wanted it” even if you couldn’t afford it.

Re: Never waste a midlife crisis

#238

Post by ulizzle »

weregiraffe wrote: post #176
ctrlp wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a coincidence. It's significantly more common in the profession[0]. They get divorced at a higher rate, and they recommend divorce to their clients. Therapists and psychiatrists are massively responsible for the divorce rates among boomers (the first widespread consumers of these services). Their children apparently learned nothing and are rushing headlong into the same therapy-culture that destroyed so many of t…

You are saying it like divorce is a bad thing.

IRL, divorce is devastating for everyone involved, especially the children. I believe therapists diagnose divorce and breakups in general so often because it eases their conscience a bit. You can see this same reasoning with abortion and such topics.

A divorced therapist is like a dentist with bad teeth or a tee-totaling drug-dealer. Can't trust any of 'em.

Re: Never waste a midlife crisis

#239

Post by mcv »

rootusrootus wrote: post #48
sph wrote: post #27

Good advice, from a 36 year old middle aged man 3 years into a midlife crisis after a massive work-related burnout event. A couple more pieces of advice from me: * A midlife crisis has its own glacial pace. Be prepared to be upside down for a long time. * Be prepared not to be the same person you were before. Be prepared to learn there is no turning back. * If you're in a midlife crisis, your previous life was simply…

> 36 year old middle aged man You're not quite middle aged yet :). And 33 is way too early for a midlife crisis, surely? Maybe it's just garden variety burnout and/or depression?

Yeah, I'm 49 and wondering if I shouldn't have a midlife crisis or something. Although reading the article, is it possible I had mine 12 years ago when I quit employment and became a freelancer? I've been a lot happier since, but it's really still the same career.

I've always wanted to create games, though. Whether computer, board or RPG. Should I quit my current freelancing and start doing that then?

Re: Never waste a midlife crisis

#240

Post by asdlkfj01293134 »

sph wrote: post #52
rootusrootus wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 36 year old middle aged man You're not quite middle aged yet :). And 33 is way too early for a midlife crisis, surely? Maybe it's just garden variety burnout and/or depression?

It was being a little cheeky. And if a massive burnout whose first month was having daily panic attacks and 3 years to recover is garden variety, I am afraid to know what a serious one entails ;) Depression was part of the baggage I was carrying around all my life. It's hard to say, given the state of things, but perhaps depression is one thing I was lucky to shed during this phase.

I remember that a few years ago, after a few months during which I dabbled in street cocaine (which may not actually have been cocaine for all I know), I started to have occasional panic attacks. I then stopped doing that nasty stuff and would not do it again for many reasons, the danger of fentanyl being one of them, but I kept drinking alcohol regularly and continued to have occasional panic attacks. Even though I continued to drink alcohol, the panic attacks stopped happening when I started to take vitamin supplements daily: B1/thiamine, B complex, magnesium, calcium, niacin, and D. Most likely, panic attacks can also be caused by pure psychological factors, but I just want to leave this information here because it might help someone who is experiencing panic attacks. Of course, I am not a medical professional, so take this information for what it's worth, which might not be much.
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