Nothing ever stops in big picture, no matter who gets hit by a bus. But there is no point in suffering.
You should try to raise VC money or get into an incubator. If you cant then quit or put this startup on hold. .Find a salary paying job, get your health back on track before it worsens further. Resume your startup when you feel better.
How to balance health issues with being a founder?
11–20 of 54 posts
Re: How to balance health issues with being a founder?
#12"Also I am have insane trouble controlling my weight, I am yet to find a safe place to exercise for free (I don't have money to pay a gym), and even with a carefully controlled diet my weight swings around madly (I managed to get 2kg lighter in 4 days, and then 4kg heavier in 2 days for example...) " I've good news about that. The +/- 4kg oscillations are just water, but you can fix the weight problem even without ex…
"Also I am have insane trouble controlling my weight ... and even with a carefully controlled diet my weight swings around madly (I managed to get 2kg lighter in 4 days, and then 4kg heavier in 2 days for example...) "
It's not pretty, but the Hacker's Diet site has a weight tracker with an algorithm that smooths out daily weight fluctuations for precisely this reason. http://www.fourmilab.ch/hackdiet/
Re: How to balance health issues with being a founder?
#13Drop the mobile games startup, it's not going anywhere. People will still play games a year from now. Find yourself a job. Get a gym membership. Change your diet. Get the medicine you need. Get glasses. Pay off your debt. Once you're situated, come back to your startup, and you'll find yourself 100% more effective.
I am in the startup because of the debt... where I live jobs that I could find don't pay enough to pay the debt.
stupid, stupid, stupid decision to take that debt to do university, I should have started to work without a degree, I would be much, much better now...
Re: How to balance health issues with being a founder?
#14"The first wealth is health"
I urge you to rethink your priorities. Very little things come before health in this world.
Re: How to balance health issues with being a founder?
#15I was recently (am?) in a similar situation. It took 4 hospitalizations before I let go of the startup, and asked my family for help getting back on my feet. I'm on the upswing now, recovered while working less demanding jobs, and after 6 months started another company.
If I learned anything, it's that my priorities had gotten pretty twisted- and that there will always be another startup.
This time, I'm keeping reasonable hours, and doing whatever I can to stay on top of my health. If I can't afford something important to my care, I'll contract on the side to pay for it. The current struggle is that it's "so hard" to exercise as a founder- but that's just a lie we tell ourselves. It doesn't take any more space than you already take up to keep fit. Due to the details of my medical stuff, I can't run anymore, but I can still walk, and do situps, pushups, and wall sits. If you're okay with looking ridiculous, you'll be surprised at how many places you can find to get a couple exercises in.
Re: How to balance health issues with being a founder?
#16This is a rather long quote, but it's relevant:
>Finally, many important things are notable for their absence from the cost-density table. Even in the twenty-first century, we still can’t buy true love, respect, or fulfillment.
>We can’t even buy decent replacements for biological adaptations that go wrong—artificial eyes, brains, hands, or wombs. Our bodily organs are the most value-dense items that we can call our own. They are beyond price, but we take them for granted until we lose them through accident or age.
>Our inherited legacy of adaptations is literally precious. Even the poorest parents give their children vast riches, in the form of senses, emotions, and mental faculties that have been optimized through millions of years of product development. They are so reliable, efficient, intricate, self-growing, and self-repairing that no technology comes anywhere close to matching them. The human genome is the ancestral vault of riches, the secret Swiss account. It is very important for consumerist capitalism to make us forget this, to take for granted what we owe to life itself. Beyond our true necessities and luxuries—our biological adaptations—we get only a little added value from market-traded products.
— Geoffrey Miller (from Spent: Sex, Evolution, and Consumer Behavior)
In other words, your health is worth much more than your startup's expected value. Drop everything else and fix it.
Also, you mention that you need new glasses. If you drive, you are endangering others.
Re: How to balance health issues with being a founder?
#17May not be the advice you want to hear, but... you sound like you're in a country with a pretty terrible healthcare system (US? India? Ah, Brazil according to your bio on your site). The first thing I'd do in your position is move to a country with a proper public health care system - probably the UK. Do it via finding a job or any other method, but somehow do it. The startup itself doesn't matter. You write "I have…
Hormone treatment for hypothyroidism is provided free by the NHS in the UK [1]. I'm not sure about the conditions that migrants to the UK have to satisfy to qualify for non-emergency treatment though.
(I am not a doctor, the following does no constitute medical advice, etc)
Hypothyroidism is a life-long condition, so you need to get your medication sorted out asap. Someone close to me has this condition, so I know from their experience that determining the right dose can be difficult, even with the help of blood tests and a doctor / endocrinologist. Be cautious about trying to do this yourself, although I appreciate you may have little choice.
Finally, T4 is not usually prescribed in the UK because it has limited effect. Nevertheless some people claim it helps them in combination and they often obtain it privately from Mexico. The same may be true for synthetic T3, which is the conventional treatment. If you do this then be extremely careful.
Good luck.
[1] http://www.thyroiduk.org.uk/tuk/NHS_Information/prescription...
Re: How to balance health issues with being a founder?
#18Drop the mobile games startup, it's not going anywhere. People will still play games a year from now. Find yourself a job. Get a gym membership. Change your diet. Get the medicine you need. Get glasses. Pay off your debt. Once you're situated, come back to your startup, and you'll find yourself 100% more effective.
I am in the startup because of the debt... where I live jobs that I could find don't pay enough to pay the debt. stupid, stupid, stupid decision to take that debt to do university, I should have started to work without a degree, I would be much, much better now...
[deleted]
Re: How to balance health issues with being a founder?
#19"Also I am have insane trouble controlling my weight, I am yet to find a safe place to exercise for free (I don't have money to pay a gym), and even with a carefully controlled diet my weight swings around madly (I managed to get 2kg lighter in 4 days, and then 4kg heavier in 2 days for example...) " I've good news about that. The +/- 4kg oscillations are just water, but you can fix the weight problem even without ex…
4kg weight swings tie into the endocrine dysfunction. Aldosterone levels are probably messed up causing screwy water retention. Try keeping sodium intake over 5 grams a day. Get more calcium and potassium, too.
As for procuring meds like t3/t4, you can order what you need online from Thai and Mexican pharmacies. It's expensive and you run a something like one in twenty chance your national customs agents will seize the goods. It's still less hassle and expense than dealing with the domestic medical cartels.
Re: How to balance health issues with being a founder?
#20Can't speak to your specific health issues, but moving to the mountains and getting a German Shepherd worked wonders for me in lowering stress, improving health and fitness, increasing my creative output and minimizing financial worries.
Living in the country is good for the mind, body, soul, and budget. Having a big dog that's with you all day long will improve your mood and motivate you to exercise (because you won't get a damn thing done with an energetic critter that needs attention). And while you're out walking, running or hiking with your new best friend (sans mobile device), you'll stimulate your creative faculties and solve problems you've been "stuck" on in your head.
Internet in Montana is nearly as good as any major city I've ever lived. Sometimes better. What else do you need in order to be productive?