Ask HN: Depressed, need to leave web development, what can I do?

Let's say there is a big project in your company called DigiRefresh - the projects aims to consolidate all data sources, standartize them and in the future extract correlated value via AI/ML - one of the most common projects in modern-day IT.

Now, someone at the TOP has secured N million dollars for this project, but he has also 5-6 other N million dollar projects. Such big projects are more or less the soldiers/power point slides of the C-level executive by which he justifies his existence to the board of the company.

All these projects on high-level sound like a must-do. Your job most probably will be to make the vision of the big guys into reality - deliver it. Which is a messsy process. Big guys don't care about the technology that much, they don't care how it will be done - they just want it done, because somebody commited to someone else for a date that makes somebody look good :)

So, your job 99% of the time is to deliver and deal with the small details like what techology will be used, how many people are needed for the tasks, orchestrate it and give yellow-green-red style reports to the top management.

The more you take away from their worry and the more time they have to play golf and the more seamless delivery you provide - the more you will raise in the corporate ladder.

Is that a healthy advice for someone struggling with Burnout/depression like OP?

And I beg to differ. Taking on lots of work is by no means a guarantee to management promotion everywhere. Often management positions go by means of connections, and are awarded subjectively to the favorable people management likes most, not to the most productive people. That's why so many managers are clueless and nearly incompetent. Because it's not always a meritocracy.

A couple of weeks back the very distinct name of a former co-worker popped into my head, and I did a search. Found some info.

When I knew him he was an intranet webmaster for a state agency. Remember "webmasters"? Anyway, in the years since, he went over to the Agile side. He's done a huge amount of contract project management work since, for several state agencies, and also for Amazon, Microsoft, and Google. And at least one gig in Australia.

Looks like a success. Completely different than what he was doing way back in the 2003-2005 period. Apparently he just decided to grab it and run with it, regardless of what you, I, or anyone else thinks about "Agile". It's a thing, and he's doing it successfully, and he seems to be in control of his life, so...

I'd say stay away from being a government employee, but as one option, governments always seem to have boatloads of money to hire consultants and contractors. Back about year 2002 I was making maybe $45k and the contractor in the next cubicle was making over $200k, didn't know any more than I did, just different things, and was treated like a god, while I was expected to eat shit and smile, all day, every day.

I quit my last job, as a state government web dev, when I decided that I'd rather die than keep working there. That was July 7, 2005. As things unfolded, I haven't worked since. This was a totally stupid thing to do, but somehow I survived. If I had it all to do over, I would be a whole bunch smarter, but here I am. I made it on savings to 2011, when I was eligible for Social Security at 62, and three years later at 65 I began drawing on my state pension. Now I'm living in Cuenca, Ecuador, where my monthly spending is under $800, around a third of my income. OK so far.