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Workaholism leads to health problems, work addiction risk depends on occupation

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Re: Workaholism leads to health problems, work addiction risk depends on occupation

#51

Post by ojnabieoot »

The most important point from the study:

> We found that job demands could be the most important factor that can develop work addiction risk. So this factor should be controlled or should be investigated by the organization's manager, for example, HR staff, psychologists.

My last job could be described as “workaholism” but what was really going on was

1) my manager had a toxic relationship with their manager and were unfairly overworked

2) they passed this attitude on to their subordinates

3) the really ugly part: although my manager had high expectations, they were not very good about actual enforcement, so work from “underperforming” ( 60 hrs) employees, without any planning or accountability - or, crucially, any flexibility. I had never had a boss who took less responsibility for their worker’s projects.

Speaking for myself: I have a serious mental illness and not a lot of economic stability. So although I am a decent programmer (when I am well) I am very susceptible to stress-related illnesses. In November and December I ended up losing about 20% of my body weight, entirely due to work stress, and had to resign. I really tried my best to get my boss to listen and didn’t have the heart or strength to drag them into HR :(

Just an ugly situation when managers don’t take responsibility for the health of their employees. Especially when the issue is their own stress and inexperience versus greed.

Re: Workaholism leads to health problems, work addiction risk depends on occupation

#52

Post by tolbish »

jostmey wrote: post #47

I get that Workaholism is a form of escapism for many people, but that's not necessarily the case for everyone. I personally become depressed if I cannot work on something important and potentially valuable, feeling that the days pass without meaning. I spend lots of time with my kid because I see that as important. I set aside time to get enough sleep so that I can remain productive. But I hate weekends (unless at t…

Wouldn't the need to feel productive in order to avoid meaninglessness/depression be considered escapism?

Re: Workaholism leads to health problems, work addiction risk depends on occupation

#53

Post by whatshisface »

trianglem wrote: post #24
vmception wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was most focused on my career after a breakup. The structure of the work environment coupled with the reward is pretty unparalleled. Other things I can think of with structure usually have a kind of endless goal that can't be spent at your discretion. Rehab, fitness, organized religion. I've never done rehab, but it seems to overlap with fitness where even if you gamify it with achievements, its not like a game at…

I find all of this so hard to relate with. I’ve worked for a decade, have a high paying job and have been promoted multiple times but to me none of it is enjoyable. I don’t think I could ever be happy in a situation where I’m required to do something for 9 hours everyday. I can’t get around the idea that all of this a weak abstraction to make money and care very little for approval from authority figures.

What's common among the rest of the commenters is that the rest of their life was rendered emotionally uninhabitable. If you had nothing positive outside of work, maybe you would see it the same way they did.

Re: Workaholism leads to health problems, work addiction risk depends on occupation

#54

Post by thisisnico »

trianglem wrote: post #24
vmception wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was most focused on my career after a breakup. The structure of the work environment coupled with the reward is pretty unparalleled. Other things I can think of with structure usually have a kind of endless goal that can't be spent at your discretion. Rehab, fitness, organized religion. I've never done rehab, but it seems to overlap with fitness where even if you gamify it with achievements, its not like a game at…

I find all of this so hard to relate with. I’ve worked for a decade, have a high paying job and have been promoted multiple times but to me none of it is enjoyable. I don’t think I could ever be happy in a situation where I’m required to do something for 9 hours everyday. I can’t get around the idea that all of this a weak abstraction to make money and care very little for approval from authority figures.

Honestly my home life is significantly calmer and more stable than my work life. Working in IT as a sysadmin, your entire work life consists an abundance of chaos, and a lot of things are out of your control that you can get blamed for anyway, even if you are not blamed for something out of your control, say office 365 is down. It still looks bad on you. It would be nice to work in an Industry with structure and actual rewards for your effort.

Re: Workaholism leads to health problems, work addiction risk depends on occupation

#55

Post by fatnoah »

wincy wrote: post #16

After our second daughter was born with a disability and we didn’t know if she’d make it to her first birthday I threw myself into my new job utterly. I was working 7-7 almost every day, took every opportunity to travel, and in general was absent from the situation as much as my “very important job” would allow. For me I felt completely powerless at the hospital. At work I got to solve “important” problems that were…

>For me I felt completely powerless at the hospital. At work I got to solve “important” problems that were trivial in comparison to the things I had no control over, and was rewarded for doing so. It felt good to be useful when my life felt in complete chaos outside of work.

Wow, did this resonate with me. In my case, I was suffering from depression, though I didn't realize it at the time. The extreme focus required by work distracted me from how miserable I was. I dreaded going home and constantly came up with excuses to go to the office on weekends.

Re: Workaholism leads to health problems, work addiction risk depends on occupation

#56

Post by justathrowa »

honkycat wrote: post #30

Most of the time I've seen it, it is avoidance of the rest of their life. "Change diapers? Oh, sorry honey, I uhh... gotta do this thing at work. Darn it!" One phenomenon I've always noticed about workaholics is that they THINK they are being more productive, but often times they are just spending more time spinning their wheels. Also the effect it has on their mood/interpersonal skills, and the pressure it puts on t…

>But that doesn't mean it is a healthy way to spend all of your time.

Dunno about that.

Just a personal anecdote, but this year my boss specifically told me to work less, slashing my salary down by $10,000 a year to emphasize the point. Prior to this, 200 to 240 hours a month was pretty typical and has been for the last 8 years. (I doubt it's out of real concern for my health, my workload hasn't been reduced).

What I've found was that in the times of idleness though I've thought more and more about suicide. The Christmas holidays were some of the first I've had to have an entire week to myself and I spent most of it was spent testing methods for speed, logistics, and discomfort, as well as scouting suitable locations; somewhere that would force an EMS / police arrival on site by 10 minutes or so. Updated my will and managed to work out the logistics of transferring all my assets to to remaining family quickly when I finally make the decision to kill myself.

Never in my life has it gotten this far before; never really had time to seriously think about until now. I'd imagine that most people though would probably be more fine with a miserably but living workaholic, then a corpse dead of suicide.

As such, could you really say that is working long hours such is really unhealthy? Or such a terrible thing?

Re: Workaholism leads to health problems, work addiction risk depends on occupation

#57

Post by supernihil »

throwaway91627 wrote: post #8

Learned this the hard way. Spent the last 7 years grinding text books resulting in a place on a Masters in CS and a ~$200k income while working remotely from the UK (without a degree, at 26). Whole purpose was to earn as much as I could and it took over my life. Now I’m on antidepressants and overweight. Recently quit my uni course and job, and settled for a role around $65k with a New Years resolution to never be a…

this is really interesting!!! i am considering a drop exactly like that except from 100k to 62k in order to clear up the anxiety induced helltrain i'm currently on, asked about it here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25765287

sounds like you made the right choice, i am getting more and more convinced about sacrificing the career to get time for treating myself and the family better

Re: Workaholism leads to health problems, work addiction risk depends on occupation

#58

Post by throwaway91627 »

qmmmur wrote: post #26
throwaway91627 wrote: post #8

Learned this the hard way. Spent the last 7 years grinding text books resulting in a place on a Masters in CS and a ~$200k income while working remotely from the UK (without a degree, at 26). Whole purpose was to earn as much as I could and it took over my life. Now I’m on antidepressants and overweight. Recently quit my uni course and job, and settled for a role around $65k with a New Years resolution to never be a…

What did you work in if you don't mind me asking?

Was a software developer but realised it’s much easier to be competitive, if you’re a good but not great dev, to get higher paying SDET roles.

Re: Workaholism leads to health problems, work addiction risk depends on occupation

#60

Post by hanniabu »

tenebrisalietum wrote: post #15
hanniabu wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm one and personally I have a lot of pride in my work, no matter what I'm doing, so it takes me longer to do things than someone else that just scraps things together. This leads to me spending way more time on work.

Overfocus on details or over-perfection could be a symptom of anxiety.

Pretty sure anxiety is a symptom of the perfectionism, not the cause
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