hoping to get some advice from mustachians about best way forward, suffering from bad career burnout.
details/info: 36, married, 2 young kids. heard about fire 5 years ago or so (the post 'shockingly simple math behind early retirement' on mmm blog was a revelation).
assets: $1.5m split between retirement accounts, cash, taxable accounts. $700k house with $400k mortgage. call it $1.8m NW.
expenses: $7k a month/ $84k a year. quite high due to VHCOL and childcare for 2 kids. should be closer to $5k in the next 3-4 years once childcare falls away.
with 4% SWR (assuming $7k/month spending continues), i'm targeting around $2.1m in assets and a paid down house, so that would mean $1m more to go, or 5 more years being stuck in the grind... and i'm just not sure i can hack it because of overall stress, long hours, not much sleep, permanent anxiety. the post covid era has been particularly harsh with the work pretty much never stopping, including weekends. i've been at this job for around 8 years and regularly thought about leaving, but just when i was about to hit breaking point, things at work coincidentally tended to temporarily relax (although the periods of relative slow down were short and rare), so i just kept going.
there are a few options i am considering:
option 1: just power through it, try to last 3-5 years to have the house paid off and $1.5-$2.1m in investments and then call it quits / do barista fire or whatever else after, travel a bit
option 2: change jobs/career for something less stressful. i've been considering this for a while, but this would drastically reduce our savings rate. instead of 3-5 years of saving to hit FIRE, it would turn into 10-20. not sure what is better: 3-5 years of intense discomfort, or 10-20 of medium one.
option 3: quit altogether, become a SAHD, while my wife continues working (which should cover our expenses). once kids are a bit older, do odd jobs here/there until stache' hits critical mass (more of a coast fire option).
any thoughts? i've been in a decision limbo for the past year, and just cannot make up my mind, partly driven by fear of changing course (which just keeps me in 'option 1' by default). i'm sure there are other options i haven't thought about - would be great to hear from the FIRE crowd.