Hi OT -- sorry to hear about that. It sounds like you're pretty miserable. I also have been working 50+ hour weeks for some time now. I don't have any great solutions for you, but what helps me is that I try my best to separate the work that needs to get done from the stress that's supposed to accompany it. It's sort of a mindset change. I know that I have a ton to do, but I also realize that I can only do so much in one day. So I do what I can get done, and if I don't get something done, I save it for the next day without apology. You know you're working hard. Your boss and co-workers know you're working hard. There's no reason to feel bad about delaying a task that didn't make your priority list for that day.
And when I leave work, that's it. I don't check my email at home, I don't log in to do one more thing, and I try my best to not think about the next day until it's here. Drawing a firm line between work life and home life helps me find some balance, even when putting in 12 hour days.
someone asked earlier if you are already FI. I didn't read the entire thread.
My advice, whether you are FI or not is to act like it. Work a set amount of hours and then go home. As someone else said, there are a lot of jobs. I simply cannot understand why people accept being overworked. Change fields. Develop some skills that are in high demand. Only two fields I know of that demand so much, but yet don't necessarily pay high enough, are IT and law.
I can answer that. Because when you work ridiculous numbers of hours, the last thing you want to do when you finally have some non-working time is to look for jobs or learn new skills. Both of those are just piling on more work to your already overworked self.
This is good, and true. I have been job-hunting too but not too strenuously. I had applied for a job last year, got a call this year, and interviewed.
The interview required:
1. A 45 minute technical presentation. I've not done one before, in fact the last time I presented at a conference was 2004? (one and only time in fact). So I had to find a topic or topics that I could talk intelligently about for 45 minutes AND "scrub" so as not to give away any proprietary data.
2. Did I mention that I had to do this when my husband was traveling over the weekend? So, single parent. So I had to take a day off work to write the presentation.
3. I had to take another day off work to practice the presentation and get it in 45 minutes
4. I had to buy interview-appropriate clothing
5. I had to take a full day off for the interview
So, 3 days of vacation, hours of work, and I didn't get the job. :( Nothing wrong with me, actually - I got positive feedback but in the end, they decided they wanted a VP instead of a senior engineer. They have not filled the position, because they haven't found a VP willing to move here (it's a beautiful place, but expensive and there aren't many jobs - in fact a good 25% of their current employees are commuters who live 5 hours away and fly back and forth every week. Even with that option, they haven't filled it.)
Well, you can imagine that with a full time job already AND two small boys, that I can't be doing that much. Plus, I'm out of vacation, and currently burning what I do have for sick children.
Your mindset is exactly the one that I've tried to adopt also, and I also almost never check email at home. The exception was yesterday, when I was home with a sick child. I used the nap time to do some work.
Otherwise, I just don't. It's hard to explain to people who go home and log on and look at me expectantly. "My children won't let me do that. The toddler will press the moon/sleep key on the computer keyboard." Even if I wanted to work at home (and I don't), my kids kind of really want to see me at the end of the day. After work it's a flurry of pickups, cooking dinner, homework, coloring, puzzles, snuggles, tickles, diaper changes, dishes, packing lunches, bedtime stories...and then I pass out.