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I Burnout for Fun
Overworking as a Coping Mechanism
I’m a workaholic. I’ve come to this realization and I accept it. It’s not because I want to. It’s because I have crippling anxiety and working keeps me sane. Let me explain. After attending a few therapy sessions and sporadic doctor’s visits, I was diagnosed with OCD, depression, and generalized anxiety disorder. And I’ve always worked a lot, and I’ve always had these three comorbid conditions.
But how do my anxiety and OCD connect to being a workaholic? I’m getting to that At first, I thought I was working to save up money and pay off student loans. That theory was debunked as years later I’m still broke and still have student loan debt. Then I thought, I’ll save up a nest egg so I can do, insert x,y,z adult-type activity here. And that was not the case. I realized I was overworking to compensate for and hide from all the problems or percieved problems that I had.
Overworking for me is an escape. I was hustle culture before the hustle. I work so much that I don’t have time to relax or think about anything that bothers me. When people say you work so much, part of me feels proud. And the soul of me feels exhausted and knows good and well that I’m not happy.
But I keep doing it and in the back of my mind I think, “what if?” Like in 2020 my what-if mind helped me to maintain a job…
