[iamthepieman]

I do not use this term to refer to myself. I respect those who do and respect the meaning behind it but am just old enough that it feels alien to me 99% of the time.

But I am SO triggered by this piece. I had that intrusive feeling you sometimes get when driving where you think, "I could just close my eyes and see what happens", "Or that clif is so close and the guardrail doesn't really extend far enough"

Only for my career. Like I should just not show up on Monday. I should get in the car and drive far away and change my name and work at a nice retail joint in a mid-sized town.

I'm going to need to sit and stare into the distance for an hour and 3.

[strken]

It's an almost exact copy of my last few months, right down to the 10am start.

Except that all our other senior engineers got laid off and there's nobody to pair with, I don't give two fucks about bullying because at this point the entire company knows I'll quit on the spot if they try, and our problems are mostly that the remaining team cannot understand the terrifying eldritch decision making process that led to fun little patterns like "wrap every API call in a try/catch and then ignore the errors".

I am seriously considering doing a TAFE course and becoming an electrician.

[Buttons840]

They took inspiration from the error steamroller: https://github.com/ajalt/fuckitpy

[CSSer]

Perhaps if one coupled this with a multimodal LLM we could achieve a singularity

[GreenWatermelon]

> wrap every API call in a try/catch and then ignore the errors

This describes the project I'm working on at $job with eerie accuracy :sob:

Dare I ask, was that project written in Java?

[strken]

Unfortunately my personal hell is written in Node.js.

I am so very sorry, both that you are suffering through this too and that the infection has spread.

[392]

Will you feel better looking at a wiring job that seems guaranteed to burn down the building if you don't fix it? And will Management agree?

[strken]

I wish the abominations software engineers create were as regulated and fixable as a bad wiring job. I would feel absolutely chuffed to work in an industry with licensed inspectors and standards bodies.

I am currently dealing with a system involving four separate serverless functions that call each other. There's no reason whatsoever why any of them need to be network calls. The fourth function just calls the first function again. One is in a different region for no discernible reason.

[hmaxdml]

Would be nice if there was a serverless library that lets you do in-process orchestration so you don't need abominations like Step Functions ;)

e.g., https://github.com/dbos-inc/durable-swarm

[Electricniko]

> There has been a point in my life where I ended every day in the dark, staring at a wall for an hour or two straight, trying to figure out why everything felt awful.

From his post about burnout and mental health. Also worth a read.

https://ludic.mataroa.blog/blog/on-burnout-mental-health-and...

[SanjayMehta]

If on Monday morning you’re wishing it was Friday evening, it’s time to quit.

[sph]

The frightening thing about serious work-related burnout is that three years after quitting, on Monday mornings you still wish it was Friday evening.

Any day now I'll be ready for the grind again. Any day now.

[ludicity]

It took me about six months off to start feeling normal, and I think I got out much earlier than most people do. And if you read that post, I still clearly let it get pretty bad before I left.

[chubs]

Many of us have kids to feed! The economy is not bursting with jobs anymore since rates rose post-COVID.

[karel-3d]

No need to quit immediately, just apply for jobs on the side.

[Aeolun]

And do the same thing elsewhere for less money and with less social capital?

[tpxl]

I went from an important cog with low pay but high responsibility to a much higher paying job with no responsibility. You can too with a bit of luck.

[feoren]

What about if on Friday morning you're wishing it was Monday? Like, two Mondays ago? So you weren't quite as late on everything?

[whstl]

As someone who managed to stay productive during a burnout despite constant bullying by a yelling CTO: it doesn't really help if you deliver on time.

[andrepd]

Yep, in theory yes, but shame that the bills won't pay themselves

[_proofs]

i don't buy that any situation is so hopeless, you're powerless to improve it. at least in the context of this field and its line(s) of work.

sounds a lot more like learned hopelessness making it harder to respond to stress with radical change because of (normal and human) fears of the unknown.

at some point though responsibility for the circumstances, the feelings, the stress -- the good, bad, and ugly or easy, hard, and nearly impossible -- has to be taken.

there's only one life to live. we owe it to ourselves and others to do more than -- to try not to -- just "roll over and play dead", so to speak.

humans have survived a lot and have adapted to just as much if not more.

if i ever allowed myself to even stay at any of my former jobs coming up in my life when i was paycheck to paycheck because of not making rent or just being flatout broke and homeless, i would have not progressed my career, or life, in any meaningful way, and just fed the negative feedback loop influencing what feels like a miserable existence (even privileged as it were).

can't hold myself hostage. and also, i can't hold those around me hostage as consequence of my non-action, either.

[bryancoxwell]

> I had that intrusive feeling you sometimes get when driving where you think, "I could just close my eyes and see what happens", "Or that clif is so close and the guardrail doesn't really extend far enough"

L’appel du vide

[albert_e]

Does the mention of such concepts or acknowledging it is real ... put some lisetners (if they are work certain professions) under an obligation to refer the person to a mental health assessment?

Example: a blog post like this one, with the author's real name, that acknowleges it front and center: https://ebb-and-flow.blog/2023/07/23/another-scan-lappel-du-...

[josephg]

Seriously, quit then. It’s not worth it. You get one life. How many hours on this earth do you want to spend suicidally depressed? If you have a really high pain tolerance, maybe you can do that for years. How lucky would that be?

There’s a polish restaurant near where I live that makes amazing food. The owner is always out and about, chatting with customers and making sly jokes. Turns out he used to be an oracle sql consultant of some sort, and he turned it all in to run his restaurant. You can tell he’s thriving. I think he’s got the right idea.

[andrepd]

Survivorship bias. In an ideal world yes but in reality there's bills to be paid and tech (generally) pays really well.

Not saying you shouldn't quit, just that it's not so simple.

[josephg]

I hear you. But also, ... if you're literally feeling suicidal because of work, in a sense it really is that simple. You aren't doing anyone any favours - not your coworkers, your family or yourself - by living like that.

[hackable_sand]

This is the answer.

Money is money, but money comes and goes.

The work you put into finding a healthy source of income is worth every minute.

[hinkley]

There’s literally a 90% chance your restaurant won’t survive its first year.

[josephg]

Then do something else! Literally billions of people are employed every day doing things that aren't software engineering. Pick anything.

[isoprophlex]

Change something for the better. You are the one who cares the most, you are the one best suited to take control over your life.

You deserve to feel good. Life is too short to be a cog in a broken machine.