I Just Quit My High-Paying Job With No Backup Plan
It All Started When I Tried to Kill Myself
It was a normal night, not unlike any other. I wasn’t feeling particularly depressed — no more than usual, anyway. Nothing radical nor sudden had happened to me in recent months. I’d had these thoughts before. In fact, these thoughts had become a regular part of both my waking and sleeping life. Yet, on that particular day I couldn’t quite shake the lingering feeling in the back of my mind that now would be a good time. After all, if I was going to end my life eventually one day then why wait for that “one day” to come? If the outcome is going to be the same, then it doesn’t quite make sense to delay the inevitable any longer.
This is what went through my mind the moment before I tried to kill myself.
I will spare the details of what happened next, but obviously — since I’m writing this — my attempt was unsuccessful. I ended up in the hospital for a week and during that time, and after I was released, I was left with a burning question: how did I get here, and what can I do to make sure this never happens again?
How Did I Get Here?
I’ve never been one to talk openly about my mental health. It’s ironic in a sense. Here I am, a professional in the world of mental health who deals with and sees people’s worsts and yet the stigma surrounding mental health and mental illness is strong and pervasive enough that I’ve questioned writing this very article.
The truth is, I’ve never been particularly mentally healthy, not since early childhood at least. Some of my earliest memories revolve around the pursuit of an escape from the reality I was facing. Even as a child, even before I had a concrete understanding of life and death, I was always drawn towards the idea of not having to experience the agony and suffering that had become my everyday life.
Sad as it is to say, this need to escape only grew with time, new traumas, and less effective coping mechanisms.
Everything came to a head when I was 16. Not only was I at the peak of adolescent emotional instability, but I was also dealing with undiagnosed mental health issues. Eventually, the weight of my situation coupled with the fact that I seemingly had no one to talk to about my struggles ended in my first suicide attempt.
I was lucky. I woke up the next morning certainly feeling like I was dying. I thought that perhaps the dying process was just beginning and I would have to wait for my organs to shut down. I feared telling anyone, so I continued on in intense physical agony until eventually it faded. Months later I had blood tests done and everything came back normal, so I simply swept that event under the rug and continued on like nothing had ever happened.
Following that event, I did receive diagnoses and treatment. I seemed to be doing well, and once I had finished high school and was on my way to university, my psychiatrist and I made the mutual decision to continue managing my mental illness under my family doctor. I later chose to taper down my antidepressants (under physician supervision of course) until I was no longer taking them after my second year of university.
Things Take a Turn
University seemed to help me thrive. I was relatively happy — as happy as someone with chronic depression can be anyway. I had made wonderful friends. I was performing well in school while maintaining a part-time job to afford my studies. It wasn’t easy by any stretch of the imagination, but it certainly wasn’t horrible. And although my mental health had its ups and downs, overall things were better than they had been and I was coping better than I had in the past… or so I thought, at least.
Things actually changed when I graduated from university. Throughout my four years of post-secondary, we were told how easy it would be for us to get jobs — being that almost everywhere on the planet is suffering from a nursing shortage. We were told we would always be in demand and that finding a job would be no problem for us. The truth was not so simple.
Upon graduation, I applied to as many job listings as I could — focusing specifically on mental health related positions as this is the area I was passionate about: helping people like me through their darkest moments. I had been there before, and I wanted to be the person to help lift them up.
Despite my enthusiasm, I didn’t receive so much as a callback for months. It was a fairly significant blow to my ego. “I’m not good enough,” I thought, “no one wants me.” Coupled with the constant pressure from family to find a job as well as a slew of personal problems and those months after graduation were far from easy.
Eventually, I did manage to find a job as a registered nurse working in mental health. I was certainly scared, yet I was excited as well. This had been my dream for a while now, and it was finally coming to fruition.
Then reality hit.
Expectation vs. Reality
My dream career— it was always to go into healthcare. When I was no more than six years old I dreamed of becoming the world’s foremost neurosurgeon. When I was a bit older, I thought I would become a psychiatrist. When I finally entered university, I was content with being an RN specializing in mental health — especially after witnessing firsthand the kind of workload that physicians have to handle with seemingly little respite.
Then, before I knew it, I was finished school. I had my first job in the field of my dreams.
Any nurse will tell you that nursing is far from easy, especially your first year out of school. This was especially true for me, as I was generally working as the sole RN in my facility, with nobody else to learn from or bounce ideas off of most of the time. Not only did I feel like I wasn’t learning or progressing, I was feeling unappreciated. Although I had a wonderful manager, and many great coworkers, I was made to feel stupid by some when I made mistakes — and was even blamed for mistakes I didn’t make in the first place. I was made to feel like I didn’t know what I was doing and most of all, I never really felt like I was taken seriously.
All of that I could deal with, however unpleasant it may have been. But what I couldn’t deal with, and what kept creeping up on me, was that I wasn’t feeling fulfilled.
Here I thought I entered into this profession where I would derive some great sense of meaning from my work. I would be able to proudly profess the difference that I create in the lives of others. I’d be able to point to concrete instances where I made a difference.
But that simply wasn’t the case.
I was surrounded by chronically mentally ill patients who realistically would never “get better.” There could certainly be improvements in their health, but with many of them facing mental illness for longer than I’d been alive, the grim reality is that, barring some incredible scientific breakthrough, these people would remain on a myriad of medications with marked mental health symptoms for the rest of their lives.
That terrified me. Seeing that, for some, the idea of “getting better” was completely unattainable really made me question whether I was simply staring at my inevitable future. A future, in which, I remain ill and am relegated to some facility where my only interactions are with fellow patients, and healthcare providers. Every time I stepped foot in the building, these thoughts flashed through my mind — and I ended up spending a lot of time at work thinking of creative ways to end my life.
This was further complicated by what I can only describe as burnout — physical, mental and emotional exhaustion — which was a direct result of my work and which most people in the field of healthcare should be intimately familiar. The sad reality is that 49% of registered nurses under 30 experience burnout and I was among them.
The truth of the matter is that while I was trying to help improve the mental health of others, I was completely neglecting my own and both my patients and I were paying the price. I began to become exhausted and annoyed by almost every interaction. Truth be told, I just wanted to be left alone. Here I was, actively suicidal and yet trying to manage other people’s mental health symptoms. It just wasn’t working, and in hindsight I don’t think it could have ever worked. While some professionals may be able to balance the mental health of their patients with their own, it’s clear that the mental health issues I was facing were so severe that this balancing act became a herculean task — one that I was bound to fail at.
As much as I thought I would get meaning from this career, as much as I thought the pay would compensate for any unhappiness I might feel, I was completely wrong. I couldn’t do this anymore.
The Attempt
I was unhappy at my job. I was alone. Like I said, I wasn’t particularly depressed — no more than usual — but still the thought of doing this thing, going through the motions of life with no fulfillment, no happiness, no true purpose weighed heavily on my conscience.
Almost every night before work, I would have a panic attack. Almost every morning before work, I would have a panic attack. Sometimes I would stay up at night worrying about shifts that were weeks or even months away. I wasn’t prepared for another 30 to 40 years of this existential suffering I was facing and while the decision to end my life was not primarily influenced by difficulties with my career, I’d be lying if I said they didn’t play their part.
For me, in that moment, purpose and fulfillment seemed entirely out of reach and so I made an impulsive, split second decision — as so many others do — that I would almost immediately regret afterwards. But I made the decision nonetheless, and I was prepared to stick to it.
The Aftermath
Hours later, I would be brought to the hospital via an ambulance and would spend the next two days virtually unaware of what was going on around me, drifting in and out of consciousness and lucidity.
Being in the hospital gave me a lot of time to think — and think I did — both while I was there, and after I got out.
Was I willing to go back to a job that, while I wasn’t happy at, enabled me to be financially stable? After all, so many people around the world sacrifice their happiness and well-being in order to provide for themselves and their families. In fact, I know many of them. Why was I any different? Is it because I’m weak? Lazy?
I went ‘round and ‘round in my head questioning what the best course of action would be, what my motives really were, and realistically if I could even afford to find another line of work.
Ultimately, after consulting anyone and everyone under the sun who was aware of my situation, I came to the conclusion that the best course of action was to quit my job.
I didn’t have a backup. I wasn’t sure whether I could even be a nurse at all at this point. I’m still not sure what the best thing is for me, other than taking some time off to focus on my mental health and thankfully I have some savings I can live off of in the meantime, although I know not everyone is that fortunate.
Now, I’m planning to go back to school and to pursue something I’ve always been very interested in and passionate about but that I always brushed aside because the career prospects were not as great as healthcare.
And who knows, maybe I’ll go back to school, and do another degree and be absolutely unable to find any jobs. That’s a distinct possibility. But there’s also a possibility that I’ll end up discovering something I really do enjoy doing that gives me some sense of purpose and that I’ll find a job in that field eventually.
The truth is, we can’t see into the future. Yes, we can make educated decisions based on statistics, prospective job sector growth and the like but if you’re someone who needs to derive something greater from your work — some sort of meaning — then I truly believe it’s best to at least try to do something you unequivocally love, whether there are ample well-paying job opportunities in the field or not. There’s an old adage that has taken many forms over the years, with the gist being “if you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life” and as fanciful and idealistic as that sounds, I do believe it to be true.
I’ve spent my entire life worrying about the future. Where will I be 10, 20, even 30 years from now? Is what I’m doing now setting me up for greater success down the road? But I think that way of thinking and living is a dangerous one. When we’re too focused on the horizon, we miss what’s right in front of us and if we’re always living for the distant future, we’ll never experience the joys of today.
Do What Makes You Happy
The reason I’m sharing my story isn’t for people to feel sorry for me. I want everyone to know that if you feel stuck and just don’t know what to do, there is hope. I’m still not 100% and quite frankly I’m not sure I’ll ever be but I already feel much better and even catch myself feeling optimistic for what’s to come, without dwelling too much on what’s to come of course.
If nothing in your life is fulfilling you, it isn’t too late to try to seek out something that does whether you’re 10, 20 or 100 years old. It’s never too late to go back to school, find a new job, make new friends or pick up a hobby. Everyone needs something in their life that drives them and if what you’re doing isn’t driving you, then don’t be afraid to stop doing it.
There is hope, but you have to work for it. Trust me though, it’s worth it. Whatever your situation, it’s worth at least trying something new. Don’t get stuck in the sunk cost fallacy of sticking with something just because you’ve devoted so much time, money or effort to a certain cause. Even if you’ve spent all your life doing something, it’s never too late to switch things up. I know this because I just spent four years of education and tens of thousands of dollars and threw it all away for something that has a possibility of making me happy and fulfilled one day, and I think I’m better for it. Don’t be afraid to do the same.
If you or someone you know needs help, resources are available. In case of an emergency, please call 911 for immediate help.
In Canada: Call Crisis Services Canada at 1–833–456–4566, text them at 45645 or visit their website to chat with someone
In the USA: Call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1–800–273–8255 or visit their website for more information.
In Australia: Call Lifeline at 13 11 14.
In the UK: Call Samaritans at 116 123.
