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Antiwork

How to talk to overloaded manager about my own workload being overloaded and damaging my health?

I've been at this job for 6 months and I love the people, but the workload is unmanageable to the extent that my manager is doing half of my job for me. While I'm grateful that she's helping, it's not sustainable for either of us. My mental and physical health have tanked. I dream about work and wake up in the middle of the night thinking about work. My eczema has flared up. I cry myself to sleep and wish I didn't exist (to put it safely). I left my last job twice due to similar issues that put me on psychiatric medication for depression and a mental health rehab program. My previous boss didn't make enough effort to help me. My current boss has, but it's just not enough to keep me safe (mental health-wise). I know no job is worth my peace, but I'm not ready to be…


I've been at this job for 6 months and I love the people, but the workload is unmanageable to the extent that my manager is doing half of my job for me. While I'm grateful that she's helping, it's not sustainable for either of us.

My mental and physical health have tanked. I dream about work and wake up in the middle of the night thinking about work. My eczema has flared up. I cry myself to sleep and wish I didn't exist (to put it safely).

I left my last job twice due to similar issues that put me on psychiatric medication for depression and a mental health rehab program. My previous boss didn't make enough effort to help me. My current boss has, but it's just not enough to keep me safe (mental health-wise). I know no job is worth my peace, but I'm not ready to be unemployed again.

I know it's risky to disclose mental health issues to your boss, but I've expressed my overwhelm with the workload for over a month and I feel like there needs to be an ultimatum to upper management before they take it seriously, because they cannot afford to fire me (at least not in Q4). So how do I express my situation tactfully?

Extra context:

I'm an Account Manager (AM) at a marketing agency. The other AMs and I all agree that 10-14 clients each is too many for us to manage. We've communicated to our manager that we all need fewer clients for a more manageable workload and so that we can give each client more attention. This conversation has been repeated over the span of months.

She says her hands are tied because of the rest of upper management, and I know this to be true. They want to add clients, so we get more clients. My boss is always willing to pick up the slack, but not always able due to her own workload.

I don't imagine there's an immediate solution because they can't just fire clients to reduce our workloads. But if there's a longer-term solution, I will be greatly suffering in the meantime. I don't want a raise to justify the extra work. I just want to not hate living because of work.

Tagged “NSFW” to be safe, due to mentions of suicidal ideation.

Edit: I also have two direct reports and have been unable to fully support them for weeks. So the overload currently extends to three different position tiers.

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