So a bit of backstory. I'm in my early 30s and I've been working since I was 14. This is the longest I've ever gone without working. I started with a paper route, and then got my first 'real' job when I was 16. I was still in high school, and sacrificed homework, good grades, and social time because I had to help keep my family afloat. At that time, I worked six days a week with the equivalent of full-time hours with only Sundays off.
I've had a job almost all of my life, except for a rough patch during the economic recession from 2011-2013, when I finally got a job after a year and a half of being unemployed but heartily searching. That job in particular put me through absolute hell. I stayed for six years, enduring mental and verbal abuse, being denied raises for some years despite excelling performance (I got a total of $1.06 in raises over six years), and so much stress that it triggered heart palpitations that made me think I had heart disease in my 20s. After six years, nearly to the day, I was laid off due to client change and downsizing, and it was the happiest moment of my life.
I coasted on my unemployment benefits and payout money for a year before deciding to go to college. I did a year and a half of college, through the pandemic, but had to stop in January due to the pandemic. So now it's over… my search for work began and I found employment which I'll have next week.
All of my life prior, whenever I've secured a job I've felt great. I don't mind earning my living, but… the times we're in now do not really feel like we're 'living' at all. We're surviving… barely. To make matters worse, the job I've secured is of the same ilk as the job that gave me so many health problems, but it's one of the few offered via work from home.
Now I'm just dreading it. The anxiety is already setting in. The feeling of doom is already pouring over me. Despite everything that has happened in the last few years, I've largely enjoyed myself. No one to berate me 40 hours a week. No one to stress me out constantly, whether I'm at work or home. Freedom to walk my dog whenever I want, and sleeping when I need it. At first I thought I was lazy, but I truly don't think that's the case. I just do not believe we're born to live like this. Back when I was 16, I remember having so much disposable income because the job I worked was paying $4 over minimum wage. This new job pays a buck fiddy over and I'll still be in the 'poverty zone'. How am I worse off now than I was almost half of my life ago, but still working in the same field?
Sorry for the long post, but I just wanted to get this off my chest to other like-minded individuals.