Killing Ourselves for Work
Over 17.9 million working days are lost each year due to ill health, with 828,000 people suffering from work-related stress, depression or anxiety. Clearly there is an issue at the heart of how we work.
By Charlotte Sheridan, Featured Writer.
“Like a soldier coming back from the front line.” That’s Simon’s wife describing how he was in the supermarket. “I was having a conversation with you and you just weren't there. You had a thousand-yard stare, just staring into space. That really scared me.” I interviewed Simon in 2020 for my Spoon by Spoon blog and he told me that early on in his career as a police officer he was the first person to arrive at a murder scene. “I was in complete shock for the next 48 hours…you see horrible things and get involved with some of the worst sides of humanity.”
This wasn’t the only time things were difficult. Simon would investigate long and complex cases but even after an arrest it could be another 18 months before the start of a trial. “The criminal justice system is a beast” he said. “It's not like it's done and dusted. The hard work begins once you've done that first bit. It was like stacking lots and lots of difficult things.”
Although it would be years before he realised, Simon had PTSD. “I definitely went through periods of time where I felt inexplicably unhappy, just very, very sad.” He used an analogy of a sponge. “Every time the tap drips the sponge gets full. But the sponge looks exactly the same. It gets to the point where it can't take any more water and it starts to overspill. I think there was a drip, drip, drip. A cumulative effect of tough things that I was dealing with.”
Simon was offered counselling after the murder case, but he declined. It was common practice to provide help, but “there was still an element of stigma attached to not coping. A stigma attached to getting a therapist. So, I just forgot about it and moved on with life.” But he hadn’t really moved on – it was still there. Plus Simon’s approach to work made it worse. He would go for a month with “pedal to metal, absolutely full on” and then the next few months he would be “absolutely wiped out and struggling to get momentum because I was feeling hopeless.”
Many of my interviewees are the same. “We've got to do it very quickly, otherwise you’ll lose the use of your right leg.” That was Jitesh’s surgeon giving him urgent advice. Jitesh worked in consulting in the Middle East and wanted to get promoted. It’s what encouraged him to work night and day.
In 2000 Jitesh was on an all-nighter in the office and felt a twinge in his back whilst lifting a heavy box of files. He ignored it and over the months continued to drive himself hard, so exercise, diet, and time off work took a back seat. He injured his back again and it didn’t get better. It wasn’t until a third occurrence that he took notice and stopped. “That’s when I paid attention, but it was too late to do anything without surgery. The nerve had pretty much become dead.”
Saavi’s work impacted both her physical and mental health - “the anxiety was growing and growing and growing… it got so bad that I just couldn't function. I had panic attacks and I was a complete mess. I couldn't be alone, but I couldn't be around people either.” At first Saavi didn’t want to share her work troubles with her friends. “Initially I chose not to tell many people. That was difficult because you're lying as well on top of that. As you know it’s difficult to keep a lie going. You have to tell 100 lies.”
Pete collapsed at a railway station on his way to a meeting. “I looked in the mirror and I had blood all over my face.” He’d had a fit and had bitten off part of his tongue. He was rushed to A&E, had a lumbar puncture, woke up after the operation with his mother saying, “Peter, don't you go before me.” Over the previous weeks Pete had been working extremely long hours, running between meetings and under an immense workload, all the while suffering from severe headaches.
Claire was working so hard for a global engineering organisation that she was too busy to notice her health. First she had a bout of shingles on her face and then “had a massive problem with my sinuses. But I was denying it was there.” She was in a lot of pain, but had a big conference coming up so “I was just working through it.” She felt she had “always been really on top of things. The most robust person in team. But suddenly I was struggling.” There were lots of physical signs “that I guess I wasn't spotting.”
Part of the problem was that she put herself last. “I was worrying about the team, being mother hen… constantly worrying about everyone else. But my Mum had ovarian cancer and died at 55. I don't want to live to be 95 necessarily, but I'd quite like not to have a stroke when I'm in my 50s!”
My interviewees are not alone. The 2019/20 Labour Force Survey found that over 17.9 million working days are lost in the UK each year due to ill health, with 828,000 people suffering from work-related stress, depression or anxiety. In January 2021 the American Psychological Association found 84% of American adults were feeling at least one emotion associated with prolonged stress. The most common were anxiety (47%), sadness (44%) and anger (39%). Clearly this is related to the global pandemic, but it’s also an issue at the heart of how we work.
Of course, this “collateral damage” is inevitable if we want to flourish, isn’t it? It’s the price tag for growth - advancing society, developing businesses, improving our lot. And we know we need to break a few eggs to make an omelette. Don’t we? Actually no. You see the problem is we’re looking backwards. Life has moved on and yet we still think work takes place in a factory.
Factories have rules. If work is engineering, then people are machines - small cogs in enormous wheels, pulling together for the betterment of society. If our focus is efficiency, organisation, constant growth, then machines will inevitably wear out. Some of us will be lost for the greater good, replaced with new parts down the line. But this isn’t the 1800s and we’re not in a mill, so our notion of work needs to change. It needs to fast-forward to align with the rest of our lives.
Here’s a metaphor I’ve been playing with for a while: shifting our mind-set about work from engineering to gardening. Gardeners spend time getting the conditions right: removing stones, putting in compost, watering, providing light. They encourage and nurture and are more patient than engineers. Even if nothing shows for a while, gardeners know their seeds are germinating under the soil. They don’t see growth as controlled, linear, or exponential, instead, they wait. Then they revel in the flourishing when it finally arrives; the surprise one morning as they step out to see a riot of colour and a blooming of flowers.
So, how can we use this metaphor in our own careers? How can we avoid being one of those statistics I mentioned earlier? Someone who is just spat out of the machine. I say channel your inner gardener - think of yourself as a garden to be nurtured.
First get your conditions right: make sure you have resources to hand that can help you flourish (friends, family, exercise, diet, fun, rest). Then make sure you have a good balance between work and everything else. Plants don’t grow if there is too much light or too much shade or if they’re parched or drowned. Next, change your expectations about constant growth - there will always be fits and starts in your life and career. Some years we have an abundance of carrots, others a plethora of weeds. Finally good gardeners keep a watchful eye. They take notice of the creeping fungus and tackle it before it gets out of hand. They aren’t afraid to cut back dead wood to let the shrub really thrive.
I asked my interviewees what suggestions they had for a better life. Pete said, “just make time for yourself. Work isn't everything. Don't pour so much into work - alter the balance with home.” This is from Claire: “whatever I do next I don't want to get into a situation where I am suffering ill health because of underlying stress. While it's been a tough period, it's really opened my eyes. There’s more to life than being on the hamster wheel of a corporate organisation.”
Jitesh mentioned that “work was the focus at that time and that drove everything. That needed changing.” His advice to us? “Get a balance between work, health and other things. Get your priorities set out clearly… refocus and re-prioritise other things in life.” He now pays attention to his health and walks regularly, practices yoga and eats properly. He’s left the consulting life behind him as well - “on the day I felt a big lead weight lifted off my shoulders. I suddenly felt a great sense of freedom. I would never go back to that environment again.”
Here’s a final thought on how to blossom. Pause and notice what’s going well - take time out to smell the roses. Otherwise, we’re just killing ourselves for work.
By Charlotte Sheridan, Featured Writer.
I’m Charlotte and I'm a writer and coaching psychologist. I help people find meaning, purpose and direction, so they can make real shifts in their lives. In 2020 I interviewed over 100 people going through change and 72 hours of conversation has given me a fantastic research base for my weekly blog, Spoon by Spoon.
I'll be writing and podcasting about career psychology and how our work can help us feel well and happy but can also impact our mental health. If you’re at a crossroads in your own career or life check out my website here to see if coaching could help you too.