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Comment by ufmace | Hacker News Reader

I'm pretty sure that much anxiety isn't normal or healthy. I hope you can find some help for it.

I don't see how what he's describing needs to interpreted as a lot of anxiety. He's just strongly pointing at the source of the anxiety. I think the GP's comment is dead on.

I think that sometimes depends on the work culture rather than a person's personality. I've worked at places where managers do monitor your every move, look at how long you take at lunch, etc. Also co-workers sometimes think unfavourably of you if they think you are not pulling your weight even if you spend more time thinking than coding.

Let's not jump to conclusions.

This is perfectly normal if you're in a toxic micromanaging environment. The open office is the panopticon.

I have this. It got so bad I had to quit work two years ago. After medication and therapy, I still can't work without getting panic attacks. I'm really frustrated and don't know what to do..

come work to BigCo (not FB nor AMZN though) where people are more diverse by age, not just a bunch of youngsters (who have nothing except the work and who is able to sit staring into monitor for 12 hours straight and have that collective herd - "team" - mentality that everybody should behave the same, "pull their weight", etc. - was myself that way just 15 years ago) In an age diverse environment people have children, lives, businesses, habits, and don't care that much about their own or your job, etc. There is no way the manager (who has all that himself) can make those people work even 8 hours in the office. In official language it is called life-work balance :)

Also, (IANAL nor MD) i think at any workplace you can ask for a reasonable accommodation if you have that medical paperwork stating that open office causes anxiety to the level of disability. Even without paperwork i think you can just ask for it at many places. For example, we have a cluster of several cubicles on one end of our floor, and some of them are permanently assigned to some employees (I got offered one too because i was b!tching too much and loud about our open office - i declined in order to avoid getting too comfortable and losing that minimal drive that i still have to change the job :)

Agreed - recently quit a job at a SV type company where the average age was late 20's, single with no kids, in an open office. In my 30's and also child-free and unmarried, I wasn't unnecessarily out of place, but the fact that everyone seemed to feel that work was equal to life, and everyone had something to prove by how long they could stay late or work on weekends, encouraged by the management (who had nice big offices, btw), left me feeling like I couldn't ever escape being on the clock.

I went back to my contracting job in an industry that is truly diverse - not just a few token 28 year old women team leads or POC, but actual diversity: middle aged men and women with kids, older devs in their 60s nearing retirement, naturalized citizens from all over the world (instead of the few big countries supplying H1Bs).

It's a much better environment. I'm happy to cover for my 45 year old coworker when she picks up the kids, and she does the same when I need to 'clear my head' by working at Starbucks for the afternoon. We don't stay late and play XBox or have happy hours, and that is fine with me. We're a good team during the day, and content to socialize a few times a year at the holiday party or few other office events.

Same here. I thought I was aging out of the industry. Got a job at a smallish but elite kind of place. My first day, I didn't meet anyone under 30. Most have kids. Most have nothing to prove, they have already done some very impressive things.

Its been very refreshing. There is no race to out-hour anyone, my coworkers all support one another vs trying to be competitive and back stabbing. I really thought I might have to consider another line of work at some point, but good places do exist.

Interestingly though, my one real complaint is the "open office." Its not entirely the company's fault, it used to be quite comfortable but they knew they would be growing and leased space in a building that is under construction. Shockingly (/s), its completion is very delayed and now we are starting to get crammed in.

I worked in a company known for its work-life balance (best in the country). We tried open office, solo work (team of 1) anywhere I like (if I wanted to go to the office, I could), and solo work besides a team doing related work. Nothing we tried worked, I felt I was being monitored for my performance even when they weren't physically present.

Have you tried CBD. A co-worker uses capsules from greenmountaincbd.com and swears by it. Says it saved her life from panic attacks and anxiety from work related abuse.

www.reddit.com/r/cbd might be a good place for you to start...

I would strongly advocate against working under the influence. Employers may be allowed to do random drug tests, and even if they're not, accident insurance might refuse payment e.g. if you slip on a staircase, end up injured and CBD showing up in your blood works.

I don't think it has any THC and is not psycho active. From what I understand you will not test positive for drug use and this CBD is legal in all 50 states.

I wouldn't put it past employers which do drug tests to fire you for perfectly legal CBD, though...

That open office anxiety isn't necessarily easily seen or obvious constantly. It can be very subtle and blends in to the background noise. I've gotten used to it over the years but I know it is still there. 'Comes with the territory' is how I'd describe it. My trick is to 'rise above it' so to speak. Tread water harder and try and keep more of my body out of it. Almost always easier said than done.

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