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Comment by Metus | Hacker News Reader

What are the warning signs? The paths you described kind of describe things I do. Sometimes they are necessary and I am taking steps to prevent them. At the same time I worry I already shut down the warning signs.

Sometimes I wonder whether "burnout" or "occupational burnout" describes something I have experienced in college. It was not a spectacular or intense thing, just losing interest in my subject completely and avoiding getting started with exercises, even though I was decently good at my subject and loved the hours and hours I spent studying.

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The usual, some combination of sleeping difficulties or sleeping too much, constantly being annoyed by nothing in particular, brain fog, forgetting things, procrastination, difficulty reaching a flow state, general disinterest in certain or most things, acute anxiety/stress response to thinking about things that should be done, increased "self-medication" with alcohol or other drugs, comfort eating, or alternatively forgetting to eat, loss of appetite.

Thank you for the list, I will take the advice to heart immediately.

Oh god. That might be me. But then I’ve always felt all of these things as long as I remembered.

Sounds an awful lot like depression to me.

i see you’ve listed out the side effects of existing in 2023

This is me since... at least high school. Probably earlier, but my memories are spotty. Almost all the things you mention present, often acutely, in relation to anything that is "to be done" - be it work or personal. Anything can trigger it, the moment it stops being something I do on a whim, and becomes something that I plan or is expected of me. No underlying medical condition to attribute it to. What to do then?

Have you already been to a psychiatrist? That sounds like it could be knock-on effects of growing up with untreated ADHD.

Yes. Treated for depression in my early 20s, but it only reduced those issues a tiny bit. Diagnosed with ADHD in my 30s (thanks to many comments like yours over the years on HN, which eventually made me talk with a doctor again); treatment was much more effective for the symptoms in question, but they never completely went away, and occasionally come back to bite with vengeance. I currently consider the effect of that treatment to be somewhere between "close, but no cigar", "you're holding it wrong" and "lulled into false sense of security".

One thing I observe being unstated for many mental health conditions is that the duration is often life.

Or that without fundamentally changing the set and setting of one's life, one can expect, on average, approximately the same metrics now as tomorrow, and so on and so forth.

Therapy and medication help, for some people, some of the time.

  > Sometimes I wonder whether "burnout" or "occupational burnout" describes something I have experienced in college. It was not a spectacular or intense thing, just losing interest in my subject completely and avoiding getting started with exercises, even though I was decently good at my subject and loved the hours and hours I spent studying.

I think this is my experience right now. I love CS and almost all my classes were great, but now it's like I can't study, I can't will myself to work on a class' project, etc. I have an exam that I have been avoiding for months and it's blocking my other classes that require this exam to take their exams

The fact that you use the past tense means you got past it? If so, I'd appreciate any advice

> The fact that you use the past tense means you got past it? If so, I'd appreciate any advice

I'd love to give you advice so much, however I forced myself through it and started to work in a different carreer.

Thanks anyway. I'm learning a lot from this subthread.

I felt the same with Electronic Engineering in my final year - because I had realised that what I was learning was so academically focused that it was almost useless in the real world. I forced myself to finish that last year, but I think that effort destroyed my love for electronic design work (fortunately, I fell into a software job instead, in part because I got my degree).

Perhaps if you can get out in the real world then you will find real problems and those will likely motivate you (if you are anything like me, anyway). The most motivated students I recall were already working, and they picked and chose relevant academic focus that could help them with their design work (i.e. they could get some value from the academic system). Even though work is often depressing in itself (varies on a huge number of factors).

Ideally, try and discover what really motivates you. I like this idea, although I haven’t tried it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29912252

Edit: perhaps relevant: I was depressed due to a relationship. She ended the relationship with me, and the next day I was long-term happy. Turns out situational depression is a thing, and that it is entirely different from clinical depression (which doesn’t fix itself in a day - exception fast bipolar?). If you feel unhappy, sometimes you have the ability to fix the situation that is making you unhappy!

Good luck.

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