'Fuck it attitude' to everything work-related since hitting 50...

[YankeeDoodleWhat]

That's it. I can't say this in real life but since hitting 50 I just don't seem to care about work-related 'stuff'.

I do my job and am in a very senior role but I've lost all attachment to it. I'm more shocked than anyone as I used to love work and everything surrounding it. Now, I'm annoyed if I have to work an evening or weekend.

Not sure why I've posted, just a rant as I can't say this out loud in the real world 🙂

If anyone's been here and come through, please let me know how. I can't afford to retire or do fewer hours.

@tiptoetipfinger

This made me shudder: I’m not in a job where we not often do teams, but next week we’re to attend to an obligatory dance work shop.

I think that's bordering on bullying. I'm hopeless at dance moves and I'm sure I would feel totally humiliated, trying hopelessly and failing like a right dork, in front of my colleagues. It only benefits those who are naturally good dancers. It's like someone, say a tennis player, hitting 20 service balls at you and laughing if you can't hit any of them back.

I get it, OP. I'm coasting gently up to 48 and I'm simply not arsed any more about a lot of stuff that I used to stress over.

In my 40s I was so energetic and motivated, despite having young dc, that retrained in an entirely new profession. A decade on I can't think why I bothered or where I got the energy from. So over it. I've got as far up the clinical ladder as it's possible to go, so the next step would probably be to diversify into research/academia or seek a non-clinical promotion, but I just can't be bothered. It's all the same old crap that I've been dealing with in various forms since I first started work in the early 90s. I do like my (young, enthusiastic, intelligent, dedicated) team but I loathe all the patronising corporate wankery I have to shield them from. I use the delete button on about 80% of my inbox these days.

I also think there is nothing new in the world, in corporate terms. When people say "let's have a fun fact of the week at our meeting" or some other wankery I just think yeah go on then, just don't expect me to do it.

I think a dancing thing is an outrageous thing to ask of anyone except a dance troupe. Years ago I was involved in planning an away day and it was suggested we do hire wires. One person at the meeting said "I'm an accountant, I really don't come to work to be forced to do things I find uncomfortable or embarrassing". Quite!

Thanks so much for this thread.

I'm 56 in a basic admin role with barely anything to do, as more tasks get digitised I'm left with less and less. I don't want to ask for more as I'm afraid of the opposite happening and getting swamped and not coping. I've applied for 2 other roles in the same dept that I would find interesting and had the skills and qualifications but not even been offered an interview.

My organisation has recently announced cost savings offering early retirement and voluntary severance so I've applied. I reckon if I save as much as I can between now and a leave date of July, I can afford at least a couple of months off without touching either the lump sum or my main savings and if necessary pick up a Christmas job to tide me over while I decide what I want to do.

My DH is a few years older and not in the best of health so I'd rather we had the time now while we can still get around and do stuff.

If I get knocked back for ER I don't know how I'm going to cope with another 10+ years.

*high wires, like Go Ape

There was a thread recently about people in jobs where they are senior, well-paid, but just feel like they don’t have a massive amount to do. That’s how I felt for ages and then someone on that thread pointed out that at a senior level you are being paid for your knowledge and experience more than what you actually do. That makes me feel a lot better about not engaging as much as I did when I was eagerly climbing the job ladder, and just not being that busy.

Most jobs are, actually, pretty meaningless in the long term and when you’re old enough to have seen things come and go - new shiny ways of doing things that everyone got excited about and then after a few years replaced with another new shiny way of doing things, and on and on. It makes you cynical.

I'm in a senior role that looks after customers (think Account Director type role). We supply services to large companies that we all use at some point or another.

I really struggle with the amount of fuss and stress they show when things go wrong. I end up sat there thinking 'oh ffs Mr Customer, you sell fucking bed linen, you're not curing cancer'. I really struggle to get that worked up about anything these days. I'm waiting for someone to question my urgency - but people just compliment me on my level headedness and the fact I don't panic or get stressed, I'm loathed to tell them it's because I don't actually give a shit if one of their shops can't dispense coffee or sell you a quilt.

Love this thread. @SomersetTart I'm another person who's inspired by your story. I have teenagers still so need to keep working, but for various reasons have had a drop in income over the past couple of years and am amazed by how little money I need to be happy. I have a good community of friends locally and we meet for coffee in the park and go wild swimming. Odeon near us is £5 (or 2 for 1 with Meerkat offer). I remember in my last job before the pandemic thinking I would set myself a target of spending no more than £10 a day, not including commute costs. I was spending huge amounts of money on absolute shit. I decluttered and got rid of about 20 lipsticks all in pretty much the same colour.

So looking forward to not having to fund kids and being able to potter about and please myself.

@Almahart

I no longer need to fund kids but

So looking forward to being able to potter about and please myself.

Sums up how I feel perfectly.

Corporate bullshit in a meeting: We had to write down 5 things we don't know about you . So I wrote shit like one foot is bigger than the other etc . No way I am I telling them anything that could be used against me or for their benefit. 😂

I feel like this too, and so does DH. Though nothing to do with turning 50, it's always been a waste of time.

And I've never been a people pleaser so I dread to think what I am going to turn into as my "caring" hormones ebb away!

@KrushedIvy I hate those questions. You don't know these things about me because I don't want you to.

Or the team meeting when you have to come up with an 'icebreaker'. I had a member of my team, early 20s, get hyper-excited about taking charge of this and can no longer quite trust him.

@Changenamefortoday good luck with that, it sounds like an amazing opportunity and exactly what I'm holding on for.

Let’s just say I’m not looking forward to it.. 😩😂

I hate those fucking fun away day things. We had to do crazy golf last year. I am shit at anything to do with hand eye coordination. Most of my team are super competitive and I looked like a flustered middle aged woman. Which I'm not. I don't get flustered was crap at things like this when I was 25.

I'd be 'really looking forward' to that dance workshop.

As far as I am concerned knowledge is power and the less they know about me in a private capacity the better.

Shame to have a colourfully violent dose of D&V that very day!
Oh dear!
Never mind. 😁

A 22yo member of my team suggested we do Bongo's Bingo after our next team day. I'd rather chop off both of my own arms.

God, yeah! I got a new job last year that I have been trying to build for about 5 years. Then DH had a heart attack, and I truly can't see work far enough.
I'm 55 now, and I can take a big chunk of my NHS pension at 60. I'm very tempted.

My 'fuck it attitude' to everything work related has gone through three phases, though if I am honest I have never been particularly invested in any business I have worked for.

The first phase was once we'd cleared the mortgage. I was 44 then, and it was the beginning of the end of the thinking about it and the start of the planning to do something phase.

The second phase was when my husband died suddenly, and I did say 'fuck it' and stopped working for 3 years, 5 weeks after he died. I was 49.

I am now in the third phase. I started a full time role again in 2022; I hadn't been looking but was approached, was flattered, and accepted the role. That was a mistake. I don't need the money. I do resent the time it takes. I have no patience for sitting in meetings / Board meetings listening to people who are too fond of their own voices talking rubbish. Back at the 'fuck it' phase level 10, but professional pride means I'll stick it out for the bare minimum - which for me is two years. Thats 6 months to go...

My general lack of investment throughout my life fundementaly boils down to the fact that I have always had the confidence that I can get another job. Though, ironically, when actually at work 'imposter syndrom' has been a thing for most of my career, and even now at the tail end of it I still have days / meetings when I think 'whay are you paying me for this' 😂

I would go. My colleague and friend stayed 2 years longer than she needed to and bitterly regrets it. She is having a ball in retirement, and the last 6-12 months at work has left a very bitter taste, which has slightly spoiled a very happy and successful career

It's very reassuring to hear so many people reflecting my inner thoughts. At my workplace everyone moans a lot, endlessly, but there's competitive busyness and it would be completely unacceptable just to say you don't give a shit.

I've worked there a long time because I had my daughter at 41 and soon afterwards became a single parent. I've been her sole support ever since and I've been so paranoid about not being able to support her that I've just clung onto the familiar and stayed where I am. I'm now paid more than I'd get elsewhere, but I'm completely stuck, seen as part of the furniture and have ten years of mortgage at £1300 a month to go. My daughter's started university, so I have at least two more years of finding thousands to keep her going and it's so hard. I'm desperate to retire and turned 60 recently so could take my pension, but it would barely cover the mortgage every month and the lump sum wouldn't come anywhere near paying it off. I fantasise about selling up and just living in a bucket with the cats, but I do want to leave my daughter some money when I die to make up for her family being absent, dead or shit. I need a plan!

@Grapesarenottheonlyfruit Completely agree and there's no sign of it stopping. The NHS needs a complete overhaul but won't anytime soon if at all, because it doesn't suit those being paid large amounts to have endless meetings and come up with more corporate and tick-boxing things while nothing changes, and being oblivious and/or nor caring about the carnage around them.

The worse is there's more and more pressure on those who are here and trained working at the coal face. Rinse and repeat.