If you have a stressful job, why do you do it?

[rickyrickygrimes]

I was speaking with my sister tonight. She definitely has a stressful job. Lots of difficult situations to deal with. Constant pressure from her superiors. And dealing with a lot of genuinely unhappy, angry, stressed, unwell people.

if you have a job like this, why do you do it?

Because the main event is only 36-50 days once every 4 years.

I do it to make a difference, for the challenge and for the money.

Because what I do is of great interest to me.
Because my current role is primarily stressful for 7 hours a day. Much less stressful the rest of the time. Previous roles in the same sort of employment are stressful all the time and left me with rampant insomnia.
Because I enjoy working with my colleagues.
Because I get 13 weeks holiday a year.
Because I know my particular area of work is one that not many people want to do. It makes a massive difference to those people I work with and their families, but when I talk about it the general response is “I don’t know how you do it”.

My job can be very stressful, but outside of the stressful times I really enjoy it. I’m a teacher at an independent SEN school for children with very complex needs, most students either have high medical needs or very challenging behaviour (or often both). It can obviously be very stressful to deal with a medical emergency or incidences of very challenging behaviour but outside of those times I find working with the students so much fun, no two days are the same, the days go quickly, I learn or discover something new every day and I love seeing the kids make progress and the difference we make to their lives. Plus due to the nature of the job I build genuine strong connections with other adults on the team as we need to have each others backs so to speak when shit hits the fan so a lot of my colleagues are also very good friends.

I'm not sure. Inertia? Don't know how to do anything else? Need the money? Being quite good at it? I think really it's because despite all the crap, and the stress, and the nightmare situations, just sometimes we literally save the life of a baby or child. And there is nothing in this world quite like seeing them again, months or even years down the line, healthy and happy. It helps glue you back together, and survive the times where you can't do anything to make things better.

There's stress and stress, though.

Stressful because it's difficult, complex, high-stakes and worthwhile - I did this kind of stressful job for years, and found it immensely fulfilling and stimulating.

Stressful because it's badly organised, working with people unsuited to their level of responsibility, inconsistent decisions and opaque processes, drama and hamfistedness - doing this now and looking to leave, it's draining and unsafe.

I have a very stressful job but it's worthwhile and I'm doing good and I get paid a lot.

What does that mean ? It makes you feel good in some way ?

I like what I do. It's interesting, challenging, makes me think, helps other people, and I like the team I work with. We have fun and have a sense of satisfaction from a job well done at the end of a project.

Me too. I’m deadline focused without a doubt. Comes up in my personality testing.

Me too. My daughter was diagnosed last year and going through the process made me realise I probably have ADHD as well.

An old boss of mine had it and was brilliant at the plate spinning thing; was a nightmare at school by all accounts but there's definitely a place for it in some types of jobs/careers/industries.

Same here. I can't be doing with deadlines that are months away. I like the pressure of a nice short deadline to focus my mind.
I'm the kind that leaves the holiday packing until about two hours before we leave too. Any earlier and I can't make decisions about what to taken or not take.

“Complex, high-stakes and worthwhile” (words used by someone above) is a great explanation of why I do my job. Drives me nuts quite often, but would be very bored if I didn’t have something like it…

also agree with the person who mentioned personal growth. I like the feeling of being able to do really really hard things, and that has come about because of a stressful job continually stretching me over many years.

Some jobs have both extreme lows and extreme highs. In my job (teaching) I can have truly horrendous days but I also have days that are incredible. If I didn’t have long holidays though, I wouldn’t do it. Although I love it I just think it would be too damaging to my health to try to maintain that level of stress all year round.

Because it's difficult but skilful and so you can develop. It's not that stressful if you are good at it and experienced

Because it pays well and I need to keep a roof over my head.

I deal with a lot of lovely people but also a lot of very difficult people who are very entitled and demanding. I do it because there are a lot of people who genuinely need help and they probably just about outweigh the ones who just want to deceive us and rant about the situation.
I have good and bad days, I can help some really desperate people to get the help they need and they are extremely grateful and that makes it all worthwhile. Then there are bad days where every client is just difficult, won't do anything we ask of them and wants us to fix a broken system just like that . Also it pays the bills, I'm planning to retire in a few years time and it's a whole lot easier than what I did before this job ( palliative care Nurse for 30 years ). At my age I don't really have many options.

I need to pay the mortgage.

I trained for years and it is quite high status. However, the salary is mediocre. Very stressful at times.

I would like a change I think. But not sure what else I could do, and it is harder to consider a change the older I get. Also, I fear 'what people would think' if I quit my profession; currently, whenever I mention my profession people seem to respond to it in a very positive way and give me respect? I'd miss that.

Single income household so the income pays my mortgage etc and my lifestyle outside of work (horses).

Learned long ago how to cut off work once I'm done for the day. COVID was actually great for reinforcing strategies to stop working at home.

Plus I love to think. I can't be in a repetitive role as the thinking is limited. I tend to innovate when I do repetitive stuff to make it go away - I enjoy the innovation. Once everything is ticking over I'm looking for something else to think about.

Just to be a pendant. You aren't ADHD, but. You (might) HAVE ADHD.
It doesn't define us

Because I thought I was good at it, made a difference, and that it was important. I thrived on the challenge and my work ethic matched the demands.

It turns out it was all bullshit - after 6 years of litigation after being discriminated against and bullied out of my career, I feel that I made little difference and it was unimportant all along.

I now have no career and absolutely no capacity for stress. I look back on myself and don't recognise me.

Same as both of you. Also suspected ADHD, and thrive on stress and deadlines. Without them I get so utterly bored, and then the wrong kind of stressed 😊

I’m medically in semi-retirement now (which I hate), but I did my stressful job because:

1. I loved it;
2. I was really good at it, which gave me enormous satisfaction;
3. My colleagues were brilliant and I really enjoyed working with them;
4. It was exciting;
5. It paid really well, and as a single parent, that was especially important.

If my health is ever good enough again, whilst I would make sure to have a better work-life balance than previously (something o was dreadful at), I would go back in a heartbeat.

So inspiring!!

Because the good bits make the horribly stressful bits worthwhile. A lot of the time I love my job and it’s the only job I ever wanted to do since I was 3 years old, I like feeling like we made a difference and helped someone through a very difficult time.
Also, I work with a brilliant team with an incredibly supportive manager, I have a flexible working arrangement that works for me and it pays enough. I have been doing this job so long and the rest of my life is so stressful that I don’t have the capacity to even consider a change to something less stressful, never mind the process of applying for a new job, interviewing, learning new skills to do it, meeting new people etc.