Have you made any life altering decisions lately?

[Ofashynessthatiscriminallyvulgar]

I've just withdrawn from a full-time teaching job I had accepted. It was a maternity cover, and I mulled over it for several days. I may regret it, but too late.
Have you made any big decisions lately?

I made a decision I'm already regretting. I received my annual payrise and it was bog standard after a really high performing year. I had been promised I would be happy with my review. I interviewed for other jobs, received a couple of offers and handed in my notice.

My current firm persuaded me to stay, matched my new salary and agreed to give me a bonus which I will get in December.

A fortnight on I really regret not making the new start and feel so flat and miserable.

Stopped smoking

Told a consultant yesterday that I needed (another) endometriosis surgery and am now on a (12 month!) wait list. Also agreed to further bowel investigations and a change in hormonal medication (the latter of which I've refused to swap to for 6 years and am not looking forward to but don't feel like I have many options left!).

This morning I'm thinking "maybe it's not that bad maybe I don't need surgery" but...it is. Facing up to that is difficult in itself though.

Third endo related surgery in 7 years, and I'm only in my late twenties. Life feels unfair sometimes.

I'm also buying a house with boyfriend (currently own alone), moving 40 mins away as part of that, considering swapping jobs, and am in therapy for work related anxiety and stress.

So just a few "big" things going on!!

Handed in my notice at work yesterday. Don't have another job lined up. Never done that in over 20 years of working. However the management was toxic and didn't care about staff safety. It feels a bit scary but also very freeing!
(Thankfully I am not the breadwinner so we should be ok till I can find something else)

I also work in mental health - retrained 7 years ago hoping for a fulfilling career and hate it! Steals my brain space even when I am not in work or on leave, the stress is incredible and ridiculous expectations of what a service on its knees should provide.

So I am going to hand my notice in and temp instead. Single parent with some savings and I have never in my fairly long life left a job without another to go to. But life is too short to do this day in day out!

Good luck to all you other big decision makers!

Best of luck to all of you and well done for having the courage!

Yup, have decided am retiring early, next year
cant wait

@Unicorn2022 Yes you regret it, but make a plan to take the December Bonus&smile as you do , knowing your going to leave January🙌🏻

Well done

TheChosenTwo thank you so much for your really thoughtful/helpful reply. Training or supervision may well be something that I move in to, in time. I leave my job in October and will then take the rest of the year out to recharge and rethink.

I completely agree. Life is too short

We accepted an offer to move into a lovely brand new build flat with our HA and I'm due our second in three weeks.

Will be a stressful time but this has been years in the making. More space and extra double bedroom.

Really excited/nervous & stressed!

I battling with my weight due to bereavement and being unhappy in job- teaching. Sick of rebranding of same old shit, being micro managed and lack of support. Yesterday thought nxt time I feel.like emotional eating remember Operation 55. I'm.out. will need a part time job. It's a shame cos I love being with the kids. Oh well 30 years on it nearli.by then. Good luck everyone.

Well done Cocunut re stopping smoking

I just remembered this thread, and wondered how everyone was getting on now.

I know some people were making what sounded like positive changes, and some people were making more difficult changes. I hope everyone is doing well though 🙂.

I have drastically cut down on my physical activity. I had a series of viruses that just wouldn't go away. Very unlike me to get ill and stay ill. Doctor ran some tests, said I was v healthy and there was nothing they could do and the next step would be acknowledging that I might have post viral fatigue/chronic fatigue.

I googled that, saw how devastating it was and have decided to have a few months of rest. I was running twice a week, commuting to work every now and then on my bike, going to the gym, working 5 days in the office plus walking the dog and not resting enough I think. I've told everyone in the house that I am taking it very easy at home, I still have to work but that's fine.

A week of doing this and I'm already feeling better. I really hope it works as I do not want to go down the chronic fatigue path particularly as it looks like there is basically no cure.

I'm sorry to hear about your husbands health and hope your change in hours makes things a bit easier for you and your family

@WillWeSeeTheSunAgain - you've done the right thing. But on the positive side, if you have chronic fatigue you can cure it. A close friend, her son and I all had it simultaneoulsy after we caught the worst flu virus I have ever had. way worse than covid (before covid) We were in bed for weeks. I failed some important exams, we both gave up work, he missed weeks of school. It took all of us 3 years to recover, but we did. We just had to take life extremely slowly for two years and then build back up to normal levels of physical activity.

These days, at the first sign of a sniffle I go to bed for a day and kill any virus before it can take hold. Battling on when you feel ill is the stupidest thing we admire in our society. I have taught my sons to behave like hypochondriacs and go straight to bed with a head cold. 24 hours later, they are well and everyone around them is ill for weeks.

Gave up on the nhs, went private, now I have a proper diagnosis of my lung condition and access to appropriate medicines and treatment for flair ups. Quality of life has vastly improved, I don't feel like I am being left to rot. Cost a fortune, totally worth it.

Oh, and that is due in large to the amazing nurse on the asthma uk helpline - who actually listened to me and detailed all the help that I should have been getting but wasn't. Until then I thought I was just doomed and nothing could be done, not that my gp practice was rubbish.

So, actually, one single person was the fork in the road between how I am today and where I was last year.

@SoWhatEh so glad you recovered. And I will do exactly as you recommend and I have also told my kids to do the same when they get ill.

It's only when your health gets taken away from you that you realise how much you are losing.

I had about a month where I felt so awful I could barely function yet there was nothing medically wrong or anything anyone could do. I've taken this as a drastic warning sign!

@Desecratedcoconut how scary for you but well done for figuring it out!

And I am not fully recovered yet by any stretch but I hope to be eventually as I'm seeing some improvement already

@Unicorn2022 Yours is a decision that can be reversed. Apply for more jobs, get another offer and just leave. You'll still be on the same notice period I assume? You don't owe them anything just because they've upped your pay etc.

For me, I left teaching last year and now work as a data scientist. I was terrified and never really celebrated getting my new job because of that. However, apart from a drop in pay (which will go up above my teacher pay once I'm trained), I'm loving it!

The biggest change in my life has been time - I did not realise quite how much of my own time was taken up in teaching. Now, I just do 9-5pm and don't think about the job outside of those hours, which has allowed me to take up a new hobby, DD to do more of her hobby etc. In teaching, I just worked most evenings, and about half of the weekend in term time.

I deferred my course for a year- possibly as a precursor to withdrawing. I feel so sad but I just don’t have the time to study properly, my brain is shot to pieces and I can’t remember anything, and I could do with the extra money.