Retire or return to work?

[Edenvale]

I have a job I enjoy and I like the people I work with. It's quite low status and I will never be promoted, but it's easily within my capabilities (although a bit boring) and I make a difference day to day to the directors I support.

I have recently had a year of health problems on top of a long history of depression. My physical health problems exacerbate my long term mental health condition and I am currently really struggling.

I'm in my early 60s, most of my colleagues are under 40 and I know I am seen as elderly. This doesn't really bother me as I know from experience that they too will get old 😁

Ill health retirement has now been mentioned and I simply can't decide between seeing if I can return to work and cope, or take the opportunity to retire early.

Obviously I would be better off financially working, and work also provides me with intellectual stimulus and contact with people. My DH is retired and is happy pottering around the garden and reading his phone, we don't do anything unless I organise it. His pension is twice my salary so we would not be short of money, we would just have to be a bit more careful. But I get little stimulus at home.

Should I go back to work for a few years or take the opportunity to retire now on full pension and get over my health problems (cancer is the latest one, long COVID is there along with some musculoskeletal problems)?

I just can't decide! My GP thinks with the cancer diagnosis I would have a good chance of getting early retirement. But I like my job and my colleagues and belonging to something.

Any thoughts? TLDR: should I stay at work and risk not being able to cope, or should I retire and risk being bored stiff?

Read the rules of your pension scheme and see how they decide ill-health retirement. It's not really something GPs know about as all schemes are different.

Honestly if you can qualify for medical retirement take it. My mum died unexpectedly just after her 65th birthday, so didn’t even make it to retirement age.
Consider taking on some volunteering to help starve off the boredom or take a course.

I'd go back and see how you get on, if it doesn't work out then think about retirement. But perhaps a phased return or reduced hours. I think there's a lot to be said for a job that you enjoy, are capable of and make a difference in.

Thanks for replies.

The pension scheme will pay if the medical advisor recommends ill health retirement (civil service). The GP would be expected to provide medical history to help the medical advisor's decision making, it's quite common for her to do this, she says. She said once cancer is mentioned it changes things.

Part time would be nice but would mean less pension when I do retire, but more income until that point...

So many variables. I'd love to do book clubs, play the piano and learn French etc. I'd have to do it on my own though.

This would probably be my view too. Use the time to build up your post-retirement strategy in terms of social network and social structure as well as activities.

If you have a history of depression and think you'd be retiring to do things alone, then I'd want to have scaffolding in place prior to retiring to protect against a deterioration in your mental health. Those are risk factors for ending up in a very bad place in short measure.

Having more time in work to build up a different retirement plan/scaffolding so you can have a softer landing when the time comes seems preferable to an immediate rocky landing into a bleak retirement landscape followed by a possible slump into isolation and depression.

But I like my job and my colleagues and belonging to something.

What will you replace this with once you retire? At the point where you have a robust plan to fill this void then go for it. Otherwise if you were my friend I would be really concerned about the scale of loss and despair you might feel stepping into a void without a plan or strong social support to meet all the needs work currently meets.

Surely if you return to work and it proves impossible then it will only bolster your case for ill health retirement? And if you go back and it's manageable then you have a few more years of positive experiences in your life and more time to build a soft landing for when you do retire.

@atticstage so helpful, thank you