Tell me about your work life!
Tell me about your work life!
I've been in and out of so many different jobs. Usually I get to a point where I burn out and just can't go in anymore. Best job I ever had was as a tour guide in a distillery telling people facts all day and working with what I now realise was a whole bunch of other neurodivergent people. Only left that because I wasn't paid enough to live. Honestly could have stayed there forever otherwise. Such is life!
Currently in the middle of a career change after realising the whole 9-5 office job life isnt sustainable for me. I'm hoping to be able to work for myself soon and not be beholden to other people's schedules!
What jobs have you tried out over the years? What has worked well for ye?
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When I was coming to the end of school, I wanted to go into journalism. Dunno why, it just appealed to me.
Then I applied for an apprenticeship at a local ship repair yard and got accepted as a welder/fabricator. Had no idea what that entailed, but they'd be paying me and I'd learn a skill. No idea how I went from definitely wanting to go into journalism to becoming a welder, but learning some twenty years later that I have ADHD probably goes a long way towards explaining it.
Anyhoo, hated almost every minute of my apprenticeship, got sacked a few months before the end, but managed to find a job doing similar work where I could finish my college exams. Then spent the next seven years working for that firm, where I hated the work, the managers and all my time there. But looking for work is hard, and I hated what I did anyway, so what was the point of working somewhere else?
Then, at 27 my wife left me, so I fucked off the welding and went to uni to study radio production. Graduated with a 2:1 (still undiagnosed at this point, so I'm still really proud of that) and used the degree to score a job on a cruise ship. Spent the next year traveling the world, spinning tunes in the nightclub every night, drinking too much rum and making the most of the all night buffet. It was great.
Did a year on there, but missed seeing my kid, so jacked it in, where I got a series of shitty, barely-paying jobs to try and pretend I was in any way a useful member of society, while I desperately tried to find work in the radio industry.
I never did manage that.
Worked at a company who made those birthday cards with the year of your birth CDs in for a couple of years. Loved that job. I got to fuck about on Photoshop with a bunch of good people, but the economy sucked and the company had to let me go.
So I gave up on my dreams and reluctantly went back on my tools.
Tried to be self-employed. Lasted a year before I had to admit defeat. Then had a couple of jobs in welding before landing at the company where I've been for the past five years.
I got my diagnosis a few years ago, which massively helped me to figure out who I am. Between that and turning 40, my brain settled down a bit and I was able to accept that I was doing a job that I didn't particularly love, but that I had a skill for and that paid the bills.
18 months ago I was offered a promotion to the role of quality manager, which has subsequently morphed into mostly providing training to our employees who need it. To be honest, I don't really care for the training side of things, but management leaves me alone, and I'm independently working on getting a health and safety management qualification which will enable me to move to a better paying job at a (hopefully) better company than this one.
Sorry, this is very long. Got into a groove, I think.
Not far off my CV in terms of length and variety!! Seeing stuff like this makes me feel better about my chequered employment history. Glad to hear things sound settled for you now! Hoping that'll be me soon too. I actually quite like training people so I'm hoping that's where I end up. Especially if it means management leave me alone haha.
Management leaving me alone is a double-edged sword.
On the one hand, I have a level of autonomy that I appreciate. I can have days where my stupid brane won't play ball, so I can get away with doing fuck all and no one will care. No one can see my screens, so I could spend the whole day playing Stardew Valley if I wanted.
But with that comes not enough accountability to actually get shit done. I don't have to meet specific targets, so I have no real way to focus my attention where it needs to be, unless I'm really into whatever task it is I've set myself. To be honest, I need to chat to my line manager about it when he's back from his holiday, because I'm not really enjoying myself at the moment.
Trouble is, that's a conversation I have to instigate, and doing it will almost certainly mean that I bring oversight to what I do, and I won't react well to that. So I probably won't...