Can I Go Live In A Cave Now?

Martha said:
Have a babysitter come over. What is wrong with that? You can putz in the yard or something.
Click to expand...

+1 on the babysitter idea. But I'm sure Brewer can think of something more fun that putzing in the yard....more like Ferris Brewer's Day Off;)

 
Dear Brewer, I think you and I work at the same company! But all kidding aside, you did mention "dogs" in your OP. May I suggest you take the dogs for a very long walk alone. If you live near a woods, hiking trail, etc. go there. If you don't, put your dogs in the car, and drive somewhere beautiful nearby and get out of your car with your dogs and just start walking. Don't decide which direction, just WALK, or let your dogs walk you. Stop thinking and making decisions for a while. Be mindless. Leave your watch in the glove box in the car. Your dogs always know which direction they want to go so let the leashes be at their full lengths. Just looking at their joyful faces on this outing will be so therapeutic for you. Just keep walking. Don't worry about getting lost. Just be carefree for a while. Now and then, even break into a RUN, not for any aerobic/cardio fitness, just run a spell, for the joy of it, like when you were a kid (didn't you just sometimes run for no reason at all?!). After a while, you look back at your smart phone and use GPS to find your way back to your car. I hope you will find bliss doing this. If not, your dogs sure had an enjoyable time. This works for me and I have a stressful job and I am also busy when I am not at work trying to fix up an OLD house by myself to put it on the market so I do truly relate to your stress. Have a beautiful day, Brewer!
 
brewer12345 said:
I told DW tonight that I really need some down time and got a frosty response. Is it cheating if I take a day off, don't tell her, disappear at the appointed time for work and just go find a place to hide for a day?
Click to expand...

I feel your pain, bro. If I was in your shoes, I would tell the DW straight up that I'm losing it and need a day (just 8 am to 5 pm) to decompress a little. Maybe not even the whole day. It's the only way you can slog it out and keep bringing home the bacon. You're not asking for permission, you are stating the facts and stating your course of action.

Maybe take the kids to the park or let them out in the backyard and let them run around while you relax and read a book, nap, or something.

Longer term, make sure you plan "down weekends" where you don't have social appointments or trips out of town. Just a do nothing weekend. Yeah, you'll still have kids and chores and choirs to contend with, but you should be able to squeeze at least a day's worth of uninterrupted unstructured time in there.
 
Brew, not having kids I can't relate completely, but sounds like everyone is stressed in your program. I like Fuego's suggestion to level with the DW. You have got to have some decompression time from the job that doesn't involve your second job of kids.
Seriously--whatever bargain with the wife you have to make--just carve out a camping trip alone with the pups or with some good buddies. You need it!
 
I go through this type of thing and call it non-financial triple witching (wife, kids, work). At least 3 or 4 times a year I take a day off from work and do something without the wife and kids. The days are usually planned a couple of weeks in advance so I learn to recognize when something like this is building. I usually go sailing with friends, but I have also gone on long hikes (16 plus miles), seen an early movie and then went to happy hour or similar things. It works wonders to feel far away from everything. I know the day is successful if it feels like I'm in another world. I think the key is to drastically break your routine.

Good luck getting through it quickly.
 
I can't imagine feeling I have to ask permission of DH to do something, nor him of me. Discuss, yes, but get permission? Never.
 
brewer, if you're like I was, a day off or a long walk won't help you at all. Everything is tainted by pain of your forced servitude. In that case, the only thing that will help is envisioning your imminent escape. Sit down in a quiet room and run the numbers. Devise ways to improve them. Run FireCalc. Read this board. Think of the deep joy you will feel on that day. Those are the only things that allowed me to keep spinning the hamster wheel and stay sane.
 
brewer12345 said:
I told DW tonight that I really need some down time and got a frosty response. Is it cheating if I take a day off, don't tell her, disappear at the appointed time for work and just go find a place to hide for a day?
Click to expand...
Well, you just told her that your fantasy day off doesn't involve her. And we marriage veterans in the guy demographic all know that it ain't about you.

The worst part of this scheme is that you'd feel guilty and wouldn't have as much fun as you would if you were truly given a guy's day off. Wait, no, that's just the bad part. The worst part would inevitably come someday shortly after you'd feel compelled to confess your "infidelity".

Is there any possibility that you could call in a personal day and spend it at home with your spouse getting caught up on the small maintenance/repair jobs that would just take an hour or so? The little annoying problems that are relatively straightforward to fix yet somehow don't get attended to for months? Spend some time together, do a chore, take the rest of the morning off, go out for lunch?
 
Even without a spouse or kid at home, when working I felt the same as Brewer sometimes. It seemed like with grocery shopping, laundry, house cleaning, dealing with household, family, or health emergencies and so on, there just wasn't time to do much but partially decompress at the end of the day and go to sleep if I could even sleep.

I used to spread my vacation time fairly evenly as "mental health days" during the year, to allow me time to just kick back and do nothing. Brewer can't even do that, because he has the kids to deal with. I don't know the solution but my sympathies to anyone with a high stress job and insufficient down time.

I enjoy ER so very, very much.
 
Bestwifeever said:
I can't imagine feeling I have to ask permission of DH to do something, nor him of me. Discuss, yes, but get permission? Never.
Click to expand...

With American divorce laws and courts, it often is much more like asking for permission. If you have children, and your spouse is likely to get custody, you are a serf. You can't just do a fade, you can appeal to fairness, but spousey is judge and jury, so you beg or simmer or both.

Ha
 
Brewer, don't discount the possibility that you are clinically depressed. In other words, your brain is not handling stress properly. I've been through a period in my life like that where nothing sounds good except crawling into a cave and hide.

Took me a long while to actually go to a psychiatrist and get some medication that put my brain back in balance. That gets you in a much better frame of mind to tackle some of the problems you got.
Why you getting your ass chewed at work? I hear a hint in your posts that you may be drinking too. If you drink everyday and can't stop for a week, then you are an alcoholic. I been there too. Functioning alcoholic that made plenty of money until it finally caught up with me. Spent a month in a rehab center to dry out and learn how to deal with that problem.

Modern medicine has help for both these problems. But you've got to fess up to them yourself. A trip to the psychiatrist can't hurt. S/he can tell you a lot more than this forum can. And don't lie about the booze either. If you are hiding empty bottles, you got a problem too big for you to handle by yourself.

Even in the normal rat race, most people are happy most of the time. If you ain't ever happy at all, then you need some help and maybe some real changes in your life.
 
I'm not sure a "day off" is really the issue here. While it may be welcomed and probably would be good preventive medicine in the future considering where you find yourself now, I am sensing that the issues may run deeper.

Sure - enjoy the day off, but consider whether a day off with just the wife would have more durable results. A good rehashing of the issues, asking for ideas and support in a calm environment could be helpful. Problem with a day off is that at the end of the day, you have the same issues lurking.
 
Could be your wife has similar feelings. If she doesn’t, she probably sees your struggle and wants to help you out, not feel part to blame.

When I had these feelings, “get away” didn’t help because I couldn’t turn off the brain. What did help was taking a short break from the big stuff and doing something – anything – than needed to be done. Just being able to cross something off my permanently growing list of stuff to do gave me a feeling of achievement, which helped my motivation.

DW and I also set aside some regular time together. Not a lot, but we found that going out to lunch or dinner alone every couple of weeks helped us get back to where we could have just small talk. Then, and now, life is much more relaxing when DW and I just sit around and talk about the little things.

Is lunch a break for you or do you eat while you work?
 
Hobo said:
Brewer, don't discount the possibility that you are clinically depressed. In other words, your brain is not handling stress properly. I've been through a period in my life like that where nothing sounds good except crawling into a cave and hide.
Click to expand...


Depression (major depression): Symptoms - MayoClinic.com

Depression symptoms include:

  • Feelings of sadness or unhappiness
  • Irritability or frustration, even over small matters
  • Loss of interest or pleasure in normal activities
  • Reduced sex drive
  • Insomnia or excessive sleeping
  • Changes in appetite — depression often causes decreased appetite and weight loss, but in some people it causes increased cravings for food and weight gain
  • Agitation or restlessness — for example, pacing, hand-wringing or an inability to sit still
  • Slowed thinking, speaking or body movements
  • Indecisiveness, distractibility and decreased concentration
  • Fatigue, tiredness and loss of energy — even small tasks may seem to require a lot of effort
  • Feelings of worthlessness or guilt, fixating on past failures or blaming yourself when things aren't going right
  • Trouble thinking, concentrating, making decisions and remembering things
  • Frequent thoughts of death, dying or suicide
  • Crying spells for no apparent reason
  • Unexplained physical problems, such as back pain or headaches
I would add sighing.

Also, the decrease in sun light could lead to Seasonal affective depression.

Seasonal affective disorder (SAD) - MayoClinic.com

Burn out another possibility.

Things to think about but difficult to diagnose on a forum.
 
MichaelB said:
Could be your wife has similar feelings. If she doesn’t, she probably sees your struggle and wants to help you out, not feel part to blame.

When I had these feelings, “get away” didn’t help because I couldn’t turn off the brain. What did help was taking a short break from the big stuff and doing something – anything – than needed to be done. Just being able to cross something off my permanently growing list of stuff to do gave me a feeling of achievement, which helped my motivation.

DW and I also set aside some regular time together. Not a lot, but we found that going out to lunch or dinner alone every couple of weeks helped us get back to where we could have just small talk. Then, and now, life is much more relaxing when DW and I just sit around and talk about the little things.

Is lunch a break for you or do you eat while you work?
Click to expand...

A word of caution... often in a struggle to feel better it is easy to shift the blame on a wife. This frequently happens if you go to a therapist who is not a doctor and relies on "talk therapy". That is a way to loose a perfectly loving wife, even though she may actually have nothing to do with your problems. Watch out for that trap. Marriage problems are one thing. Don't confused them with clinical depression. They can look the same, but the cause is very different.
 
Sorry to hear about the rough patch brew. I know nothing about the kind of relationship you have with your wife, so rather than give advice I will only share what I would do in a similar situation. I think I'd be honest with DW and tell her I need some "me time". Nothing wrong with that. We don't have to be joined at the hip 24/7 to be a strong couple. Actually, these days, DW is the one who often needs some "me time" after a trying week at work. So I give her space on Saturdays. She goes spend time with her girlfriends, she takes a bubble bath, she goes get a massage, whatever floats her boat. I think this is beneficial for both of us.
 
FD said:
Sorry to hear about the rough patch brew. I know nothing about the kind of relationship you have with your wife, so rather than give advice I will only share what I would do in a similar situation. I think I'd be honest with DW and tell her I need some "me time". Nothing wrong with that. We don't have to joined at the hip 24/7 to be a strong couple. Actually, these days, DW is the one who often needs some "me time" after a trying week at work. So I give her space on Saturdays. She goes spend time with her girlfriends, she takes a bubble bath, she goes get a massage, whatever floats her boat. I think this is beneficial for both of us.
Click to expand...

One thing I noticed during the brief stint of my DW being a stay at home mom is that she had a skewed perception of my time and how I should be spending it. From her perspective, when I come home from work I should be spending the great majority of my time on "family time" with her and the kids. She was making an allocation decision over the roughly 40 hours per week that I was not asleep and not working. She even used the phrase "I'm bored, entertain me" - as if that was my only purpose in her life... :D

From my point of view, I had 40 hours of not working, but I had to accomplish all of my non-work tasks in that time (family time, recreation, tv watching, down time, mr. fixit stuff, chores, lawn care, bills/money management/financial, etc). So I'm allocating my time over all these different items, whereas DW thought the majority of my non-working time should be spent with her and the kids, and me spending free time doing whatever I wanted to do (sit by myself in a quiet room reading a book for 2 hours while sipping coffee, for example) was "wasting" my time, and I was not spending enough time with her and the kids.

I discussed the issue with her and I think she understood where I was coming from and everything got better once she realized I had a limited amount of free time and I had a lot of different things I wanted to accomplish each week. And DW also went to work full time shortly thereafter. The "I'm bored, entertain me" calls stopped, since we both understood well that our free time is very limited and we have to be flexible with each other.
 
Hobo said:
Why you getting your ass chewed at work? I hear a hint in your posts that you may be drinking too. If you drink everyday and can't stop for a week, then you are an alcoholic. I been there too. Functioning alcoholic that made plenty of money until it finally caught up with me. Spent a month in a rehab center to dry out and learn how to deal with that problem.
Click to expand...
While Brewer's biting back his sixth or seventh response to this post, I'll point out that you may be overanalyzing in the absence of data.

First let me just say that if you worked in Brewer's job you'd also feel like a herd of badgers were snapping at your ass all day long.

As for the "hint of drinking", you may or not be aware that he's a nationally-known home brewer. That doesn't necessarily correlate to being a nationally-known home drinker.

I wouldn't discard the possible symptoms of depression, either, but I'd try a few "home remedies" before I brought out the heavy artillery. After reading his posts all these years I'd say that his current feeling is more environmental than biochemical...
 
Nords said:
After reading his posts all these years I'd say that his current feeling is more environmental than biochemical...
Click to expand...

Correct. I am getting shelled at work and there has been no give elsewhere.

I slept most of the afternoon and feel somewhat better.
 
brewer12345 said:
Although it is hard for me to admit as a neutered, modern 'Merkin male, ding, ding, ding!!! Part of what is pushing m to the edge of the cliffis that just as I drag my thoroughly chewed ass to the weekend, I know that I have full-time kid care duties to deal with because DW is a member of a fairly serious choir which be performing on Sunday. Sorry dear; its nice you lead a full life, but I have needs too.
Click to expand...

We love our kids but when they left home for college it felt like getting out of prison. A couple of times a year we have someone look after the kids and DW and I would take off for the weekend. Didn't have to be far, just a day and night by ourselves.

Bestwifeever said:
I can't imagine feeling I have to ask permission of DH to do something, nor him of me. Discuss, yes, but get permission? Never.
Click to expand...

Same here. I would take a weekday off fishing with some friends several times a year, and she would go on choir retreats.

One thing my company did allow was a Friday off every 3 weeks. (It was called a 989 work schedule). That Friday was great because the kids were at school, DW was at work etc. Any chance for you getting the odd day off in lieu of hours worked?
 
Alan said:
One thing my company did allow was a Friday off every 3 weeks. (It was called a 989 work schedule). That Friday was great because the kids were at school, DW was at work etc. Any chance for you getting the odd day off in lieu of hours worked?
Click to expand...


Actually, I usually get every other Friday off (although I am frequently bombarded with emails that require a response, as is the case today). But the time is eaten by kids/house/dogs/whatever.
 
Something I read somewhere: "Life doesn't begin at 40; life begins after the kids leave home and the dog dies."
 
brewer12345 said:
Actually, I usually get every other Friday off (although I am frequently bombarded with emails that require a response, as is the case today). But the time is eaten by kids/house/dogs/whatever.
Click to expand...

Khan said:
Something I read somewhere: "Life doesn't begin at 40; life begins after the kids leave home and the dog dies."
Click to expand...

Shoot the dog, and start buying luggage for the kids? (how old are they?)

Come to think of it we did buy luggage for the kids for their 16th birthday. If I ever said to my son "What has your Dad promised you?", he would reply, "When I'm 18, I'm out the door!!".
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

A
I think I made it...for now, at least.
2
Replies
25
Views
2K
Andre1969
A
F
I have COVID and need help. I am in panic mode
2 3
Replies
56
Views
3K
F.I.R.E User
F
B
has anyone tried brazil nuts to lower cholesterol
Replies
21
Views
958
badatmath
B
D
Anyone negotiate a "severance" in non-RIF times?
2
Replies
35
Views
2K
Closet_Gamer
C
Out-to-Lunch
Please help me game out a cost for a duplex
Replies
14
Views
953
Letj
L

Latest posts

Back
Top Bottom