A two-week break. More or less, anyway. It’s difficult to take a break when you have to justify to yourself, your harshest critic, why you’re taking so much time away from work when you’re already just a small step away from financial precarity. Hard to justify rest at a time in your life when little is certain and there are always things to do. I remarked to my therapist, as I was entering my second day of this unplanned break and realizing that I needed more than just a couple “normal” work weeks would provide, that part of the reason I hesitated to do anything like this is because the problem at the core of my exhaustion is burnout. I’ve given everything I had and more to keep going on now there’s nothing left but enough of a spark to sputter along enough to keep myself financially solvent and alive. Little remains beyond what I can scrape together on a day-to-day basis. Nice as this two weeks of rest have been, they can’t solve that problem. Typically, this kind of burnout requires multiple months of rest, which requires a degree of financial stability I’m not sure I will ever have at this rate. That I won’t have for another few years at the earliest. It is better than nothing. It will help me get through the next couple months at least. I hope. I don’t know how long it will last, actually, since a rough week at work could burn through everything I’ve recovered.

Thankfully, I’ve also knocked out some tasks. I’ve gotten most of the systems in place to keep my new Free Company (player guild) in Final Fantasy 14 running along. Others have stepped up to help carry the burden I’d been dragging along, too, so now I can work a little less hard on that. I’ve done the work required to get the supplies we need mostly sustainable. I also finished a lot of the decorative and set-up work required to make my part of the FC’s house feel lived-in and comfortable. I might move some stuff around, but it’s ninety-nine percent of the way there. We’ve also settled a lot of stuff in the discord (though there will always be more stuff to do), brought in a couple new players who found us organically, ironed out a few processes, and officially celebrated not just our first month as an FC, but also our first month at the top of the leaderboard for our world. I’ve done a lot, enjoyed some games (started playing Ghost of Yotei and I Am Your Beast), and did my best to sleep a bunch.

Unfortunately, my AC died on day two of the eventually five-day heat wave that lingered over my city, so I didn’t sleep well from Tuesday of last week (a week ago from when this gets posted) through today. Six hours without AC got my apartment warm enough that even now, days later, it is still trying to cool back down to where it was before the heat wave. Toss in nights of fireworks (and staying up late so the fireworks wouldn’t wake me up) immediately following the too-hot-to-sleep-well nights and I am ending this two week break rather more sleep-deprived than I hoped. I also didn’t do the deep cleaning of my apartment that I meant to do, since the initial twenty-four hours of heat blossomed into an entire week of it. I absolutely did not want to spend any time moving around if I didn’t need to, so I spent those days with a fan blowing directly on me in my office and doing my level best to avoid moving once I’d sat down. And sweating. Tuesday through Thursday I sweat constantly. Only toward the end of Thursday was it finally cool enough where all of my entertainment options where that I could stop sweating if I didn’t move for five to ten minutes.

All-in-all, it definitely wasn’t the most restful set of weeks possible. But, for something that showed up and demanded I rest by inflicting me with debilitating exhaustion two weeks ago (and a day, at least from when this gets posted), it was enough to let me get back to work. I was able to use my time fairly well and largely to my own satisfaction, but I am definitely still feeling that all-consuming kernel of burnout deep within my chest, so I know it will come back eventually. Even a single day at work was enough to remind me that rest alone won’t fix my problems. Rest and a sense of security. A removal of precarity on top of recovery. Even if I don’t have to worry about layoffs like most people in tech do (a thing I am constantly grateful for and the reason I’m still in this job years after realizing I wasn’t happy with it), that does not mean it is easy or that I can work peacefully. I can’t slack off and I still need overtime to make ends meet comfortably, but at least I don’t have to worry about losing my job. If only I could have that security financially and socially as well as employmently…