I agree with all the posts re stress and work.
LK - I like your posts and I ask this with respect:
if your job is causing you to have to take blood pressure medicine, why do you continue to do it? Is it for the love of the work? is it for the $$ for your family? is it for some other reason?
I ask because I have been tossing the idea of completely changing careers, downsizing my lifestyle, and "enjoying the journey" more. I work a lot of hours and it gets stressful at times (I'm an IT manager) and I sometimes ask myself what the fuck i am doing it for.
I really want to take a manual labor job and be outdoors, working my body instead of carrying a stress load, maybe get more drumming gigs in local watering holes. I'm not on any medication and eat well and exercise very well, but damn Im toast at the end of the day
Let me start by saying the high blood pressure is not solely due to stress. It's no secret that my weight has gone up over the years and it's contributed to the blood pressure issues, but high stress absolutely pushed it from being mild hypertension to some very risky blood pressure measurements.
Why do I kill myself for a paycheck? The simple answer is to provide for my family.
About 5 years ago we had our 2nd child (my first...our oldest is my wife's from a previous relationship) and a magic switch went off in my head. I started working harder than I ever have at my job. I went from putting in my 40 hours of time just to get by to putting in 60+ hour weeks. The financial rewards were immediate and my career has been on a fast track to the top ever since.
So a large part of why I keep pushing myself is that the upward trend in my career hasn't stalled out yet. I'm not bored, but I feel compelled to keep reaching for that next level. I still love my job and the rewards it brings, but at what cost to myself and my family.
I work at home and put in about 15 weeks a year on the road. One question I've asked myself is why the fuck am I wasting away in Winston Salem when we could pick up and move our family anywhere that has an airport nearby which would allow me to continue my current work responsibilities. Its definitely a consideration, but I'm not sure I would slow down and work less. It would just be new scenery with new stresses to worry about.
Ultimately, I'm going to have to pull back. We're very comfortable financially and we take 2-3 big vacations a year, but I can see myself being burnt out in a few years.
In summary, it's a combination of being very driven to take my career to crazy heights, but also financially driven in the sense that I want to keep my family well provided for. Could I take a step back and we adjust our lifestyle to account for the loss in earnings? Certainly. Do I want to? Nope, but the day will come when I do want to and I think we'll be comfortable enough for it to happen.