Anyone else in their exact job a long time and wants to stay that way?

I’m going through one of those periodic phases where I feel like a weirdo/loser for wanting, even needing, more than ever, continued continuity not change in my job. I don’t just mean the actual employer (with whom I want to be a ‘lifer’ until retirement, if spared) but the exact same post, grade, job title, non-managerial type of responsibilities etc.

In my specific case I work in a university library, have done for 21 years, and have remained in the lower pay range/job grade for all of that time. I know that additional responsibilities in a higher post would make me miserable, burn me out, and gave me feeling totally out of my depth and dreading going into work. Whereas what I have been doing, and want to continue with, is something akin to cataloguing primarily (record checking, metadata finessing, document uploads), but with occasional front of house duties of a more traditional hands-on nature: answering queries, helping find and issue books etc. which I love and feel like I won the job lottery to be doing (more than that it’s literally one of about two or three things I could do long term and full time without a breakdown).

A few years ago a sequence of events brought me to a bad mental state and I freaked out about status anxiety, was I a joke and a loser etc. while others sought to climb the ladder into the scarce few managerial roles that were coming up, and, if having failed to do so in some cases jumping shop to other careers. That kind of prideful yet cavalier jumping about scares the hell out of me (how on earth do others do it with ease? How can they not value the hard won comfort of an established fixed constant role? How can radical change an constant new horizons not make them feel ill with worry?) And then I start wondering if there something deeply wrong in me that I can’t begin to want to be like that. Before concluding that even if I am rare or anomalous in wanting the same exact things week in week out, it’s how I cope, in a world of too much uncertainty and overwhelm already. So, even if I end up being the Ken Barlow of my workplace while all else come and go around me, I know that’s something I’ll live with. I just wish there were more who felt like me. Even the few fellow travellers who started around the same time as me, and didn’t ascend to (overrated) ‘greatness’ or just arbitrarily switch jobs/career sometimes hint that they’re restless, dream of moving on, leaving the library service or university entirely. Some poorly thought through Changes to the service haven’t helped - morale in offices through most of the building I’d at an all time low due to corporate-style tinkering in a realm that is ill suited to that type of upheaval. It has made even the ones I’d hoped would be there to their or my retirement feel like less of a cert than once they did. So I’m freaking out a bit. I know it will pass, and I know that typing this is already exorcising some of the more intense anxiety about it all just by dint of getting it outside my head and onto the ‘page’.

And yet… I know I’d feel comforted by hearing from anyone on here whose personal autistic wiring, not dissimilarly to my own, has kept them in one workplace, one post, one set of largely unchanging duties. Perhaps declining the path of ‘advancement’ when others have tried to (well meaningly? Sometimes I wonder) nudge them along it, because they know they need exactly what they have and no more. Is there anyone who’s exceeded my twenty one year (so far) stint in my one job type and grade, and do they likewise feel it’s what they need and defensive about that being as valid a life as the more orthodox slippery pole etc? I just want to feel like I’m ok as I am I suppose. Not some kind of freak. I know I’m breaking no laws by wanting the exact routines and tasks I have, this year, next year, and until the day I retire (if I live that long). That’s ok… isn’t it? But if so… why does everyone else have to be so restless and trying to prescribe the same for me? I just want peace. Security. Predictability. I mean no harm.

Thanks for reading this far if you gave, and I hope I don’t sound like an utter loser.

Parents

Shardovan 10 months ago

Just a bit of extra information about why my periodic anxiety about this happened to spike just now: bit of a perfect storm really.

For context: when I first got diagnosed in 2022, I (wisely or unwisely, but at the time I felt I needed to do it) sent an email round my immediate colleagues in the smallish dept. I work in. It disclosed the diagnosis, explained what a relief it had been, what a difference to my self-undertanding it was, assured than minimal to no specific adjustments would be needed to my work environment/set-up, and ... mosy crucially (and the thing that took the greatest weight off my shoulders) explained that what might to others look like stagnancy (not doing occasional interviews for other gigs, not wanting higher grade posts when they came up etc.) to the average person was, for me, scaffolding keeping me right, warding off burnout etc. In other words, I'll be in this post/grade for the long-term (if spared), and please don't put any 'why don't you apply for X' or 'did you see that job that came up in another university' type stuff in front of me as it will only make me feel triggered and I have no intention of rolling the dice or putting myself through another interview ever if I can help it. I really couldn't have been clearer. And my colleagues were very nice and understanding... and even forgiving of the email's inordinate length (I struggle with conciseness at the best of times).

And yet, time rolls on, a managerial post (related to my specialism) comes up with a completely different employer in a building full of total strangers, and I this week receive an email from a colleague (one of the ones who received and read my email, and seemed to understand) linking to it and saying 'Did you not see this?', the apparent implication being that I should be considering it, asking for preparatory help for shortlisting/applying etc. And I can't believe that I've had this done to me, because it's either amnesia on their part, or they're stirring the pot so to speak and trying to make me feel like my 'excuse' (as they might see it) was insufficient to get off the hook for this precscribed 'should' that is a passing curiosity for them but a major trigger for me (in terms a of the defensive/paranoid position it puts me into, exactly what my 2022 email was intended to avoid ever happening again). Then of course imposter syndrome comes in as there's an implied 'Well, we all have challenges in life, doesn't mean you shouldn't be getting on...' as well as a sense of 'Do I get on everyone's nerves to the extent that they'd ride roughshod over what I told them just to force me to read between the lines and go and bore/annoy some other office colleagues instead... all while being miserable and five minutes from a nervous breakdown of course!

Then I had another colleague (genuinely well-meaningly I think, but again ignoring what I clearly laid out I needed/will always in life - conitinuity not change, the persistence not abandonment of my dream job that I already have) verbally say to me in passing 'Would you never think of moving to another city/country for another job in our field?' I was kind of shocked they'd even ask and could feel this anxiety surge like it was already happening, change forced upon me even by suggestion! I brushed it off politely but the wheels were turning all night: 'Can't they see I need the people, places, work environment, work 'family' I already have?'., 'isn't it obvious that I want to stay in my forever home... forever?' 'how can they not know me after all this time and openness?'

And finally, talk of dissatistaction and wanting to leave from even a cople of (what I thought were) fellow 'lifers' means that I feel like the one reliably unchanging constant with all potentially about to fall away in some churn of change at any given moment.

All sounds very heightened doesn't it? I know I need to dial that down a bit! I think the real autistic takeaway here is... sometimes relatively small (in NT terms) external events or comments can create an inner tsunami that might only be barely glimpsed behind one's masking. What is a passing curiosity about a 'wouldn't you be mad not to...?' for them that they forget two minutes later has sparked an inner turmoil and unravelling of self-worth/former certainties about being finally understood, and the tsunami effect once again tilts the world on its axis. Picking up the pieces, then, am I OK as I am? Is my life OK as is? And I deemed lacking? Does it matter? Who is authentic when they nod apparent understanding? Who is mischievous and who well-meaning? Is there any reliable consistency of attitude or what's valued in any place, community, workplace? Has reality been re-written overnighht and if so am I expected to adapt or is my destiny to hold firm to who I know I am and how I need to function?

Wow, that became very rambly and stream of consciousness! Therapy territory indeed. And maybe I should now park all that and reiterate my deep gratitude for all that's been said by others in this thread. It's helped immensely.

Reply

Shardovan 10 months ago

Just a bit of extra information about why my periodic anxiety about this happened to spike just now: bit of a perfect storm really.

For context: when I first got diagnosed in 2022, I (wisely or unwisely, but at the time I felt I needed to do it) sent an email round my immediate colleagues in the smallish dept. I work in. It disclosed the diagnosis, explained what a relief it had been, what a difference to my self-undertanding it was, assured than minimal to no specific adjustments would be needed to my work environment/set-up, and ... mosy crucially (and the thing that took the greatest weight off my shoulders) explained that what might to others look like stagnancy (not doing occasional interviews for other gigs, not wanting higher grade posts when they came up etc.) to the average person was, for me, scaffolding keeping me right, warding off burnout etc. In other words, I'll be in this post/grade for the long-term (if spared), and please don't put any 'why don't you apply for X' or 'did you see that job that came up in another university' type stuff in front of me as it will only make me feel triggered and I have no intention of rolling the dice or putting myself through another interview ever if I can help it. I really couldn't have been clearer. And my colleagues were very nice and understanding... and even forgiving of the email's inordinate length (I struggle with conciseness at the best of times).

And yet, time rolls on, a managerial post (related to my specialism) comes up with a completely different employer in a building full of total strangers, and I this week receive an email from a colleague (one of the ones who received and read my email, and seemed to understand) linking to it and saying 'Did you not see this?', the apparent implication being that I should be considering it, asking for preparatory help for shortlisting/applying etc. And I can't believe that I've had this done to me, because it's either amnesia on their part, or they're stirring the pot so to speak and trying to make me feel like my 'excuse' (as they might see it) was insufficient to get off the hook for this precscribed 'should' that is a passing curiosity for them but a major trigger for me (in terms a of the defensive/paranoid position it puts me into, exactly what my 2022 email was intended to avoid ever happening again). Then of course imposter syndrome comes in as there's an implied 'Well, we all have challenges in life, doesn't mean you shouldn't be getting on...' as well as a sense of 'Do I get on everyone's nerves to the extent that they'd ride roughshod over what I told them just to force me to read between the lines and go and bore/annoy some other office colleagues instead... all while being miserable and five minutes from a nervous breakdown of course!

Then I had another colleague (genuinely well-meaningly I think, but again ignoring what I clearly laid out I needed/will always in life - conitinuity not change, the persistence not abandonment of my dream job that I already have) verbally say to me in passing 'Would you never think of moving to another city/country for another job in our field?' I was kind of shocked they'd even ask and could feel this anxiety surge like it was already happening, change forced upon me even by suggestion! I brushed it off politely but the wheels were turning all night: 'Can't they see I need the people, places, work environment, work 'family' I already have?'., 'isn't it obvious that I want to stay in my forever home... forever?' 'how can they not know me after all this time and openness?'

And finally, talk of dissatistaction and wanting to leave from even a cople of (what I thought were) fellow 'lifers' means that I feel like the one reliably unchanging constant with all potentially about to fall away in some churn of change at any given moment.

All sounds very heightened doesn't it? I know I need to dial that down a bit! I think the real autistic takeaway here is... sometimes relatively small (in NT terms) external events or comments can create an inner tsunami that might only be barely glimpsed behind one's masking. What is a passing curiosity about a 'wouldn't you be mad not to...?' for them that they forget two minutes later has sparked an inner turmoil and unravelling of self-worth/former certainties about being finally understood, and the tsunami effect once again tilts the world on its axis. Picking up the pieces, then, am I OK as I am? Is my life OK as is? And I deemed lacking? Does it matter? Who is authentic when they nod apparent understanding? Who is mischievous and who well-meaning? Is there any reliable consistency of attitude or what's valued in any place, community, workplace? Has reality been re-written overnighht and if so am I expected to adapt or is my destiny to hold firm to who I know I am and how I need to function?

Wow, that became very rambly and stream of consciousness! Therapy territory indeed. And maybe I should now park all that and reiterate my deep gratitude for all that's been said by others in this thread. It's helped immensely.

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