I’ve worked from home a few years now, and whilst the upsides are well known I’ve personally found some challenges there too. Have you experienced anything similar? How did you deal with it?
My tale:
When the UK went into lockdown (along with everyone else) in early 2020 I started working from home full-time. For the first year I was with the same team I’d worked with for years whilst in the office, so nothing really changed except my location.
I switched jobs mid-2021 and the new team was much smaller. I work as a software developer, and this team was a grand total of three people including myself. We didn’t have many meetings, only one a week, and except for being assigned new work I never interacted with anyone. It took a big toll on my mental health and I quit after three months.
I took an extended break from software development and started working on a plant nursery, driving tractors and tending plants - it was so much fun, but paid very little and ate into my savings a lot.
Went back to software development last year and thankfully manage things much better. I’m not a very social person, so it was surprising how important socialisation was to my mental wellbeing. I’m now part of quite a large team that speaks regularly, and when I next change jobs I know that this is something I need to look for.
I also have a garden now, so when the call of the wild hits me I go outside and sniff my tomato plants. I do miss driving tractors though.
Hi, I’ve worked from home for over 20 years. I’m self-employed and build websites for different design agencies. I chat regularly with project managers so do have ‘work contact’.
I don’t mind being home alone all day, we (married 20 years) have 3 cats who are verbal throughout the day so there are interactions and I don’t feel alone.
That said, through lockdown I loved my wife being home all day. Luckily my workload only took a small dip, and we had a great time in the garden, reading, watching new TV etc.
I also play badminton twice a week in a club so have enough social action away from the computer.
It sounds like you’ve got a good balance now, keep well 🙂
Thank you for sharing! You reminded me of another good point - When I first started working from home we weren’t allowed pets, but after I started at the plant nursery we were able to convince our landlord to let us get a cat. We’ve since bought our own house, so there’s inevitably going to be more cats to follow. I think having a cat has also made working from home alone a lot easier.
At least in the UK things are starting to turn around and it feels like pretty soon the default will be to allow pets in rented accomodation and landlords will hopefully have a hard time rejecting them. They have a big impact on mental health.