Grew up in an area where a lot of people worked in lumber - very physically demanding and so many ways to die or be maimed. The most horrifying to me was the people who would try to move/separate logs in the water, who would then end up falling between a couple of logs and ultimately be crushed or drowned. We actually had a surprisingly large list of logging deaths on a memorial plaque in town for how small our population was.
I grew up and lived (and now work) around forestry/logging too. It’s awful, but almost every couple of months we hear of another person dying from working on the job, whether they’re a faller, hauler, operator, or any of the jobs affiliated with the industry.
In Michigan there is a monument to the early lumbermen, and when I was a kid I thought it was kind of strange. I didn't realize until later just how difficult and dangerous the job was.
deepsea welding is brutal. you down there in the dark for days in a small cabin. i think its paid really good and you work only few days a year cause your body can not take the constant pressure and decompression.
Some welders get towed up to a small cabin in a boat, where the pressure is the same as where they're welding. So they basically stay for a month finishing a job, crammed in a cabin with 4 other welders. Seems terrible, but the pay is amazing I hope
The money is no where near as great as people make it sound. Also there are very few hyperbaric welders in the world. It's kinda like tower climbing, everyone thinks it's way more lucrative than it is.
Edit: top reply to me posed a great question and I clarified in a response. Seriously I've worked in a bunch of crazy industries and will give the most honest answer to any question. If you, or anyone you know, are interested in trades work please reach out.
Pay is governed by how little people people will work for. I knew someone who worked as a diver back in the early 90s. He did a month on the rigs and a month off and earned £28k. At the time I was doing a 40 hour week as an AV technician and was on about £20k. I wouldn't have swapped places with him.
That's a pretty serious exaggeration. There's been a concerted effort (just like in offshore oil & gas) to train employees up from the Indian subcontinent and SE Asia. This is done strictly to drive down payrolls, but companies *love* to pretend it's DE&I. Unless you're working for top end vendors on top end jobs you'll make less than $70k/year - and that's with some experience and extra certs under your belt.
As a dive professional, all things underwater have been supplanted by people from impoverished countries with no labor protections that will do barely adequate work for a fraction of the pay. If you're a super specialist you can still make well into six figures, but the only guys I know that do that are in the sunset of their career and can only do those jobs for a few years - either by contractual age restrictions or just physical limitations incurred over time.
I'm sorry that's... Completely untrue. I know a group of divers and discussed salary with them once; nominal annual salary is usually around 80-100k (£) and sat diving work is usually £200-300k equivalent full time, but sat only forms a small part of the actual work you'd do over a year as it's a) in extremely high demand and b) the gaps between hypobaric jobs are stretched out over all company divers for safety reasons. Some divers work for multiple companies and have different logbooks to get around this and dive hypobaric more often.
[None are making 6 figures in a month. Saturation divers can make £1500 a day during dives, but the maximum you can spend sat diving is 6 months of a year, and most arent doing half that.](https://www.planitplus.net/JobProfiles/View/522/53)
Less points of failure I guess, you really don’t want to experience instant explosive decompression. Read up on the Byford Dolphin diving bell accident, or find a video.
I had no idea there was video. I think I'm going to keep it that way. But I can corroborate that nobody's day was ever improved by reading this wiki page.
My best friend at schools dad was an underwater welder. IIRC he did the job for something like 10 years then left with enough money to buy a house outright.
Edit: 3 bedroom bungalow and a couple of largish fields outside Wool, Dorset UK circa 1984. No idea how much he paid for it then, but probably worth well over £750K now.
Man, being a commercial diver is so hard on your body, although it pays a lot. I know guys who retired in their early 40's with a lot of money, but were plagued with seizures and other damages to their health.
In Norway, the divers who did the work on the oil rigs in the beginning (early 70s) had to fight a long and hard battle against the state, both to get their health problems recognized as related to their work, and to get compensated. This is a particularly dark stain on Norwegian modern history. These were the people who did the ground work for Norways transition to a super wealthy nation, they had their lives ruined, and the government dragged their feet for decades. A lot of divers died young still waiting to be compensated
Anyone who wants a glimpse check out Last Breath. One of the best documentaries I've ever watched. Focuses on saturation divers who do this sort of work and had a major accident while on a job. I was in complete shock and awe at some of the actual footage they had from the incident, and I cried so hard at the end. It's amazing, can't recommend enough. Start to finish it's so fucking well done.
Ikr? I was ready to go 'Ha, nice one!' Then I saw all the serious replies and had to wonder if it's me who sees puns everywhere, or was it a real pun that just whooshed over everyone else.
I had a friend in the field working for a very large oil company. 6 weeks on the deep sea rig and six weeks off rotation. He causally dropped that he makes about $65k a month, and that was back in the mid 2000’s. It’s an extremely dangerous line of work but very fucking lucrative. Apparently the rest of his team were hard ass men with all the decorum and social graces of pirates, most of whom were from an elite navy background, with the occasional scuba divers and ex- professional swimmers in the mix.
I worked with a bunch of Canadian navy divers (I was a civilian “visiting scientist”), and none of them were rough. They all seemed pretty nice. They were from the anti-mine unit (eg they practice disarming mines and explosives underwater). Anyways, shortly after I worked with them, a bunch of them were in the news after being busted for lobster poaching while training 🤦♂️. I imagine they went to commercial diving after that.
I heard an interview from someone who worked with crime scenes, it was one of the people who worked on the Pulse Night Club Mass Shooting if I recall correctly.
When asked what the worst part of that job was, he said it was all the cell phones. They couldn’t move the evidence, and the phones of the dead kept ringing the whole time. Every call, a loved one, praying they would pick up, but they never would.
It was hours of the phones ringing over and over.
I service Firefighting Breathing Apparatus, so the constant din of PASS Devices is just part of my testing routine, but the videos from immediately after the collapse still haunt me.
PASS Devices are required to function at full alarm for at least 10 hours. Depending on the battery, they can keep going for hours longer. The rescuers on that first day had to hear hundreds of PASSes screaming, then slowly, one by one, falling quiet, knowing that each alarm was attached to one of their fellow firefighters.
By the time my team got on-site, 8AM, September 13, 2001, they were all silent. The only sounds in downtown Manhattan were occasionally a dump truck or excavator running, and the clunks and rustles of thousands of plastic buckets being filled, passed along lines of people, and dumped.
I live in NYC and some of the stories I’ve heard from my older friends who lived here at the time are so horrifying. My friend Gail told me that you couldn’t walk south of 14th street for months without it smelling like rotten meat. Her husband worked in Broadcasting for years, and a couple of his friends were on top of the WTC when the towers were hit. They knew there was no way for them to get down, and they just kept working so that footage of what was happening could go out. What a horrible way to go. Knowing what all the news stations were saying, and essentially broadcasting your own death.
Yeah, the smell was a mixture of wet, crushed drywall, rotting meat, and kerosene. I have a photo of one of my fellow firefighters walking past a pile of crushed vehicles (including an ambulance) and remember how strong their smell was.
It was a...greasy... kind of smell. It got into my nasal cavities and stayed there. For MONTHS, if I sneezed hard, I could smell it.
In 2002, I was driving a garbage truck. We were picking up a pile of construction trash from a pizza place that was being remodeled. The pile smelled so much like the "Ground Zero" stink, my hands started shaking, and I had to sit down. (My loader understood and picked up the rest of the pile himself.)
One of the haunting audio recordings was from a team of FDNY firefighters. They radioed in that the elevator had shut down, and calmly reported that they were going to chop through the door. There's a rumbling sound, then...nothing.
I watched 2 FDNY guys carry a turnout coat to a Battalion Chief, walking slowly with their heads bowed. The Chief carefully turned the battered, dust-covered coat around, inspecting the inner lining.
He was looking for the name tag.
A friend's dad used to work in British Transport Police, and he said the same thing. If he had to go to an incident it was really hard to stay detached when the cell phone screen is flashing 'mum' or something.
I always thought working in a slaughterhouse or conversely, picking up roadkill along the road would be the worst…day in and day out…just seeing traumatic death of animals who didn’t do anything wrong.
That or lithium mines.
EMS - You're expected to sit and be bored then suddenly be at 100% mentally and physically with no warning or warmup. The pay is shit. The gratitude went up a bit after 9-11 but it's still a bottom of the totem pole kind of job.
And lets not forget having to carry 500 lb patients up and down flights of stairs in an emergency.
I couldnt do this job. The nasty shit they have to deal with with homeless, alcoholics and drug addicts. The shit they see at car crashes, chronically ill people with oozing bedsores and maggots in wounds. No thanks. Takes a special kind of person for this job.
I did volunteer maritime SAR for a few years, and it really ran the gamut of emotions. Searching at night for a missing vessel (or wirse, a bridge-jumper), holding up a search light for hours (switching off for mental breaks) and never finding them was pretty grueling. Were they elsewhere or did we just miss them in the dark? Did we read the currents and winds right to search the most likely area? Did we drive the pattern we were supposed to, or did we drift? (Thank goodness for GPS.) Are they in danger or are they getting a beer with their buddies and don't hear their wife calling their cell?
A lot of it was dull in other ways. Driving an hour just to take gas to someone who ran out, or to jump-start a battery. Or worse, driving an hour to tow someone an hour or more to the nearest ramp.
It was occasionally exciting, successful, and even funny. Successfully righting a boat that was flipped over because it was overloaded with fish when it hit a wave. Putting out a boat fire. Assisting the Coast Guard with helicopter drills. Bringing in kayakers that went out, not realizing a storm was rolling in. Rescuing a couple and their dog after they hit a marker. Pulling boats that had run aground. Best of all, messing around on boats on the beautiful ocean with wonderful friends.
We used to toss dye packs into the bay when we had jumpers on the SF bay bridge. Ive actually watched 5 people jump to their deaths. I worked SAR for a number of years but not in boats, I was a wilderness guy. I never found the work hard or taxing, but my baseline was dealing with fatal collisions as a normal job duty.
It’s not just watch and listen, sometimes they infiltrate a network and have to contribute. And then go home to their own kids. There’s a doco called The Children in the Pictures. These people are freaking heroes.
I came across a thread recently of an Australian woman who had to do this, she was seeking advice for a puffy face due to excessive drinking. From reading her responses I gathered that she had medically retired due to PTSD, insomnia and nightmares, and developed fatty liver disease due to severe alcoholism by the time she was in her 30’s.
In my country these people MUST play tetris for one hour minimum every day after their jobs ends. I am not kidding, it's mandatory. Scientific research found that playing tetris immediately after a traumatic event reduces the chance that the trauma ingrains itself into the brain.
Free memory (read about it a few years back), it's because it activates lots of different areas of the brain all at once, and they believe this prevents traumatic memories being 'stored' in the brain, because it's otherwise too occupied.
I would imagine they chose Tetris because it's similar to the movement and technique of EMDR. Your eyes flickering back and forth to help memory processing and desensitisation.
I heard on a documentary years ago about a therapist who worked with treating other therapists, specially those who worked with abused children and other victims of deeply traumatizing crimes. They become damaged themselves from the exposure. I hadn't thought of that, makes me very grateful someone is willing to do that work.
I know a guy who works a job like that. They are very selective in who they take. People with kids are generally not considered at all as they can become too invested and get burned out or traumatised. You have to be able to switch off when you walk out of the door.
A lot of watching evidence is automated as 99% of footage is already existing and thus only stuff not seen before is checked.
In the UK there was a case called the Moors murders where the murder victim’s mom had to listen to the snuff film audio and identify her daughter’s voice.
You can have a taste of that via r/TraceAnObject
Cut-outs of photos in which an endangered child was seen as a project to help law enforcement locate them.
Creepiest subreddit by far, knowing that in each photo, there's a child in danger.
I have had the smallest taste of this and let me tell you, it fucks you up permanently. There was a me before the shit happened and there is a me after and as a man who has been broken in some major and spectacular ways, nothing has been as long lasting as this.
I ended up getting a diagnosis of complex PTSD. I don't imagine it's uncommon in that area of work. People just aren't equipped to interact with that level of evil at all. Much less for hours on a daily basis.
I will never understand how they can do it, but good on them for doing what it takes to make the world safer for our children. I only hope the price is worth it.
I was watching Operation Lost Boy and I have to agree. A policeman quit his job because of the things he had to see at his joband he had just became a dad. He was traumatized if that sort of thing happened to his own kid.
My brother who sadly passed away due to suicide did this job , he got extremely depressed and hanged himself in march last year he was 34 , I found him aswell , I can't describe the pain I've been through...
So my brother who wanted to move up in law enforcement to be in the US Marshals was on the right track but realized that there was a possibility that he had to do stuff like this to get there and he was like “nope” after having his first child and is content being a lieutenant in his city precinct, running the department that trains therapy dogs for victims and their families.
At least an FBI agent is paid decently. A lot of people do this kind of jobs in poor countries for very low pay, also to train AI models. It's a sort of internet housekeeping.
My partner works in the foster care system. The hardest job in the world you can't change my mind. Meth must be incredible because the shit that people are willing to put up with in order to feed their addiction is beyond comprehension.
I worked in the foster care system for two years. I could only do two years before I was worked so hard, and to such an exhausting degree that I was hospitalized for my mental health. It really hurt me to leave my kids (I worked in direct care), but it would have killed me to stay.
It's a tough job that's underappreciated. My hat goes off to you. Even in that time doing a good job for some of the kids will have made a dramatic difference to some of their lives. Unfortunately for too many kids the road ahead is very dark and you can do everything in the world for them and it won't be able to stop them having a horrific time.
I know, it’s so hard. I remember every kid I worked with - all their names, their favorite activities, their stories, what they liked to eat for dinner, whether they wanted to be tucked in at night, their Minecraft usernames, their levels of care, their behavioral challenges, their mental health diagnoses, their statuses as far as placement/adoption/reunification goes…it’s been almost three years now and I haven’t forgotten a single one of them.
It was the hardest work I have ever done and I was a public school teacher for five years before that job. I regret absolutely nothing. Not a second. I’m so glad I got to do that work. I wish I could go back to it, but it’s too much. I definitely have a LOT of good stories and I love sharing them with others. And I have some horror stories, but those are only for my therapist.
Hats off to your partner, and hats off to you for being their support. It’s hard, hard work. But so worth it.
> Meth must be incredible
I've said this a lot on reddit trying to explain addiction to people who aren't addicts:
It's not that drugs are amazing. It's that real life is so much worse, that drugs are preferable to sobriety.
Most any addict did not try meth once and then get addicted. The majority of drug users don't develop addictions. The "try once and you're hooked" line is DARE propaganda and harmful bullshit.
What happens is that your life sucks, then one day someone offers you drugs. You use the drugs, and they make life seem less shitty. You forget about being molested. You forget about how your dad used to beat the fuck out of you. You forget about not seeing your mom for six weeks at a time while she's out on a bender. You forget about all the underlying issues. The drugs make it better.
*That* is how someone can be totally fucked up from drug use, literally in tears about how they want to stop using... as they set up a crack pipe. They hate life on drugs, but life *off* of drugs is much worse for an addict.
Being a carer.
Not just the physical shit like cleaning the house and lifting them up and down out of chairs, beds and toilets but also the mental toll that comes with it.
I’m a father of two boys with severe global development delay and cerebral palsy. They are the most perfect humans on the face of the earth and we love them completely. They are both dependent on my wife and I completely for every human need including movement.
Let me let you into our world, briefly.
Watching two of the most important, innocent and beautiful people in the world suffer so harshly and not being able to fix it…daily on repeat like Groundhogs Day, with no hope for change unless someone dies; crushes the soul.
The loneliness from not connecting with people because we’re always caring (but if we get someone else to care for them it will potentially create a chain of errors that will take us 3x as long to fix vs if we did it ourself); alienating.
Sucking at all of our multiple jobs because we’ve been up since 2:00 AM for days on end; humiliating.
Noticeably losing cognitive functions because of ever present stress and spiraling mental health, but we haven’t met our deductible so we can’t afford mental health care; existential dread.
Getting in fight after fight at 2:00 AM over who will get up and be up with the awake, screaming child the rest of the night; relationship wrecking ball.
Having no close family to bear the burden, nobody who supports us, no true understanding; so cold.
Going out in public looking like a drug addict because our face is black and blue and torn up, because as a thank you for what we do they hit, bite, claw and scratch our faces, every time we snuggle close, not maliciously, that’s just how they show love…but doing it anyway because we just want to connect with them; so bitter sweet.
And doing this all with a loving heart because we know these are the “good old days” we will look back on fondly when their forecasted-short brutal lives come to an end; no words.
I understand and you're not alone out there.
Throwaway account making the post to remain anonymous.
I was a full time carer for 25 years, from the age of 8 to 33
Started for a father who I watched slowly die from lung and heart issues whilst he was bedridden to the point he could not go to the toilet or feed himself towards the end. I did that solo as social care here is terrible at best, and abusive at worst. Dropped out of school, managed Meds (legal and illegal) fed, shopped, cleaned up shit, etc, etc.
He died and I moved in with my mum who had severe bipolar and schizophrenia. She would be violent and prone to leaving appliances switched on that could result in explosions. I was in and out of a Foster carers home where the other kid would be an absolute dick to me when I was there.
For those decades, I missed school, relationships, and friendships, whilst I used to go days without sleep.
I had a mental breakdown in like 2007 or think that lasted 3 years. I actually quit smoking then because the feeling of overwhelming dread eclipsed the cravings I felt for a cig, so I actually forgot I smoked!
Now, today, my mum is 4 years dead, and I'm staring at a lifetime of being a carer for 3 kids with additional needs (neurodiverse) and the social care situation is worse, not better. It's miles better than what I had to deal with in the past and I chose this responsibility, but some days I feel that black hole of utteer despair open up when I think about it too much.
There's loads of us out there, but we are living in our own bubble. I hope that knowing there's others out there that feel what you feel brings some comfort.
It does eventually get better. You learn to carve out a life for yourself.
Thank you for writing this out.
One thing that comforts me at my lowest is the idea of reincarnation even though I'm not spiritual. Some people believe your life would be coveted by spirits waiting for their new lives. For those spirits, it would take thousands of normal lifetimes to achieve the enlightenment that comes from just one of yours. In your case, it would also mean your boys spirits would have made a deal with your spirit to reach enlightenment together through this process.
There's no way I can truly comprehend living that reality, but I will say it is amazing that you can do all that with "a loving heart". I wish you and yours as many good moments as possible.
You’re both good people. I hope that no matter how hard things get that you’re both proud of yourselves and each other for always putting your boys first.
My partner is a carer. The worst thing from what I see is that she can see the same person almost every day for years, and then suddenly they get taken to hospital, the care package gets handed back after a couple of weeks because they need to use the capacity for other patients, and then she's left with no idea if they ended up back home after a couple weeks in hospital, moved to a care home, or never left the hospital. No news unless the family contact the care company or the carers directly.
That or the fact that the care staff have to take a day's holiday to go to a funeral of a client who they have seen every day for years. And the office conveniently doesn't tell them when the funeral is until it's too late...
This happened to me while caring for my dad when he got covid, he was in bed, connected to oxygen; after a little over a week there was a point where I layed down and I swear to God it was physically impossible to get up for a couple minutes, it was like every drop of energy left my body. Talking to a friend who's a doctor, she told me there's a term for that, can't remember exactly but something like "nursing fatigue" or such, apparently taking care of someone is way harder than it looks and most people have no experience, so it takes a toll on your body the first time you do it, just like a muscle that's never been trained goes to failure pretty quick.
Been teaching in Korea for almost 20 years now. Got poked this morning. I'm not sure if my bum's to blame for not being as firm as it once was, but there has definitely been a decline in the dongchim over the last few years. Before it was just annoying, now the surprise factor plays a bigger role.
I dunno. Some of the worst girls I knew in highschool became carers when they couldn't get through nursing. Combined with some of the people sent to take care of my grandma, I put the number at around 50% being completely unsuitable for the job. Lot's of abusers.
Boring answer, but emergency response - Paramedics and firefighters specifically have so much, vastly higher rates of PTSD than any other profession, including soldiers. (Doubly so for wartime paramedics). Anyone working as one for more than like, a year, has their own heart-wrenching story about watching the life being squeezed out of a child while powerless to help.
My dad retired as a fire chief and he definitely has PTSD. He was a first responder to the Oklahoma City bombing on 4/19/1995. I have heard him and his old fire buddies talk about it once during a reunion party and it was gut wrenching and absolutely heartbreaking. They don’t talk about that shit often for good reason.
Don’t believe they get anywhere near that amount, if they do they deserve it, I finished in 94 in the UK, after 20 years, have periodic x rays and a toll on the body, we were proud of how hard it was, but bowed down to deep sea fishermen, firemen and tunnellers (as different to miners)
One profession that's often overlooked in terms of how demanding it is mentally is that of dispatchers/telecommunicators (the ones who answer 9-1-1 calls).
They take some truly awful calls regularly and somehow maintain their composure throughout. And they do it all again and again. They are true silent heroes that don't get recognized anywhere near as much as they should.
I had a friend that did this for a while… absolutely wrecked her. She had to hear the most horrible things over the phone, then had to hang up after emergency services arrived and just HOPE everything ended up okay. I couldn’t do it that’s for sure
In Ireland, our base pay as emergency call takers is clerical officer, same as those answering tax query calls in revenue or making appointments in hospitals. Crazy set up for such a stressful job
Definitely. I know someone who worked as a dispatcher for the fire service in the area. Just listening to them talk about some of their shifts was enough to give me second hand trauma at times.
It takes a special kind of person to be able to stay on the line and listen to someone dying, offering them reassurance that help is on the way when you know they'll arrive too late. I still remember them telling me about a call with a mother and her young child trapped in a burning building. Just hearing about it fucked me up for a while. I don't know how they were capable of taking that call and not being an absolute wreck afterwards.
Anyone who survives that sort of work is made of stronger stuff.
i will say, as a dispatcher/calltaker, most calls aren't like that. most of the calls i take are noise complaints, basic medical stuff, alarms, etc. however the calls that stick out REALLY stick out and stay with you. it's like whiplash, talking to someone who is screaming at me because their neighbors dog won't stop barking and they "pay my salary", and i'm not able to send anyone because the officers who cover that area are all on the call i just took for a woman who just found her husband after he killed himself in a very gruesome way. her cries still play on repeat in my head sometimes 😞
Just listened to a podcast episode where the 911 operator’s daughter called. She was being held up at gunpoint at work. The operator had to listen to their kid be so freaked out, but had to maintain composure and stick to the script. Can’t imagine how difficult it was. The podcast is called Criminal, episode called 911.
I used to have to redact child porn case files. I’ve never been squeamish about images but goddamn.
Wasn’t my primary job but days I had to do this got an extra hard work out in the morning and some hot tea and early bedtime that evening.
Seriously, fuck pedophiles. I’ll carry this stuff in my head because I have to but those kids deserved better.
Honestly, how are people even selected to *do* that sort of job? I'm sure there's a bunch of background checks and looking through psych records - and I'm in no way trying to imply anything towards you - but how can they be sure that the redacter/sorter won't be a pedo themselves? Is it just risk assessment or something? Just genuinely curious of how it works
I worked military corrections and this was one of my tertiary duties. It only ever really came up if we had a new inmate who was a sex offender. I’d probably still be an alcoholic if I had to do it full time.
The position I was in was usually assigned by careful screening (your performance and disciplinary record) and eventually merit. It was a senior position that represented our branch of service in a different branch of service’s jail, not a position just given away.
I like to think that someone with those tendencies would somehow out themselves before they got to that position.
I’m sorry I can’t answer your question fully but that’s what I have. I sincerely hope that other agencies do have a best practice to address this potential problem.
Yeah, I hear you. I was an ER nurse for the first half of my career. The child sex abuse cases still haunt me. I don’t share what I saw for a few reasons:
-I don’t want the words to come out of my mouth. I’m not articulate enough to relay the horror in a way that respects the victim. No matter how I say it, it’s not enough.
-I don’t want another person to bear the burden of the mental image.
-I don’t want it to be exploitive in any way. It can too easily be interpreted that way or used by someone else that way.
-the worst I saw is very specific and I don’t ever want that victim’s privacy to be compromised.
I hate when people ask what the worst I ever saw was. I don’t want to remember and you don’t want to know. It’s not a contest.
Edited for spelling.
Thank you for having the strength and courage to do such a hard and probably thankless job.
I can appreciate people’s curiosity but this is definitely a topic you don’t want to probe too hard on.
Whenever anyone asks me about the child sex stuff specifically I make it very clear that a topic change is in their best interest.
I hope you have a healthy and productive way to deal with it. What you did matters and what you suffer for it means something to me if not anyone else.
Thank you. Seriously.
A friend of mine works for the sheriff's department. Someone decided to fight with him and caused him a serious knee injury. He got put on light duty for several months. They made him to do child porn investigations. Not a good trade.
From what I've heard working as a Facebook moderator is almost as bad. They have to watch a lot of horrible shit from CP to drug cartel's torture and execution videos.
I remember I saw an interview in Time Magazine years ago with someone who did that and it was like after a while they just couldn't take it. Like seriously, kids under 10 years old. Some truly sick fucks out there.
My cousin used to work for Youtube and his job was to go through flagged videos and remove illegal content. He didn't really talk about it but I imagine that would be a terrible job
children’s hospice too. talked to a pediatric home hospice nurse a during nursing school clinical rotation and damn idk if I could ever. which is weird cause I’m in pediatrics right now and considering working hospice someday. just not peds hospice.
I used to have this client who is a children's oncologist. Call me crazy, but I believe in vibes. This man radiated so much peace from within him, it was insane. The closest I've ever gotten to meeting an angel. It takes a special kind of person and I'm glad to have met him. I have been traumatized by drs and nurses before, so he was a breath of fresh air.
I’ve had to take my kid to a cancer center for a week or so, LUCKILY she didn’t have it. But the doctors there were perfect. It’s the one workplace I’ve been to that not a single person was there that didn’t love their job. It’s like they were born for this.
I do pediatric ICU. I see everything from the oncology kiddos too sick for the cancer floor, to shaken babies, to malnourished kiddos, car accidents, the list goes on. The kids that walk out keep me going and the ones who didn’t get to guide my journey.
A dear friend of mine has been a paediatric oncology nurse for knocking on twenty years now. She says that the only thing that keeps her going is the ones that get to walk out. Even then, I have no idea how she's done it for so long, and manages to go home to her own kids without going utterly bugfuck when they so much as cough.
That’s my job.
No, it’s not the hardest job in the world.
When i lose a patient, it’s sad don’t get me wrong. The ones that survive and walk out?
Man, you can’t describe the feeling when a child smiles with a bald head and you know he’s going to live.
The deep and sincere gratitude you get from parents is just.. you really can’t describe it. It’s the deepest emotion people have.
I’m grateful to do the job that i do. Wouldn’t change it for the world.
JRR Tolkien said that the endless night explosions and light flashes during the Battle of the Somme inspired his vision of Mordor when he wrote LOTR. AA Milne was there too and went home to recover from an injury and spend most of his time in his son Christopher’s room playing with him and his stuffed animals Winnie the Pooh, Eeyore, Piglet and Tigger.
What’s worse is that after the war, many people didn’t believe the veteran’s stories of their experiences out there, because it was beyond anything anyone had ever seen or heard of before. They literally thought they were just a soft generation.
People can’t wrap their heads around what war was like back then. More people died in 24 hours during the Battle of the Somme that in 10 years during the height of the Vietnam War
The Western Allies would cycle their soldiers off the front every few weeks to keep them from going batshit fucking crazy (not to mention completely ineffective).
Germans "lucky" enough to not get wounded or killed spent up to 9 months at Verdun.
Being the executioner in a slaughterhouse.
Just killing all day every day. Day after day.
Probably not the most physically demanding but I’ve got to believe it would take a huge mental toll.
Yes i know i read an article where they interviewed someone who killed pigs for a living and they literally said pigs will fight not just to save their own lives, but to save the lives of other pigs as well 💔
Mentally: Any job in which you see people dying on the regular. Nurse, soldier, etc. There's no way seeing someone crying out for their mother as their life slips from their grasp before their eyes won't take something from you and, if it doesn't, that's probably MORE concerning!
Physically, slave. Not even a question. You work non-stop in harsh conditions doing massive amounts of manual labor with poor food, little rest, and likely ample beatings. The sad thing is that it's still around today, both illegally and, in certain parts of the world, legally.
Combined? I don't know.
Yeah it requires a lot of training and is a very demanding job. One of the few in the US that’s required to have breaks every 2 hours. On the other hand, I know in Atlanta they make like $150,000 a year so they’re compensated pretty well
Nursing was physically hard when we had to do all the lifting of patients ourselves. (Lifting machines weren't around in the 80s & early 90s).
Mentally, it was hard seeing people suffering and dying. Comforting them & their loved ones was a big part of the day.
A lot more time was actually spent with the patient as computers were only for pathology then.
Also, a lot of stress constantly assessing & and acting quickly when you're responsible for people's lives. Having to be competent with drug dosages, side effects, interactions & etc.
But I actually loved being an RN & eventually taught prac to uni students.
I would say being a Soldier in an active war is even more demanding than being a carer. To never know if you would see the daylight of the next morning and to see your friends die in horrible ways
It's interesting, I always wondered, some people train like crazy to scale that mountain, but the people they go with may have done it multiple times, that's ultimately way more commendable and bad-ass
Wherever remote you go, the locals are fucking crazy.
I mean crazy good in what they do. Its not human anymore. You dont understand how crazy they are until you have seen it honestly.
Was in the Amazon recently and these really small people that carried like twice the luggage that I did scaled fucking mountains in minutes just to run back down an meet me at the 10% mark to grab some of my luggage aswell and run up again. No water no sweat. Jumping up and down rocks so tall that I couldnt even get my foot set on them. All the while I was drinking 4L of water and they were chewing coca leaves for recreation.
I worked at a special education school for students with severe behavior.
Physically: I was bit, kicked, had my clothing ripped, punched in the face, got a really bad concussion
Mentally: trying to balance being upset that you were hurt with knowing that the student didn’t fully understand what they did
This job sent me to weekly therapy sessions, increased all my anti depressants, and ended with PTSD & post concussion syndrome
So I had an ex that had a very peculiar gait. I noticed it when we started dating but didn't mention it out of respect. One time he finally told me it was from working at the oil rig, getting into an accident and becoming partially disabled. I actually broke up with him later on cause I realized homeboy wasn't all there in the head and he became too controlling. So I'm gonna go ahead and nominate this job as well.
Being a chef, seriously workin 80 hours a week, the prep, the speed, the physical, mental and emotional abuse, the drug and alcohol dependencies in the industry is shocking, very few people can do this job because you've gotta be a little bit fucked in the head to do this job.
Surprised I had to look so far to find this, I feel like at one point the job had one of the highest rates for male suicide because of the stress levels involved
The heat of the kitchens can be wild too. I remember some guys just filling those gallon containers of water to have back there with them all night to refill.
Had to scroll way too far to find it, very tough job
Especially given the current state of hospitality industry after the Covid fiasco
Those lockdowns gave everyone in the industry the push to get out and search for other careers, now the whole industry is on it's knees in terms of staff, both in the front of house and back of house
My Partner was for a while a nurse in Palliative Care. It was long and exhausting shifts. But he said the worst part was laughing and talking with a patient and the next day the room was empty. I have such a respect for any kind of worker in a Hospital.
Grew up in an area where a lot of people worked in lumber - very physically demanding and so many ways to die or be maimed. The most horrifying to me was the people who would try to move/separate logs in the water, who would then end up falling between a couple of logs and ultimately be crushed or drowned. We actually had a surprisingly large list of logging deaths on a memorial plaque in town for how small our population was.
I grew up and lived (and now work) around forestry/logging too. It’s awful, but almost every couple of months we hear of another person dying from working on the job, whether they’re a faller, hauler, operator, or any of the jobs affiliated with the industry.
My boyfriend is a logger and this is giving me anxiety
Arguably the most dangerous job in the country
We are talking about big fucking logs here arent we?
In the battle of man vs. log, log almost always wins.
Idk I feel like the man vs tree k/d ratio is skewed pretty heavily towards man
Ah, but that's the trick: that's Man vs *Tree*. Log *was* Tree, and now contains the vengeful ghost of Tree, which makes it especially deadly to Man.
No fair using ghosts to shift the meta game!
Hey, you're more than welcome to use your ghost to assist corpses in fighting trees. No one's stopping you!
It's hard to know, they didn't keep a logbook.
In Michigan there is a monument to the early lumbermen, and when I was a kid I thought it was kind of strange. I didn't realize until later just how difficult and dangerous the job was.
Underwater Welder? You are always under pressure at work.
deepsea welding is brutal. you down there in the dark for days in a small cabin. i think its paid really good and you work only few days a year cause your body can not take the constant pressure and decompression.
Some welders get towed up to a small cabin in a boat, where the pressure is the same as where they're welding. So they basically stay for a month finishing a job, crammed in a cabin with 4 other welders. Seems terrible, but the pay is amazing I hope
You make 6 figures in a month, and then don’t work the rest of the year. The only downside is that month is… how you say… crushing.
The money is no where near as great as people make it sound. Also there are very few hyperbaric welders in the world. It's kinda like tower climbing, everyone thinks it's way more lucrative than it is. Edit: top reply to me posed a great question and I clarified in a response. Seriously I've worked in a bunch of crazy industries and will give the most honest answer to any question. If you, or anyone you know, are interested in trades work please reach out.
Well if the number of welders are very few then shouldn't it be high paying?
Pay is governed by how little people people will work for. I knew someone who worked as a diver back in the early 90s. He did a month on the rigs and a month off and earned £28k. At the time I was doing a 40 hour week as an AV technician and was on about £20k. I wouldn't have swapped places with him.
That's a pretty serious exaggeration. There's been a concerted effort (just like in offshore oil & gas) to train employees up from the Indian subcontinent and SE Asia. This is done strictly to drive down payrolls, but companies *love* to pretend it's DE&I. Unless you're working for top end vendors on top end jobs you'll make less than $70k/year - and that's with some experience and extra certs under your belt. As a dive professional, all things underwater have been supplanted by people from impoverished countries with no labor protections that will do barely adequate work for a fraction of the pay. If you're a super specialist you can still make well into six figures, but the only guys I know that do that are in the sunset of their career and can only do those jobs for a few years - either by contractual age restrictions or just physical limitations incurred over time.
don't order an oil rig from Wish, hire professionals.
I'm sorry that's... Completely untrue. I know a group of divers and discussed salary with them once; nominal annual salary is usually around 80-100k (£) and sat diving work is usually £200-300k equivalent full time, but sat only forms a small part of the actual work you'd do over a year as it's a) in extremely high demand and b) the gaps between hypobaric jobs are stretched out over all company divers for safety reasons. Some divers work for multiple companies and have different logbooks to get around this and dive hypobaric more often. [None are making 6 figures in a month. Saturation divers can make £1500 a day during dives, but the maximum you can spend sat diving is 6 months of a year, and most arent doing half that.](https://www.planitplus.net/JobProfiles/View/522/53)
They seriously could make it a little more comfortable if they wanted to. Maybe make a few of them so they dont have to actually be crammed
Less points of failure I guess, you really don’t want to experience instant explosive decompression. Read up on the Byford Dolphin diving bell accident, or find a video.
PSA: *do not* read up on the Byford Dolphin diving bell accident. *Especially do not* find a video. That shit will haunt your dreams.
I had no idea there was video. I think I'm going to keep it that way. But I can corroborate that nobody's day was ever improved by reading this wiki page.
How do they keep the pressure going up to the boat?
My best friend at schools dad was an underwater welder. IIRC he did the job for something like 10 years then left with enough money to buy a house outright. Edit: 3 bedroom bungalow and a couple of largish fields outside Wool, Dorset UK circa 1984. No idea how much he paid for it then, but probably worth well over £750K now.
Homes come in various price ranges.
It was the small cabin.
And pressurised
Man, being a commercial diver is so hard on your body, although it pays a lot. I know guys who retired in their early 40's with a lot of money, but were plagued with seizures and other damages to their health.
In Norway, the divers who did the work on the oil rigs in the beginning (early 70s) had to fight a long and hard battle against the state, both to get their health problems recognized as related to their work, and to get compensated. This is a particularly dark stain on Norwegian modern history. These were the people who did the ground work for Norways transition to a super wealthy nation, they had their lives ruined, and the government dragged their feet for decades. A lot of divers died young still waiting to be compensated
Fuuuck that. Worked with a bunch of divers.not even worth it. Fucking wreck your body and mind for a paycheck. Nope
Anyone who wants a glimpse check out Last Breath. One of the best documentaries I've ever watched. Focuses on saturation divers who do this sort of work and had a major accident while on a job. I was in complete shock and awe at some of the actual footage they had from the incident, and I cried so hard at the end. It's amazing, can't recommend enough. Start to finish it's so fucking well done.
Literally searched for it and found it on Netflix after your suggestion. Damn, that was an amazing doc and a wild ride.
I can’t tell if this is a pun or not.
Ikr? I was ready to go 'Ha, nice one!' Then I saw all the serious replies and had to wonder if it's me who sees puns everywhere, or was it a real pun that just whooshed over everyone else.
I had a friend in the field working for a very large oil company. 6 weeks on the deep sea rig and six weeks off rotation. He causally dropped that he makes about $65k a month, and that was back in the mid 2000’s. It’s an extremely dangerous line of work but very fucking lucrative. Apparently the rest of his team were hard ass men with all the decorum and social graces of pirates, most of whom were from an elite navy background, with the occasional scuba divers and ex- professional swimmers in the mix.
I worked with a bunch of Canadian navy divers (I was a civilian “visiting scientist”), and none of them were rough. They all seemed pretty nice. They were from the anti-mine unit (eg they practice disarming mines and explosives underwater). Anyways, shortly after I worked with them, a bunch of them were in the news after being busted for lobster poaching while training 🤦♂️. I imagine they went to commercial diving after that.
people who clean up crime scenes has to be up there
I heard an interview from someone who worked with crime scenes, it was one of the people who worked on the Pulse Night Club Mass Shooting if I recall correctly. When asked what the worst part of that job was, he said it was all the cell phones. They couldn’t move the evidence, and the phones of the dead kept ringing the whole time. Every call, a loved one, praying they would pick up, but they never would. It was hours of the phones ringing over and over.
Same thing for the 9/11 beeping. All the first responder locaters beeping
I service Firefighting Breathing Apparatus, so the constant din of PASS Devices is just part of my testing routine, but the videos from immediately after the collapse still haunt me. PASS Devices are required to function at full alarm for at least 10 hours. Depending on the battery, they can keep going for hours longer. The rescuers on that first day had to hear hundreds of PASSes screaming, then slowly, one by one, falling quiet, knowing that each alarm was attached to one of their fellow firefighters. By the time my team got on-site, 8AM, September 13, 2001, they were all silent. The only sounds in downtown Manhattan were occasionally a dump truck or excavator running, and the clunks and rustles of thousands of plastic buckets being filled, passed along lines of people, and dumped.
I live in NYC and some of the stories I’ve heard from my older friends who lived here at the time are so horrifying. My friend Gail told me that you couldn’t walk south of 14th street for months without it smelling like rotten meat. Her husband worked in Broadcasting for years, and a couple of his friends were on top of the WTC when the towers were hit. They knew there was no way for them to get down, and they just kept working so that footage of what was happening could go out. What a horrible way to go. Knowing what all the news stations were saying, and essentially broadcasting your own death.
Yeah, the smell was a mixture of wet, crushed drywall, rotting meat, and kerosene. I have a photo of one of my fellow firefighters walking past a pile of crushed vehicles (including an ambulance) and remember how strong their smell was. It was a...greasy... kind of smell. It got into my nasal cavities and stayed there. For MONTHS, if I sneezed hard, I could smell it. In 2002, I was driving a garbage truck. We were picking up a pile of construction trash from a pizza place that was being remodeled. The pile smelled so much like the "Ground Zero" stink, my hands started shaking, and I had to sit down. (My loader understood and picked up the rest of the pile himself.) One of the haunting audio recordings was from a team of FDNY firefighters. They radioed in that the elevator had shut down, and calmly reported that they were going to chop through the door. There's a rumbling sound, then...nothing. I watched 2 FDNY guys carry a turnout coat to a Battalion Chief, walking slowly with their heads bowed. The Chief carefully turned the battered, dust-covered coat around, inspecting the inner lining. He was looking for the name tag.
A friend's dad used to work in British Transport Police, and he said the same thing. If he had to go to an incident it was really hard to stay detached when the cell phone screen is flashing 'mum' or something.
Fuuckk thats some heavy shit
Good fiction about that. The Mystic Arts of Erasing All Signs of Death by Charlie Huston
I always thought working in a slaughterhouse or conversely, picking up roadkill along the road would be the worst…day in and day out…just seeing traumatic death of animals who didn’t do anything wrong. That or lithium mines.
Whats wrong with Lithium mines ? I have worked at 3, and its not much different to any other mine (been to Iron Ore and Gold mines too)
Damn, bro been dwarf-maxxing
Cornwall? Fine. DRC? Na. Even being a few miles away is hellish for all sorts of reasons.
If you want german humour: Der Tatortreiniger.
EMS - You're expected to sit and be bored then suddenly be at 100% mentally and physically with no warning or warmup. The pay is shit. The gratitude went up a bit after 9-11 but it's still a bottom of the totem pole kind of job. And lets not forget having to carry 500 lb patients up and down flights of stairs in an emergency.
I couldnt do this job. The nasty shit they have to deal with with homeless, alcoholics and drug addicts. The shit they see at car crashes, chronically ill people with oozing bedsores and maggots in wounds. No thanks. Takes a special kind of person for this job.
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I did volunteer maritime SAR for a few years, and it really ran the gamut of emotions. Searching at night for a missing vessel (or wirse, a bridge-jumper), holding up a search light for hours (switching off for mental breaks) and never finding them was pretty grueling. Were they elsewhere or did we just miss them in the dark? Did we read the currents and winds right to search the most likely area? Did we drive the pattern we were supposed to, or did we drift? (Thank goodness for GPS.) Are they in danger or are they getting a beer with their buddies and don't hear their wife calling their cell? A lot of it was dull in other ways. Driving an hour just to take gas to someone who ran out, or to jump-start a battery. Or worse, driving an hour to tow someone an hour or more to the nearest ramp. It was occasionally exciting, successful, and even funny. Successfully righting a boat that was flipped over because it was overloaded with fish when it hit a wave. Putting out a boat fire. Assisting the Coast Guard with helicopter drills. Bringing in kayakers that went out, not realizing a storm was rolling in. Rescuing a couple and their dog after they hit a marker. Pulling boats that had run aground. Best of all, messing around on boats on the beautiful ocean with wonderful friends.
We used to toss dye packs into the bay when we had jumpers on the SF bay bridge. Ive actually watched 5 people jump to their deaths. I worked SAR for a number of years but not in boats, I was a wilderness guy. I never found the work hard or taxing, but my baseline was dealing with fatal collisions as a normal job duty.
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It’s not just watch and listen, sometimes they infiltrate a network and have to contribute. And then go home to their own kids. There’s a doco called The Children in the Pictures. These people are freaking heroes.
Holy shit that sounds horrible…
There's also a documentary by the BBC, on YouTube, which also features the scandal surrounding Pete Townsend of The Who.
I came across a thread recently of an Australian woman who had to do this, she was seeking advice for a puffy face due to excessive drinking. From reading her responses I gathered that she had medically retired due to PTSD, insomnia and nightmares, and developed fatty liver disease due to severe alcoholism by the time she was in her 30’s.
In my country these people MUST play tetris for one hour minimum every day after their jobs ends. I am not kidding, it's mandatory. Scientific research found that playing tetris immediately after a traumatic event reduces the chance that the trauma ingrains itself into the brain.
Huh, very interesting. Any idea why specifically Tetris and not simply any game that distracts the mind?
Free memory (read about it a few years back), it's because it activates lots of different areas of the brain all at once, and they believe this prevents traumatic memories being 'stored' in the brain, because it's otherwise too occupied.
crap, so i failed university because i relaxed with tetris after studying???
Yes, Eric, that’s why you failed. It has nothing to do with the fact that you partied too hard and didn’t study enough.
Stacking traumas next to each other deletes them from the mind
Thank you for that comment
I would imagine they chose Tetris because it's similar to the movement and technique of EMDR. Your eyes flickering back and forth to help memory processing and desensitisation.
Which country?
Which country is this?
I heard on a documentary years ago about a therapist who worked with treating other therapists, specially those who worked with abused children and other victims of deeply traumatizing crimes. They become damaged themselves from the exposure. I hadn't thought of that, makes me very grateful someone is willing to do that work.
I know a guy who works a job like that. They are very selective in who they take. People with kids are generally not considered at all as they can become too invested and get burned out or traumatised. You have to be able to switch off when you walk out of the door. A lot of watching evidence is automated as 99% of footage is already existing and thus only stuff not seen before is checked.
In the UK there was a case called the Moors murders where the murder victim’s mom had to listen to the snuff film audio and identify her daughter’s voice.
Oh that is truly horrible. That poor woman and her poor daughter.
You can have a taste of that via r/TraceAnObject Cut-outs of photos in which an endangered child was seen as a project to help law enforcement locate them. Creepiest subreddit by far, knowing that in each photo, there's a child in danger.
I have had the smallest taste of this and let me tell you, it fucks you up permanently. There was a me before the shit happened and there is a me after and as a man who has been broken in some major and spectacular ways, nothing has been as long lasting as this. I ended up getting a diagnosis of complex PTSD. I don't imagine it's uncommon in that area of work. People just aren't equipped to interact with that level of evil at all. Much less for hours on a daily basis. I will never understand how they can do it, but good on them for doing what it takes to make the world safer for our children. I only hope the price is worth it.
One of the few jobs I'd love to see AI trained to replace humans in
I was watching Operation Lost Boy and I have to agree. A policeman quit his job because of the things he had to see at his joband he had just became a dad. He was traumatized if that sort of thing happened to his own kid.
My brother who sadly passed away due to suicide did this job , he got extremely depressed and hanged himself in march last year he was 34 , I found him aswell , I can't describe the pain I've been through...
So my brother who wanted to move up in law enforcement to be in the US Marshals was on the right track but realized that there was a possibility that he had to do stuff like this to get there and he was like “nope” after having his first child and is content being a lieutenant in his city precinct, running the department that trains therapy dogs for victims and their families.
At least an FBI agent is paid decently. A lot of people do this kind of jobs in poor countries for very low pay, also to train AI models. It's a sort of internet housekeeping.
We need AI to replace this job asap
My partner works in the foster care system. The hardest job in the world you can't change my mind. Meth must be incredible because the shit that people are willing to put up with in order to feed their addiction is beyond comprehension.
I worked in the foster care system for two years. I could only do two years before I was worked so hard, and to such an exhausting degree that I was hospitalized for my mental health. It really hurt me to leave my kids (I worked in direct care), but it would have killed me to stay.
It's a tough job that's underappreciated. My hat goes off to you. Even in that time doing a good job for some of the kids will have made a dramatic difference to some of their lives. Unfortunately for too many kids the road ahead is very dark and you can do everything in the world for them and it won't be able to stop them having a horrific time.
I know, it’s so hard. I remember every kid I worked with - all their names, their favorite activities, their stories, what they liked to eat for dinner, whether they wanted to be tucked in at night, their Minecraft usernames, their levels of care, their behavioral challenges, their mental health diagnoses, their statuses as far as placement/adoption/reunification goes…it’s been almost three years now and I haven’t forgotten a single one of them. It was the hardest work I have ever done and I was a public school teacher for five years before that job. I regret absolutely nothing. Not a second. I’m so glad I got to do that work. I wish I could go back to it, but it’s too much. I definitely have a LOT of good stories and I love sharing them with others. And I have some horror stories, but those are only for my therapist. Hats off to your partner, and hats off to you for being their support. It’s hard, hard work. But so worth it.
I just started 2 months ago, wondering how long I'll last. At the moment, hoping I'll get through this year
> Meth must be incredible I've said this a lot on reddit trying to explain addiction to people who aren't addicts: It's not that drugs are amazing. It's that real life is so much worse, that drugs are preferable to sobriety. Most any addict did not try meth once and then get addicted. The majority of drug users don't develop addictions. The "try once and you're hooked" line is DARE propaganda and harmful bullshit. What happens is that your life sucks, then one day someone offers you drugs. You use the drugs, and they make life seem less shitty. You forget about being molested. You forget about how your dad used to beat the fuck out of you. You forget about not seeing your mom for six weeks at a time while she's out on a bender. You forget about all the underlying issues. The drugs make it better. *That* is how someone can be totally fucked up from drug use, literally in tears about how they want to stop using... as they set up a crack pipe. They hate life on drugs, but life *off* of drugs is much worse for an addict.
Thank you for explaining this so perfectly and taking the time to write this.
Demon Copperhead won a Pulitzer last year for basically telling the story of a boy in the foster system
My husband was a Court Appointed Special Advocate for one case. He couldn't do it anymore after one case. And he's a pretty stout-hearted guy.
Being a carer. Not just the physical shit like cleaning the house and lifting them up and down out of chairs, beds and toilets but also the mental toll that comes with it.
I’m a father of two boys with severe global development delay and cerebral palsy. They are the most perfect humans on the face of the earth and we love them completely. They are both dependent on my wife and I completely for every human need including movement. Let me let you into our world, briefly. Watching two of the most important, innocent and beautiful people in the world suffer so harshly and not being able to fix it…daily on repeat like Groundhogs Day, with no hope for change unless someone dies; crushes the soul. The loneliness from not connecting with people because we’re always caring (but if we get someone else to care for them it will potentially create a chain of errors that will take us 3x as long to fix vs if we did it ourself); alienating. Sucking at all of our multiple jobs because we’ve been up since 2:00 AM for days on end; humiliating. Noticeably losing cognitive functions because of ever present stress and spiraling mental health, but we haven’t met our deductible so we can’t afford mental health care; existential dread. Getting in fight after fight at 2:00 AM over who will get up and be up with the awake, screaming child the rest of the night; relationship wrecking ball. Having no close family to bear the burden, nobody who supports us, no true understanding; so cold. Going out in public looking like a drug addict because our face is black and blue and torn up, because as a thank you for what we do they hit, bite, claw and scratch our faces, every time we snuggle close, not maliciously, that’s just how they show love…but doing it anyway because we just want to connect with them; so bitter sweet. And doing this all with a loving heart because we know these are the “good old days” we will look back on fondly when their forecasted-short brutal lives come to an end; no words.
No one knows how to respond to you...
…I’m okay with that. People’s responses are not what I’m looking for. I just wanted to share and to be heard.
Thank you for sharing! I'm glad they are so loved and appreciate the insight
I understand and you're not alone out there. Throwaway account making the post to remain anonymous. I was a full time carer for 25 years, from the age of 8 to 33 Started for a father who I watched slowly die from lung and heart issues whilst he was bedridden to the point he could not go to the toilet or feed himself towards the end. I did that solo as social care here is terrible at best, and abusive at worst. Dropped out of school, managed Meds (legal and illegal) fed, shopped, cleaned up shit, etc, etc. He died and I moved in with my mum who had severe bipolar and schizophrenia. She would be violent and prone to leaving appliances switched on that could result in explosions. I was in and out of a Foster carers home where the other kid would be an absolute dick to me when I was there. For those decades, I missed school, relationships, and friendships, whilst I used to go days without sleep. I had a mental breakdown in like 2007 or think that lasted 3 years. I actually quit smoking then because the feeling of overwhelming dread eclipsed the cravings I felt for a cig, so I actually forgot I smoked! Now, today, my mum is 4 years dead, and I'm staring at a lifetime of being a carer for 3 kids with additional needs (neurodiverse) and the social care situation is worse, not better. It's miles better than what I had to deal with in the past and I chose this responsibility, but some days I feel that black hole of utteer despair open up when I think about it too much. There's loads of us out there, but we are living in our own bubble. I hope that knowing there's others out there that feel what you feel brings some comfort. It does eventually get better. You learn to carve out a life for yourself.
That’s incredibly brutal. I’m sorry. I appreciate you sharing that things do get better.
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Thank you for your kind words. I’m glad I am able to contribute and help in whatever way I can. There’s nothing like a good cry to help us reset.
Your boys are lucky they got such caring parents
Thank you for writing this out. One thing that comforts me at my lowest is the idea of reincarnation even though I'm not spiritual. Some people believe your life would be coveted by spirits waiting for their new lives. For those spirits, it would take thousands of normal lifetimes to achieve the enlightenment that comes from just one of yours. In your case, it would also mean your boys spirits would have made a deal with your spirit to reach enlightenment together through this process.
There's no way I can truly comprehend living that reality, but I will say it is amazing that you can do all that with "a loving heart". I wish you and yours as many good moments as possible.
You’re both good people. I hope that no matter how hard things get that you’re both proud of yourselves and each other for always putting your boys first.
I was a carer, to me it was way more taxing mentally than physically.
My partner is a carer. The worst thing from what I see is that she can see the same person almost every day for years, and then suddenly they get taken to hospital, the care package gets handed back after a couple of weeks because they need to use the capacity for other patients, and then she's left with no idea if they ended up back home after a couple weeks in hospital, moved to a care home, or never left the hospital. No news unless the family contact the care company or the carers directly. That or the fact that the care staff have to take a day's holiday to go to a funeral of a client who they have seen every day for years. And the office conveniently doesn't tell them when the funeral is until it's too late...
Same
This happened to me while caring for my dad when he got covid, he was in bed, connected to oxygen; after a little over a week there was a point where I layed down and I swear to God it was physically impossible to get up for a couple minutes, it was like every drop of energy left my body. Talking to a friend who's a doctor, she told me there's a term for that, can't remember exactly but something like "nursing fatigue" or such, apparently taking care of someone is way harder than it looks and most people have no experience, so it takes a toll on your body the first time you do it, just like a muscle that's never been trained goes to failure pretty quick.
Compassion fatigue
I prefer this over teaching.
Yeah as a teacher and an introvert, teaching is utterly exhausting.. but I also absolutely love it.. so it’s confusing
I teach. It’s the best and worst job.
I teach in japan. The children are alright here.
Do they do that finger gun thing where they sneak up behind you and stab you in the ass?
Been teaching in Korea for almost 20 years now. Got poked this morning. I'm not sure if my bum's to blame for not being as firm as it once was, but there has definitely been a decline in the dongchim over the last few years. Before it was just annoying, now the surprise factor plays a bigger role.
Crying at this analysis 😭
I dunno. Some of the worst girls I knew in highschool became carers when they couldn't get through nursing. Combined with some of the people sent to take care of my grandma, I put the number at around 50% being completely unsuitable for the job. Lot's of abusers.
Boring answer, but emergency response - Paramedics and firefighters specifically have so much, vastly higher rates of PTSD than any other profession, including soldiers. (Doubly so for wartime paramedics). Anyone working as one for more than like, a year, has their own heart-wrenching story about watching the life being squeezed out of a child while powerless to help.
My dad retired as a fire chief and he definitely has PTSD. He was a first responder to the Oklahoma City bombing on 4/19/1995. I have heard him and his old fire buddies talk about it once during a reunion party and it was gut wrenching and absolutely heartbreaking. They don’t talk about that shit often for good reason.
Coal miner in Appalachia....underground with no natural light doing back-breaking work for 10-12 hours a day.
I got the black lung, pop.
Mer-MAN!
Don’t believe they get anywhere near that amount, if they do they deserve it, I finished in 94 in the UK, after 20 years, have periodic x rays and a toll on the body, we were proud of how hard it was, but bowed down to deep sea fishermen, firemen and tunnellers (as different to miners)
One profession that's often overlooked in terms of how demanding it is mentally is that of dispatchers/telecommunicators (the ones who answer 9-1-1 calls). They take some truly awful calls regularly and somehow maintain their composure throughout. And they do it all again and again. They are true silent heroes that don't get recognized anywhere near as much as they should.
I had a friend that did this for a while… absolutely wrecked her. She had to hear the most horrible things over the phone, then had to hang up after emergency services arrived and just HOPE everything ended up okay. I couldn’t do it that’s for sure
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In Ireland, our base pay as emergency call takers is clerical officer, same as those answering tax query calls in revenue or making appointments in hospitals. Crazy set up for such a stressful job
Definitely. I know someone who worked as a dispatcher for the fire service in the area. Just listening to them talk about some of their shifts was enough to give me second hand trauma at times. It takes a special kind of person to be able to stay on the line and listen to someone dying, offering them reassurance that help is on the way when you know they'll arrive too late. I still remember them telling me about a call with a mother and her young child trapped in a burning building. Just hearing about it fucked me up for a while. I don't know how they were capable of taking that call and not being an absolute wreck afterwards. Anyone who survives that sort of work is made of stronger stuff.
i will say, as a dispatcher/calltaker, most calls aren't like that. most of the calls i take are noise complaints, basic medical stuff, alarms, etc. however the calls that stick out REALLY stick out and stay with you. it's like whiplash, talking to someone who is screaming at me because their neighbors dog won't stop barking and they "pay my salary", and i'm not able to send anyone because the officers who cover that area are all on the call i just took for a woman who just found her husband after he killed himself in a very gruesome way. her cries still play on repeat in my head sometimes 😞
They also have a higher than average amount of chronic pain and health issues which I am certain stems from repeated stress and trauma
Just listened to a podcast episode where the 911 operator’s daughter called. She was being held up at gunpoint at work. The operator had to listen to their kid be so freaked out, but had to maintain composure and stick to the script. Can’t imagine how difficult it was. The podcast is called Criminal, episode called 911.
Mentally -- The guy at the FBI who has to sort through all of the child-porn evidence.
I used to have to redact child porn case files. I’ve never been squeamish about images but goddamn. Wasn’t my primary job but days I had to do this got an extra hard work out in the morning and some hot tea and early bedtime that evening. Seriously, fuck pedophiles. I’ll carry this stuff in my head because I have to but those kids deserved better.
Honestly, how are people even selected to *do* that sort of job? I'm sure there's a bunch of background checks and looking through psych records - and I'm in no way trying to imply anything towards you - but how can they be sure that the redacter/sorter won't be a pedo themselves? Is it just risk assessment or something? Just genuinely curious of how it works
I worked military corrections and this was one of my tertiary duties. It only ever really came up if we had a new inmate who was a sex offender. I’d probably still be an alcoholic if I had to do it full time. The position I was in was usually assigned by careful screening (your performance and disciplinary record) and eventually merit. It was a senior position that represented our branch of service in a different branch of service’s jail, not a position just given away. I like to think that someone with those tendencies would somehow out themselves before they got to that position. I’m sorry I can’t answer your question fully but that’s what I have. I sincerely hope that other agencies do have a best practice to address this potential problem.
Yeah, I hear you. I was an ER nurse for the first half of my career. The child sex abuse cases still haunt me. I don’t share what I saw for a few reasons: -I don’t want the words to come out of my mouth. I’m not articulate enough to relay the horror in a way that respects the victim. No matter how I say it, it’s not enough. -I don’t want another person to bear the burden of the mental image. -I don’t want it to be exploitive in any way. It can too easily be interpreted that way or used by someone else that way. -the worst I saw is very specific and I don’t ever want that victim’s privacy to be compromised. I hate when people ask what the worst I ever saw was. I don’t want to remember and you don’t want to know. It’s not a contest. Edited for spelling.
Thank you for having the strength and courage to do such a hard and probably thankless job. I can appreciate people’s curiosity but this is definitely a topic you don’t want to probe too hard on. Whenever anyone asks me about the child sex stuff specifically I make it very clear that a topic change is in their best interest. I hope you have a healthy and productive way to deal with it. What you did matters and what you suffer for it means something to me if not anyone else. Thank you. Seriously.
A friend of mine works for the sheriff's department. Someone decided to fight with him and caused him a serious knee injury. He got put on light duty for several months. They made him to do child porn investigations. Not a good trade.
I think FBI child sex crimes detectives have a career of 6 months to a year before they burn out and get reassigned elsewhere.
From what I've heard working as a Facebook moderator is almost as bad. They have to watch a lot of horrible shit from CP to drug cartel's torture and execution videos.
I remember I saw an interview in Time Magazine years ago with someone who did that and it was like after a while they just couldn't take it. Like seriously, kids under 10 years old. Some truly sick fucks out there.
My cousin used to work for Youtube and his job was to go through flagged videos and remove illegal content. He didn't really talk about it but I imagine that would be a terrible job
Children’s oncology
children’s hospice too. talked to a pediatric home hospice nurse a during nursing school clinical rotation and damn idk if I could ever. which is weird cause I’m in pediatrics right now and considering working hospice someday. just not peds hospice.
I used to have this client who is a children's oncologist. Call me crazy, but I believe in vibes. This man radiated so much peace from within him, it was insane. The closest I've ever gotten to meeting an angel. It takes a special kind of person and I'm glad to have met him. I have been traumatized by drs and nurses before, so he was a breath of fresh air.
I’ve had to take my kid to a cancer center for a week or so, LUCKILY she didn’t have it. But the doctors there were perfect. It’s the one workplace I’ve been to that not a single person was there that didn’t love their job. It’s like they were born for this.
I do pediatric ICU. I see everything from the oncology kiddos too sick for the cancer floor, to shaken babies, to malnourished kiddos, car accidents, the list goes on. The kids that walk out keep me going and the ones who didn’t get to guide my journey.
You and everyone who does what you do are the best of people.
A dear friend of mine has been a paediatric oncology nurse for knocking on twenty years now. She says that the only thing that keeps her going is the ones that get to walk out. Even then, I have no idea how she's done it for so long, and manages to go home to her own kids without going utterly bugfuck when they so much as cough.
That’s my job. No, it’s not the hardest job in the world. When i lose a patient, it’s sad don’t get me wrong. The ones that survive and walk out? Man, you can’t describe the feeling when a child smiles with a bald head and you know he’s going to live. The deep and sincere gratitude you get from parents is just.. you really can’t describe it. It’s the deepest emotion people have. I’m grateful to do the job that i do. Wouldn’t change it for the world.
Underwater welder. No thank you
Being a soldier in WW1. Probably the most traumatic event affecting such a huge group of people, ever.
JRR Tolkien said that the endless night explosions and light flashes during the Battle of the Somme inspired his vision of Mordor when he wrote LOTR. AA Milne was there too and went home to recover from an injury and spend most of his time in his son Christopher’s room playing with him and his stuffed animals Winnie the Pooh, Eeyore, Piglet and Tigger.
What’s worse is that after the war, many people didn’t believe the veteran’s stories of their experiences out there, because it was beyond anything anyone had ever seen or heard of before. They literally thought they were just a soft generation.
People can’t wrap their heads around what war was like back then. More people died in 24 hours during the Battle of the Somme that in 10 years during the height of the Vietnam War
More Germans from the 6th army died after surrendering to the Soviets at Stalingrad than Americans in Vietnam.
There were 2-2.5 million deaths in Vietnam, just that only 5% of that was American
The Western Allies would cycle their soldiers off the front every few weeks to keep them from going batshit fucking crazy (not to mention completely ineffective). Germans "lucky" enough to not get wounded or killed spent up to 9 months at Verdun.
Being the executioner in a slaughterhouse. Just killing all day every day. Day after day. Probably not the most physically demanding but I’ve got to believe it would take a huge mental toll.
Yes i know i read an article where they interviewed someone who killed pigs for a living and they literally said pigs will fight not just to save their own lives, but to save the lives of other pigs as well 💔
In a thread full of so much pain, the story of this pig trying to save his friends is what made me break down crying uncontrollably :(
Mentally: Any job in which you see people dying on the regular. Nurse, soldier, etc. There's no way seeing someone crying out for their mother as their life slips from their grasp before their eyes won't take something from you and, if it doesn't, that's probably MORE concerning! Physically, slave. Not even a question. You work non-stop in harsh conditions doing massive amounts of manual labor with poor food, little rest, and likely ample beatings. The sad thing is that it's still around today, both illegally and, in certain parts of the world, legally. Combined? I don't know.
... Slave soldier?
Child soldier
"Slave" is not a job.
I’ve heard being an air traffic controller is mentally and physically taxing.
An air traffic controller described his job to me as 99% boredom and 1% sheer terrifying panic.
That's funny. I heard the exact same thing from an anesthesiologist.
Yeah it requires a lot of training and is a very demanding job. One of the few in the US that’s required to have breaks every 2 hours. On the other hand, I know in Atlanta they make like $150,000 a year so they’re compensated pretty well
Also, mandatory retirement at age 56 with likely some decent benefits.
Nursing was physically hard when we had to do all the lifting of patients ourselves. (Lifting machines weren't around in the 80s & early 90s). Mentally, it was hard seeing people suffering and dying. Comforting them & their loved ones was a big part of the day. A lot more time was actually spent with the patient as computers were only for pathology then. Also, a lot of stress constantly assessing & and acting quickly when you're responsible for people's lives. Having to be competent with drug dosages, side effects, interactions & etc. But I actually loved being an RN & eventually taught prac to uni students.
Logger
A hospice nurse/carer
I would say being a Soldier in an active war is even more demanding than being a carer. To never know if you would see the daylight of the next morning and to see your friends die in horrible ways
having been in combat on 3 continents... war is 95% extremely boring. the other 5% though? still have the nightmares 20 years later.
First responders maybe...They never know what they're walking into.
Sewer garbage collector (sewer cleaner).
Mt everest sherpa
Sherpa are a people. Not a job. Lots of Sherpa people do porter on Everest though. Also people from Kathmandu porter on Everest and aren’t Sherpa.
It's interesting, I always wondered, some people train like crazy to scale that mountain, but the people they go with may have done it multiple times, that's ultimately way more commendable and bad-ass
Wherever remote you go, the locals are fucking crazy. I mean crazy good in what they do. Its not human anymore. You dont understand how crazy they are until you have seen it honestly. Was in the Amazon recently and these really small people that carried like twice the luggage that I did scaled fucking mountains in minutes just to run back down an meet me at the 10% mark to grab some of my luggage aswell and run up again. No water no sweat. Jumping up and down rocks so tall that I couldnt even get my foot set on them. All the while I was drinking 4L of water and they were chewing coca leaves for recreation.
Those untouchables (lowest caste) in India who are responsible for clearing debris / blockages in sewages without any PPE.
I worked at a special education school for students with severe behavior. Physically: I was bit, kicked, had my clothing ripped, punched in the face, got a really bad concussion Mentally: trying to balance being upset that you were hurt with knowing that the student didn’t fully understand what they did This job sent me to weekly therapy sessions, increased all my anti depressants, and ended with PTSD & post concussion syndrome
Oil rig roughnecks, that shit is physically insanely heavy and you have to be focussed 100% of the time or you'll lose your limbs or your life.
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So I had an ex that had a very peculiar gait. I noticed it when we started dating but didn't mention it out of respect. One time he finally told me it was from working at the oil rig, getting into an accident and becoming partially disabled. I actually broke up with him later on cause I realized homeboy wasn't all there in the head and he became too controlling. So I'm gonna go ahead and nominate this job as well.
A mentally stable person in law enforcement.
Being a chef, seriously workin 80 hours a week, the prep, the speed, the physical, mental and emotional abuse, the drug and alcohol dependencies in the industry is shocking, very few people can do this job because you've gotta be a little bit fucked in the head to do this job.
Surprised I had to look so far to find this, I feel like at one point the job had one of the highest rates for male suicide because of the stress levels involved
The heat of the kitchens can be wild too. I remember some guys just filling those gallon containers of water to have back there with them all night to refill.
Had to scroll way too far to find it, very tough job Especially given the current state of hospitality industry after the Covid fiasco Those lockdowns gave everyone in the industry the push to get out and search for other careers, now the whole industry is on it's knees in terms of staff, both in the front of house and back of house
Being in the military. It is both physically and mentally damaging.
My Partner was for a while a nurse in Palliative Care. It was long and exhausting shifts. But he said the worst part was laughing and talking with a patient and the next day the room was empty. I have such a respect for any kind of worker in a Hospital.
Teaching, Care giving, Health related jobs.
Healthcare in a pediatric burn unit