Just had a cancer diagnosis (bile duct, I'm 53). Surgery in a months time will hopefully see me healthy again after it, but I've already decided to make changes even if it has spread and I only have a much shorter time to live.

I always thought I'd contemplated life and death before this (I am not religious), but having had several weeks of genuinely not knowing if I only had a week to live, I think you only really do this fully in that kind of situation. Even if I am cured, my life and attitude will never be the same again.

About six years ago, my seven year old son passed away: he had liver cancer at a really young age, had a full liver transplant at six months, and lost all hearing as a side effect of the anti-rejection medications. It was a sudden turn -- he was participating in his school's holiday program on a Friday (spending the rest of the afternoon with me at work on his iPad because neither mom or the babysitter could pick him up) and had passed on a Wednesday.

My job at the time gave me three days off before calling to ask me if I could come back to work, with my boss and HR on the line telling me that they also 'gave me the weekend' (since I was on-call when it happened). When I said that I needed more time away in order to deal with it, they fired me, then begged me to come back as a contractor a few months later.

I was so upset over the things that happened that I turned them down -- it wasn't what I wanted to do and it wasn't how I wanted to be treated: I'm much more selective about where I'm working at these days.

I have a 10 year old daughter with a very rare genetic condition. She has no one to care for her if I pass away. She can't yet talk and operates at a 2year old level, autism is just one of the side effects of this genetic condition. She has learning challenges as well, can't read, write or understand very well. I need to leave behind substantial assets or money for her for her long term care. I would love to retire early too but I don't seem to have that luxury because if I do, I don't know what I will leave behind for my daughter's care. I've switched several jobs over the past decade only to find that there is nothing fulfilling from a job perspective. Nothing that adds value to other people's lives or even to my own, aside from a paycheck to pay for my own funeral and my daughter's future care. When the time comes I don't know how my daughter would manage my funeral and which bad people will try to take away everything that I leave behind for her for her care. I can't afford to give away 30% of my worth to law firms that will allegedly guarantee my daughter will be safe from some money hungry assisted living centers or other such nasty organizations and opening a special needs trust fund is equally expensive. I think I'll work my whole life or whatever is left of it, I'm 43 and also work in tech and this is a dying industry with AI taking up so many jobs like automation did in the automotive industry.So I'm not sure how many more good years I'll be able to work for, so I'm just going to put my head down and work humbly while I can.

The main issue with turning the dial to "life" early is that your peer group usually hasn't. My peers spend most of their time on work: sometimes to pay the bills, sometimes for status laddering, sometimes for reasons I don't get.

I have found friends that are less focused on work - sometimes because they have more control over their hours and sometimes because they are past retirement age and sometimes because they don't work for other reasons.

I'm looking forward to the next decade+ as maybe more of my peer group friends will choose (or be able to choose) to do less work hours/days.

Sadly it often takes a devastating life event to make us rethink our position and priorities in life.

We work to live, not live to work, and don't you let any overachieving founder mode startup bro sell you otherwise.

Sorry for the author's loss.

> I am taking my work/life balance and turning the dial all the way to “life”.

That is an awesome way to put it.

We don't often hear about everyone's troubles and trauma. And seeing it written down is surely nothing compared to living through it. But there is a lot of it out there, whether we know about it or not, so when people go through it... I heartily approve of recognizing that life is more important than work, and knowing when to adjust that dial.

I found out a week ago that my partner has stage 4 sarcoma. The prognosis is poor. It's been difficult because we have a 1 year old toddler, so naturally we can't go out and do something big without it affecting them. Furthermore, the cancer has inhibited her ability to move.

At first it was complete shock. The next few days were complete confusion and sadness. However, I think one thing you learn pretty quickly is that acceptance is the only path forward, and that if you don't accept early, you will only get worse. I'm really grateful that I've had many, many years of therapy prior to this, so that I at least can identify the tools to bring me back out of the grief.

I would say that I'm somewhat stable now. I don't necessarily fear what might happen in the future, although grim. Have my feelings changed? Not necessarily, but they don't affect me in the same way they used to. I let them be there, however I do not attempt to push them away or let them consume me. A few days prior I would struggle to wake up in the morning, however after going through therapy I can usually wake up early.

If anyone is struggling, I would recommend a book called "The Happiness Trap" it's been instrumental in getting my mind back on track.

Fuck.

I had Bruce as a teacher in one of our early CS classes at college, he showed us all sorts of black-magic performance tricks (at least as it appeared to us at the time) and that curiosity in wanting to understand the how/why played a large part in where I am today.

I don't know if it's any consolation but I know he had an outsized impact on a number of us back then.

Reading or seeing things like this on the internet also makes me reflect on my life and think about what my priorities should be, and I'm not really in a financial position where I can just retire and turn the dial all to way to "life" but the best thing I can learn from this is to appreciate the little things in life. Like living in a first world country, having food to eat, hot showers, a bed, good health, etc.

I retired early this year. My advice to anyone seeking to do so is think clearly about it. Because once you do it, you can never go back to that world. The world of waking up early, having a boss tell you what to do, going to meetings that mean absolutely nothing, running on that hamster wheel, seems so trite and meaningless afterwards. That's a good thing, but you can never go back. Then it becomes time to concentrate on what life is really about- your health, your relationships, having fun and discovering what life is like without that tether on your ankle. Everyone isn't cut out for that, some need that hamster wheel. The best people are cut out for it. :)

I’m very sorry to hear that. It’s always sad to read posts like this one, as the time goes by, it hits me how I’ll relate to it sooner or later. Apologies for rambling below —

I’m much younger (late 20s), don’t have too many worries in life as my parents, albeit older, still alive, my siblings are fine, friends are okay, don’t have that many financial troubles either at this point.

That being said, a couple of years ago I got a text about a high school friend of mine passing away after years of fighting cancer. It was one of the weirdest emotions I’ve ever felt in my life, and I couldn’t (still can’t) understand why. I’ve seen my grandparents passing away in front of me, I’ve been to funerals, yet this one hit like a brick. At that point, it would’ve been about 10 years since I’ve talked to that friend of mine, maybe just exchanging some happy birthday messages from time to time. But we were fairly close in middle school, and later in high school as well, just the life drifted us apart, living in different cities and etc. Yet I remember the moment I read the text how he passed away. I remember being on a plane, and my entire mind being completely clouded for a week afterwards.

It’s like a sudden realization of how life can be very short for some of us, and you can lose people out of nowhere. I understand I’ve been lucky enough to never experience it until that point of my life, but it really sucked. And it just sucks knowing how it’ll happen more and more, or might even happen to me.

Anyways, it’s been about 2 years now, and I’ve lost all of my ambitions wrt my career. Took about 6 months off as well, which made me realize how small and fun the world is. I know for a fact I won’t be able to enjoy it as much in 30 years. But unfortunately I’m not at the point where I can do whatever I want yet.

Until then, every work day is just a repeat of things I don’t care about, followed by 10-20km walks to feel something. I wish it wasn’t the case, because I consider myself slightly above average in terms of skills and getting things done. Every morning I wake up thinking if I found just one thing that I could throw my life or at least a couple years at, I would do a decent job. But it’s hard to convince myself that anything matters. Then I remember how people that I hold dear to myself might be gone as well, and it becomes another day of spiralling.

Anyways, sorry for Sunday morning trauma dumping, but reading the OP’s story made me reflect on myself for a minute. Thank you.

This is the person who was in the news a few years ago for commuting to Google campus using 19 different methods in 19 days

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZWftDrwY2U

Probably unpopular opinion here, but I hope OP feels blessed that he can retire to take care of himself and dial up his life after such a terrible event. Not all of us have that option. For most people, if someone in our family god forbid suddenly died, we would not be able to just take a month here to grieve, then another month there, then 3 more months, then just decide to retire. That is a rare privilege. The rest of us have to get right back to the grind while doing the terrible job of picking up the pieces during the evenings and weekends.

I really envy people who lucked out in tech and can simply decide to retire like this. I guess I would say to the author (and others here in the comment section who somehow have $5M liquid saved up): "Turn your work/life dial over to life and move on as you are planning, but please be grateful and thankful that you ended up with such outlier financial results that allow you to do so." I think it's good for people who have these kinds of options to take a step back, reflect, and recognize how lucky they are.

Like most, I know I will probably be having to work until something disables me and prevents me from working, regardless of what tragedies life decides to throw at me.

I sold my first company at 25 (25 years ago almost to the day now) and that was retirement money and then some (I cannot spend the yearly interest let's say), but i've never been interested in retiring. I like doing what I do and can't see myself ever quitting; if I do, I probably will be writing 8 bit shmups for 80s systems. Aka; building things.

The premise that your life should be work until 65 and then you can finally do what you want is so depressing to me. I have goals beyond just doing what I want, but it all just seems like an endless rat race i can never win as I chase money/prestige in order to accomplish those goals or those things serve as a nice but ultimately meaningless byproduct of accomplishing those goals while my life slips away.

Always enjoyed this blog. The post on thermal throttling stands out as a fun one, but there were many others. Hopefully Bruce comes back to writing at some point after some recovery time.

I'm contemplating retirement. I find myself ostensibly in a workplace of high personal relevance, but it's going in the wrong direction, largely I think due to layers of disconnected professionalization that are supposed to have the answers, but the result is just a race to the bottom.

I'd like to have more cash before retiring, but it'd be ok with a bit of restraint. It's mostly up to finding a good lifestyle.

Thing is, I still enjoy 'tech;' the activity of programming, writing tests, designing things (even building workstations), constant learning, and the larger potential it brings to more than technical people, tied in with the sometimes distant idea that a more participatory world can be fairer and more peaceful.

I wonder if an engaging hobby will appear that combines elements of free software, wikipedia, non-dominating personal perspective, and problem solving. People like solving puzzles, maybe we can help solve other people's puzzles too.

I'm surprised it hasn't happened so far, but contributory culture has been abducted so many times, and the intentionally free/open world hasn't been very good at course correction. Which isn't surprising considering other powerful interests, including professionalization and the way "startups" took over with their compartmentalize and cash-out energy, the tech giants, and now of course AI (which could be part of a helpful system). "Sensemaking" was a thing for a while, but it's not really talked about anymore.

That sucks, what he went through. That happens to a lot of people. As we get older, it tends to happen more often.

Sounds like he made exactly the correct choice. I support him in continuing to make correct choices. This is but the first of many.

I did it, myself, but not by choice. I was "frozen out" of the tech industry, after leaving a very long-term job.

It absolutely infuriated me, at first, but, in the aggregate, it has turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to me. It also coincided with close family members having some health issues, so my being available has been beneficial.

In my case, I really enjoy programming and tech; just not when it is being ruined by terrible managers and coworkers. I was really starting to hate what I did, and having full control of my own process, made all the difference.

For one thing, it showed that I was usually right, in my personal philosophies, which were regularly disparaged by said managers. When given the chance to practice my own personal Process, things have been going very well, indeed.

So I get to work for free. It's a blast. I've gotten more accomplished, in the seven years, since I was pushed out, than I did, in the thirty preceding years.

In my case, I am involved in organizations that constantly surround me with people with whom I have very intimate relationships. Socializing isn't a problem; but I understand that it can be a real issue for retired people. This goes double, for ones that have the means to wall themselves off from others.

I do know a number of folks that preceded me, in retirement, after long, lucrative careers. Most, were dead within five years of retirement.

In my case, I feel that I'm just getting started.

Sorry for your loss. Not that saying it makes it better, but I am.

Financially, you can retire. one less thing to add to the destruction.

If there's a bilionare here willing to give me a basic income until I pass, let me know. You could even give me a condition like doing social or creative work. The corporate world is tiring, and time flies by.

    - Philanthropic individual billionaires? 
        - Mythical creatures.             

    - Philanthropic trillionaires (aka: large govts or corps)? 
        - Mythical creatures. 
   
    - Collective individuals (aka: you and me)?
        - Now you’re on to something.

I'm sorry the OP has to endure this. Grief is long.

The story reminds me that busy people don't seek health care enough (not saying it would have changed anything in this case).

We wait until something is so bad that we can't work. But we really don't want to wait.

Roughly speaking, health care can prevent many, many things, but it's rare that it can solve something once it's so bad that it actually interferes with life or work. So the real efficacy of health care lies in prevention and early intervention.

It's natural to be prone to choosing the urgent over the important. That's why you should counter by encouraging those in your circle to take care, since you would never de-prioritize the important for your loved ones. So get them to do it, and do it for them.

Preventative care is mostly a matter of self-education (based on real sources), self-monitoring, and nurturing good active providers. It's not strongly limited by resources. It includes building trust within your biological family to share genetic risks and disease incidence. Knowledge and monitoring should increase your confidence and peace of mind (i.e., if you find it making you anxious, then it's existential anxiety directed at health, which should be otherwise addressed). And there may not be a "payback" because you may never know what problems you prevented; the only feedback would be relief from catching something early enough to do something about it. So it's not part of the reward system feedback loop; just do it on principle, based on the efficacy profile of health care with prevention and early detection.

First of all, truly sorry to the author for what happened to them, it is devastating, and something that indeed will shake your world and priorities.

Any advice for people who are not finding the courage to quit, despite probably having the financial means to do so?

I came from very humble origins and moved to Silicon Valley from another country and have a gained a fairly solid financial situation, by having accumulated $5.5M liquid with expenses of around $50k (no kids, no mortgage, just a loving girlfriend).

I am so unhappy with work. I have changed 3 employers over the past 4 years and I’ve been more and more depressed with each transition. I spend my life in a state of immense disappointment about having to work. I am not even passionate about software anymore, so it’s not only the corporate madness (meetings, offices, coworkers, bosses, pressure to perform, code reviewers, etc). My weekends are filled with anxiety about Mondays.

I haven’t quit yet because everyone is telling me not to: my parents, still living in another country, are telling me to milk it until I am 45 (38 now), the few close friends I have are telling me not to squander the opportunity to earn until I get to $10-$15M due to real estate/healthcare/lifestyle costs going up (especially if I revisit the decision not to have kids, which I don’t think I will), and even financial communities like bogleheads/fire subs are telling me it’s not time yet and that I need to accumulate more given my privileged position.

I’ve tried a couple therapist but it didn’t work for me.

I also do not have anything to retire to: no particular passions, or hobbies. I just dream of spending a life of slow breakfasts, hiking on Monday mornings to celebrate a new week, reading books, slow traveling, and spending more time close to my aging parents.

I need to comeback and read this post regularly to remind myself of ..Life, death, and retirement.

If you've never contemplated the value of your life, an encounter with death awakens novel feelings and thoughts, and may lead to changes in meaning.

But changes can't escape your circumstances, which you must suffer nonetheless. Make any change in priorities and you're still as beholden to your life's vicissitudes.

It's common with death to find sudden compassion for self and others, and a compassionate disposition may lead to remarkable changes of feelings about life and attenuate obsessive responses. This is not necessarily good.

All thinking about death misapprehends the finality of death for thought.

You can learn do what you want, but you can't conserve time. Life can't be optimized. Moreover, an efficient world would have prevented your existence in the first place.

But there are trails left by others to follow.

The time to make things right for yourself and others is always here and now. In any situation, there's a chance things can improve because you're here. And if you can't make things right here and now, maybe you can elsewhere later.

Going for treatment? Appreciate the work of those treating you.

Not going for treatment? Appreciate being of service to others.

Don't understand the importance of your work? You have something to work on.

Others don't understand where you're coming from? Be on lookout for others who need attention.

Pass on enjoyment.

——

Bob Dylan:

The man in me will do nearly any task And as for compensation, there's a little he would ask

It take a woman like you To get through to the man in me

Storm clouds are raging all around my door I think to myself I might not take it any more

Take a woman like your kind To find the man in me

But, oh, what a wonderful feeling Just to know that you are near It sets my a heart a-reeling From my toes up to my ears

The man in me will hide sometimes to keep from bein' seen But that's just because he doesn't wanna turn into some machine

It take a woman like you To get through to the man in me

Good Lord. I hope your manager took an extremely long look in the mirror after that phone call.

When my 5 month old daughter got her heart transplant, my manager at Salesforce essentially said, "be with your family, call us when things settle down." I'd only been there for 3 months. I took 3 weeks to get her home from the hospital, set up our new routine, and mentally reset. Didn't get a single work-related Slack, text, or call during that time.

Might have just been a great manager, but I think the overall culture was a big factor too. Not sure if that's ever really something you can pick up on during the hiring process, though.

I'm blown away that this was their response.

My oldest child committed suicide on New Year's Eve of 2021, aged 36. I reached out to my boss and HR saying I'd need some time away. HR responded by telling me not to report to work for two weeks. We'd talk at that point about whether I was ready to come back or not, with a possible extension if need be.

This is the way you do it.

I can’t begin to imagine the weight of your story, and I know there are no perfect words to ease the pain of living this life. Please know that my thoughts are with you during this.

I can only imagine the depth of your concern for your daughter’s future, and I wish there were more I could offer. For now, please accept my deepest sympathy and a warm, virtual embrace.

That's so difficult, man. I'm sorry. It shouldn't be this way.

> I have a 10 year old daughter with a very rare genetic condition. She has no one to care for her if I pass away.

Wow that sucks.

When my daughter was one and half years old, her mom passed away after one year of absolutely exhausting illness. I thought it was tough to be left a single father, but hey my daughter is perfectly healthy, so maybe I have it easy...

> I can't afford to give away 30% of my worth to law firms that will allegedly guarantee my daughter will be safe from some money hungry assisted living centers or other such nasty organizations

Is there no-one you are close to that you could trust to look after money? It's a hefty burden but don't we usually have someone in our extended family or friend network that is trustworthy?

I certainly agree that I personally wouldn't want to trust most professionals in the business.

Have you looked at the social welfare programs in other countries and considered moving there? It would be a lot of work to get citizenship there for you and then your daughter, but it sounds entirely feasible within a decade

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We work to survive, I would not call this living for the vast majority of us. There is no possibility of re-assessing our priorities because not working is death. Anyone that has the ability to re-asses their priorities can only do so from a place of extreme privilege that most will never have access to. Plenty people with a cancer diagnoses just die because they cant afford any other option.

Most of the time, those over-achievers from the outside lead a very unhappy, constantly unfulfilled life. I've met few of those up close (former girlfriends, close friends) and oh boy its a sad view once you see full picture. Success is never really enjoyed for long, there is always next target to chase. Close people around suffer accordingly.

Then when you know what signs to look for, you see it a lot more among those 'very successful'.

There is one success for me - living a good life that one is happy to have lived when looking back old/dying. Good, sometimes hard moral choices instead of less moral shortcuts. A lot of people put themselves a lot of such baggage over years and from young happy folks they are grumpy envious older ones (there are many more reasons for such of course). Whatever such success means to you, all the power to you. For most of us, work achievement are pretty low in that list, so look for success elsewhere in life.

I quit a gig that was great in a lot of ways — great product, great peers, great potential — primarily because of of an "overachieving founder mode startup" individual. This person was exquisitely talented and inspiring but ultimately the only way to participate in the company was to overdrive yourself to the point of misery.

I stayed longer than perhaps I might have because that person was young enough to learn and change. And they definitely learned and changed over time, but not the lessons I thought they should learn. This doesn't make the direction they took objectively wrong, but eventually I and all the engineering peers I valued bailed out.

It was frustrating because I remain convinced it didn't have to turn out the way that it did. But leaving was absolutely the right thing to do and I'm much happier now.

The system wouldn't work otherwise and your overlords won't like it. We already had the pandemic and people had a slice of that taste. Came back with harsh interest rate hikes and tightening of the job market to get everyone back in line.

I actually enjoy my job (well, mostly anyway). I would probably do it for free tbh (except for some of the BS parts)

The only people with that premise are those that want a higher defined benefit pension via Social Security, perhaps because they don’t have sufficient wealth otherwise. That age is going up to 67 in 2025.

Nobody with sufficient passive income to satisfy their desired quality of life works longer than they have to.

You can work and achieve goals. No one said you can't.

In terms of prestige, I would float this thought: Can you name the CFO of Home Depot (or, another major company of your choice)?

I can't and I loved Home Depot. That CFO has C-suite privileges and prestige beyond what most will achieve, but they still aren't known even to people who like their product.

Also, stop worrying about prestige because no one else really cares. We don't. We don't care if you drive a Mercedes-Benz or live in a tawny neighborhood. We have our own stuff to deal with, just like you.

In fact, you'll probably get the worst side of people of your looking for clout. That's when folks will try to take it away by any means necessary. Be nice to yourself face while screwing you in the rear.

Worry more about what you love, not what everyone thinks.

Yeah likewise. I get no satisfaction from any full time work. It might be nice for a few months but then it always turns into drudgery. I think most of this stems from the fact that I absolutely hate working with people and on teams, which is very different from the active social life I lead away from work. I don’t think it’s my coworkers but the very structure of a work place that makes it impossible for someone like me to make friends and enjoy my time there. On the other hand, I can spend hours and hours on my hobbies over decades and still always look forward to them.

Don't accept that premise!

> ...I did it, myself, but not by choice. I was "frozen out" of the tech industry, after leaving a very long-term job...It absolutely infuriated me, at first, but, in the aggregate, it has turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to me...

I would say i'm about a decade or maybe a decade and half before i can freely retire...But, already i see signs of the possibility of being frozen out of tech. Its such a fearful thing, and even moreso at a latter age! I quite enjoy technology both in isolation but also connecting proper tech to solve human problems...But so often it feels that at my $dayjobs, it always feels like we are solving the wrong problems...like chasing whatever some senior leader added into their presentation...as in, a goal for them, but not always something that is sustainable for the org, substantially helpful to people, etc. Its clear to me that while i still have the enthusiasm of my 25 year old around tech and genuinely helping people wit tech, i am so much more cynical about corporate use of tech. Nowadays, i'm at the point where i am seriously considering leaving tech, and trying to get some other job...and then only having fun with tech on the side, such as contributing to open source projects, playing on my own home lab, volunteering with orgs on digital divide, etc. I figure those sort of "hobbies" or side projects can also help me transition whenever the time comes for me to retire, of if/when i get pushed out. Now, i just have to ensure my costs are down so i can weather any salary hits.

@ChrisMarshallNY Sorry that you got impacted by a freezing out...But glad to hear that you're getting started on a new phase of life for you, and hoping it keeps being positive for you! Cheers!!!

What does it mean to be "frozen out"?

You've got plenty of money, you're living on 1% of your savings, which is great - controlling expenses is significant.

You should be able to invest the money with the goal of beating inflation and grow your pile. There's people who retire with a lot less. There's tools to help, where you can play with the numbers, investment returns, inflation rates, etc.

It's difficult to predict the future. You might wish you had more money a couple of decades from now, or you might get hit by a bus next year and wish you had lived it up more when you had the chance. Eventually the stress of your current job is likely to affect your health. It takes a while to get over being burnt out.

The safest option might be to look at your money as a wonderful cushion, giving you options that others only dream of. You can find a different job that you like, even a lower paying job preserves a lot of your savings. You can take time off, maybe doing something along the way that looks good on your resume. You can work on and off. You can change careers. Maybe figure out what you'd want to do if money were not the object. You are way ahead of the game. The world is your oyster!

It can take a while to figure these things out. Best of luck!

I'm still thinking about this comment 2 hours later, so I thought I would chime in. If you and your friends/family think $5.5M liquid is not enough to retire, I just want you to know, that you are in a very very elite and strange SV bubble. I don't live in SV, but I too know people with your net worth in SV, and they all act like they are poor and what they have is never enough.

For this alone, I'd urge you to expand your horizons, maybe when you retire move out of SV or just spend time with people outside your circle.

Have you done the math on this? At your current expenses, you can live indefinitely on the proceeds of pretty safe investments of the 5.5mm, and still hit 10+mm by the time you are “regular” retirement age…

It’s probably too early for you to decide that you are done forever, but you could be if you want to.

You could take a break of 1-2 years and see how that goes. Call it a sabbatical on your resume if you want to go back to work after.

This sounds like classic burnout. You just need to take a break from work, try 3 months or so.

If you don't mind leaving the US, there are lots of places around the world that will make that 5.5m go way further. Keep a very modest/middle-class lifestyle. Never upgrade and you'll have ultimate peace of mind.

> I just dream of spending a life of slow breakfasts, hiking on Monday mornings to celebrate a new week, reading books, slow traveling, and spending more time close to my aging parents.

That sounds like a lot to retire to if you ask me. And $5.5M seems like quite a lot to me. Probably especially if you move back to your home country or almost anywhere else in the world outside Silicon Valley.

Myself, I do have some hobbies but I'd probably go nuts without the structure of having a formal job. If I were you, I'd try and find work that I actually enjoy and find meaningful; you probably don't need to worry about money so much, but if you had a job that covered your expenses, you could let the principle you've already accumulated grow.

I am an europoor from Italy but 5.5 millions.. I think I could retire for a few centuries

It sounds to me like you hate work more than it’s warranted in normal circumstances. Work-life balance aside, there might be something else in there.

Dear struggling Internet person: I hate to give a diagnosis over the Internet, but you are either depressed or burned-out. I recommend to take a year off from work. If you are good/valuable enough, your employer might let you take it unpaid. You can probably find some blogs or books about people like you who have done the same. If you are only 38 and worth 5.5M USD, then you are likely very highly skilled. You can easily get another tech job after you take a year off. And, if anyone asks why you took a year off, just tell them you had a sick family member that needed your care. (That makes them shut-up real quick!)

Lastly: About therapy: One thing I tell people: If you believe in it, it will work. (Conversely: If you don't believe in it, then don't waste your time and money.) So, if you do believe that therapy can work for you, try a different therapist -- couples or single. Example: Choose a therapist with a different gender. It will help to open your eyes to a new way of thinking.

> I just dream of spending a life of slow breakfasts, hiking on Monday mornings to celebrate a new week, reading books, slow traveling, and spending more time close to my aging parents.

What is really stopping you from leaving the US and go back to your country? Is it your girlfriend? Is that it's hard to leave Silicon Valley and its tech-scene (i.e., FOMO)?

The money would probably be more than enough in your parents' country. And eventually, you could probably get bored and would find hobbies or passions to entertain yourself..