For those who don't have employment

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Just curious as to why you don't work?

I have worked full time since high school but every single job I've suffered big time. I haven't been diagnosed with anything until now [which still isn't 100% confirmed] so I've had no reason not to work.

I do wish I could work part-time/casual and do more things to help myself, like attend like minded groups etc. But working full time, having panic attacks at work, I come home and want to go to bed. No mental time for anything else but work.

Some times I get so worked up at work, after over eight hours, I don't have the energy to walk my dogs.

Anyway I was just really curious So here I am asking.

I was in sales and I couldn't handle being forced every single day convincing people that they needed something they's already shown they wanted. Now, I've spent the last 2 years looking for something else and nothing so far had worked out.

Well the big thing is my husband is in the army and we have kids. I have to sometimes drop everything whenever to take care of the kids if his job decides that tonight he will work till such and such a time. This alone irks me and drives me insane. BUT, I also ended up quitting my last job because I was so miserable. I had an on the job freak out and walked out. It was in food sales and services. It took too much out of me, I couldn't take the people or the drama, they treated me like I was dumb. I had a boss who constantly knocked me up side the head and said dumb blonde moment and ask when I was dying my hair so I'd match "all my moments" . From what I know now I think it was overstimulation. I would cry in the back and take things very personally. The drama sucked my life even though it had nothing to do with me most of the time. I would take things too literal, I would forget things or do them wrong CONSTANTLY. Now, the thought of returning to that upset me and makes my stomach turn into knots. I am going to try a new job, I'm just taking things one step at a time. This time I'm going to let a doctor help me find out what is up with me so I never let anyone treat me like that again.

Last edited by Mommaof3 on 07 Sep 2011, 4:39 am, edited 1 time in total.

i try to work, parttime to pay for college, but it doesn't really work out usually.
my employers are dead-set on me following their difficult and inefficient routines, and trying to do thing my way, speeding me up to at least the expected level, usually beyond that, i get called off and fired becouse i'm "doing it wrong" :S

I worked until 3 years ago when I suffered a middle-aged burnout due to bad health, depression and a life time of background anxiety due to my undiagnosed AS. Though I stopped work through choice, it really had become impossible to continue as I was in physical pain and had constant intrusive thoughts about death. Now I am somewhat better but after such a long break I'll struggle to find any employment in my field. However, I'm not sure I'd really want to go back to the life I had before as I believe it is unsustainable for me in the long run. I'm always trying to think of ways that I can earn a living that won't involve me going back into the traditional kind of workplace, but no luck so far.

I do not work for a variety of reasons.

A big one is that I never get past the interview. I show little or no emotion (at least in ways NTs look for), I don't make eye contact, and I stim without realizing it, and I suspect this is offputting, unfortunately. I am not sure if the way I verbally communicate during interviews helps or hinders.

Once I do get a job (three in the past 21 years), it's because I didn't need to interview for it. But what happens is:

1) I make a mistake and get fired (two jobs)
2) I burn out and find it extremely hard to keep working (the third job).

I did attempt to make some money freelancing, but when I picked up a reasonable workload (one of my housemates did the same job and probably was twice as productive as I was, at least), I'd hit a wall and end up losing projects left and right until I have nothing left. More burning out, in other words. I burned out this way twice (with three consecutive burn outs, the middle one being an attempt to attend college for the fourth time).

I would love to work and have tried to work and it has fallen apart, both actual working and having spent years looking for work and not getting hired. Since I've started the application process for SSI, I have had three people - my attorney, my therapist, and the psychologist who did my initial evaluation to determine if I was disabled enough for state benefits - tell me that as far as they are concerned, I appear to be too disabled to work.

Thanks so much for the replies, really interesting to read other reasons. Maybe reason isn't a good word but you get what I mean; I hope.

I've had two interviews in the last month, one went horribly and one went well but the guy isn't sure he can afford to hire someone. The job would have been perfect and I did pretty well at the interview as it's something I love doing.

I'm trying to get something where there is more variety but I can't seem to get past interviews or freak out that I'll end up where I am right now.

Now I'm just so turned off interviews

I'm lucky now that my manager is a little thoughtful about my "issues" but the work is so boring, far too much negative thinking time. Even my psy thinks my current job isn't helping me at all. She offered to write me a letter to my manager if things get too bad.

With this current job, which I've had for three years, I didn't have an interview.

Sitting here now knowing how I'll probably have a mini melt down tomorrow at work *sigh* Then I'll have to go buy coffee and morning tea because food/the art of eating calms me down.

After the graduation, I spend 3 years trying to find a job but has rejected in all job interviews - probably because I have a tendency to reply to the questions with "yes", "no" and similar monosyllabic expressions.

When I finally got a job, it was like a miracle - there were two persons for the same place, but the other missed the interview because was pregnant (with the bonus that the interviewer made questions about the job instead of silly questions style "Talk about you, TPE2").

In college I was one of the best students and got excellent grades. I seldom made below an A in a class, and generally found it fairly easy to get along with people. After I graduated, I spent a year looking for a job before I finally got a part time job. The first full time job I got, I stressed out so badly I quit after a week. It was a fairly fast paced job with pressure to do a lot in a very small amount of time, and my anxiety spiraled out of control. The next real full time job I got was as a data entry clerk. It worked out fine for a year, then the department got reorganized and we all had new (higher) quotas for data entry, and I didn't meet the quotas. In both cases, I was defeated not by a lack of ability, but the inability to work as fast as the employer's expectations. I didn't change, but the expectations did. As a student, the teachers teach and all I have to do is learn. It doesn't matter how I do it or whom I interact with, or how much time it takes, as long as I pass the tests and turn in the projects. In the competitive job world, it's suddenly all on you to prove your worth and convince people that you're going to be useful to them. It's really going from a cooperative society to a competitive society, and I'm not suited to the latter.

I finally found a job through my local vocational rehabilitation office, and my employer knows my condition, and knows what the likely result will be if I'm overstressed or pushed too hard or given a lot of social activities. I don't get paid much, and have pretty much let go of any ambition to be wealthy or even affluent. The ironic thing is, when I'm left alone and not bothered, I'm very productive. As a part time employee, I manage the inventory, fill the ink cartridges, keep track of supplies, handle the entire empty cartridge program, and I also have designed and am continuing to expand a database for the business. I really enjoy being able to do different things and help the business grow, and my encyclopedia brain is very helpful remembering lots of things about printer cartridges.

The problem is, most people don't want to make any accomodations for those who are different. A lot of people think mental disorders and disabilities are excuses to be lazy. It's much easier for employers to just find someone who will conform to expectations, rather than having to actually find ways a person can contribute and adjust their own expectations. A lot of them blame the disabled person for not being able to "man up" or "tough it out" or w/e other cliche. The more generous and compassionate will at least say "it's not their fault" and throw some money at them in the form of welfare checks or charity of various sorts. I would prefer a world where everyone can find a task suited to their nature and everyone can contribute, but our current competitive society rewards conformity, greed, and individual ambition more than anything else.

I have never had a paid job (although I've done a couple of voluntary jobs) because I have what people have generally classed as a "serious mental illness" (schizophrenia). I receive disability benefits, income support benefits, housing benefit and I live in supported accommodation. BUT one day I will work paid, because I am in uni studying pharmacology (although I still need a full time support worker there). I have moderate-severe AS which also impacts my life, but I am deeply interested in anything pharmacology/medicine-related so I spend my free time reading textbooks on those topics. If only there was such a thing as an "academic medicine" course; my AS and schizophrenia (as well as having been sectioned under the Mental Health Act by the police and other authorities...) pretty much prevent me from doing medicine and working in a hospital....damn.

But I have just been accepted for a voluntary job today. I am very nervous about starting and still need considerable support.

NAIRU - Non-Accelerating Rate of Inflation Rate of Unemployment. An unemployment rate target set by governments and central banks. In the U.S. the traditional NAIRU has been between 5% and 6%. Should unemployment rates drop under the NAIRU targets, governments and central banks work to increase unemployment so that this reserve army of labour is large enough to keep existing workers in fear in the event of job loss and to keep wages down. NAIRU has been an official policy goal since about 1979 in most Western countries.

Thanks to NAIRU, employers can be very selective, can let workplace conditions deteriorate and tell everyone to be grateful for their jobs, and can exclude people with any differences that may possibly inconvenience them.

I'm scared to get out there myself. I really need to, though.

I was in full-time work for some time - long-term roles and always had excellent performance.
My longest time was as a systems analyst/operations manager, but I've also worked as magazine editor/writer and as a trainer/admin assistant (ironically training job seekers to find work), but then my last job was working in collections for a call centre.

I lost my job due to economy, AS causing problems with office politics, and due to the simple fact that call centres are TOXIC - the one I worked for is widely known for being one of the worst, NT's can barely manage so I stood no chance once they turned on me. I worked there for two years before getting fired, the official reason was 'call avoidance', but the actual reason was that they knowingly gave me faulty equipment so I had no choice but to end calls, I suspect this was done before they lost their contract to avoid paying redundancy - I wasn't the only one to have lost their job this way.

Economy went belly-up at the same time I lost my job and locally most roles are call-centre based, we're also known as being one of the worst areas in the country for unemployment. Then the job centre started chipping away at me to make the situation worse, they made me to leave my courses at college, then forced me into a work placement which was dodgy as hell and thus led me into the first meltdown I've had in about a decade - what little confidence I had was destroyed on that day. Despite having worked in a call centre I cannot hold an actual telephone conversation*, after this work placement anxiety and AS regression has made my problems worse, now I can't use a phone at all, including answering the phone to potential employers - not that they ever call; only had 4 interviews max over 3 1/2 years.

* No one seems to understand why I could work in a call centre, a collections department to be specific, but cannot answer a simple phone call, this just adds even more problems when dealing with potential employers and the ignorance/prejudice from job centre staff.

Now I'm long-term unemployed - as well as having been fired from my last job, no longer able to work in call centres or even able to use a telephone at all, and being disabled - no one will even give me a chance, and I can't even get a job cleaning toilets.

On the plus side I've just been through training and gotten my SIA licence, so I'm hoping there'll be plenty of security guard roles available for me, it's given me a little bit of confidence back as I was very good at physical intervention, and I'll be excellent in this line of work in general. *FINGERS CROSSED*

I avoided it for a very long time by doing college courses and becoming a band photographer.
Then when I tried to get work I couldn't get past the job interview.
People say it was because I lack experience but I know i was because how I come off.
People want to hire someone with great social skills even if the job doesn't always call for it.

I hate change and especially now with my sensory issues being so extreme I'm forced to wear earphones when I go into a public place. My own functionality can be average to low on any given day.

But I have made effort to try to make a career on my own. Band photographer failed, as did inventor of doo-hickeys nobody needs but would use as long as it had Wifi and comic book illustrator and author. Now I'm attempting to write my own science fictions series and I've actually progressed more in nine months than I did at anything I've ever attempted.

I'm also eventually going to get back into professional photography, just to get a few crumbs on the table for when I live in Sydney.

I wish I was better at working, then I would not feel so much pressure to stay in college even though I don't know what I am going to do with it and I can already feel this not going to be a very good semester to be honest I just don't have the energy...but looking for work is not reliable either so at the moment I really have no idea what to do.......other then find a way other than a job to make income or just commit myself to a psych ward before I end up homeless and freeze to death because I am to uninformed and clueless to find a shelter or anywhere to stay. Ok so I am being kind of pessimistic, but yeah I just tend to get fired without any effort to fail so hard on my part.

A little over a year ago, I got frustrated with my job and quit.
Really stupid thing for me to do, considering how bad the economy is these days. I haven't been able to get another job since.
Although I would've had to quit my job eventually because I'll be moving soon. I just hope I have better luck at my new place.