630: How The Wrong Career Can Affect Your Mental Health

(00:00) Jackie Meister: This isn't the right fit for me, and it's all remote, and I can't connect with people the same way. It was just like a perfect storm.

(00:07) Scott Anthony Barlow: Your work can have such an impact on your health. We all know it. It's the prolonged stress, it's the people causing the stress.

(00:16) Jackie Meister: I did get promoted to manager. But that's when I worked with this toxic leader. My nervous system was just off kilter. That's when my health started to go downhill a little bit.

(00:25) Scott Anthony Barlow: That's Jackie. She worked as a manager in healthcare. It's obvious that she wasn't in a great place at that time. Clearly, the wrong fit.

(00:33) Jackie Meister: I think the big thing was the lack of energy and just, I think I gained like 40 pounds in four months. It was just a wake-up call.

(00:41) Scott Anthony Barlow: But the real question is, how did she go from a bad fit role, toxic environment, carrying the extra 40 pounds all the way to work that is a phenomenal fit.

(00:51) Jackie Meister: I got out of all of those things and realigned myself, and now know that I am made a good fit with my home, out of an unhealthy relationship, and in a job that I absolutely love, and I have never had more energy. The weight just came off.

(01:08) Scott Anthony Barlow: It wasn't easy for her, but if you've listened to very many episodes of the Happen to Your Career podcast, you know that it was worth it.

(01:15) Jackie Meister: It was a big leap. I honestly, I didn't know it was good, if it was gonna work out, but I just knew I couldn't keep going in the same direction.

(01:23) Scott Anthony Barlow: In this episode, we'll uncover how Jackie navigated career change, a divorce, and relocation all at the same time. How was she able to say yes to something new, even with the fear and uncertainty?

You'll even hear why she walked away from a leadership track to find work that feels aligned. This is the Happen to Your Career podcast, where we share stories of real people making real transitions to work that fits them, their families, and even their bank accounts.

If you aren't already subscribed, hit subscribe and follow so you can get notified every single episode that drops, so that you can learn to design an extraordinary career for yourself. Here's Jackie telling about where she started.

(02:02) Jackie Meister: Looking back, it was a really great first job. I got connected with really special people.

I loved the work. I loved being in an office and, you know, seeing patients face to face. It was just a really good job. Because I did my job so well, I got promoted to a team lead. So I was with a team of nurses. I think I was in my element there, but I could feel myself stretching a little bit and maybe getting a little stressed out.

So I stepped away from face-to-face interactions with patients. It was hard to do, but at the same time, I was working with a good team of nurses and social workers, and it was fun. Where it took a turn is I was… I had my first experience with like a really toxic leader. My nervous system was just off kilter. That's when my health started to go downhill a little bit, and I was looking for another job.

(02:55) Scott Anthony Barlow: Yeah. So, when you say toxic, what are some examples of what made it feel toxic for you?

(03:00) Jackie Meister: I was in a car accident Monday morning, that's when I usually do payroll. I called her. It was a pretty serious accident. It was scary, thought my life was over, spinning out of control over the freeway.

(03:18) Scott Anthony Barlow: Literally were spinning out of control in the accident.

(03:21) Jackie Meister: Yeah. Yeah. So I was shaken and I asked to take the morning off and she just gave me a lot of grief for it. And she had to do payroll and she was just not happy about the fit, and I just thought to myself, this isn't healthy. I mean, that's when I really knew. It's like, “Hmm, I gotta be able to take care of myself.”

(03:43) Scott Anthony Barlow: It’s inclement weather. The car starts spinning out of control. You're completely shaken up. You call in and you're met with frustration that, yeah, your boss has to do payroll.

I don't think that meets anybody's definition of supportive. I can understand the frustration, but also that is, yeah, that's not ideal for anybody whatsoever. It sounds like the crux where you started thinking, “Look, I have to do something else.” What happened next?

(04:12) Jackie Meister: So that's when I found another position and this is the position I most recently left.

(04:20) Scott Anthony Barlow: Yes.

(04:21) Jackie Meister: It was another manager position, which I, you know, at the time I was looking for that, I thought, you know, that's what you do. You look to get promoted and, you know, keep on getting promoted and get more money and do well at your job. And I wasn't really considering if it was the right fit or not.

So I did find another position. And really, what sold me is the supervisor or boss that I was interviewing for was just amazing. And she was so, I think, like motherly and supportive, and I'm like, “Whatever this job is I'm in,” you know.

(04:56) Scott Anthony Barlow: It's like the antithesis of what you experienced from the previous

(05:00) Jackie Meister: Exactly.

(05:01) Scott Anthony Barlow: Situation, right?

(05:01) Jackie Meister: Yeah, yeah,

(05:03) Scott Anthony Barlow: Yeah.

(05:03) Jackie Meister: I got the job right when COVID hit, so it was like mid-March when I actually started the position, and it was all remote, and it was all different. I did sense that it probably wasn’t the right fit for me. It was a building care management program. It was a challenging dynamic. And that coupled with, you know, me already feeling like this isn't the right fit for me, and it's all remote, and I can't connect with people the same way.

It was just like a perfect storm, I think, for, you know, that was my really my biggest bout of depression. It’s when my health started to go downhill. I actually had to take leaves for a little bit because of the depression. I had some unhealthy coping mechanisms, which I'm sure everyone kind of did in COVID, unless you were like the lucky few that actually like really focused on your health.

(05:51) Scott Anthony Barlow: Most of my coping mechanisms initially were not particularly helpful. So totally agreed. I think that that is, that's a normal human thing to move through that first. I'm curious, and I think something that's really important here is when people get into those wrong situations, especially when it's compounded by external circumstances, like in your case, we're talking about, you know, what many of us experience through COVID, when did you start to recognize that you were feeling depression?

Because a lot of times it seems like it starts creeping in and we don't recognize it to so much after the fact. And I'm curious what caused you to recognize that this, that's what I'm experiencing right now.

(06:31) Jackie Meister: Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, it wasn't my first bout of depression, and I'll be candid, and I don't know if this is appropriate for the podcast or not.

You know, I was having trouble getting out of bed. Normal activities were just exhausting to me. I was dissociating from my body, and I could actually feel it. I wasn't excited about things, you know, all of the signs. And so I recognized it, and for a while, I continued with the unhealthy coping mechanisms.

Like I just made my world so small in a way that I could control. And, you know, partly that was the eating disorder. Partly, it was just… I kind of shut down, my body shut down, I shut down. It was difficult. I don't know how I did this, but I really started focusing on my health. I think the big thing was the lack of energy and just, I think I gained like 40 pounds in four months.

It was just a wake-up call. And so I really focused on my health. I focused on, you know, sleep, nutrition, got exercise, did all the things. It took good three years to recover from, I would say.

(07:43) Scott Anthony Barlow: I experienced the same thing. I think a wonderful thing in your situation is that you have some of the professional experience in order to recognize, 'cause you've seen it, seen others experience it, and you were recognizing some of those signs.

So that's amazing, and I think that that's actually really helpful for others. That's why I wanted to just ask you about your experience. But for me, at that time, I had no idea. I just knew that I was gaining weight, I was horrifically unhappy. I was experiencing these weird things that I later realized were panic attacks, and it took me many years to undo, not just the weight side, but also the other pieces that went along with it, too.

I think that's the trap that we tend to fall into. We go through these experiences, don't realize how complex it is, and then our human brain says, “Well, if I only just did this or I should be able to just do that,” and we reduce it to this like single, very non-complex problem of I should just be able to do that and that's not how humans work.

(08:42) Jackie Meister: Yeah.

(08:43) Scott Anthony Barlow: And you're right. Yeah, it is. It's incredibly complex.

(08:45) Jackie Meister: I was thinking, oh, maybe it's mold toxicity, I don't know.

(08:49) Scott Anthony Barlow: Yeah. Yeah, well, that's what we do. We start gravitating towards all of these things. Well, it has to be this or it has to be that, and if yes, totally agreed. So then one of the things that you mentioned is you started then shifting your focus to your health and your wellbeing. What were some examples of what that looked like for you to be able to do that, even in small ways at first?

(09:14) Jackie Meister: You know, I started eating really healthy. I think that was the biggest thing, because before, like I said, and I was still struggling with the eating disorder for I think up until like two years ago.

I mean, it was that recent, so it took a long time to be able to, but when I did eat, I ate healthy, and then I worked up to, you know, now I eat a lot more, I'm healthy with that and I just feel, gosh, so thankful that I don't struggle with that anymore because it was very isolating. It's isolating to have to keep a secret for that long. Anyways, I focused on my sleep.

I got a WHOOP band that, that helps with that. I was doing all these things right, and I was still having the depression, and I went to my primary care provider and she was like, “Imagine how you would feel if you weren't doing all these things.” Because I kind of like, like I have a morning routine that lasted like an hour and a half just to make sure I have a good day.

And, you know, I journaled, I did all this stuff, and when she said that, I'm like, “Gosh, there's gotta be something else.” I went to see a functional medicine doctor and, you know, she found some food and in activities, but like the big thing was when we started talking about personal things. I've had some trauma I did not process. And I think looking back, I think my trauma was actively happening, and I didn't realize it. I think just the fact of not doing the things that you should be doing, like not doing the things that are a good fit for you, or having boundaries, or I was a perfectionist.

I was a people pleaser, and I didn't have good boundaries, and I was pushing myself too hard, and unhealthy relationship, and all of those things, I think, were contributing to it. I got out of all of those things and realigned myself, and now know that I made a good fit with my home, out of an unhealthy relationship, and in a job that I absolutely love, and I have never had more energy. The weight just came off. It was just, I know that that was the underlying issue.

(11:19) Scott Anthony Barlow: So let's talk about that then, because you just alluded to you've made not just one change in your life, not just moving to work that is a far better fit in some really key areas for you, but also you made a number of other changes too along the way, and all of those have contributed to you feeling better and more like yourself in so many different ways.

Let's go back for a moment. You're in that most recent role that you left. You're feeling disconnected, literal disconnection, and also figurative disconnection. You're disconnected from, you know, relationships because of how it's functioning. You're disconnected from your body. You're disconnected in a variety of different ways. What caused you to say, “Okay, I need to make another change here.”?

(12:10) Jackie Meister: I think all the work that I've done up until that point, so it took a good five years of just working on myself, making healthy changes, and I did. I felt like I was more connected with my body.

I was doing all the right things, and that did help me get to the point where I could be self-aware and know that, “Hey, this job is not the right fit.” I knew my relationship was unhealthy, and I knew these things were not the right fit. And I started to back away from my job. I was making small changes over the last previous year.

So one is my boss, that was my motherly, you know, supportive boss. She decided to retire and she really wanted me to take on the role as director. She traveled a lot and honestly, I didn't wanna do the same thing. I knew that in the back of my mind, but again, I was getting pulled off like, “Oh, well this is what I need to do. This is what's expected.” You know, get a promotion.

(13:14) Scott Anthony Barlow: This is what you do. You just keep going up no matter whether or not it's actually a good thing for you. Yes, that's a hundred percent.

(13:19) Jackie Meister: Yeah. Keep climbing. I think when she retired, I did think about it a lot. And I knew I didn't wanna take that position, and I think the position was taken away anyway, so it wasn't even an option.

They restructured. I made the slow change to decide I wanted to go back to school, and I think I probably still do, made like a long-term plan with my new supervisor to transition back to a care manager role. I was doing all… I was slowly planning my exit from this position. As I was doing that, I was feeling better and better, like this was good, but I knew a whole part of my life was also not healthy and not good, which my relationship.

It was hard and I really didn't realize how bad it was again, until looking back on it. It just all kind of happened at once and was not planned. It was done in a way that I tried everything. You know, I tried everything. We tried everything.

I think the biggest thing was my kids were getting impacted. As you can see, I can tolerate a lot and kind of just muscle through things, but when my kids were suffering too, and I could see that, I think it was easier to make that decision.

(14:37) Scott Anthony Barlow: I can definitely, definitely empathize with hard decisions and recognizing that if you don't make that decision, it's impacting, continuing to impact your kids.

That hits home for me in a lot of different ways. You know, you're in this situation where you recognize that so many different pieces of your life that you thought were gonna be a fit, you've done the work to try and figure out like could they fit, would they fit, and then they don't. How did you move forward from there?

(15:12) Jackie Meister: It was a big leap. I didn't know if it was gonna work out, but I just knew I couldn't keep going in the same direction. I knew I needed help and support, and at that point in time, I was feeling, I don't think I realized I needed the support that I needed. I was just trying to do it on my own.

I think the more and more I reached out to people for support, the more it felt right, like I've just made, I started making more connections, and things just started to work out. So it started out slow. I knew I had to make a change. I think the more I moved in that direction, it's just the more the universe kind of gave me people and places and things that just worked out, and it was like, yeah, this is hard, but it's right. It feels right.

(16:00) Scott Anthony Barlow: Let's talk about that. What's an example of where you didn't know if it was gonna work out, but you ended up reaching out or making connections or putting yourself out into the universe to some degree, and the universe responded?

(16:17) Jackie Meister: Well, I think just this job that I have now. I knew a friend of a friend that was working here, and connected with her, and she said, “Hey, they're having a job fair, and they're hiring.” So I showed up and just met like at the same feeling I got with my previous manager, that was so supportive. The new manager at the job fair, we just clicked and we connected, and I had that same feeling. And when she gave me a tour, I actually ran into one of the nurses that used to be when I was a manager. She was one of the nurses and she is just a master at picking good cultures and good, like good teams. She used to work in HR, so.

(17:08) Scott Anthony Barlow: She's had some experience, then.

(17:09) Jackie Meister: That's right. That's right. And so, of course, she recommended me for hire with her, you know, that manager, my manager, that's current.

So I got to interview different teams. So there were a few teams within this hospital that were hiring. And, you know, there's different culture pockets, you know, there's different dynamics with the teams. And when I got to this nurse that I used to work with, her team, oh, they were just so amazing.

They're just, you know, they're just, you know, women that you would just like to hang out with, you know? So, they were all positive and I just felt this like a whole body yes to this situation. So I was joking with Ben. I didn't even have to apply to the position. I got through the whole interview process, and they're like, “Oh yeah, you didn't apply yet, so you need to do that before we hire you.”

So it was just, yeah, it was just good. It was good, good connections.

(18:14) Scott Anthony Barlow: When you do a great job of engineering a situation, the, oh yeah, you should probably apply to this after we've already made the decision. That type of event is what occurs after you have done a great job creating that situation, we'll call it.

So really nice work there. What I'm curious about, it sounds like you knew a lot more of what those pieces were that you were looking for this time around, and it's always an evolution, like that'll happen for the rest of our lives, right? But you knew a lot more about what you were looking for in this situation, so tell me a little bit about what were the pieces that made it a great fit for you, and how did you get to learn what those pieces were?

(19:02) Jackie Meister: Yeah, so for this job in particular, a lot of it is to do with connections and feeling connected with people, making, you know, meaningful purpose in my job. So I get to, you know, work directly with patients and help them and I get to meet them in the clinic, but then also, you know, over the phone. So it's more face-to-face.

(19:23) Scott Anthony Barlow: But you knew that you needed that too because you'd had that previous experience where you had gone mostly remote, and that was not a great thing for you in that same way. You didn't get the type of connection that you were looking for, right?

(19:34) Jackie Meister: Exactly. And then just the face-to-face connection with the team. You know, I had a really good team and we joked around a lot and it was just fun to go to work, and I have that again now, and it feels really good. It's really fun, and I miss that part, you know? Because you just don't get that in a remote situation, most of the time. Yeah. I just get to, I get to work with just the best of the best, too.

Like they're all like, this is one of the best hospitals in the country for what we're doing with bone marrow transplant and I get to just spend time with the experts and just absorb their knowledge, and that's really special too.

(20:14) Scott Anthony Barlow: That sounds really cool. But I'm curious, for you, what made that personally important?

(20:19) Jackie Meister: And I'm not sure if this is one of my top values, but I really love learning. I love the challenge of it and I think in my other jobs I was expected to be the expert and I don't think I was. So this is just, you know, beginner's minds, just learning everything I can, and it's just, I think that is an atmosphere that really helps me thrive.

(20:45) Scott Anthony Barlow: I think that's really interesting because so many people don't really think about, you know, who you're surrounded by in that particular way, through that lens. So what I hear you saying is that you recognize that you're a learner. You need a high rate of learning, and particularly for you, which might be different for the next person, but for you, you need to be able to sort of be in that sort of beginner type of mindset, for lack of a better phrase, always curious and always learning and have an available, that works well if you have an available source of experts where you get to keep learning over and over and over again. And I think that's just something most people would never consider at all in what they need out of work.

(21:27) Jackie Meister: I had two offers that I was working with. So this position, and then another position, and I was thinking, gosh, this other position was work from home mostly, but just go into the office once a day or once a week. We're on the phone most of the day with the patients, and it would've been an easy, an easy job.

I was talking to Ben, I'm like, “Maybe I need this because,” you know, I've had so much other change and but then we looked at our values and like, what is my body really telling me? And it's, “Hey, I need more connection.” And so like sometimes the easy job is not the best fit.

(22:02) Scott Anthony Barlow: Yeah. Have you ever had multiple job offers in your life before, or is this the first time that that's happened?

(22:07) Jackie Meister: That was the first, yeah, that was the first time.

(22:10) Scott Anthony Barlow: So what was that like for you? What was great about that for you? What was challenging about that for you?

(22:15) Jackie Meister: It was great because I had a, you know, choices. I could see what I really wanted, and I can kind of see, you know, compare the two and take the time to do that.

But also it's a lot of decisions, you know, at the same time it's very stressful. Like, am I making the right decision? And, you know, there's a big fork in the road.

(22:32) Scott Anthony Barlow: These are what we call good problems, right? It's still a problem. But these are good problems.

(22:38) Jackie Meister: Yeah.

(22:38) Scott Anthony Barlow: Arguably great problems. Looking back on that situation, what do you think it took to be able to get to the point where you could evaluate these two job offers in a way that became useful for you? Because I'm gonna guess that if we went back 10 years ago, that you probably didn't have the same ability to be able to assess, hey, this is the good one.

Who knows? Maybe you would've ended up with the easy one, and it wouldn't have been the right fit. But what do you think it took for you to be able to get to the point where you could better evaluate?

(23:12) Jackie Meister: Doing that work with Happen to Your Career, where we kind of, I took the time to figure out what the values were that meant a lot to me and just learn, helped me learn, learn about myself, and it really helped clarify things. I think Ben also helped me very kindly point out there were some limited beliefs in my thinking when I was evaluating the jobs. I think one of the cons I had about this job I have now is, and I'm not gonna be there for my kids, or it's a different way of thinking.

I mean, there's a lot of places where I'm leaning more on people, and I think it's helping me stay connected with people at the same time.

(23:54) Scott Anthony Barlow: Yeah, I think that's the really fascinating thing to me when I think about your story is that there are so many elements here that are past tendencies, past beliefs, behaviors that are stopping you from connecting with people.

But ultimately, one of the biggest things that you particularly need, maybe more so than the average person, is to be able to connect with people. So it's really amazing, actually, just how you have, challenge by challenge, sifted through that in order to get to a point where you can better connect with folks in the way that you want to, and that's good for you and probably better for them too. And it's probably better for your family, probably better for your dogs as well, I would imagine.

(24:38) Jackie Meister: Yeah, that's so true. It's so true. And I think it's good to lean on people both ways. Yeah, 'cause, you know, they probably feel more comfortable asking me for help as well, you know, because we're more connected and I'm leaning on them so they can lean on me and it's just a good, beautiful way of looking at life.

(24:57) Scott Anthony Barlow: So I'm curious, from your perspective, what was that like, and what advice would you give to other people who are going through those same types of challenges where they're going through a career change and a divorce at the same time?

(25:09) Jackie Meister: That was a part of it is knowing that you only have, you know, this one life to live.

And if you're aware things’ not working and if you tried to make 'em work and you just know, you know, something has to change, I think it's that realization that you don't have to be stuck. You can make this change, and it might not be popular, and it might not be logical to others, but I think when you get to this space of life, it's like you don't care anymore.

You just, you know, you know, you know it's not working, and you don't have to stay in a situation that's not working for you. I think that was a big part of why I felt so okay with making all these changes is because I wanna be that example for my kids too. You know, what kind of example would I be if I, you know, just stuck with things even though they weren't working, and just because that's what everyone else does, or that's what's expected of me.

(26:01) Scott Anthony Barlow: You're making me tear up. The big reason we have this business, the big reason we have, big reason we do this type of work is because I badly want to, you know, set an example for my kids and role model for my kids and teach them to be able to be more of themselves in every aspect of life. And so thank you for, thank you for doing that.

Like what you've done for yourself and, you know, what you've done partially for your kids too as well. It is inspiring, and that'll help other people too. I really appreciate it.

(26:44) Jackie Meister: Thank you.

(26:44) Scott Anthony Barlow: And if you've listened to very many episodes of the Happen to Your Career podcast, you know that this is the entire reason our company exists. To help you find meaningful work that actually fits what you are looking for, help you build the life you want, and figure out how work fits within it.

So if you're ready to take control of your career journey and find work that aligns with your strengths, we'd love to help. All you have to do is just pause this right now and drop me an email, scott@happentoyourcareer.com. Just shoot me an email. Put “Conversation” in the subject line, scott@happentoyourcareer.com.

I'll connect you with my team, the specific team member who can help with your unique situation. That's all you need to do. Drop me an email right now.