Hi everybody! Short post for today in which I ask for your help.
I volunteered to give a talk about Mental Health and FI at a small event later this year. Data suggests that a shit ton of people (at least 1 in 5 ‘mericans) deal with mental health issues, and over half of them don’t seek treatment. At best, this means these people are suffering way more than they have to, and at worst this can be life threatening.
If you’ve read some of this blog, you know I’ve dealt with my own mental shit show, and I’m super thankful that I blundered into proactively working on my mental health around the same time I found this FI stuff. Looking back, it was total luck that I happened to find both domains of knowledge, and that I was randomly motivated to work on them.
While my life may not be perfect, it’s a hell of a lot better than it could be. I attribute much of that to me not fucking around with my mental health. I’ve been up close and personal with too many situations where others had shit compound (in the bad direction), and things went pear shape. On the plus side, I know what brains taste like. Well, that’s not really a plus; just some horrific gallows humor for you, to hopefully drive this point home and get your attention.
Anyways, the whole reason I’m giving this talk is to hopefully get more people to educate themselves about how to work on their own mental health, and give them some ways to find help if they need it. This whole FI thing has its own unique challenges as it relates to mental health; doing stuff counter to most of our consumerist culture, loss of identity and social network when retiring early, and general social isolation. These are all typical risk factors which increase the likelihood of mental health crap that are associated with this FI community. Hence me doing this talk.
Right now I’ve got a decent draft of the talk, and have been practicing and fine tuning it on the reg. I am running into one issue though. My mental fuckery is specifically related to trauma, and I’m rated for PTSD through the VA. Both of my former professions are filled with plenty of great books about trauma, and I’ve been lucky to get some good therapy through the VA. Even before I got care from the VA, I got some great counseling from a non-profit which gave free treatment to survivors of trauma. Great for me, but I don’t have much experience in seeking education or care outside my little niche. Which finally leads me to my ask:
- Have you read any good books, blogs, or whatever that gave you a better understanding of mental health?
- Do you have any tips for finding a therapist, especially when having to navigate insurance and all that?
Despite everyone talking more about mental health, there is still considerable stigma attached to all this stuff. Yet another reason why I’m talking about this. But that leads to this last point; I know I’m asking you for help, and you might not want to leave a public comment about this. That’s cool, I spent years acting like I was fine while hiding my self-work. Kind of like stealth-FIRE. Most people I talk to everyday don’t know how many commas are in my accounts. Nor do they know I go to therapy.
So…I get it it. And I’m guessing I’m not alone there.
If it helps, please feel free to leave an anonymous comment if you so desire. Or you can email me direct at:
I really appreciate any help you can give me. Hopefully we can turn my ramblings into something actionable that will help somebody else out there.
Thanks friends. 🙂
Good on you for doing the talk. The mental side of FIRE is one I definitely deal with and I only deal with it by deep diving into the FIRE rabbit hole to find like minded people to see their struggles. To see that it is real.
No useful therapy on my side for the mental challenges that go with FIRE. have talked to a few retirement coaches but they do not fill that gap on the mental side Once you tell them you have the money figured out and that you know about the work identity piece, the social loss, etc they have nothing to add. Most FIRE blog provide better info support than they did.
I hope you record the audio of the talk with slides for us 10s of readers to partake in. It would still allow you to be anonymous while spreading the message
Good luck and good on you for taking the talk on. I am curious if it’s at a CampFi as I was looking to signup for one thiis late summer / fall
Thanks Vader. Hopefully it helps someone. I don’t know about the audio, but I plan on writing out the entire talk to help me rehearse it. I’ll post that up here along with the slides and other resources. At this point it’s super long, and I need to pair it down so it’s less than 45 minutes long. I may keep the extra stuff in the written version.
It is not a Camp FI, but I’d like to get to one of those.
I just wanted to come here and applaud your write up in Pathfinders. I’m just at that point of the book but your write up has been my favorite. Really resonated with me. I just pulled the plug on my work life 6 months ago myself and woke up with an existential crisis this morning for the first time. Your story helped! Thank you! As far as therapists- I have tried many and eventually found a good one who has good people working with her at her new practice but there was no scientific method of finding her- I had googled marriage counselor to find her and she had great reviews. Now my 24 y/o son goes to one of her therapists virtually and I see another for individual counseling and all are wonderful. However they do not accept insurance. Looking forward to reading your blog when I can. Good luck to you in your search!
Hey there! Thanks so much for the accolades, and congrats on leaving work life behind! I appreciate the feedback on the therapist stuff. Frankly just hearing that googling worked for you and your family gives me hope that others can do the same. I hear you on the existential crisis; it’s a weird place to be in. It’s hard to justify when we’re in such comparably good positions, but I think this view of it as a “first world” or “champagne” problem can exacerbate the feelings. Yeah, we’re lucky to have such a challenge, but it is still a challenge nonetheless, and one that there isn’t much guidance for. I hope you’re able to work through yours. Please contact me if you’d like to talk about it. I don’t have the answer, but I’ve found it helpful to know I’m not alone.
Related to that, I just heard Brandon from the MadFIentist interviewed on Mindy(and Carl) on Money. Brandon talked about how he was basically in a funk for the first three years of retirement, but now is in a much better place. This seems to be common, and I know I feel much the same. If you’re into podcasts, maybe give it a listen.