What kind of jobs mesh with mental health issues?

June 14, 2023 1:22 PM

How does a 25 year old with anxiety disorder and depression find a job they can be successful enough to live independently?

Some details:
Therapy and medications are already in place but depression is really treatment resistant. Bachelor's degree in Psychology earned but lacking energy and stability to get Masters at this point. Also unsure what area to study. Graduated during COVID and have tried a few things. Worked in a restaurant kitchen (lots of yelling and stress), preschool helper (very low pay), instructional assistant in a small, private middle school for kids with learning and mental health issues (low pay, no future or benefits), provisional teacher elementary school (large class, no asst or support, very difficult kids/fighting, awful parents, have to get Education masters in 3 years, good pay, but mental health tanked).

Longest employment stretch was the small middle school. Loved helping others, making a difference for the kids. Job allowed creative/crafty side and artistic talents to be used. Very good at it but not even enough money even with living at home. Tried to get salary increased by taking on more responsibility but it was refused. At this point, very burnt out and not sure what to do. Benefits are critical as losing parental coverage soon and therapy and meds are not cheap even with insurance.

What kind of jobs would be a good fit? It does not have to involve working with kids. Everything is still probably entry level in terms of skills. Good at organization, computer literate, prefer to go to a job or be hybrid (all remote was rough during COVID). Not even sure what industries may be better. Looking for recommendations especially if you or someone you know manages to work enough to support themselves and stay somewhat mentally healthy.

posted by maxg94 to Work & Money (12 answers total)

Have you considered healthcare? A good-sized teaching hospital can offer multiple career paths depending on your interests, and reimburse you for training/education as you go. You like working with kids so maybe being a child life specialist would suit you - you could start with an entry-level position in pediatrics and go from there. Your psych degree could also fit with clinical research coordinator/regulatory affairs specialist for R&D, with community health educator, with HR/internal training, with patient advocacy (although that could be challenging depending on your stressors), etc.
posted by headnsouth at 1:54 PM on June 14, 2023

Unfortunately it's 2023 and a lot of perfectly healthy 25 year olds can't live independently working artsy helping jobs. Can you be more specific on what salary and location is necessary? What is the timeline for reaching financial independence?

Luckily it's 2023 and you can get insurance without a job through Obamacare/ACA, so long as you are in an expansion state. We're also still in a labor shortage, and if this individual isn't sure what they're good at temping will take the mental burden of applying and being rejected off their plate but give good feedback on what they like or don't like. Typically if the person has solid computer and office skills temping will pay 1.5x minimum wage in my area.
posted by Narrow Harbor at 2:03 PM on June 14, 2023

This is outside your obvious skillset, but what about some physical/outdoor work -- like gardening, outdoor forest school for kids, even construction, trade apprenticeship, etc? A friend of mine had a white-collar job but was struggling with depression and got a basic gardening/landscaping job with the city (hence, benefits and healthcare). She loved it and it got her outside and out of her head -- and the exercise and hard work was really beneficial for her body/soul. Eventually, she went back to a variation on her white-collar job but she went back in a much better state of mind.

In the longer term, what about better-paying jobs in the educational/therapy sector? Play therapist, speech therapist, occupational therapist -- all well-paid but highly rewarding. These require another degree, so not for this period in your life, but they sound like they might be a good fit.

On a side note, the jobs you've done so far sound incredibly stressful; kids (and restaurants) are really hard even on those with solid mental health.
posted by heavenknows at 2:04 PM on June 14, 2023 [9 favorites]

Here to second temping! Good way to see inside a bunch of different kinds of offices and even industries. Larger cities usually have multiple temp offices. You can register with more than one. There's a little uncertainty, as sometimes you go a stretch without assignments, and sometimes you get a call to go do a gig on the day of, and have to scramble. But by and large, it was a decent wage for decent gigs.
posted by SaharaRose at 2:17 PM on June 14, 2023 [2 favorites]

Occupational therapy or SLP? But yeah the issue will be dealing with parents or administration, and depending on your area, only ok pay. There’s always something.

You can browse O*Net Online for jobs - here are some with your likely interest codes (social, investigative, artistic): https://www.onetonline.org/explore/interests/Social/Investigative/Artistic/

Or here are “bright outlook” occupations:
https://www.onetonline.org/find/bright?b=0

You can tool around in there and filter all kinds of things in or out if you want to download the spreadsheets. (Example, you could filter out high conflict jobs. And then see if you like the sounds of what’s left, maybe you decide you could live without using your artistic skills at work for the sake of relative peace and pay.)
posted by cotton dress sock at 2:48 PM on June 14, 2023 [1 favorite]

Consider AmeriCorps. AmeriCorps pays very poorly, but you get an education grant at the end all at once, which is often super helpful for getting a masters or something later in life. In many cases, they handle some or most of the living arrangements for you-- it really depends on the nature of the specific posting, but it can be a good way to gain more independence in a structured way.

AmeriCorps is a GREAT way to get experience in a field you are interested in, especially working with kids or teaching people, and you may get posted somewhere cool that you're interested in visiting. Sometimes they have benefits or a stipend for Obamacare benefits. It also looks amazing on your resume when you're done.
posted by blnkfrnk at 2:53 PM on June 14, 2023 [4 favorites]

Outdoor jobs are great if you can get them, tho often low pay. Still, look at your State Parks or National Parks in your area.

This may be a strange pivot, but consider a job doing internal tech support for a large company. Your experience in teaching / helping would be a great transferable skill to most hiring managers. Don’t do customer facing, but instead be the person who troubleshoots employee’s audio drivers or gets them access to a shared drive. I’ve worked in a few - the teams have been very supportive, eventually the employees you help get to know you, you sit in a cubicle and respond to tickets, and pretty soon 90% of what you do is simple and predictable. Bonus is that you get to know everything about the company, and if you decide to stay, you’ll have a good idea about what team you might want to explore.

I also think that you may age out of the depression, or better stated, progress in your strategies to manage it without it taking you under. So simple / structured / helpful / graspable with solid benefits for a few years is just fine for now. Consider it Stage 1. Good luck!
posted by Silvery Fish at 3:06 PM on June 14, 2023 [1 favorite]

Depending on your particular inclinations, you may want to consider delivering mail. Being a mail carrier is a noble profession. You get lots of exercise, the work is important but not high-pressure, and you get to be on your own while also having a lot of opportunity to socialize. I know some people who have seen their mental health improve dramatically, because the job works for them.

There are downsides, of course. In the US, the USPS will overwork you. The environment is for some people really stressful. I also know some people who had to quit because the job was undermining their mental health.

So, it's not definitely the right career for you, but it might be something to consider.
posted by meese at 4:33 PM on June 14, 2023 [3 favorites]

In the longterm, you might want to look for jobs with good union representation. A job where you are represented by a union usually pays a living wage and you get healthcare. Depending on the vocation, and a healthy union, you would have a better work life balance than a non-union job.
posted by AnyUsernameWillDo at 6:42 PM on June 14, 2023 [6 favorites]

40's something here with (oh god so many) mental health issues, and I've found state level, peon government work to be really pretty alright all things considered. I have coworkers who have severe mental health problems that are debilitating for months at a go, and they still get to keep their jobs. The labor protections and stability from this type of work have actually helped reduce some of the day to day anxiety symptoms I've experienced.

It's not amazing, fulfilling work (you have to find something else to talk about at parties), but it leaves a LOT of bandwidth to just do shit for shit's sake. For me that means family time, volunteering and more hobbies than I had before I got the job. If you can find a position that you're good at, it's not hard, and unless you work in a few key areas you won't be overworked.

The healthcare coverage is drastically better than the private analogs. My actual wage is slightly lower than what I was making in the private sector, but since so much more of my medical expenses are covered under our union's health plans, I take home significantly more of that pay. You'll likely be a part of a (strongish at worst) union, and you'll eventually get a shit-butt-ton of time off compared to your peers (think measured in months not weeks eventually). Pensions are also nothing to laugh at. Government jobs are woefully understaffed right now, and there's lots of entry points for folks with little experience.

I was unaware of this until I was in a government job, but terms like "limited duration" are often required to be used for certain new hires as budgets adjust and expand. This scared me off of even applying for such jobs in the past, but once you've had an LD job, you're typically at the top of the list for other agencies. Many (but not all, and it's not bad to ask during an interview!) LD positions become full time positions at the end of legislative budget sessions.
posted by furnace.heart at 7:01 PM on June 14, 2023 [11 favorites]

(I’ll note that the benefits of government jobs vary wildly from jurisdiction to jurisdiction [city, county, state and federal]. My state hasn’t offered pensions for new hires since the late 90’s/early 2000’s. Federal jobs offer excellent benefits but are very hard to break in to).
posted by raccoon409 at 7:14 PM on June 14, 2023 [1 favorite]

Longest employment stretch was the small middle school. Loved helping others, making a difference for the kids. Job allowed creative/crafty side and artistic talents to be used.

I don't know if "art teacher" should be the only or primary job to aim for, since there aren't a lot of positions and the pay is never going to be that high, but maybe keep an eye out for that kind of work. (I'm assuming that a teacher gets paid more than an assistant, but ymmv regarding amounts.)
posted by trig at 9:12 PM on June 14, 2023 [1 favorite]