First job in 7 years,, help

[gregcool]

Hi guys,im a old NMP user and my journey has been a long one till this day but up till now iv learned to except my mental health and deal with day to day life,but for the last 7 years iv been out of work apart from working in a charity shop for a few hrs hear and there,so always been low commitment and always been able to come and go in that job ,, anyway i started a new job 4 days a week 7 hrs a day in a little coffey shop which i always felt would be great to have a little job and always felt this kind of job would help me get away from my mental health and make me feel better ,well up till now,i was wrong, iv gone from spending most days on my own and not having to get up to anything apart from the gym which iv done for 1 year 3 days a week,to now getting up at 9am and getting to work for 10am, the job its self is not hard and iv picked everything up very easy,but its the fact im in a environment where im there for the whole day and have to engage with people, talking etc through my day and when there are no customers i have to engage in chit chat with the other 2 workers,im finding this constant communication really high anxiety provoking and my day really drags,and in my head im screaming in frustration as im not used to any of this kind of life style, im used to no commitment and coming and going through my day,when ever i want and avoiding human contact,
As much as i hated my isolating life,i got use to it over the years but now im in a different world and dreading every day,even when im off sat sun mon,im always thinking about going to work on the tue my mental health has gone up 50% more since working and dont know how much longer i can go on feeling the way i do as iv not had this level of mental health for years and my every moment of every day im ruminating and analysing my every thought and feeling which i have not done in years,iv always had my anxiety under some sort of control,i dont know what to do and how to get through this,,it seams im not ment to work at all, iv had to give up the gym as there is no time for me to get in anymore and iv lost all enthusiasm to want to do ANYTHING,even the smallest of things are hard work and stress provoking ,,its like a switch has been flicked since starting this job that has ramped up my mental health and i dont know what to do
Any advice please
Many thanks
Iv also just lost all interest in everything that i used to enjoy before this job,and right now just feel like i want to leave and get back to how i was before this job,im feeling zero enjoyment all day every day,which i never had before this job

[Darksky]

Maybe you just simply don't like this job. What about working with animals in some form? They are not big on communication and it can be very rewarding.

[fishman65]

Farm work is usually low on the human contact front I think Greg. Do you live in a rural area?

[gregcool]

Well not really and you prob need some sort of experience to be taken on,but nothing local to me anyway

[Lissa101]

Hey Gregcool,

First of all, huge congrats on getting the job and sticking with it so far - that's huge! I'm in the same situation but I only do 4 hrs a day. And I find that really, really tough. Its a people facing role too and I've been stuck in horrid conference rooms for training, argh.

I think you have to remind yourself that you have options and choices, you can reduce your hours or get a different job or go back to volunteering. Reducing the pressure on yourself will help. I get the feeling though that you'd like this to work out. If that's the case then maybe explore methods of reducing anxiety at work and also how to distract yourself from worrying on your days off.

If it comes to it and you leave, don't think of it as failure. We're all trying to find the best ways to manage our anxieties and maybe you need to experiment with different jobs.

All the best x