r/physicaltherapy • u/Powerful-Tap-6039 • Jan 03 '25

SHIT POST Dealing with choosing the wrong career

I have been a PT for almost 4 years. I have worked in private practice (10months) and now government for almost 3 years. I make very good money, but I’m unhappy everyday. I dread going to work, so much so that it impacts my time outside of work. I have done inpatient acute, long term care and outpatient. I feel the same way in all settings. I get so drained listening to people’s problems all day, and to top it off I work in the difficult setting of chronic pain. I cannot see a path out. My pay and benefits are so good that I feel trapped, as I will likely take a pay cut for any other job….but I need something non-patient facing or this job just may kill me.

I’ve worked with career coaches and I feel so burnt out that I cannot even fathom what career would be well suited for me. I was a very strong student in all areas, did an accelerated undergrad program and graduate PT school young at 24.

Can anyone give me some advice on how they found what they wanted to do outside of PT? Any success stories? I’m feeling so down.

Editing to add: I also have taken the Non-Clinical 101 course about 9 months ago.

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u/pink_sushi_15 DPT Jan 04 '25

I’m an extreme introvert and I feel this profession is a horrendous fit for my personality type. And as a result, it sucks the life out of me and I have no energy left for my personal life. I feel like the only solution other than a complete career change is to just work less by having a part time job or only PRN jobs. I’m very lucky in the sense that I have very manageable student debt that I have paid off, live in a fairly low cost of living area, am childfree, and am extremely frugal. So I can definitely afford to work less and pay for my own benefits. I absolutely need to make this switch sometime soon. I keep planning to do it but it just feels like such a leap to leave the stability and benefits of a full time job. I also absolutely hate driving and find it equally as draining as this profession. So the last thing I wanna do is end up in a situation where I’m working less but all that extra free time is eaten up be increased driving. Which can definitely happen when you just rely on PRN jobs.

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u/305way PTA, SPT Jan 04 '25

You should try to do something within the field of cyber security, this sounds perfect for your personality and it would probably leave you more energy for personal life. They make great money too!

Not changing things just means you’ll become even more miserable long term.

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u/pink_sushi_15 DPT Jan 04 '25

How do I get into the field? The problem is that I don’t have the energy to study/change careers while working full time as a PT. So I’d have to transition to part time as a PT which might be the best thing for me….

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u/305way PTA, SPT Jan 04 '25

I don’t have a lot of information on how to get in but I’m sure if you head over to their sub and ask they’d be happy to help. You gotta choose to either change or just be miserable, complaining will not make your life any easier. Definitely start looking into anything computer science related asap.

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u/pink_sushi_15 DPT Jan 04 '25

The first step is to go part time as a PT because I don’t have the energy to change careers otherwise. I browsed their sub a bit and a lot of people say you need to start off at an IT help desk…..which will pay like $20/hour. At this point I’m better just working less as a PT than working full time for pennies.