Apathy toward my work in the current climate… anyone else? (TW: suicide).

I find that I’m struggling to really focus on my research. It feels like I’m barely going through the motions and I cannot pull my head out of the fog.

Get up early, check the news (dread), commute to work (frustration), sit at my bench side cubicle (more dread and frustration), look around and realize that everyone else has left… go home (more traffic and dread). Take an edible, make a healthy dinner, go to bed. Repeat.

I have deadlines approaching and I couldn’t care less about the work. Meetings with our federal collaborators are paused. No one knows if the funding issue is going to be resolved. The morale in my lab was lower than whale shit at the bottom of the ocean to begin with.

I keep getting auto-rejected for even entry-level jobs in industry that I am way over qualified for.

I just want to return to an era where I was passionate about science. I want to not wake up every day in doom and gloom. Hell, I want to DO SOMETHING about everything that’s going on.

Truthfully, I’m increasingly considering suicide. I have no support in my role, seemingly no future (despite having a good track record of productivity), my postdoc is likely to be terminated soon because my boss is insane and is trying to “clean house.” Without a backup, I’m going to be living out of my car very soon.

I’m lost, and I don’t know what to do.

Update: Thank you all SO much for your kind words. I posted this during a particularly dark hour, when I was feeling hopeless and frustrated. I will keep this post up (for now), because there is incredible support in this community, and I hope this post helps someone else feel a little less alone in the current academic and political climates.

I am planning to pivot to a different role (either inside or outside science), and have come to the realization that my current lab IS NOT what I want to do with my career. It's toxic enviornment that aims for perfection with morbidly low morale, and I need to pivot to something that is a bit more fulfilling.

Step one: shutting down the 24-hour news cycle.
Step two: touch grass and see the sunshine for a bit.
Step three: find a new job.