I am new to the forums and found them tonight after I suddenly burst into tears thinking about all of the work I have to do over the next several weeks and decided to take a break.

I have been seriously contemplating quitting my job for about 9 months now, but I feel confused as to whether the problem is the job or me. I worked really hard to get the job I have now, and I used to tell people it was my "dream job," but I seriously can't stand it anymore. The crying tonight was brought on by the fact that I had been working for nearly 12 hours, and I realized I still had a couple of hours of work ahead of me before I could go to sleep.

On top of it, I am single and live in a small town. I moved for work, and I do not have a single friend or family member that I can get to without flying. I tried being friends with some co-workers, but I found that it didn't work out - work disagreements turned into personal conflicts and vice versa so to avoid things really blowing up I decided to keep the relationships professional. But since all I really do is work, I haven't been able to meet anyone outside of work either.

I'm just stressed and lonely all the time and never seem to get enough sleep. I want to quit, but it will be a death sentence to my career (I'm sorry I'm being vague about what I do - I feel, probably irrationally, worried about being identified). So you'll just have to trust me when I say that if I leave this job, it will be extremely hard for me to ever find another one like it. But I don't know if I want another one like it anyway since the stress is the product of the job, not my particular employer.

On the other hand, I've also been having a lot of personal difficulties lately, and I'm worried that this is clouding my judgment. Basically, I've come to the realization that I attract users and critical people into my life, and I've been trying to slowly weed them out, but it is making me lonelier than ever. In the past few months, I have cut three of the closest people from my life due to ongoing dishonesty, criticism, and hurtful behavior. There just aren't that many left, and if I'm honest, a few of the ones left aren't that great either, but I'm too lonely to do much about it. As it is, I only talk to these people on the phone because, as I mentioned, I have no friends in the actual vicinity of where I live.

So I basically want to quit my job and just leave this city and go move somewhere where I do have at least one decent friend, but I am afraid that I am being too drastic. I am in therapy, and it's helping to validate my feelings, but I still don't know what to do about my actual life. I have enough savings to get me through about 6 months, but if I didn't have a new job before that, I don't know what I'd do. But my current job is so overwhelming that it is extremely difficult to find the time and energy to search out other opportunities, especially since I want to relocate across the country.

Anyway, sorry if this is long and confusing. I am very tired at the moment and since I didn't get my work done tonight after all, I'm now going to have to get up in about 4 hours and try to finish it then. Any thoughts would be appreciated.