Dear Pavlov's Cat,

I can definitely identify with what you wrote.

Bearing with anxiety is a virtue in my book and so I think you are a very heroic person regardless of what you decide to about your future.

I once worked in a stressful and high pressure job in advertising. It was totally the wrong fit for me as you can imagine since I suffer from anxiety and panic attacks. It was a pretty high paying job but I needed something "low stress" regardless of the pay.
Luckily I happened upon a government job shelving books in a library. Talk about low pressure and low stress. There was very little interaction with my superiors which was fine with me. It was a quiet and peaceful job. There was also a volunteer job if I wanted it as someone doing book sorting for the Library Friends Society but I needed some pay to live.

It was odd going from being a PhD Candidate and ad exec to taking a qualifying test on the Dewey Decimal System.

Since government people are in the business of spending money and not making it, they tend to be rather easy going. There was little excitement in my job. Once someone put a live chicken in a book drop and I was drafted to catch it and take it out to someone who had a farm. But as far as excitement goes, that is about it.

I am not, of course, recommending a library job for you. I am certainly not one qualified to give advice that you or anyone could or should rely upon!

I do hope you find something that works out for you. Anxiety can be awful.

"They" [the infamous 'they'] say work binds anxiety. I don't know if this is true but I found that it helped with my anxiety. I want to wish you the very best and hope others here will have more helpful words than my poor words.

Sincerely yours, Yao Wen