Over-Functioning Made Me Sick – Literally

I’m about to get pretty vulnerable. And, to keep things on the up and up, I’m going to hold back some identifying details about the situation, but I promise it’s all true.

A number of years ago, I got what I thought was going to be my dream job. It seemed to align with so many of my values and my disposition. My first week, it was clear that the place had been vastly understaffed, and I have this innate drive to move things from chaos to organization. An overachiever throughout adolescence and into adulthood, my small job description was soon out the door, and I was managing all sorts of things that were never mine to manage. 

A couple years into working there, I regularly worked 80 hours a week and didn’t take vacation. I had very little life outside of work. All my friends were somehow associated with work. I told myself it was because when you’re passionate about your work, that’s what you do. And, maybe that’s true for some. 

Towards the end of one of our busier seasons, I had been clocking a little over 100 hours a week for six weeks straight. My boss chose to go out of the office during this time telling me that I could handle it, and I was taking my iMac home to squeeze out just a few more things while I sat with my mostly neglected dog. 

On a Friday, I went to the urgent care because my eyes were swelling and I had a sore throat and many other symptoms. They diagnosed me with allergies and put me on prednisone. I had a follow-up with an allergist the following Tuesday. I worked the whole weekend. Then Tuesday came around and a friend had to drive me because my eyes had swollen so much I could barely see. The allergist came in and took one look at me and said he was positive it was mono. When the test came back positive and I told him that I hadn’t been in any contact with someone with mono, he asked me if I had any stress in my life. My friend laughed. I cried. What made it worse is that the prednisone had taken out the rest of my weak immune system. He told me that I needed to slow down or I would end up in the hospital. 

On the way home, my friend and I stopped for popsicles for my throat. Being an HR guru, she advised me to go on short term disability. When I called my boss to tell him that I was taking the rest of the day off, he was irritated. I went home and slept.

The following day, still swollen and very ill, I went to work. I asked for short-term disability, and they told me that instead, they’d allow me to cut my hours back to 40 a week. And frankly, that sounded like a vacation to me, so I agreed.

A few months later, still teetering on the edge of health, they opened up a position that would’ve been a promotion for me. I asked to be considered. My boss told me no. He said he thought a man would be a better fit, and suggested that if he promoted me that eventually I would leave with everything he taught me to build a bigger, better organization than he ever could. I told him that if he was never going to promote me, that I would have to start looking for a job where there was growth in my future. He told me that the organization couldn’t handle me leaving on a whim, so I could either sign a contract saying that I’d stay for a year, or I’d be done in two weeks and get a couple months of severance. 

I was heartbroken. I had given EVERYTHING to that place. 

Now, there are lots of things this taught me. Sometimes I joke about how I’ve learned a lot of leadership skills by seeing bad leadership and avoiding those things. But, let’s focus on me and what was in my control. Afterall, we’re talking about over-functioning.

I had taken all of it on. It wasn’t the healthiest of environments, but I kept participating. I kept thinking that I could handle it, and as soon as I did, it just became mine. The entire organization molded and functioned around me and my fellow over-functioners on staff. I could’ve said no. I could’ve pushed back and said there was no way for someone to work that much. But, I didn’t. For a long time, it felt like a badge of honor to be so crucial. I felt like the glue that held things together. But, I wasn’t actually leading – the right people didn’t get to participate. I didn’t pass anything on – I just held onto it. And it cost me greatly.

What I understand now is that this wasn’t just an individual problem. It was a systems problem.

Organizations quietly adapt around over-functioners. The more capable you are, the more the system redistributes toward you. Until eventually, entire departments, workflows, and leadership structures become dependent on a handful of people absorbing unsustainable amounts of responsibility.

And because high performers usually look calm while they’re doing it, leadership often mistakes this for strength.

But systems built around over-functioning are fragile.

They stop developing people properly. Accountability gets uneven. Knowledge gets trapped in individuals instead of shared across teams. And eventually, the organization begins protecting the output instead of the person producing it.

That’s not leadership maturity. That’s organizational dependency. And, I see versions of this everywhere.

As we’ve been talking about over-functioning the last few weeks, it’s not simply theoretical. This is our one precious life we’re talking about. This is our health. Our well-being. It is absolutely critical that we figure this out sooner than later. And sure, my experience is a bit extreme. But please learn from my lesson. 

I bet you’re wondering what I did. I took the severance. And, I took a break from work and essentially started over. The organization was shocked. But, they had told me through their actions that as a person, I didn’t matter to them. Several months later, they were still calling me to ask how I did things or what was organized where, but never asked how I was as a person. 

For a long time, I thought leadership meant becoming indispensable. Now I think real leadership looks almost the opposite.

Real leadership builds systems that can function without sacrificing people inside them. It develops others instead of collecting responsibility. It distributes knowledge. It creates clarity. It allows people to matter as humans — not just as output-producing machines.

And maybe most importantly: real leadership recognizes that being needed is not the same thing as being valued.

That lesson cost me a lot to learn.

I hope it costs you less.