"Why Should We Work Ourselves To The Bone?" This 24-Year-Old Explained What Differentiates Gen Z From Other Generations And Why She Feels "Guilty" Among Her Peers

Welcome back to Gen Z Journals, where we highlight the day-to-day lives of individual Gen Z'ers from all walks of life. From weekly expenses to recent challenges, here's where we glimpse into the lives of one of the most pivotal generations of the moment.

This week: Meet Andie (she/her), a 24-year-old from Newport News, Virginia. The remainder of this post will be from her POV.

I am a reading interventionist for third and fourth grade at a public elementary school. Basically, I provide small group instructions for the students who are struggling the most in reading and are the furthest behind grade level. I also teach whole-group math for a third-grade class whose primary teacher has only ever taught kindergarten. I started this exact position only in March, but I have worked in this public school district as a classroom volunteer, substitute teacher, and student-teacher since October 2018.

I make $35 an hour, or $52,500, for the whole school year and four weeks of summer school. My husband’s salary as a middle-school science teacher in the same district is just about the same as mine.

Our weekly income fluctuates quite often, especially around busy times of the school year and holiday breaks. Our rent is about $400 weekly, or $1600 monthly, for our two-bedroom apartment. We typically spend around $150 on groceries. Eating out is a bit of a splurge for us, and we usually spend around $100 on eating out each week, including taking ourselves out for ice cream and one date night. Between gas, water, and other bills (like items for our two cats), it comes out to about $850 a week. Some weeks end up being cheaper when we don’t need to get gas in our cars or skip going out for date night, and some weeks end up being more if we get together with friends we haven’t seen in a while or treat ourselves to a movie or community theatre show.

My husband and I pool both our incomes into one shared lump. We take each of our paychecks and combine them. I get paid bi-weekly, and my husband gets a monthly paycheck. Then, we allocate that big sum using an app with categories like groceries, gas, rent, household items, "Taylor's Fun Money," and "Andie's Fun Money." We also have a shared category called our "Wishing Well," where we put leftover extra money towards more expensive and rarer treats, like our vacation or an expensive item we're saving up for, like a new climb-tower for our cats. We also have a savings account courtesy of my grandfather, where we put in money for retirement, a down payment on a house, and our future children.

I am beyond grateful for my financial situation, and I thank my lucky stars every day for it. My husband and I both work jobs that we enjoy, have great hours, and pay well. That is a blessing in itself. It also helps that we live in a not terribly expensive area, and we both worked throughout high school and college, so we were used to managing money (I was a camp counselor and theatre director, and my husband worked retail for years).

Another blessing that I am amazingly thankful for is that I was my paternal grandparents’ only grandchild. My grandfather worked at PBS for years. When he realized that I would likely be his only grandchild, he poured almost all the money he earned into various savings funds for me. Because of him, I did not have to take out ANY student loans to earn my bachelor's or my master's, and with the scholarships I earned, I didn’t have to use up as much of his savings for me as we originally thought. My husband and I expect to be able to pay off his student debt and possibly put a down payment on a house in the near future because of my grandfather. He was an incredible man.

I aim to get eight to eight-and-a-half hours of sleep each night. I try to be in bed reading at 9:30, then have lights out and earplugs in by 10 p.m. I need to be up at 6 a.m. every day for work. I can usually manage to get myself out of bed and into the shower on time, but I won’t lie — it can be hard to get good sleep when I’m stressing about upcoming testing or the constant changes in the education field.

My husband started dating in November 2018 and married in the summer of 2023! Between my husband having ADHD and me having formally diagnosed anxiety from being abused in the past, we have learned to support each other in some unique ways. My husband is not good at remembering dates or times, coordinating meetings with other people, or planning things like dinner reservations or appointments, but I have a better memory and like planning, so I take on that. My husband knows that I am very sensitive and get overwhelmed easily, so he provides regular reassurance and confidence boosts so I can power through even when I'm anxious. Since we went to the same college and entered the same field, we both know what the other goes through and how to keep each other sane — whether it's taking on chores the other can't do at the moment or surprising each other with little treats or extra special date nights.

So many of our friends are single, not necessarily by choice, and it makes us all the more grateful that we found each other in college. From what we’ve gathered about the dating scene for Gen Z, it seems like dating can be a very shallow experience. Some of our friends have been in terrible relationships because they just wanted a partner, while other friends haven’t been in a relationship in years because they can’t bring themselves to be vulnerable with other people. My husband and I always say that our relationship is successful for two reasons: First, where one of us is weak, the other is strong, and we work at continuing to balance each other out as life changes. Second, neither of us is perfect, but we’re perfect for each other. My husband is not Prince Charming, and I’m not a perfect 10, but we forgive each other when we mess up and value each other, flaws included.

I was a full-fledged fourth-grade teacher at the start of this school year, with a classroom of my own at a different school in the same district. I had just finished my student-teaching and master's program and was excited to be starting my first year of teaching. It was a miserable time, and it lasted until the last week of January before I left that position for the new one I found. It wasn’t the students that drove me to leave halfway through the school year, but the other adults at my school, parents, and problems from the district higher-ups, too.

I was given a group of students that essentially set me up to fail, and when I asked for help and was clear about what I needed, I was instead given “help,” which just made things harder for me. I came home crying nearly every day. I spent the whole weekend panicking about having to go back to school. My self-esteem was plummeting because I couldn’t meet data goals even though I followed all the advice I had gotten from my master's program and other teachers.

The final straw was when another teacher made very inappropriate and downright cruel and abusive comments to me in the teachers’ lounge, and my admin did nothing about it. These comments were about my infertility struggles and the abuse I suffered as a child, for the record. Admin offered a meeting to work out our differences, but it never happened, and the teacher who went off on me stopped talking to me, even though we were on the same team. I realized then and there that I would never get any actual support, so I quit and reached out to HR about options outside of that school.

I’m very fortunate that my district has recognized my talents as a teacher and wanted to keep me in the elementary schools. I ended up getting into my new placement a few weeks later, and now, I LOVE working with small groups and helping the students who need my help the most.

I have been overweight most of my life. The only time I wasn’t overweight was when I was under six and going in and out of the hospital for RSV (a severe respiratory infection) and vomiting spells. Being overweight has been a huge issue in all aspects of my life. There were periods when I lost some weight, but I always regained it. I’ve been turned away from on-campus jobs at my university that I was more than qualified for because my “image” wasn’t right. I did theatre my entire childhood and have directed children’s theatre, too, but I’ve been denied roles in shows because of my size, not because I lack talent. It confused the hell out of people when they saw my swim team trophies because fat athletes are apparently few and far between. I see how much more kindly my thinner friends get treated pretty much everywhere we go, and it breaks my heart.

My husband is about half my weight. People constantly assume that he is only attracted to me because I’m fat and ask if he would stay with me if I ever lost a significant amount of weight. People genuinely believe that he must have a fat fetish (he doesn’t) because why else would anyone marry someone so much heavier? It shocks people when they find out that he is currently really helping me focus on losing weight and keeping it off, not only so we will have a better chance of conceiving in a few years, but so I can be more active with him. He can do any ride he wants at theme parks and water parks, but the only theme parks and water parks where I can consistently ride anything is Walt Disney World, which is, luckily, VERY size-inclusive.

We do feel a bit of pressure to figure out what to do about our anticipated struggle with infertility. I'm an only child; my parents were 41 and 39 when I was born. My mom has already had a few health scares. I feel more pressure to get myself in shape to boost our chances of conceiving sooner rather than later because I want my parents to have plenty of time with their grandchildren. My parents aren't pushing us to have kids at all yet — they want us to enjoy being married for a while (they had 12 years of marriage before they had me), but I still want to have kids while they're still active and going strong. My parents struggled with infertility and miscarriages for years before they had me, so I worry that my husband and I will struggle too because of my weight and medical history.

My parents are incredibly supportive. My in-laws are awesome, too. My husband and I do have a few friends nearby, and we have a slightly larger circle of long-distance friends to whom we can turn if we need someone to listen. However, as we get older, it's becoming harder and harder to make new friends and hold onto the ones we do have. I've also ditched quite a few people who I considered friends after learning they have deep-rooted homophobic, transphobic, sexist, or racist beliefs, and I didn't want to associate with people like that.

I am very lucky to have professional and caring co-workers and admin at work, but that is a rarity at many schools. I get no support from my extended family on my mom's side, but I've stopped letting that bother me. I'd rather feel genuine love from my in-laws and friends than try to force even basic respect and tolerance from people who have no desire to give it.

I think there are two things that have really shaped Gen Z that make us unique compared to older generations. First, think about how many school shootings or other instances of school violence there have been in our lifetimes. As a student, I remember doing lockdown drills multiple times a year, and now I do them with my students. It's traumatic! You’d think that after all the events that have happened, there would be some sort of meaningful change around gun control, but still, no. Secondly, the future is uncertain. We Gen Z’ers have been hearing all our lives how the economy is screwed, the environment is screwed, the government is screwed, and how we won’t be able to grow old, let alone retire. No wonder so many of us are miserable! We haven’t been prioritized at all. How can we expect to give our all to a world that hasn’t given much to us? What world will even be left for us in the coming years?

When older generations say, "The young people don't want to work," it's like, WHY DO YOU THINK THAT IS?!? First and foremost, very few jobs pay a livable wage that someone can stay at for decades. Even if you are lucky enough to have a job that pays you a livable wage, does that job take a toll on your health? Does that job give you solid benefits and time off? Is that job comfortable enough that you aren't miserable? Also, will your pay increase even as inflation and the cost of living increase? For a lot of our peers, the problem is that the pickings of jobs that will pay enough to afford just to live (and not even live extravagantly) that won't suck the life out of you are practically non-existent.

We want to have lives outside of work where we can see our family and friends regularly, occasionally treat ourselves to things that make us happy, and have enough money to provide for our children and pets. So many of us know that the odds of finding work that allows us to have a healthy work-life balance and allow us to live not only making ends meet but happily is very slim, so we’ve become hesitant to try. Why should we work ourselves to the bone for a job that would fire us in an instant and not care about us getting to live a happy life?

I find it so disheartening that the only reason I am not in debt and can afford to live such a wonderful life with my husband is that my grandfather worked in a lucrative field at the right time, had only one grandchild who he loved more than anything, and had enough financial literacy to set me up for success as an adult. Luck should not have had as much of a hand in my being as financially stable as it did, but that’s capitalism for you. Sometimes, I almost feel guilty that the cards fell in my favor so many times because I know that LOTS of people are nowhere near as lucky as I am. But that’s also what drives me to serve my students as best I can.

If you relate to this story, let me know why in the comments below! If you have a Gen Z Journal of your own to share, you can fill out this short form with just the basics. We'll be in touch to discuss it further if your story is a fit.

Note: This submission has been edited for length and/or clarity.

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