Week 34. For those who don't track: that's about eight months.
I'm not writing this for advice. I've read all the posts. I know the system is broken. I know rejection isn't personal. I know I should take breaks and do things I enjoy and treat it like a job. I've done all of that.
I'm writing it because I want someone to say: yeah, this part is actually really hard. Not "it'll get better" (probably true). Not "here's what you're doing wrong" (not useful right now). Just: this is genuinely one of the harder things a person can go through.
Because here's what nobody mentions. It's not just the rejections. It's the erosion. The slow grinding down of the sense that you're a competent, valuable person. Eight months of "we went with someone else" or "we've paused the role" or just silence, and something starts to shift in how you see yourself.
I was a senior IC with 14 years of experience. I know objectively I'm good at what I do. I have references. I have offers on my old terms as proof. And I still catch myself wondering if I'm broken.
The things that have genuinely helped: setting a daily ceiling on application activity. not a floor. a ceiling. "no more than 2 hours today." telling one or two people in real life what's actually happening, not the polished "exploring opportunities" version noticing small wins. made it to final round. got a callback on a cold outreach. these matter more than I let them exercise, but not as "self-improvement" productivity. just movement. just existing in a body
If you're in week 8 or week 20 and reading this at midnight wondering if something is wrong with you: probably nothing is wrong with you. The market is bad and the process is dehumanizing and you're allowed to feel awful about it.