I used to think it was possibly to work 60 hour weeks just because I loved what I was doing. When I was shipping Assassin's Creed 2 and being both the team lead

I used to think it was possibly to work 60 hour weeks just because I loved what I was doing. When I was shipping Assassin's Creed 2 and being both the team lead and main programmer on the combat system, I worked sustained 60 hour weeks for somewhere in the range of six months. Just before shipping, I realized I was making so many ridiculously obvious mistakes that I requested someone shadow all my code commits. And then when the project was done? I was burned out so bad I would have panic attacks if I even saw code. It was nearly three months before I could program again. Just because you love it doesn't mean you will avoid burn out and other downsides to sustained long work days.