Exploring Burnout – the challenges of acknowledging it, reflections on where to start and what can help

 

I’m writing this from a personal perspective, where I’ve had to manage a period of burnout following challenging life events.

It was a slowish, steady journey of moving towards a place where the light shone through for me again.
I became my own Occupational Therapist & Mindfulness Practitioner for a time, a holistic therapy for mental health, emotional and physical wellbeing.
It was key for me to start by embracing the importance of validation - of actually recognising my signs of burnout and symptoms for what they were.

 

A bit about my experience of burnout

When our lives turned upside down following a sudden family bereavement, I’d initially held a tenuous belief & hope that I’d be able to manage it all - that I’d somehow be able to support my grieving teenagers, deal with my own complex grief reaction, manage my recent new work role, look after my wellbeing as best I could, manage the range of other demands that were already beginning to feel overwhelming….

I went straight into my default mode of ‘pushing through’, a ‘doing’ mode of getting on with what needed to be done, and feeling I didn’t really have a choice.

It all came so natural to me, to just get on with whatever life threw at me, being a single parent and ‘warrior’ woman for many years up to this point.
I’d been forever juggling family life alongside ongoing personal stressors, a family member’s deteriorating health with each passing year, demanding work roles, trying to keep my passion alive through studying & life-long learning, managing my wellbeing as best I could through practicing mindfulness and building in coping strategies for mental health wellness, dealing with the range of life’s demands….

 

It was only a matter of weeks when my body had the final word over my busy, ‘doing mode’ of mind and default pattern of coping, and I had no option but to take time off work.
Signs in my body had obviously been building up but I’d kind of ‘managed’ it through ‘my toolbox’ of wellbeing strategies, mindfulness practices and stress relief exercises.
Following a second full weekend of migraines alongside an insidious mental & emotional exhaustion, symptoms of brain fog, feeling anxious, feelings of overwhelm, I was faced with the stark reality that I just couldn’t go on like this……the stark reality that my priority had to be the wellbeing of my family, along with my own wellbeing…..

My body had made the decision for me, it had effectively ‘crashed’ and I had no choice but to take time off work.

And yet, it was only when a respected colleague stated I was in burnout that I really felt able to ‘allow’ myself to stop and take this much-needed time off work for my teenage family, and for me…..
It was these valuable words that gave me the validation I needed to look after my health and wellbeing, and that something was ‘desperately off’.

 

Let’s talk a bit about why burnout can be so ‘invisible’ to us

As in the point I made above, it was actually the validation from someone else that made me realise I was in full burnout mode…..why is it so hard for us to realise for ourselves?
It feels like there’s a sense of normality in pushing ourselves to the limit and maybe a sense of ‘winging’ it, not realising how close we could be to falling under and maybe having to stop:

We’re not really encouraged to slow down by society, almost like there’s a ‘badge of honour’ we wear amongst family and friends as to who’s the busiest, who’s juggling the most.

There’s a tendency for some of us to be over-doers or perfectionists and we can put pressure on ourselves, we can feel pressure from others, whether at home or at work, and there’s a pressure that society puts on us as a whole, to be busy and productive.
We’re so used to pushing through our day, our endless ‘to do lists’, always being available wherever we are, via our mobiles, maybe an expectation that we’re always contactable.

We can judge ourselves for being lazy if we take time out to rest, which is so needed to balance out our daily activity. Maybe we don’t even know what proper rest is because our minds are still busy from the day if we ‘collapse’ in front of the sofa in the evenings, or maybe we’re multi-tasking and scrolling through our phones whilst we’re watching tv….we all do it!

Carrying on this theme, and one that’s close to my heart – so many people I’ve worked with say they just don’t know how to relax, their minds always busy and body always feeling stressed.
Relaxation is when our mind and body are at rest, at peace – such a restorative activity to restore balance in our busy lives….but so hard to do when we’re maybe ‘wired’ in our mind and body most of the time.

We can also feel like we’re being selfish if we take time out for ourselves when we have children, family, other people that are relying on us, so continuing to push through as we don’t feel we have a choice.

Maybe we don’t feel able to take time off work because it will impact on others there, or we have unsupportive colleagues, or maybe it’s the thought of the work all just piling up if we do take time off…and maybe, actually we’re ok to push through for a bit more, we’ll just rest when we take our holiday…

So……we feel that we have to keep on going….maybe we crash in the evenings, maybe we crash on the weekends…..ready to recharge for the next bout of ‘doing, doing & more doing’…..

It’s hard on our bodies but we can tend to normalise it, aches, pains and tension in our body becoming part of the everyday….an everyday feeling of being drained and rundown…..maybe everyone else feels the same….does that make it ok?

 

As I’ve described above, there’s a range of potential behaviours, patterns, mindsets, expectations that can contribute to an ‘invisibility’ that burnout has for us as individuals, a sense of normality attributed to this frenetic world we live in…

 

So, what happened when I actually had to ‘stop’?

When I actually had to ‘stop’…..when I actually had to put the brakes on…..when I essentially became my own Mindful Occupational Therapy practitioner…..it gave me some time to reflect on what had led up to this…..essentially the foundations for how I could begin to make changes over time…

I realised how much I’d been pushing through for years, ‘ignoring’ the signs my body had been giving me to such an extent, having the odd ‘total crash’ evenings to recharge, sometimes full weekends…It was a realisation that a ‘functioning burnout’ had been lurking in the background for a while.

Becoming my own therapist and practitioner, I began the process of validating where I was at, in the context of the likely burnout that had been building up:

-so really validating the immense emotional journey we were all on and the exhaustion that came with grief and sadness….it was about being kind to ourselves and each other

-and just through bringing awareness to all the residual burnout symptoms I was experiencing – a range of physical, mental, cognitive, emotional and sensory challenges – making everything so hard to get going some days. Just validating what I was going through, just the simple act of bringing some understanding and care to myself was so helpful in the process of starting over….

It wasn’t easy to do mind, but I tried, with gentle patience when I noticed myself becoming frustrated with my total lack of ‘mojo’.

Not surprisingly, my reflections also touched on why I hadn’t previously asked for help when I could feel things were becoming overwhelming for me and I reflected on the fact that it’s just not something I do……it would be interesting to explore at some point whether that’s a more common approach for single parents? Just a thought….

It was also hard to reflect on the unrelenting work environments I’ve often worked in, the lack of breaks taken, the ongoing stress of never feeling you’re doing enough, the challenging environments that don’t really support your wellbeing, often only paying a certain degree of lip-service to wellbeing concerns.

And let’s not forget the ‘pushing through’ mindset I had to get all my demands done, I call it a kind of being in 5^th gear…and the sense of frustration I could feel if I couldn’t stay in 5^th gear, the tightness in my chest when I started to feel overloaded, increased tension in my jaw or shoulders when I hadn’t stopped for a break anytime soon…….

I’m now ‘owning’ the fact I didn’t listen to my body, I’m validating the experiences I’ve had and see it as an insightful new beginning.
It’s been a new way of relating to my body and my mind, supporting a greater understanding of how I engaged in my life, supporting an understanding of what helped, what didn’t help so much, what I could do more of, what I could maybe look to make changes in…..

Whilst I’ve always considered myself experienced & knowledgeable from a long career working in the areas of mental health, chronic stress, fatigue and pain, I’m also reflecting on the importance of this additional layer of my own ‘lived experience’, of having to really get to know myself all over again, of building on what helped me to move towards the light at that stage of my life…
It’s this important period of burnout in my life that has also helped me to really ‘own’ what I do, and to feel authentic in what I deliver to others, which is such an important value for me.

 

What helped me move towards the light again?

I basically became a good friend to myself and my own Occupational Therapist & Mindfulness Practitioner through the coming months…..helping me on a slowish, steady path towards the light….

Underpinning everything though was really getting to know myself again, beginning to understand myself.
It was so much easier once I’d stopped and re-connected with myself in this way- understanding more about my patterns of behaviour, of thinking, my helpful habits, my more unhelpful habits….and reminding myself of all those unhelpful habits I could so easily fall back into, not kidding myself anymore, being truthful with myself. It helped so much in my next steps.

Just being able to bring awareness to thoughts or judgements that I ‘should’ or ‘could’ be doing more, and then bringing awareness to how much I was still struggling on some days – whether mentally, physically or emotionally – it just helped in easing off on myself, just helped to show a bit of kindness to me, a bit like the sort of kindness and care we might show to a child who’s poorly, a good friend or a family member

This wasn’t always easy to do of course, and it isn’t easy when we’re so used to pushing through, but like making things a habit, we can learn to practice this new way of being with ourselves over & over and maybe even, over & over again to support ourselves.
Bringing awareness to old habits became those helpful reminders of how powerful the pull of my default ‘doing’ busy mode had been in the past and a gentle reminder of it’s role in my slow-burning burnout over time…….

 

So followed a process of gentle care and kindness to myself, a slowish, steady path interweaving mindful self-compassion into and throughout my day.
It all helped to support a validation of my need for rest, a validation of why I found it so hard to relax, a validation of strong emotions like overwhelm, sadness, frustration …..and yes, validating how much I missed my lack of ‘mojo’….

With time passing, I began to creatively pace my days, building in a gentle rhythm of meaningful activity over time. It involved adapting and re-calibrating whenever a space opened up, sometimes starting over again if things changed.

It’s all helped towards re-building my own life, alongside my family’s, to start a new chapter in my life:
-gently re-connecting with my body
-easing sensory overload
-building on my energy levels
-building up my concentration levels
-building on stress relief exercises

I’m also thankful for the role that mindful self-compassion played in supporting me to gently ‘hold’ this awareness & understanding of myself, supporting a re-building of my mindfulness practices, enhancing my mindful living for mental health and emotional wellbeing, stepping out of autopilot towards living more consciously and present.

 

What else can be helpful?

Everyone’s experiences of burnout are different, but essentially, it’s our body’s way of telling us we’re in a state of exhaustion – mentally, physically and/or emotionally. Some of us can keep on going in this ‘survival’ mode of living for a long time, so it can really take its toll if or when we do end up ‘crashing’.

Managing burnout symptoms can be supported through the following types of programmes I offer:

-Lifestyle Management, including pacing, energy conservation, energy management

-Supporting Behavioural Change

-Building in Helpful Habits and Making Changes

-Personalised Mindfulness Programmes

-Supportive Self-Management Programmes

Having a ‘toolbox’ of practices and strategies can also be helpful to build in to our lives, adapting them according to what we need at different times, or managing different symptoms we might be experiencing.

This can include:

-building in Mindful Therapy techniques, concepts & practices

-Mindfulness Meditation for managing pain, fatigue, stress, mental wellbeing

-Emotional Regulation techniques & practices for mental & emotional wellbeing

 

Interested further?

If any of my story has resonated with you and you want to explore areas for further support, please feel free to reach out.

My clinical expertise is in supporting people to live more fully alongside health challenges of fatigue, pain, chronic stress and mental health needs.

I’m thankful my own experience has given me a special insight and awareness towards understanding more about myself and also support me towards living more fully after challenging life events.
I’m also grateful this can serve to benefit my professional practice and my own sense of authenticity as a therapeutic practitioner.  
 

You can contact me via email natalie@mindfulotpractice.com  and arrange a 30mins (free) online consultation to chat further.
All my appointments are online/telehealth appointments for your convenience.

 

Warmest wishes

 

Natalie