Moving Beyond Burnout

In today’s episode, I tell you about my experience with burnout. Through my story, I give you all my tips and tricks to avoid burnout and to move beyond it if you find yourself in one or how to help your friends who are experiencing burnout symptoms.

Today’s episode will be a little different. Instead of giving you a step-by-step guide I want to tell you my burnout story. I think it’s really important to share these stories to create awareness but it can also help somebody out who might not realise it’s time to slow down or it might help you see that a loved one needs help. For me, it was a big wake-up call and it has altered the course of my life quite a bit.

The diagnosis

So I’m going to kinda start in the middle of the story. I did not want to go to the doctor. I thought I was fine. It was normal to be tired and stressed from work. Climbing the career ladder comes at a price. There are so many people doing this. Working isn’t fun that’s just how it is. My boyfriend had been telling me for weeks that I should go to the doctor because he did not recognise me anymore, same for my best friend. I didn’t listen. Until the crying started. Around a week before I finally went to the doctor I was in a meeting and my boss made a rude comment. Nothing really bad he was just stressed. But I could not take it anymore. All the piled-up stress and fatigue came out and I started crying in the middle of that meeting, quite embarrassing to be honest. But after that, I kinda didn’t stop. For a week I. cried about having to go to work, I cried about any minor inconvenience And eventually, I cried about having to put groceries away when they got delivered. That’s when my boyfriend had enough and he just made the appointment for me. But at that time I knew he was right. I was exhausted. But going to the doctor I did not expect that I would end up being home for months.

The path to burnout

But you might be wondering how I got to that point. And it’s not a simple answer. Everybody assumed it was my job. And it was, but it was only the final drop. Yes, my job was highly demanding with a lot of overtime and stress and I always kinda felt out of place. So yes it pushed me over the edge for sure but that’s because I was already very burnt out, to begin with. The crash came after years of overworking myself. It started in my second year of university I think. That’s when I started working a lot more besides my studies. My dad opened up his restaurant and I helped him renovate the whole building as well as run the store afterwards. On top of that, I was very active in a couple of student organisations. but at that point everything was fine. I was tired but it was okay. The next year is where I started pushing boundaries. I. took a new job in a supermarket and I often had to get up at 4:30 in the morning to go to work multiple times a week. I worked around 20 hours per week on top of my studies. Don’t do that it’s a bad idea… That was also when I started paying for my own studies and stuff. The next year I realised that that job wasn’t a great idea and I switched to working in a coffee shop. I worked 20 hours weekends and 2-3 times during the week. Besides that, I started studying something different and I had a whole lot more classes. But I managed. It was a fun year. Then that summer I went overboard. I gave summer camps every week and still did my 20 hours every weekend at the coffee shop. I did this for a month. I was so sick by the end of this… It was so stupid but I wanted the money and I kinda needed it too. Then the second year of my new studies started and it was hell. I have never had so many classes and so many assignments in my life. On top of that, I had to work because I needed the money. I was drowning. and then Covid hit. For me, it was a saviour. I would have crashed if it wasn’t for covid. But Lockdown wasn’t recovery either. I had exams during that period and because my body had gotten addicted to stress I started working out way too much to compensate. I was still exhausted. I worked all summer again and was so tired by the end of it. You can start to see a pattern here of overworking myself for years and I continued for a while longer. In my last year of college, I gave my all to finish with honours while working a minimum of 30 hours a week. I made it and it was great but I should have taken I break after that but I didn’t I started to work right away. But that was actually okay. My job was pretty chill actually and for the first time in a while, I could allow down. But I did not like that job. So when I got another job offered to me without even applying for it. I immediately jumped on the opportunity and that’s where the crashing began. I was already tired before I started and the job was not for me. The pressure was too high, and I felt super out of place. had the idea that everybody was better than me and I had to catch up and prove that I was worthy, yadayadaya. You get the point. I ran myself into the ground for the approval of others and I hate myself for it. But then 2 of my friends had to move house in a short period of time and helping them took the last bit of life that I had left out of me and that’s how I ended up at the doctor.

The recovery

So before I get into the recovery I just want to give 2 disclaimers. First I had a mild case of burnout. Some people spend months in bed and can’t work for years. That's not my story, but it could have been if I would have pushed through which I would have done if my boyfriend did not stop me. The second disclaimer is that recovery is very personal I have a friend who suffers from burnout too and her symptoms are wildly different from mine.

For me, it started with sleeping problems, I could not sleep for weeks even though I was suuuper tired. Then it turned into sleeping way too much. I couldn’t handle any stress cooking with more than 2 pots on the stove was impossible. Hanging out with friends for too long would make me sick. and then there was the constant migraine. I had a headache 24/7 for 2 months going from mild to so bad I had to lie down. I am not telling because I want petty, I don’t but I do want to point out that burnout is serious and even a mild case can be really hard to deal with. I had panic attacks daily, sometimes even more than once a day. and I just felt like I could not breathe. And that is because of a job. Trust me when I say that no job is worth that, no matter the salary.

So recovery started with a month of resting. I read about 2-3 books per week so now I’m back on track with my reading goal for the year so that’s nice. Then I started therapy and it did not help me with recovery but I do believe it helped me shift my mindset a lot and that will help a lot with preventing burnout in the future. After resting came doing stuff to fill my days, slowly getting back into the gym, and trying to cultivate healthy habits. And today I feel like I’m ready to go back to work again.

What’s next

So what’s next for me? I actually quit my previous job this morning of my recordings. It’s extremely liberating. I know nothing good will come from going back there so I won’t. When my brain started functioning again it left me with a lot of time to think and I’ve wanted to work for myself for ages. So that’s what I’m going to do. I’m currently freelancing 2 days a week and the rest of the week I do this. I work on Studio-I. I have a passion for helping people and I believe that anybody deserves to live a life that truly makes them happy. So I created the Studio-membership where I coach you personally to your own dream life, I created the dream life workbook as a tool to coach yourself and if you don't want to spend any money you can also just follow on youtube, Instagram TikTok and of course you can follow the podcast too! I hope to take this little business full-time in a couple of months. So yeah we’ll see what the future holds.

Resources

I wanted to end this episode with some tips and some resources. I’m not an expert on burnout at all. Not even because I had one. But I will link some useful tools in the description and some tests where you can evaluate yourself. But if you really feel like you can’t give anymore, please go to a doctor 🥺. Some. tips if you see friends around you struggling: See if you can take some pressure off their shoulders. Make them food, clean their house ask if you can do anything to help. It really means a lot. and it really makes a difference. If they do end up at home, unable to work, support them. It’s an emotional process and it often feels like you failed. Make them feel valued. I know you mean well when you want to distract them with fun things but they may not have the energy to even get out of bed. Let them blob with you it really helps.

This episode was a little shorter I hope that’s okay. If you have any questions feel free to shoot me a message on Instagram or leave a comment if you are watching this on Youtube.

So yeah, that was it for this episode! Thank you so much for listening, if you enjoyed it please leave a nice review, it really does help a lot and if you are watching this on youtube, like comment and subscribe to see more.

See you soon! Toodaloo