Ten Signs Of Burnout, And What To Do About It

We all experience stress from time to time, as I've already discussed on this blog.  But sometimes, that stress can turn into something more. Today, I'm going to look at burnout - what is it, what are the signs of it, and what can you do about it.

What is burnout?

Burnout is what happens when the body has been under a large amount of stress for a long time, and your ability to cope with that stress becomes compromised. It is a state of complete exhaustion - mental, physical and psychological. The term "burnout" was first coined in the 1970s, so it's been around for a while now - it isn't a clinical diagnosis in the same way that depression, or PTSD are, but it is a cluster of recognisable symptoms that can be really difficult to manage.

What are some of the symptoms of burnout?

• Feeling tired all the time - and not just tired, completely exhausted. Chronic stress, and lack of available resources to cope with it, is eventually going to force your body to take a break whether you like it or not. Making sure that you're constantly worn out is one way of trying to do just that.
• Increased irritation - people often get snappy or irritable with friends and family. Being worn down is hard, and dealing with the fall-out of repeated arguments with loved ones is even harder.
• Generally blunted emotions - where acute stress tends to sharpen everything and increase things like anxiety, burnout tends to blunt emotions to the point where everything feels grey and dull. This often comes hand in hand with less interest in activities - if you don't get the same sense of enjoyment from your hobbies that you used to, it becomes harder to motivate yourself to do them.
• Lack of motivation or less interest in everything - as I said above, if your emotions are dulled it's hard to motivate yourself, but having less interest in things is also a sign that you might have taken too much on. If everything feels overwhelming, it's hard to know where to start, and to feel enthusiastic and motivated when you know that you're going to have to juggle five things today rather than just work on two.
• Struggling to sleep - insomnia can be an early sign of burnout, and to me feels like one of the cruelest symptoms when combined with exhaustion. Insomnia makes exhaustion worse, of course, but then no matter how tired you are you still find yourself awake at 3am struggling to get back to sleep.
• Impaired concentration and memory - people that I work with who are heading towards burnout, or living with constant chronic stress, often tell me that they have been tested for dementia. They find it hard to believe that their difficulties with memory (think repeatedly boiling the kettle, or putting the car keys in the fridge, down to more serious things like forgetting to put the handbrake on in the car) and concentration (being unable to sit through a film or read a book) are not due to what they believe are more serious brain conditions. But burnout is serious, and difficulties with concentration and memory are there to prove that to us.
• Changes in appetite - usually people tell me that they struggle to eat, even if they know that they probably should. Sometimes it's the opposite. Either way, changes in appetite can lead to a whole host of other problems when you're experiencing burnout, and are part of the whole constellation of symptoms that lead to you not looking after yourself very well.
• Loss of sex drive - when you're chronically stressed, exhausted and close to burnout, you probably don't want to be thinking about sex. Enough said.
• Feeling detached from others - this can be a sign of depression, but also of burnout due to difficulties in motivavting yourself, as discussed above.
• Increase in self-critical thoughts or suicidal thoughts - when it gets really bad, and you're struggling with a lot of these symptoms, you can start to blame yourself. If you could just cope better, you wouldn't be feeling this way, right? Other people manage with what you're going through - you're just weak. When this happens, it can be a very small step from being negative about yourself to feeling as though other people would be better off if you weren't around. None of these things are true, but they are a reflection of how burned out you are feeling and a clear indicator that you need some help.

What can I do about it?

If you're struggling with some of the above symptoms, here are some things you can do to start to regain control:

• Recognise that it's not about you - it's really important to realise that it's not your fault that you feel this way. It's a symptom of operating at increased stress for a prolonged period of time, and possibly not taking steps to nip it in the bud as soon as possible. There is no point blaming yourself, and you're likely to feel even worse if you go down that road, so please don't.
• Take a break - this isn't really an optional step. If you keep going, you risk further exhaustion and burnout. Even just taking half an hour back from an otherwise busy day is a good start, although it's unlikely to be enough in the long term.
• Ask for help - when possible, it's always better to ask for help when you're struggling. This involves managing any thoughts you have about being weak, or a burden, and asking clearly and honestly for what you need other people to do in order to give you a chance to recover.
• Manage the symptoms you do have whilst looking at the bigger picture. Having a break from stress will help to calm your stress system down, but you might also need to target some of the other symptoms you are getting more specifically. For example, take a look at my tips for getting better sleep if you're struggling with insomnia, or see a therapist if you're struggling with suicidal thoughts.
• Practice relaxation techniques - cultivating a relaxation practice is really helpful, although when you're in the grip of burnout it can feel a little bit like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic! Try to build this up slowly so that you don't get overwhelmed - five minutes a day is plenty at first - and don't expect to see dramatic changes overnight.
• Be more sociable - it's the absolute last thing you probably feel like doing, but it probably gives you a break from the things that have caused you to feel burned out and lets you speak to your friends honestly about how you're feeling.
• Do some detective work - when you start to feel a little better, it's important to sit down and think about how you got into this situation. This helps with thinking clearly about what your next steps might be, and will also help you to avoid getting into the same situation again - for example, if you know that one of your first signs of burnout is waking up at 3am, when this happens again you can stop and think about why, and take steps to remedy it before it gets any worse. Prevention is much easier than cure, after all.

​Do you have any tips on managing burnout? Let me know in the comments.