Am I Experiencing Burnout?

How to Recognize it and Recover

Burnout doesn’t always look like a big emotional breakdown.

Sometimes it looks like being really good at your job — until you’re not.

Burnout isn’t usually as visible as, say, a “nervous breakdown.” It can be much more discreet with subtle hints of it showing up in your life in different ways, like a repetitive voice in your head, or an image that keeps flashing in your mind.

I used to see myself collapsing.

Defining Burnout

According to the World Health Organization: Burnout is a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed. It is characterized by three dimensions:

• Feelings of energy depletion or exhaustion.

• Increased mental distance from one’s job, or feelings of negativism or cynicism related to one's job.

• Reduced professional efficacy.

Burnout refers specifically to phenomena in the occupational context and should not be applied to describe experiences in other areas of life.

What Burnout Looked Like for Me

I experienced what WebMD calls, Overload Burnout. This happens when you work harder and harder, becoming frantic in your pursuit of success. If you experience this, you may be willing to risk your health and personal life to feel successful.

I put my job before everything else, including eating, sleeping, drinking water, my family, my friends, my finances, and my mental health. If there was something that needed to be done for work, I was going to do it, at all costs. 

I coped in many different but mostly dissociative ways, whether it was through TV, social media, drinking and smoking, junk food, sex, or even picking fights. As a result my health suffered, and I struggled with things I wasn’t even aware of because I was so out of touch with myself. 

Burnout — for me — felt like drowning, which should have been frightening. But all I felt was apathy. Whatever I suffered for, the “success,” felt worthy of my sacrifice  — or so I thought at the time. 

Signs I Ignored

Some other signs for me that I was experiencing burnout:

• I took everything personally — “If people knew how hard I was trying and how much I was suffering, surely they wouldn’t keep expecting things from me,” including just my time or attention — so the fact that people did was shocking and upsetting to me. Simple questions like — “Can you help me with something? “What are you doing?” “Do you want to make plans soon?” — literally felt like an assault. 

• I couldn’t take care of myself — I got up and showered most days, got dressed for work, ate some food every day, and I eventually got in bed, but usually my days looked like this: 1 or 2 non-nutrient dense meals, sitting at a desk mixed with occasional walks around the property I managed, coffee, cigarettes or vapes, and either tequila or wine — sometimes in place of dinner. 

• My relationships suffered — The only people I spent real time with during those years were my coworkers and anyone who wanted to drink with me. I didn’t get to see my friends that I didn’t work with very often, I missed holidays and birthdays and family events, and I didn’t even try to start a relationship, I just had a handful of unhealthy situationships. My days off were spent on the couch watching TV and ordering food, even if it was just a block away so I wouldn’t have to get dressed or leave the house – unless it was to do something ‘fun,’ like drink with my coworkers. 

• I had nothing left to give — I became apathetic to a lot: if it didn’t have to do with work, it didn’t matter. And eventually that bled over into work. I just couldn’t care about certain things anymore.

• I felt hopeless — I didn’t know if things would ever change and I sort of accepted it.

What Helped

After about two years of experiencing this to the severity I’ve described above, I sought professional help, and over the next few years working with a therapist and finding the right doctors, I was able to recover. But it was not a quick fix. Here’s what helped:

• Therapy — For many reasons therapy was helpful, but specifically in this situation, my therapist suggested that I start noticing what things replenish me and what things deplete me; this was the start of making necessary changes.

• Quitting my job — This may not be necessary for everyone, but it was for me. I was able to take a full year off. If I’m honest, I would have appreciated even more time, but I am so grateful I was able to take as much time as I did. I had to make some major changes to accommodate this decision, including staying with family, and specifically in my mom’s living room for almost 8 months of that year because I couldn’t afford it otherwise. 

• Prioritizing sleep — This may seem obvious, and it is, but it’s not easy. There are so many factors that affect our sleep quality. Making sure I got enough of the good kind took intentionality.

• Prioritizing my health WITHOUT creating a huge to-do list — This was important for me because if prioritizing my health became an endless to-do list, my burnout recovery wouldn’t be successful. I had to focus on the simple things, like eating breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and drinking water. 

• Taking a break from drinking and smoking — Another obvious one that wasn’t difficult per se because I knew I had to and wanted to, but was challenging in terms of learning to live a life without it being a priority. 

• Exploring my relationships — I ended my situationships as well as certain friendships, and set boundaries with those I wanted to continue to cultivate. This process probably took longer than the rest, as it wasn’t always clear to me what was healthy and what wasn’t. 

• Taking walks — I hadn’t moved my body intentionally for a long time, and I needed to just start small, and get outside. Sometimes I listened to podcasts which helped to motivate me to go, and other times I just took in the views, or called a friend or family member to catch up. I tried getting into yoga and doing some hiking which I enjoyed, but some days even that was too much for me.

• I eased back in — My first job after this was short-lived but I did my best to stick to my working hours, and leave work at work. This was hard for me, but I also had support when I struggled with enforcing boundaries, and I made clear what my priorities were for myself from day one. No one in that office was surprised when I left at 6pm on the dot.  

I recognize that healing looks different for everyone — what’s accessible, affordable, or realistic will vary. But both rest and support, in whatever form you can find it, matter. 

How Our Work Culture Contributes

It wasn’t just my own self-serving need for success, and inability to balance my life with my workload that led to my burnout. It was also a result of the environment I was working in. The Mayo Clinic shared a comprehensive list of what often contributes to burnout in the workplace, and having experienced most of the items on the list I think it’s important to ask yourself if you might be experiencing any of the following in your workplace:

• Lack of control. 

• Lack of clarity about what's expected of you. 

• Conflicts with others. 

• Too much or too little to do.

• Lack of support.

• Problems with work-life balance. 

How Do You Know if You’re Experiencing Burnout?

I don’t see the collapsing girl anymore — except on rare occasions when I’ve overdone it — and if I do, instead of ignoring or dismissing her, I remember why she’s there, which is to remind me of what is important. 

If you’re having similar experiences and wondering if it’s burnout, here’s some helpful tips from Psychology Today on how to distinguish burnout from stress or depression, as well as a quick self-test you can try:

• Stress and Burnout — Under stress, you still struggle to cope with pressures. But once burnout takes hold, you’re out of gas and you’ve given up all hope of surmounting your obstacles.

• Depression and Burnout — Relative to depression, burnout tends to be more specific to a situation or context, such as a work setting.

• Burnout Self Test — This test can help you determine if you’re showing signs of burnout.

If you’re seeing signs of burnout in your life, please take them seriously — your body is talking to you. Burnout can be extremely difficult to experience, but it is highly possible to recover from. 

In all honesty, it took me a few years to fully recover from burnout. Recovery takes time and support, so I suggest reaching out to people you trust to figure out what that support looks like and where you can pull back on the areas in your life affecting you in this way. You’re not alone, and you don’t have to fix it all at once. Start by noticing. Start by finding rest. 

For more information, check out these books and podcasts that explore burnout:

Recommended Books:

• The Burnout Generation by Anne Helen Petersen

• Can’t Even: How Millennials Became the Burnout Generation by Anne Helen Petersen

• Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle by Emily Nagoski & Amelia Nagoski

• Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto by Tricia Hersey (of The Nap Ministry)

• Emotional Agility by Susan David

Recommended Podcasts:

• We Can Do Hard Things with Glennon Doyle – Episodes on burnout & how to complete the stress cycle with the Nagoski sisters.

• Unlocking Us with Brené Brown – Episodes on stress, boundaries, and workplace culture.

• The Happiness Lab with Dr. Laurie Santos – Multiple episodes on workplace stress and resilience.

• The Nap Ministry on Instagram & Podcast – Insightful reflections on the value of rest, particularly for those in marginalized communities.

Whatever your version of the ‘collapsing girl’ is, don’t ignore her — she’s trying to tell you something.

Are you going to listen?

Disclaimer: This blog is not meant as professional advice or counseling. If you are in emotional distress or experiencing thoughts of harm to yourself or others, help is available 24/7:

• If in crisis, call 988

• Text HELLO to 741741 to connect with a Crisis Text Line counselor

• Call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline:

  • 1–800–273–8255 (TALK) Spanish & English

  • Deaf & Hard of Hearing TTY 800–799–4889

• Call 911

• If you need mental health treatment but cannot afford it, contact Rise Above The Disorder, a 501(c)(3) non-profit dedicated to making mental health care accessible to everyone: YouAreRAD.org