Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi all,
It's over a year now since I suffered a major burnout leading to long term sick, and since I've returned to work I've been taking care of myself by not travelling and really carefully managing my sensory environment & keeping away from hubbub (lots of conversations etc.). My self care has worked really well, and I've feel that I've discovered "normal, healthy" levels of stress for the first time in my working life (healthy levels of stress for *me*, at least).
Now that I'm looking like I've recovered from burnout and I'm starting performing at 95% again, I can feel myself coming under pressure to start attending meetings in person again and travelling again. Before my burnout I was flying into Europe alone maybe every month and just feeling important rather than stressed. Now I'm very wary about returning to what everyone else will see as normal.
I don't know what I'm asking others here for - maybe just sympathy & to tell me that yes, I need to look after myself and not put myself under pressure.
By the way, one of the things I'm *really* mindful of is giving an inch and being expected to do a mile.............
I used to be a complete model employee. Always on time, hard working, honest,no slacking. I became more and more tired and ended up having no energy whatsoever. Before that I also started to get ill every 4-6 weeks. Then when I was unemployed and had to find a new job, I got panic attacks. In my last job which was a temp job, I had to go to the ladies room and cry because I was so exhausted.
Long story short, I went to my doctor and asked if I had work-phobia? I explained why and was send for therapy. The therapy did nothing at all and my last sentence on the feedback was that I still worry because of the incredible tiredness at work.
I was then diagnosed with CFS [Chronic Fatigue Syndrome]. It made sense and I thought I had found what was wrong with me. I haven't been able to work since as every little bit of stress or actual physical work makes me so very tired.
However since being pre-diagnosed with High Functioning Autism, I wonder if these two things are related. I just can't take stress at all. I used to fall ill right after deadlines with flu like symptoms.
What if I burned myself out by trying to do too much at work. By trying to be too good at work. I worked for a few decades as I was only diagnosed recently at 50.
Is there a known link between CFS and Autism? Maybe we take things too literal and stress ourselves far more than others, which could lead to the burn-out or 'Yuppie flu' as it was known in the 80s. I know I couldn't handle many work environments any more nowadays.
I was a model employee and I was really happy and proud to be one. Even through nobody a work noticed. Always on time, reading work emails during my lunch break, working hard. I’m still trying to be a model employee, it’s hard to relax and let go. Even through everything starts crumbling around me. I’m tired, I try to do everything and start making silly mistakes and forgetting things. I stopped talking to my coworkers completely. I think they might avoid me, nobody talks to me anymore. Every day I come home exhausted and just sit on the sofa, not doing anything, because I’m too tired to do anything. Even too tired to watch TV with my husband. I go to to bed early but I don’t wake up full of energy. I wake up tired and unmotivated. I still like my job. I don’t want to change it. I don’t have enough energy to change it. I use my weekends to recover but two days is not enough time to recover. My husband told me to call in sick and stay home for few days but I’m somehow unable to make that decision, unable to call in sick when I’m not sick. Unable to stop, even through probably I should stop.
Aurora said:I was a model employee and I was really happy and proud to be one. Even through nobody a work noticed. Always on time, reading work emails during my lunch break, working hard. I’m still trying to be a model employee, it’s hard to relax and let go. Even through everything starts crumbling around me. I’m tired, I try to do everything and start making silly mistakes and forgetting things. I stopped talking to my coworkers completely. I think they might avoid me, nobody talks to me anymore. Every day I come home exhausted and just sit on the sofa, not doing anything, because I’m too tired to do anything. Even too tired to watch TV with my husband. I go to to bed early but I don’t wake up full of energy. I wake up tired and unmotivated. I still like my job. I don’t want to change it. I don’t have enough energy to change it. I use my weekends to recover but two days is not enough time to recover. My husband told me to call in sick and stay home for few days but I’m somehow unable to make that decision, unable to call in sick when I’m not sick. Unable to stop, even through probably I should stop.
You have pretty much summed up my life at the moment. The same as you I am constantly exhausted and I am also suffering other health problems as well - that might even be linked.
Like you, I can't let go and just switch off. Everything that needs to be done, fixed, solved, achieved is constantly buzzing round my head and not in a stressing about a deadline sort of way, just that it needs to be done and until it is done and it's perfect, then I cannot rest. So the result is I never rest and I know that the above is unrealistic to achieve, but how do you back-off and not make your work suffer?
The other side of this is I realise I have no life outside of work. My interests, hobbies and keeping fit have all been pushed to one side, because I feel too tired or ill to do anything else. Then there is the guilt when you do try to do something for yourself, that you could be doing work instead and getting on top of things. I realise all of this isn't healthy, but how do you change and still do a good job?
Exactly, that's exactly how I feel about my job.
I could have written so much of that. It's almost like going through the days in a kind of hypnosis - like you're a robot. You do what you have to... and then you pull the plug and shut down. Your life is in your hands... and yet it isn't. You just go through the motions.