Recognising burnout symptoms in oneself and management strategies for late diagnosed aitism

I think the first thing is it is different for everybody, as far as I can tell. It has happened to me 3 times, each of which took 6-12 months to recover from. Each was the culmination of years of stress. Each is accompanied with depression, obsessive analysis of the past, self blame, dark thoughts, reduced abilities - harder to talk, no desire to do anything, harder to pay bills, everything is put off including health concerns -,  generally have a quite negative view of things, hard to sleep more than a couple of hours at a time (was sleeping 3hrs a night in Jan this year on average), autistic traits become more pronounced.

It is hard to recognise I am in it. I still feel like me, still think logically for most things. 

I try to keep routines, so go to work but become less effective and talkative. I mask. Few notice and issue, but the I am mostly on my own. Work helps and hinders as there is food, drink, steady temp, more space, gets me out of the house, prevents too much isolation, gives me a purpose, but is also the source of a lot of the stress.

I have placed so much pressure on myself to succeed over work. I have finally stopped it. I am doing as much work, but the pressure has gone. 

I have anticipatory anxiety, which can be quite bad (sweating, cant sleep, flustered, knot in chest), with quite a crash afterwards as adrenaline goes. So routines help.

I've found one of my issues is due to stress, and blood tests showed quite dysregulated hormones, plus other stress related issues. Many things are now falling into place since I discovered all this stuff this year.

I have quite a few historical issues and have been on my own for a long time, which doesn't really help.

I think I have been overloaded almost all my adult life, so I guess I have mostly skirted this and sometime tip over the edge. I think drink does it. Not excessive amounts, but as a coping strategy it helps until it doesn't.

Anyway, it this sounds anything like what you have, then how do you get out of it? Reduce pressure, by self compassion, stop trying to keep up. Try to eat well, remain hydrated.

Try to talk to someone, which may be hard on them due to recursive thinking, i.e. constantly revisiting the same topic every day for months. So I have spent about 150 hrs talking to AI over the last 6 weeks which has really helped.

How to avoid it. Try to pay more attention to when stress is building, you can feel it but I always ignored it. Allow time to relax, the actively actually relax by music, art, reading, sleeping. Allow time to just daydream and process all the thoughts, don't push them away. Don't feel guilty about doing nothing, this is my biggest one. I didn't used to benefit for taking timeout because I felt so guilty. Try to use leave, I find it hard to add it disrupts routines and I have needed validation and to be seen.

Try to feel things, instead of think things. This is what I am now working on. This may be more than just ASD in my case.

Hope this helps.

I think the first thing is it is different for everybody, as far as I can tell. It has happened to me 3 times, each of which took 6-12 months to recover from. Each was the culmination of years of stress. Each is accompanied with depression, obsessive analysis of the past, self blame, dark thoughts, reduced abilities - harder to talk, no desire to do anything, harder to pay bills, everything is put off including health concerns -,  generally have a quite negative view of things, hard to sleep more than a couple of hours at a time (was sleeping 3hrs a night in Jan this year on average), autistic traits become more pronounced.

It is hard to recognise I am in it. I still feel like me, still think logically for most things. 

I try to keep routines, so go to work but become less effective and talkative. I mask. Few notice and issue, but the I am mostly on my own. Work helps and hinders as there is food, drink, steady temp, more space, gets me out of the house, prevents too much isolation, gives me a purpose, but is also the source of a lot of the stress.

I have placed so much pressure on myself to succeed over work. I have finally stopped it. I am doing as much work, but the pressure has gone. 

I have anticipatory anxiety, which can be quite bad (sweating, cant sleep, flustered, knot in chest), with quite a crash afterwards as adrenaline goes. So routines help.

I've found one of my issues is due to stress, and blood tests showed quite dysregulated hormones, plus other stress related issues. Many things are now falling into place since I discovered all this stuff this year.

I have quite a few historical issues and have been on my own for a long time, which doesn't really help.

I think I have been overloaded almost all my adult life, so I guess I have mostly skirted this and sometime tip over the edge. I think drink does it. Not excessive amounts, but as a coping strategy it helps until it doesn't.

Anyway, it this sounds anything like what you have, then how do you get out of it? Reduce pressure, by self compassion, stop trying to keep up. Try to eat well, remain hydrated.

Try to talk to someone, which may be hard on them due to recursive thinking, i.e. constantly revisiting the same topic every day for months. So I have spent about 150 hrs talking to AI over the last 6 weeks which has really helped.

How to avoid it. Try to pay more attention to when stress is building, you can feel it but I always ignored it. Allow time to relax, the actively actually relax by music, art, reading, sleeping. Allow time to just daydream and process all the thoughts, don't push them away. Don't feel guilty about doing nothing, this is my biggest one. I didn't used to benefit for taking timeout because I felt so guilty. Try to use leave, I find it hard to add it disrupts routines and I have needed validation and to be seen.

Try to feel things, instead of think things. This is what I am now working on. This may be more than just ASD in my case.

Hope this helps.

This is a really useful post. I can see so much of my own struggles in your words. I now think I am like you skirting the edge and falling in and out of burnout at times. However, I am exhausted by it all. Spoke to my GP and ended up with more medication. I must rattle when I walk due to all the meds I take!!

I do not know how to break the cycle, just try to keep my head above water so to speak.

Why oh why to we have to explain again and again to folks what autism means to us and still end up treated the same.

'Same as it ever was'