Recovering From Burnout

LegacyUser

Basically, this story is probably pretty familiar to people, it's certainly not uncommon or an isolated incident.

Last year, I took on far too much work. Some of it came my way accidentally, some voluntarily.

Perhaps predictably, the outcome of this was burnout. All the symptoms were there - feeling "snowed under", decreased interest in doing things outside my field, feeling like I just wanted to get things I had to do over and done with - decreased interest in doing the job well, withdrawing from people etc.

It took me a while to realise what had happened to me, but happily I am free of one bit of work I had to do last year. I still have to do things (academic) however. I am wondering how people recover from burnout? Is there any way to sort of re-engender interest in something that burned me out before, and to get back to a reasonably enjoyable existence?

mikewest

Very, very difficult to recover from burnout in the same situation that burned you out. You need a change away from the source of the burnout, be it a different role in your current place of work or a different job altogether.

Wompa1

recoveryfromburnout wrote: »

Basically, this story is probably pretty familiar to people, it's certainly not uncommon or an isolated incident.

Last year, I took on far too much work. Some of it came my way accidentally, some voluntarily.

Perhaps predictably, the outcome of this was burnout. All the symptoms were there - feeling "snowed under", decreased interest in doing things outside my field, feeling like I just wanted to get things I had to do over and done with - decreased interest in doing the job well, withdrawing from people etc.

It took me a while to realise what had happened to me, but happily I am free of one bit of work I had to do last year. I still have to do things (academic) however. I am wondering how people recover from burnout? Is there any way to sort of re-engender interest in something that burned me out before, and to get back to a reasonably enjoyable existence?

It's tough. I recently reached a burn out. It's very tough, It got to a point in which it physically manifested itself. I started getting whats called vascular migraines when at work which pretty much made me lose my sight. The real kicker now though is the company nurse has told my boss who is now trying to molly cuddle me so much that he comes to my desk and tells me to go home at the end of my hours. But theres no help to get the work done so I'm just busier in the hours I do have work...

Also I've noticed after working constantly for so long I no longer have anything to occupy my time outside of work, so I'm really bored when I get home....Oh well better that then getting Migraines!

pwd

I think being strict about separating work and leisure helps this sort of thing. Academic work is often very unstructured by its nature, which seems to in some people getting stuck thinking about it in a kind of first or second gear all the time. Focusing on it fully for a working day and then putting it out of your mind works a lot better.