Burnout: managing not fixing ❤️‍🔥

Further thoughts from the messy middle of burnout

Selfie of me on a recent sunny day sitting next to the river. I’m wearing sunglasses and smiling at the viewer. (Didn’t spot any kingfishers this time!)

Hello you,

Here I am again writing to you from my desk (aka under my duvet). How have you been this past couple of weeks?

I recently shared some half-formed thoughts about burnout and, well, thank you.

It’s safe to say I’m not alone! Many of us are in the messy middle and I truly appreciate the honest, moving and vulnerable comments folks shared.

You can read it here:

Is it burnout?

A few people kindly shared that they appreciated me sharing from this muddy middle place. So here are some more fragments.

Shifting my mindset from fixing to managing

Historically, I’ve treated periods of fatigue/ burnout as something to ‘fix’. Random blips which I could push through or wait out until I was ‘better’ again.

I’ve finally acknowledged that these blips were, in fact, all connected.

In the past I’ve been completely shocked and frustrated when they arrived ‘out of the blue’ (if I’d been paying attention I would have seem them coming a mile off).

And I’ve always experienced something akin to a euphoric high when my capacity returned. I’d falsely believe that; “this time I’m fully fixed! Wahey!”

I would convince myself that the energised me was ‘actual’ me. Positive, productive, peppy, present. And that tired version of me was just a glitch.

In doing so I was basically rejecting myself. Valuing and identifying with the ‘good days’ Janelle. And feeling ashamed of the low capacity Janelle, doing my best to forget it had all happened and move on.

That’s why I’m quite proud that when I did my return to work interview recently, I didn’t say that I was ‘all better’. I approached it more around how we would manage and support my undulating energy levels.

My ‘ebb and flow’ as I now sometimes think of it, is not something I can ever fix or get rid of. This is how I am. And I want to work on accepting my whole self - not just the bits I prefer or are more culturally and socially valued.

“In order to heal, we need to be able to hold all of who we are in one whole image that embraces a widely diverse set of characteristics. That means no longer overfocusing on just our challenges or only our strengths. Each of us is a complex human being.” - p.90 A Radical Guide for Women with ADHD - Sari Solden & Michelle Frank

An orangey glowing sunset sky with the Harrogate skyline taken recently

Taking time for pride and recognition

Holy shit. This is pretty big stuff isn’t it? Sometimes it’s when you write stuff out that you actually recognise the progress.

This seems an apt time to mention self recognition and pride.

In the mess of being unwell, exhausted and ashamed, thinking about how well you’re doing can feel alien.

But when I reflect, I really have come so far with this. There are so many past instances I can recall where I’d just be in a pit of frustration and self-shaming. Utterly baffled as to why I couldn’t do all the things I wanted and needed to do.

I didn’t even have the language to articulate what I was experiencing. I had no frame of reference. I just felt shit, like a failure and like it was my fault.

Now I’m approaching it so differently. Even accepting that I’m allowed to take time off work sick is a big change. Being more honest and open with myself and others is a big change. Writing these sentences right now is big change!

This is a different kind of progress and achievement to what productivity culture teaches us.

I’ve won the support network lottery

All of this is in the context of having the most incredible support network - I feel incredibly fortunate and privileged. I have a wonderfully loving, understanding and practical partner who supports me in so many ways.

I’m so fortunate to work for an organisation that, I feel, genuinely cares about us. This includes funding talking therapy sessions which I’ve maxed out for the past several years and have continued to self fund. It also includes training sessions on topics like avoiding vicarious trauma, showing up for trans folks 🏳️‍⚧️💗 and an in-depth dive on perimenopause and menopause.

I have family, friends and chosen family with whom I can be my real self with. (And even then I’ve had to work on that and gradually open up).

I also count writers, artists and teachers among this incredible wider community.

It’s all part of the tapestry that contributes to being able to see ourselves, see the stories we inherit and embody and show ourselves and others compassion.

Dreaming about how I can work with my energy not against it

Whilst I was away from the workplace for a little while and started to recuperate, I found I had space to daydream.

I found myself imagining what life could look like. How might I continue to set up a life that works with my natural rhythms vs how I’m ‘supposed’ to be.

How could I live and work differently? How could I lean into my ebbs and flows rather than always pushing to be consistent?

A beloved friend recently told me she tells others about me in a positive way. She so admires that I’m building a life that I want and that works for me. I struggled to fully take the compliment but I wasn’t sure why.

Then I read this.

“You see, women with ADHD are not nonconformists out of choice; rather we have little choice but to deviate from typical roles and social norms due to our brain-based differences.” p.90 A Radical Guide for Women with ADHD - Sari Solden & Michelle Frank

Bingo! I’ve made changes to my life because I couldn’t really cope with the alternative. I've also been able to do so due to a lot of privileges e.g. I don’t work full time because my partner and his much higher income financially supports us both. It’s also true that I basically crumble if I try to keep up with full time work.

I’m slowly and gradually starting to think of other routes and giving myself permission to even dream about non-traditional ways of doing things.

I am allowed.

We are allowed.

Some resources (that I can remember at this moment in time - there are way more!)

The Nap Ministry's Rest Deck with a card that reads "I will wrap rest and care around myself like a warm blanket today." And a picture of the book Women who Work Too Much by Tamu Thomas

• Book: A Radical Guide for Women with ADHD - Embrace Neurodiversity, Live Boldly and Break Through Barriers by Sari Solden and Michelle Frank - This workbook was recommended to me by my therapist and it’s been very affirming to work through

• Book: Women Who Work Too Much by

  Tamu Thomas
  - I had this book on my TBR for so long and, as so often happens, picked up it up at the time when I most needed it. I particularly appreciate the ‘dear one’ love notes at the start of each chapter.

• Book and card deck: Tricia Hersey - Rest is Resistance and The Nap Ministry Rest Deck - I’m so grateful to the imagination, innovation and revolutionary work of Tricia Hersey and the Nap Ministry. I’ve been re-reading Rest is Resistance via audio (beautifully read by Tricia) and have been pulling cards from her beautiful nap ministry deck. This unlearning of white supremacist capitalist patriarchy is huge, lifelong work…

• Alex Elle
  ’s soothing and healing tracks on Insight Timer, many of which are free to listen to. Alex’s voice settles me and she often has the very words I need to hear. Even if I listen to the same recording, different words will resonate on different days.

• Also Mother Nature and sunshine!

  

  Blue sky, wispy clouds and an expanse of sandy beach. Taken on one of my resting days at St. Anne’s

Thank you so much for reading. And if anything helped you here then know that this is treasure to me.

Take care,

Janelle