Author Topic: Burnout !!!!!  (Read 5321 times)

Pomegranate12

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Burnout !!!!!
« on: December 21, 2020, 07:50:05 PM »
I feel like I am burned out. 
When you have felt like this how have you approached the problem

sailinlight

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #1 on: December 21, 2020, 08:48:13 PM »
Take tomorrow off work and go for a walk/hike/surf/ski

Albatross

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #2 on: December 21, 2020, 08:53:47 PM »
I have felt burnout numerous times for overworking in my biglaw job and also having personal commitments that I cannot meet, let alone basic things like exercise.

I usually try to figure out what is causing the burnout so I can rationalise the situation. Once identified, make a gameplan for ensuring you do not get burnt out in the future. For me this either means quitting my job and finding something much less well paid, or simply carving out 'me time' everyday, usually in the mornings when there are few distractions.

In the latter route, if I am able to do the basics of what I consider to be personal fulfilment, e.g. basic exercise, stretching, working on side projects (like YT or learning coding) and time with wife, then I feel as if I have control, even if the rest of the day is a sh*tshow.

Feeling like you have control will only get you through relatively short burts of insane work (e.g. 2 weeks to a couple of months). Beyond that, you have to really reconsider your career, life choices etc as maybe you are not able to cope with whatever is causing burnout and need to change. Recognising this and admitting to it is not a bad thing. I already admitted to myself that this biglaw career is not something I can do forever.

Hope that helps.

Metalcat

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #3 on: December 22, 2020, 03:59:21 AM »
What would you do if you had a serious illness? How would you address it?

Burnout is a serious mental illness, and you need to take it seriously. It has profound long term consequences on your health if left untreated.

You need to quickly get to the bottom of why you are burning out and make a plan for significantly changing something in your life to reduce the burden.

It's not a matter of sucking it up and trudging on, that is incredibly dangerous.

Rhinodad

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #4 on: December 22, 2020, 11:36:12 AM »
I feel like I am burned out. 
When you have felt like this how have you approached the problem

I guess you have to get to the root cause of the problem of why you are feeling burned out to begin with. Most times that comes from unmet expectations. What expectations do you have that you aren't meeting? Not saving fast enough? Not climbing the ladder fast enough? Not being fulfilled enough at work or at home, or with your impact on society at large? What expectations do others have of you that you are finding very difficult to meet? (Boss has unrealistic expectations, family has unrealistic expectations, friends, church community, etc). I think if you can answer that question, you will be well on your way to solving this issue...and perhaps you will need some outside help to solve it.

DaMa

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #5 on: December 22, 2020, 08:23:23 PM »
I changed jobs, because a change is as good as a cure, right?  Wrong.  That was out of the frying pan, and into the fire.  Ended up with a major depression event (MDE, otherwise known as a nervous breakdown).   A year later I went back to a lower level position and pursued FIRE aggressively. 

I slowly ended back up the ladder.  This time I recognized the signs and got out.  I was at Lean FIRE by that time.  I downshifted to a lower level position again, then FIREd a couple of years later.

Mental health is as important as physical health.  I had many of the same symptoms as Sun Hat - insomnia was major contributor.  No job is worth what I went through.

BTW, Rhinodad nailed it.  I had to change myself, my goals, what I expected from myself.  Learning mindfulness and focusing on what I really cared about was the key.  Therapy helped a lot.

Metalcat

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #6 on: December 22, 2020, 08:40:21 PM »
Mental health isn't just *as* important as physical health, it *is* physical health.

The body has a major physiological response to chronic stress, and it's very, very, VERY bad.

I used to treat chronic pain patients, where stress is really a chicken/egg thing, but it was shocking how sick the seriously stressed people were, and how hard they were to treat. It was like trying to bail out a sinking boat. The only way I can describe it is that their bodies were on fire, every system was acting up: joints and muscles hurt, digestive system was all whacky, gums bleeding, recurrent infections, skin rashes, headaches, etc, etc

It was like the entire body's defense systems went haywire trying to throw whatever it had at the mystery illness that was hurting them, but the illness was stress and all of these responses were useless.

I've seen many cases of permanent functional damage due to sustained burnout. That's why I call it an urgent medical condition.

It's not strong to push yourself beyond your adaptive capacity, it's dangerous. And society won't reward you for it, the system will just let you burn until you are nice and crispy and then walk over your ashes.

K, that sounded a little dramatic, but it's also true and I like the visual.

Suffice to say, I cannot possibly overstate the importance of taking action before your body does it for you. Because of you push your body far enough, it will fucking drop you if it has to.

StarBright

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #7 on: December 22, 2020, 09:04:47 PM »
I feel like I am burned out. 
When you have felt like this how have you approached the problem

I powered through, ignoring my rapidly deteriorating mental and physical health. My job was important. I didn't want to be a failure or weak. That bullshit thinking nearly cost me my life.

It started with sleepless nights, then the inability to focus, then the wrenching stomach pain, losing my temper, turning to fatty carbs and alcohol to quiet my racing mind. Then came the panic attacks, vomiting, dizziness, alternating terror and rage, - but oooh, I kept working. Until the day where I realized that I had to drop what I was doing and leave my workplace because I would rather die than stay. I walked straight to the hospital, checked in, and never went back to work. In the years since, I've worked with an army of specialists to rebuild my mental health, but there's only so much that can be done to repair a shattered mind.

I highly recommend taking a different approach. You're worth more than your salary and are more than your job title. If your work is making you sick, find a way to leave asap.

Sun Hat  - I needed to read this today. Thank you.

And Malcat, I needed to read this too:
The only way I can describe it is that their bodies were on fire, every system was acting up: joints and muscles hurt, digestive system was all whacky, gums bleeding, recurrent infections, skin rashes, headaches, etc, etc
I have been dealing with all of those things for a few years and they have sort of become background for me as I trudge through. Reading your post was a good reminder for me that those things aren't just how things are.
« Last Edit: December 22, 2020, 09:11:49 PM by StarBright »

Taran Wanderer

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #8 on: December 22, 2020, 09:06:18 PM »
Convinced a guy in Wuhan to eat a bat. Spawned the novel coronavirus. Waited for it to spread around the world. Went into lockdown. Worked from home for the past 9 months. Feeling all refreshed!

In all seriousness, the lockdown and work from home has been well timed and good for me.  I had been feeling progressively more burned out for several years. I tried long vacations - two 3-week vacations about 11 months apart. I tried additional activities outside of work, both volunteer and family. In the end, refocusing on my family and work-life balance through WFH has been what has worked.

Edited to add:  having solid FU money and being lean FI has also meant that I don’t actually need to stress about work anymore...
« Last Edit: December 22, 2020, 09:10:13 PM by Taran Wanderer »

Adventine

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #9 on: December 23, 2020, 09:23:10 AM »
@Sun Hat that's a generous offer and I hope people take you up on it.

 

achvfi

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #10 on: December 23, 2020, 10:43:17 AM »
I think I have chronic burnout.

In my career of about just 10 years I worked in unhealthy conditions(working day and night many hours a week) and bad managers. I am still struggling to understand its toll and any solutions.

I moved to current role to escape and is relatively not stressful and not something I cannot handle. But still stress appears out of no where. It takes little to get my brain go into that spiral.

Linea_Norway

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #11 on: December 23, 2020, 11:31:08 AM »
I think I have chronic burnout.

In my career of about just 10 years I worked in unhealthy conditions(working day and night many hours a week) and bad managers. I am still struggling to understand its toll and any solutions.

I moved to current role to escape and is relatively not stressful and not something I cannot handle. But still stress appears out of no where. It takes little to get my brain go into that spiral.

@achvfi
Even people who FIRE from a busy job often need at least half a year to decompress. For you with a cronic burnout, it won't take less time.
Just try to have few obligations as you can. Quit everyting you are a member of that gives you obligations and stress, outside your job. And say no when your boss asks you to take another project.

I am finally getting less stressed myself, after having FIREd at the beginning of this year. It certainly helps to not be in a neighbourhood board with a lot of shit messages and to not get so many interactions with others. I can now occasionally have a few days without getting email, instead of me earlier hesitating to open my private email in expectation of getting several stressful mails.
« Last Edit: December 24, 2020, 07:23:42 AM by Linea_Norway »

Taran Wanderer

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #12 on: December 23, 2020, 12:29:19 PM »
I have a former boss and friend who sold his business and retired in his mid 50’s. He said it took 18 months to decompress. He didn’t realize until that long after retirement how stressed he had been when working.

We had this conversation a couple of years ago, and it was helpful to put my feelings of stress in context. He owned his business. I am an employee of my company. While I take a feeling of ownership in what we do, it has been very helpful to give up the self-imposed stress I carried for so long.

I had a series of anxiety attacks ten years ago that I thought were heart problems. We actually had an ambulance come to our house late at night once, and then I went on a heart monitor for a week to rule out cardiac issues. That in itself helped reduce my stress levels, and I could think my way out of anxiety attacks after that, but I was still stressed.

I was joking in much of the post above (obviously I hope), but I’m serious about WFH being a good thing. I’ve been snuggling with my “bored” little boy for the past hour and a half, sitting it a sunbeam.  That’s a great de-stressor.

achvfi

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #13 on: December 23, 2020, 02:17:45 PM »
Quote from: Linea_Norway link=topic=119758.msg2758343#msg2758343 date=1608748268
[member=32620
achvfi[/member]
Even people who FIRE from a busy job often need at least half a year to decompress. For you with a cronic burnout, it won't take less time.
Just try to have few obligations as you can. Quit everyting you are a member of that gives you obligations and stress, outside your job. And say no when your boss asks you to take another project.
Good advise @Linea_Norway. That is exactly how I have been surviving for sometime now. Usually I attract lot of work from word of mouth. I having been trying to be under the radar not get too much attention and setting up my boundaries. It does work to an extent.

Freedomin5

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #14 on: December 23, 2020, 03:04:02 PM »
I experienced severe burnout a few years ago. Insomnia, migraines, numbness in my arm. I was working two well-paying jobs (one full time, one part time). I ended up quitting the part time job which was with a poorly managed company with managers who had no idea what they were doing. Thinking about that company still makes my heart race and my stress levels go up. I also downshifted in my full time job, moving to part time. A year later, I changed jobs to a less stressful position and moved apartments since the crap construction of our apartment was also stressing me out.

In my case, what worked was getting rid of all the things that were causing the burnout, giving myself a fresh start, and then setting boundaries like mad.

Now, I don’t check emails on the weekends and in the evenings, I don’t take on high stakes projects if I don’t have to, I try not to work more than my designated 40 hours. I had to adjust a bit for COVID as it was “all hands on deck”, so I’m now having to redraw the lines. I also now have the mental space to add in joyful and meaning-making activities, but that only happened after I got rid of the stressors that was sucking away my soul.

OtherJen

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #15 on: December 23, 2020, 05:39:34 PM »
I feel like I am burned out. 
When you have felt like this how have you approached the problem

I powered through, ignoring my rapidly deteriorating mental and physical health. My job was important. I didn't want to be a failure or weak. That bullshit thinking nearly cost me my life.

It started with sleepless nights, then the inability to focus, then the wrenching stomach pain, losing my temper, turning to fatty carbs and alcohol to quiet my racing mind. Then came the panic attacks, vomiting, dizziness, alternating terror and rage, - but oooh, I kept working. Until the day where I realized that I had to drop what I was doing and leave my workplace because I would rather die than stay. I walked straight to the hospital, checked in, and never went back to work. In the years since, I've worked with an army of specialists to rebuild my mental health, but there's only so much that can be done to repair a shattered mind.

I highly recommend taking a different approach. You're worth more than your salary and are more than your job title. If your work is making you sick, find a way to leave asap.

This. All of this.

I nearly destroyed my health because I waited so long to acknowledge and address burnout. Please don’t do that.

Smokystache

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #16 on: December 23, 2020, 07:57:07 PM »
A big challenge with the concept of "burnout" is that it is used to describe:
A) I've been working too many hours for a while OR I'm in a stressful work environment, but a couple days or weeks off would fix it.
B) I'm ready to quit tomorrow, or I've just gotten back from the emergency room/recovery room at the hospital
... and everything in between A & B.

Can you describe where you are on this continuum?

effigy98

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #17 on: December 24, 2020, 09:41:33 AM »
Was burning out for maybe the 2nd time in my career.

Took 3 weeks off so I can reset my mind and put things into perspective. My job has been much more demanding since working from home since people can "ask" you for things ALL DAY LONG with little to no effort now. Before there was at least a perceived barrier, not sure exactly why but people think you should always be available now via remote chat.

I tried to just leave all my devices and turn off my office room at 5pm, but I cannot shut my brain off which keeps cranking on the days problems which ends up cutting into my sleep. We also have this crazy ON CALL bullshit now where we have to be available 24/7 for any little problem and respond to it which i tried to ignore but got dinged for it. Still not sure how to handle this one...

My strategy for when I get back to work after vacation is to exercise WITH my device for a 2-3 hours a day outside the home. If someone bugs me during that time I will give them a short answer and say I will look into it when I get back to my desk. I am sure this will cut into others perception of me, but I think I will go crazy if I keep treating the house a prison and have ground hog day over and over again and I am 100% sure I will burn out if I don't start taking care of my mental health.
« Last Edit: December 24, 2020, 09:48:05 AM by effigy98 »

2sk22

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #18 on: December 25, 2020, 06:05:36 AM »
I was definitely feeling burnout earlier this year before I retired. It was mostly self-imposed. The more I was paid, the more I felt pressured to deliver value commensurate with my salary. I found myself spending every weekend studying new technologies - not because they were interesting but because I felt the pressure to be the go-to person who could explain them. Anxieties would peak on Monday mornings.

John Galt incarnate!

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #19 on: December 25, 2020, 07:56:55 AM »
I feel like I am burned out. 
When you have felt like this how have you approached the problem

I've never felt burned out but like everyone else "I've  had a bad day."

On those occasions I would indulge in a reverie in which I would project myself into the future when as a FIREee I would be doing something enjoyable.

In that projection I would look back at my present,   bad-day situation and say to myself "The unpleasantness of that bad day years ago was an unavoidable trade-off to obtain the happiness and contentment I now enjoy as a FIREee."

OP, to assuage your feeling of burnout  project yourself into your future life as a contented FIREee when burnout will no longer be an issue.




« Last Edit: December 25, 2020, 07:58:58 AM by John Galt incarnate! »

Metalcat

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #20 on: December 25, 2020, 08:31:42 AM »
I feel like I am burned out. 
When you have felt like this how have you approached the problem

I've never felt burned out but like everyone else "I've  had a bad day."

On those occasions I would indulge in a reverie in which I would project myself into the future when as a FIREee I would be doing something enjoyable.

In that projection I would look back at my present,   bad-day situation and say to myself "The unpleasantness of that bad day years ago was an unavoidable trade-off to obtain the happiness and contentment I now enjoy as a FIREee."

OP, to assuage your feeling of burnout  project yourself into your future life as a contented FIREee when burnout will no longer be an issue.

That doesn't work for actual burnout. No psychological tricks do, and anything that helps the person keep going, just prolongs and worsens the damage.

Burnout is not just a casual emotional state that can be neutralized by positive thinking. It's a systematic breakdown of core functional systems causing overload and often permanent damage.

Even therapy won't help stem the effects of burnout.
The main benefit of therapy for someone experiencing burnout is that it can help them reach the conclusion that they must change their circumstances.

None of us who are sounding the alarm bells are being dramatic.

John Galt incarnate!

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #21 on: December 25, 2020, 09:23:06 AM »
Mental health isn't just *as* important as physical health, it *is* physical health.

The body has a major physiological response to chronic stress, and it's very, very, VERY bad.

I used to treat chronic pain patients, where stress is really a chicken/egg thing, but it was shocking how sick the seriously stressed people were, and how hard they were to treat. It was like trying to bail out a sinking boat. The only way I can describe it is that their bodies were on fire, every system was acting up: joints and muscles hurt, digestive system was all whacky, gums bleeding, recurrent infections, skin rashes, headaches, etc, etc

It was like the entire body's defense systems went haywire trying to throw whatever it had at the mystery illness that was hurting them, but the illness was stress and all of these responses were useless.

I've seen many cases of permanent functional damage due to sustained burnout. That's why I call it an urgent medical condition.

It's not strong to push yourself beyond your adaptive capacity, it's dangerous. And society won't reward you for it, the system will just let you burn until you are nice and crispy and then walk over your ashes.

K, that sounded a little dramatic, but it's also true and I like the visual.

Suffice to say, I cannot possibly overstate the importance of taking action before your body does it for you. Because of you push your body far enough, it will fucking drop you if it has to.

Imaging technology revealed that stress actually  damages telomeres.


Telomeres – the aglets of the genomic world
HudsonAlpha telomeres-the-aglets-of-the-genomic world
The image of a genetic aglet, a region at the end of a DNA strand that protects it from damage



New imaging technique shows how DNA is protected 
sciencedaily
Feb 11, 2016 — In terms of function, telomeres are like the plastic coating (aglet) on the ends of shoelaces that prevents the laces from unraveling.

John Galt incarnate!

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #22 on: December 25, 2020, 09:30:36 AM »
[quote author=Malcat link=topic=119758.msg2759182#msg2759182

That doesn't work for actual burnout. No psychological tricks do, and anything that helps the person keep going, just prolongs and worsens the damage.

Burnout is not just a casual emotional state that can be neutralized by positive thinking. It's a systematic breakdown of core functional systems causing overload and often permanent damage.

Even therapy won't help stem the effects of burnout.
The main benefit of therapy for someone experiencing burnout is that it can help them reach the conclusion that they must change their circumstances.

None of us who are sounding the alarm bells are being dramatic.
[/quote]

Noted.

JohannaP

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #23 on: December 25, 2020, 01:05:22 PM »
Albatross has some great points.  There are many different causes of burnout.  Good idea to isolate the specific cause of the burnout and try to tweak it.  Sometimes it is the environment (eg. a toxic environment or organization with goals that are not congruent with your values), sometimes it is you (micromanaging not delegating enough work) and sometimes it is one particular part of your job (one toxic coworker or a specific task you dislike) or maybe it is just the dumpster fire that is 2020.  Once you figure out what it is you can address that part of it and things will get better. 

My job (physician) has high burnout rates and I have felt burned out multiple times in my career.  Each time they were due to different causes and the fix was different.  When I was working for a particularly greedy private practice that didn't care about good patient care it was a toxic environment, so I left.  More recently I was the problem.  I had increased responsibility with the pandemic.  I had to learn to delegate better.  If news/the world is getting out down take a news break/social media break.

Also remember sometimes burnout can lead to clinical depression.  If you find yourself experiencing more serious symptoms of depression get some professional help (I am not a psychiatrist or therapist for what it is worth).  Getting the help you need is not weak, and sometimes necessary. 

Good luck, and remember a lot of people feel this way sometimes, and for most it gets better!

Goldendog777

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #24 on: December 25, 2020, 02:19:20 PM »
I quit.  I was so burned out of my mortgage fraud job that I was wishing to get hit by a bus in the morning on our walks with our dogs so I wouldn’t have to go to work.  I was that miserable.  I had migraines constantly.  It was terrible. 
   

OtherJen

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #25 on: December 25, 2020, 04:36:16 PM »
I quit.  I was so burned out of my mortgage fraud job that I was wishing to get hit by a bus in the morning on our walks with our dogs so I wouldn’t have to go to work.  I was that miserable.  I had migraines constantly.  It was terrible. 
 

I knew I had to leave research when I started fantasizing about being hit by a bus because even if I didn't die, it would mean a long absence from work. Death or hospitalization for major injury was starting to seem like the more appealing option.

effigy98

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #26 on: January 02, 2021, 10:16:53 PM »
@effigy98

A couple of thoughts:

Your idea of working out with devices is a good one - certainly better than feeling like you can't work out at all. I found that I wasn't able to mentally unplug as well when I had my devices with me as without, so my guess is that this will improve but not  fix the problem.

Since you're always on call, and your mind is always racing, I HIGHLY recommend mindfulness meditation, where the idea is to identify your thoughts and gently let them go while you focus on your breathing in the moment. Not only is it the most relaxing 10, 20, or however many minutes of the day, the practice can help you to identify when you're ruminating unproductively at other times of the day so that you can allow yourself to let it go and just be in the moment. I highly recommend any book or app by Jon Kabat-Zin.


Good advice and I am going to add this to my routine when I go back to work Monday. I decided to change a lot of things this year, starting with ignoring work after my work is done and only responding to emergencies. My current strategy is work 2 hours in the morning then a couple in the evening. This will make it so I don't miss something critical, but time box my day into 4 hours on a typical day extend it potentially for many hours on days with emergencies. This should even out to reasonable work hours where I don't feel like I am burning out. I realized after thinking about this for awhile that most of it is due to me not shutting off my brain and working full days everyday, then when an emergency happened, working basically another FULL DAY extra. I need to reduce my typical working days down to account for these hectic stupid amount of hour days to have balance. I am also going to stop going to useless meetings and ignore busy work from others where it has no value on my measured goals.
« Last Edit: January 02, 2021, 10:22:32 PM by effigy98 »

SAR

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #27 on: January 02, 2021, 11:00:45 PM »
I have some speculative thoughts on the subject.

First, research on heart disease shows that the most potent predictor is living at the bottom of a hierarchy (see work by Marmot, 'the Whitehall Studies'). You'd think the effect is surely an error attributable to a confounder, but none have been found. Access to health care, smoking, diet, exercise, poverty . . . nope. And the measures can be quite gross--like societal level measures of inequality such as the Gini index--and big effects are evident. For example, different post codes in Chicago can have a near 20 year life expectancy difference.

Other work by Sapolsky on stress response and hierarchies in baboons shows the same effects. Baboons at the bottom of the hierarchy are subject to capricious stressors, and they develop abdominal fat and the same poor metabolic health markers that we have. His work also shows that a re-structuring of the hierarchy so it becomes less harsh decreases rates of aggression and the health markers improve.

I guess this is a long way of saying that if you are unable to restructure your social environment, moving to a new one can be good advice.

Second, absent the ability to make such changes, there are multiple things we can do to affect how we respond to stress. Off the top of my head, and to reiterate/add to what has been stated:

1. Meditation has been shown effective. A free app like insight timer can have big effects--one study I recall showed a lengthening of telomeres;

2. Sleep is very important for maintaining health. If you are having trouble sleeping, look into strategies to improve it (e.g., get rid of bright light, sleep early and on a fixed schedule; use your bed for sleep only; possibly consider melatonin etc.);

3. Exercise is important for how you react to stress. Figure out some way of pushing yourself to the point of getting a good sweat on 3 or more times per week. e.g., run, bike, climb stairs, hike up a mountain . . .

4. Diet is important. Eat real food, fresh veges, green leafy stuff, some fruit, and if you eat meat eat the stuff that ate a natural diet (e.g., grass fed beef to get the omega 3 to 6 ratio in your favor; wild caught fish). Avoid processed shit at all costs.

5. If you are stressed, it is likely that you are both depressed and anxious (I forget the exact correlation, but it's high and generally if you have one, you have the other). There's good evidence that cognitive behavioral therapy can improve both, and you can even self-administer (e.g., see David Burns, the feeling good handbook). I'd be inclined to see a clinical psychologist or good psychiatrist if you are past self-help, of course.

6. Social support is important. If you have an ally or two who you are sure you can confide in, that may help. It may also help to do other things that give you more control over your life. Do you really need to say 'yes' all of the time? Do you really need to work those extra hours? Answer that email at 2am?

I'm sure there's more, but it seems to me that for those of us stuck in a situation, there are multiple and simple things we can do to improve our reactions to stress.

2sk22

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #28 on: January 03, 2021, 03:06:06 AM »
First, research on heart disease shows that the most potent predictor is living at the bottom of a hierarchy (see work by Marmot, 'the Whitehall Studies'). You'd think the effect is surely an error attributable to a confounder, but none have been found. Access to health care, smoking, diet, exercise, poverty . . . nope. And the measures can be quite gross--like societal level measures of inequality such as the Gini index--and big effects are evident. For example, different post codes in Chicago can have a near 20 year life expectancy difference.

Here is some research to back up your observations.

A quote from this article:

Quote
A new study from the Indiana University Kelley School of Business finds that our mental health and mortality have a strong correlation with the amount of autonomy we have at our job, our workload and job demands, and our cognitive ability to deal with those demands.

I have always been the happiest when I had autonomy in my work. When I worked at a megacorp, I progressively lost a lot of my autonomy due to reorganizations and management changes. At some point it became clear that I had to leave even though my salary had actually increased. I hypothesize that many of the people here in the MMM forum are those who value autonomy.

SAR

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #29 on: January 03, 2021, 12:41:49 PM »
This hierarchy/health relationship is long-standing and there's a lot of work on the subject.

Here's Whitehall 2, which shows the same effects as the link (cited over 4k times), including lack of freedom.

The effects apparently extend beyond retirement, and appear to even increase.

It has been some time since I looked at this literature, but I would hope by now that someone has started to do interventional studies to see if the effects can be ameliorated.

One other hypothesis that I do not think has been considered is general fitness, in a biological sense. There's a line of work on IQ which claims that there's a general fitness factor which represents genetic quality and (possibly) absence of developmental insult (e.g., childhood illness, maltreatment, poverty, famine . . . ). That hypothesis would also apply to the incidence of disease later in life. Given that IQ is the strongest predictor we have of social status, there's certainly reason to assume that it may be a mediating variable.

Here's a link to Whitehall II:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/014067369193068K


henramdrea

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #30 on: January 03, 2021, 06:28:29 PM »
I quit.  I was so burned out of my mortgage fraud job that I was wishing to get hit by a bus in the morning on our walks with our dogs so I wouldn’t have to go to work.  I was that miserable.  I had migraines constantly.  It was terrible. 
 

I knew I had to leave research when I started fantasizing about being hit by a bus because even if I didn't die, it would mean a long absence from work. Death or hospitalization for major injury was starting to seem like the more appealing option.

Interesting and good to know I'm not the only one who has had these thoughts.  "What if I just don't wake up tomorrow?"  "Maybe someone will just shoot me and put me out of this whole thing".   I perish those thoughts instantly as pure silliness and drama, but that they'd even be thoughts.....man.  Some things have got to change in the new year!  I've got a family that still needs me, patients and co-workers who rely on my expertise.

There's the possibility of having reduced hours at work here in the near future, which would be helpful for sure.  I've been in the healthcare field for nearly 30 years, and it's starting to show.  It's the most dangerous it's ever been with COVID being the major threat.  I can't yet afford the "coast-FIRE" option and I somehow need to hang on for another 8 more years.

Adventine

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Re: Burnout !!!!!
« Reply #31 on: January 04, 2021, 05:47:19 PM »
Moreover, no one should wait to reach the point of having suicidal thoughts to seek help. The idea of self-harm or fantasizing about accidents is already a warning sign.

I know. I've been there, fantasizing about jumping off my office building to get away from my miserable life (bad job, terrible commute, toxic relationships). I'm much better now. But I had to actively work at it. It doesn't magically "get better" unless you make concrete changes.
« Last Edit: January 04, 2021, 06:18:28 PM by Adventine »

 

Wow, a phone plan for fifteen bucks!