What is stress and burnout?
Burnout-related complaints can be recognized by a combination of the following symptoms:
- Exhaustion that doesn’t seem to go away
- Difficulty concentrating
- Forgetfulness or being chaotic
- Difficulty processing stimuli, such as too many sounds/images/people
- Sleeping badly
- Tension in your body
- A lot of worrying
If too much is asked of you for an extended period of time, without being able to recuperate, you will get overtired. For example, you start to have trouble sleeping, have the feeling that you can never really get the right energy and you start having trouble concentrating or with your memory. If this continues for too long, more and more pressure will be put on your system and eventually you will get burnt out. You can hardly process anything anymore, your energy is gone and you’re done, physically and mentally. You can’t see a way out anymore, because everything that used to work no longer works.
Where do stress and burnout come from?
When your system has been burdened by stressors for too long a period and without enough opportunity to recover, burnout will eventually be the consequence. Your system is basically always ‘on’ and doesn’t know how to go ‘off’ again and relax. And then suddenly, the emergency brake is pulled. You can’t do anything anymore and you are forced to stand still. This is a very intense experience that brings a lot of complaints and can cause fear: ‘How do I get out of this?’, ‘Will I ever be the same again?’ and ‘Why don’t my usual solutions work anymore?’
The treatment of stress and burnout
Recovering from a burnout is a unique experience that follows a different path for everyone. Sometimes a person feels a lot better after 3 months and sometimes it takes 2 years or more. This all depends on the seriousness of the symptoms, the duration of the process, the support in the environment and more. A number of general steps can be distinguished in the treatment of burnout.
Explanation
Explanation about the functioning of the para- and sympathetic nervous system, how the ‘on’ and ‘off’ switch in your body works.
Research
Discovering how you got into this situation, why it had a purpose earlier in your life and what was important for you at the time.
Recognition
Rediscovering your body step by step, so that you can better recognize your boundaries and guard them in a safe way.
Practical
Practical steps that you can take in your daily life to recover better.
Becoming yourself again
It’s definitely possible to recover from a burnout and become yourself again. We will explore which steps will fit you best, so that you can regain your energy and live life the way you want.
At Psychologist Groningen you can plan regular sessions or plan a package of three sessions with which you can work on a specific question. For example: “How can I handle my energy differently?”
And if you already want to get to work on your own, take a look at the following resources.
Do you want to get started on your recovery?
Take a look at the following resources:
The power of time off
Stefan Sagmeister explains why free time is often overlooked and how you can transform it into a helping daily practice (17:24 min).
10 mindful
minutes
Mindfulness expert Andy Puddicombe explains how just 10 minutes can make an essential difference (9:08 min).
InsightTimer
With this free app you can get access to an enormous database of exercises designed to help with sleep, anxiety and stress.