Burnout: A Silent Stalker

High-achieving women tend to be highly adept at handling challenges, in part because they excel at anticipating problems. By doing so, they can either prevent problems from escalating or develop an action plan to handle problems when they arise. Unfortunately, burnout seems to be an exception for high-achievers, often sneaking up on them unexpectedly and significantly interfering with their productivity and overall quality of life.

There are two main reasons for this. The first has to do with the inherent nature of high-achieving women. They tend to gravitate toward jobs that are extreme, which makes their work hours exceedingly long and their workloads exceptionally heavy. Adding insult to injury, they also put enormous internal pressure on themselves to excel. Naturally, this kind of intensity can take a heavy toll on the body and mind, yet high-achievers are so confident in their ability to overcome challenges and so passionate about what they take on that they have trouble anticipating that burnout (for them) is even a possibility. The second has to do with the nature of burnout itself. No one wakes up one morning and is struck with a bad case of burnout. It's much more insidious, creeping up on its victims over time, which makes it much harder to see coming.

But this doesn’t mean that you have to fall prey to burnout. There are readily identifiable warning signs, and if you know what to look for, you can anticipate and defend against it.

Defense #1: Acceptance

As a high-achiever, you’re likely very passionate about what you do, so it might be hard to imagine that you could ever burn out. But that’s exactly how it gets you. If you don’t recognize or accept that burnout is a possibility, you’ll never see it coming.

Defense #2: Knowledge

Once you accept that burnout is a possibility, you have to understand what it is and how it develops in order to anticipate and protect yourself against it.

Burnout is a state of chronic stress that leads to physical and emotional exhaustion, cynicism and detachment, and feelings of ineffectiveness and lack of accomplishment. Once you’re in its grasp, it’s difficult to function effectively on a personal and professional level. Yet, knowledge is power. By knowing the signs and symptoms, all of which exist on a continuum, you can recognize them earlier and take important steps to protect yourself from becoming a victim of burnout.

In a previous post, I provide a detailed discussion about burnout's signs and symptoms. But for the purposes of this article, here's a quick breakdown:

Signs/symptoms of physical and emotional exhaustion:

1. Chronic fatigue

2. Insomnia

3. Impaired concentration/attention

4. Physical symptoms such as chest pain, heart palpitations, shortness of breath, gastrointestinal problems, dizziness, fainting, and/or headaches (all of which should be medically assessed)

5. Increased vulnerability to infections, colds, flu, and other immune-related medical problems

6. Loss of appetite

7. Anxiety

8. Depression

9. Anger

Signs/symptoms of cynicism and detachment:

1. Loss of enjoyment

2. Pessimism

3. Isolation

4. Detachment (a general sense of feeling disconnected from others or from your environment)

Signs/symptoms of ineffectiveness and lack of accomplishment:

1. Apathy/hopelessness

2. Irritability

3. Lack of productivity/poor performance

Defense #3: Protective Action

Once you identify the areas in which you’re experiencing some vulnerability, you need to take action to prevent a worsening of these signs and symptoms. This is typically the hardest part for high-achieving women because it requires making changes to what, by all accounts, appears to be an enormously successful and accomplished life. It takes courage and strength to honestly assess the amount of stress in your life and find ways to reduce it before it's too late. It’s easy to convince yourself that if you just keep plugging away, everything will eventually even out and all will be well.

However, the danger of ignoring burnout is the same as ignoring a stalker. It's not going to just go away on its own. In order to protect yourself, you’re going to have to make some modifications. The more signs and symptoms you have, the more changes you’ll have to make to see an effect. And yes, that's hard, especially for high-achievers who pride themselves on successfully tackling even the most challenging problems. But the alternative is unsustainable in the long run. Without protective action, burnout will always win out.

Sherrie Bourg Carter, Psy.D.