Tired of the work you loved before? Colleagues and meetings are annoying, in the morning you don’t want to run to the office as before? You may have been the victim of professional burnout. It has a range of symptoms, and if these are not ignored, irreversible consequences can be avoided. Before reaching the finish line, when it is almost impossible to return the former love for the profession or a particular position, the “burnout” goes through several phases.
There is still no single definition of a burnout symptom. Often it is described as a state of complete physical and emotional exhaustion caused by constant stress, overwork, or even bullying. The “victims” describe their feelings as follows: they seem to be sitting in a car, pressing the gas pedal all the way, but at the same time the car is moving at a snail’s pace. Such people “burn out” physically and psychologically, lose their energy and can no longer work normally.
A variety of people fall into the risk group, including the very young. The main reason for what happens to them is stress at work, especially one that is associated with increased responsibility, serious time and energy costs, and excessive demands. This applies primarily to managers, executives, police officers, firefighters, soldiers, officials, doctors, teachers, social care professionals – they all experience incredible stress.
Today, the risk group is replenished with children and adolescents. At school and family, they are often given impossible tasks and require a lot, their day is scheduled to the minute, and this contributes to the onset of the disease.
Causes and symptoms
Blaming stress alone for burnout would be wrong. There are other reasons too:
- impossible leadership tasks,
- great responsibility associated with the importance of the project or high position,
- too tight deadlines
- bad team atmosphere
- routine and monotonous actions,
- fear of losing a job
- too little effect on the overall result,
- constant disruptive meetings.
Many patients report symptoms such as impotence, fatigue, exhaustion, feelings of inner emptiness, meaninglessness, decreased efficiency, avoidance of communication. Of course, they are not necessarily associated with burnout and may also indicate depression. Emotional signs are usually accompanied by physical symptoms: insomnia, digestive problems, headaches, back problems.
“creeping” process
Burnout syndrome does not appear suddenly – it is a sluggish process. Most doctors distinguish three main stages.
Step 1
Patients are active, consider themselves indispensable and effective, which is often accompanied by increased aggressiveness. There are no obvious signs of burnout yet.
Step 2
With the entry into the second stage of the disease, patients experience a feeling of overwork, the quality of work decreases, and there is a fear that they will no longer be needed. A person loses interest in what he does, he moves away from his colleagues, becomes passive. There is a feeling that something is going wrong, but it is not clear what exactly, and this interferes with the early prevention of burnout.
Step 3
Burnout is gaining full strength, frequent attacks of panic and anxiety begin, and a feeling of hopelessness grows. Often develop various forms of dependence (alcohol, drug). Many have to struggle with thoughts of suicide: the suffering becomes unbearable. As a rule, only at this stage people turn to specialists for help.
12 phases of professional burnout
In addition to this generally accepted division, there are other models that explain the course of the disease. For example, the American psychologist of German origin Herbert Freudenberger, who introduced the concept of emotional burnout, divides the course of the disease into only two stages: sensitive and insensitive. Another model, developed by the German psychiatrist and coach Vinzenz Mansmann, suggests 12 phases:
- Desire for recognition, high ambition
- Willingness to work overtime
- Relegation of needs to the background
- Hidden signs of overvoltage
- Distortion of the perception of reality
- The first hidden signs of the disease
- Switching to drugs or alcohol
- Resistance to recommendations and advice
- Alienation from oneself and one’s emotions (a person continues to only perform functions)
- Fighting inner emptiness, panic attacks and discouragement
- Depression as a result of prolonged despair
- The onset of complete exhaustion, both mental and physical
How to help yourself?
What can be done to prevent burnout? Having found all the symptoms, or at least part of them, the first thing to do is to talk to your doctor and discuss treatment options. It will be even more successful if supplemented with the following steps:
- Analyze your own and others’ expectations of yourself and your work – are they too high.
- Change your work environment: improve your current working conditions, move to another position, quit, or make a professional reorientation.
- Use stress management strategies (coaching, autogenic training, sports as compensation).
- Strengthen social ties (turn to family, relatives, friends for support).
- Plan for long breaks from work and mandatory periods of rest and sleep.
- Balance your diet, avoid harmful foods and substances.
- Keep a sense of humor – according to Dr. Mansmann, this is the best medicine. Start and end every day with a smile.
It is extremely important to reduce stress and learn to keep it low so that you can truly relax. Treatment of burnout syndrome is a long process that promises radical changes in life. And these changes will definitely be for the better.