Inna Shukshina

Do you love your work?

Or do you feel like a squeezed lemon after it? Do you know how to recover?

A month ago a man came to me for a consultation who was dissatisfied with his job. In the winter of last year he took a new, interesting job which at first inspired him a great deal. But gradually he began to sleep less and less. Then his weekends disappeared. After that, every free minute he rushed to his work and did it at home too. You would think that the more you work, the greater the result and the joy from it. But no — he only got more tired and accumulated stress. He started “snapping” at those close to him and stopped taking care of himself. It seemed to him that he only had to endure a little longer and he would clear the backlog at work and finally rest. But day after day the same thing repeated itself. The backlogs and rush jobs did not stop, the management was just as demanding. When — far from immediately — he came to his senses, burnout syndrome was already obvious!

So how can we notice that work has started taking up too much space in our life, has crowded out our personal life, and does not bring us the return and satisfaction we need? This is important for mothers to know too, since they can burn out in exactly the same way. Young mothers do nothing but give and receive almost nothing in return. The work of a stay-at-home mother is unpaid and hard.

Think about whether work has a negative effect on your family, your health, your mood. The most unpleasant thing is that you can burn out in six months and then take far longer to recover. We develop a feeling of emptiness, a lack of energy, we see no progress in our work and see all of life in a negative light.

We put in a lot and get very little

We come to burnout when we put a great deal of time, strength and emotion into work and do not get back a positive assessment from people and recognition of the significance of our labour. Of course, children are not yet able to appreciate our efforts, and bosses are more inclined to demand than to praise. Here it is important to understand that only we ourselves can determine the line up to which we are ready to give. Nothing happens in life without our permission. Even if that permission was given deep inside. The most important thing is how we assess ourselves. How much can we give others without harming ourselves and those close to us? Where is the line beyond which we are already harming ourselves, and in the longer run our family too, when it has to put up with our breakdowns and help us recover from exhaustion?

Unrealistic tasks

Unrealistic and fundamentally impossible tasks set for us are also a very strong source of stress. You have to understand that no one but us can determine that very line beyond which you must not go. One woman asked me what to do if she gets very tired from her job and from her boss’s excessive demands. And I answered that when we always say “yes” to work, we say “no” to ourselves and to our family.

That is, we have to say “no” in any case. It is only that we do not choose whom exactly to say it to; we let that choice be made for us. By whoever is perhaps more demanding, or whoever we are more afraid of. So we will have to learn to say “no” anyway, and it is better to say this word consciously. It is better to make the choice ourselves, taking our own interests into account.

Young mothers can burn out easily

A few years ago I “burned out” myself. Our third child was born, less than a year apart from the second, and the children demanded attention and 100% of my time. There was no help from anyone except my husband, and he also had to work. It was an enormous problem to take a shower, go to the toilet or eat; every time I had to pull my husband away for it. Let alone doing the housework. One child a month old, the other one year and seven months — neither able to do anything by themselves. What hobbies and self-care could there be!

But I began to notice that it was very hard for me to get out of bed in the mornings, that I had nightmares at night, that I had gained a lot of weight and that unpleasant and worrying symptoms had appeared in terms of my health. The situation seemed hopeless, but we — even at that time and with those modest earnings — managed to find a solution. We hired a nanny for a few hours a day; she took the children for walks not far from home, while I could do my own tasks and learn a new profession at the computer. It is a pity this only happened when my youngest son was already 7 months old and the hardest period had passed without help. Plus there was my eldest son, five years old, who also demanded attention! And when we tried to send him to nursery, he started getting ill constantly and infecting the little ones and me, and everything got even worse! I am still recovering from that period — my health, my appearance, my ability to feel when I am already close to exhaustion and it is time to say “stop” to everyone. Recovery requires a lot of money, time and effort. It is better not to let it happen at all!

I have done a great deal of work on restoring myself, and it is still going on! I am glad that my efforts are bearing fruit, that life is improving and turning from hard into pleasant.

A lack of growth

Work with no opportunity to develop, grow and learn can be very oppressive. Especially when a person is talented and capable. When no one supports any of our initiatives and they are cut off at the root, we cannot express ourselves as a person or show creativity. It is important that a job allows you to keep growing as a professional. So what can be done about it? Change jobs? You may have outgrown this job, but first of all it is worth assessing the opportunities available and trying to make use of them. Recognise your need for self-improvement and look for ways to meet it in the conditions you already have. In the case of stay-at-home mothers — think about how creativity can be brought into daily life. Try new recipes? Draw together with the children? Also buy the books and toys that you yourself find interesting and enjoyable? Take the children to developmental classes somewhere, or run them at home for your friends’ children? Everyone can find their own suitable way, if they use their imagination and believe in success! And the most important thing for mothers is to find ways to arrange for someone besides themselves to spend time with the children. First of all you need confidence that this is necessary and faith in success, and the solution will certainly come.

Conflicts with people, difficult relationships with someone, tight deadlines and monotonous work also take a great deal of energy.

How else can we help ourselves not to burn out?

It is very important to have various interests besides work and household duties, and to be able, when necessary, to defend your need for them and for rest. Sometimes mothers drive themselves into such a corner that it seems to them that any need of theirs takes away time and strength needed by the family. Forgetting, meanwhile, that at the very least they are sacrificing their own good mood and teaching their children that you have to push yourself and your interests aside for the sake of others — and this habit will not always be for the good of them or of other people. First of all, children will learn not to value themselves and not to value others. They will not be taught that a mother’s labour deserves respect and that she needs rest too. A small child will not understand this, but their elder brother will, or they themselves will when they grow up, while the mother’s habit of pushing herself aside will remain.

And husbands who are close to burnout, for their part, get nervous and fear that any rest or any spending of money will cost them their earnings. Even buying a pen or a pastry can anger them and seem to them a threat to their well-being. Here you have to understand: it is not a matter of stinginess but, possibly, of an unhealthy atmosphere having developed at work. In that atmosphere the husband feels that he is not valued and could be replaced by someone else at any moment. And if that is so, then tomorrow there may be no money at all, and then there is no time for pastries and pens.

How to avoid burnout at work or at home: simple tips

• Do you read books only about your speciality? That is not the best habit either; it is worth being able to read not only for benefit but simply for pleasure.
• Bring variety into your work, think about a new project or some innovations
• Learn to assess yourself not only by how those around you assess you, but to be your own judge.
• Learn to encourage and support yourself, do not wait for it from others.
• Give yourself enough time to achieve your goals.
• Socialise not only with old friends but also with new people, including those who are not like you, who live a different life or work in a different profession.
• Give yourself a complete break from work or from home — a day when you do nothing at all.
• Get enough sleep! In the long run sleep is far more important than this project or that task.

The day before yesterday the man I mentioned at the beginning of the article decided to take an unpaid day off work and spent the whole day on a trip out of town with his family. He was very pleased and discovered for himself that rest only helps work rather than hindering it, that it lets you look at everything with fresh eyes and that interesting ideas come by themselves. And now he is on the way to restoring the balance between work and life. I wish you the same!

 Inna Shukshina

This article of mine was written for the portal Matrony.ru: http://www.matrony.ru/lyubite-li-vyi-svoyu-rabotu/#ixzz3AMHcXvv1