The current-day woman finds herself in a challenging setting. There are many demands upon the modern woman to stay on top of the daily tasks and workload. This can take a toll – let’s look at how…..
The following is an example of a situation I regularly see in the clinic. So let’s talk about a typical employed woman, call her Alice.
Alice is employed and works diligently in her job. She takes pride in her role, and the income is used for her family. She works hard throughout the day, giving 100% to her work. After work, Alice comes home to start her ‘other jobs’ – wife, mum, domestic, cleaner, chef…..
She continues with these household tasks until she falls asleep in bed at night, exhausted. Even though she’s exhausted, she’s still thinking about the tasks for tomorrow. A To-Do list is piling up in her head.
Alice wakes up the next day feeling tired and unrefreshed. She doesn’t feel like she’s ready to jump out of bed and start the day. Instead, it feels like Groundhog Day. But still, she gets up and pushes herself through the day. Sometimes, she feels like she’s a robot on autopilot and doesn’t feel as productive as she used to be.
Don’t get me wrong, Alice gets all her daily tasks done. She gets through her day, and anyone looking at her from the outside will say she’s productive, efficient, and effective. But inside, Alice doesn’t feel like she accomplishes her tasks adequately. She feels like she’s letting herself and her team and family down.
Her brain feels foggy and feels full. Alice feels like she can’t take on much more or retain anything else. And she is concerned about the relatively new tendency of being halfway through a sentence and forgetting what she was talking about. Or sometimes, she walks into a room thinking about all her other tasks and completely forgets why she walked into this particular room.
Due to her exhaustion and busyness of her life, she doesn’t want to interact with anyone, including friends and family.
She’s starting to withdraw and isolate herself.
She feels hopeless, and she feels alone.
She feels like she’s the only one that’s feeling this way.
Alice thinks that her whole life revolves around her job, her work, her family life and her household tasks.
Do you identify with this scenario?
Honestly, this is a fairly typical scenario that I see in my clinic.
Could this be an example of how you’re feeling?
Or could it be an example of how your loved one’s feelings?
I know I have felt this way in the past. Unfortunately, it is a common scenario in the life of a modern-day woman. This is especially true at the moment with the added burden the current pandemic has created.
Alice’s story is an example of a life of a woman living with exhaustion, burnout or adrenal exhaustion syndrome.
But the problem is………usually, a woman who is experiencing this situation keeps going. She keeps soldiering on, sometimes unaware of what these circumstances are doing to her physically, mentally and emotionally.
Are you (or a loved one) relating to Alice’s scenario?
Here are 5 things that you can do:
1. Become aware:
It is crucial to become aware of this situation more than ever. To break this cycle, gaining awareness must occur, or change can never happen.
2. Identify the Triggers:
Daily habits, routines and personality traits can contribute to exhaustion and burnout. Start by looking at your current life and identify possible triggers. Triggers can include workload, overly critical boss or co-workers, stress response, perfectionistic personality traits, being a people pleaser, being highly critical of oneself, and being unable to set boundaries and say ‘No’ to others asking for help.
Sometimes it is about accepting that we’re not Superwoman. Society does not expect women to be everything to everyone. We all have capabilities and limits, and being aware of them helps us be true to ourselves……. And there is no need to be a Superwoman.
3. Stress management:
Once the triggers and stressors have been identified, create a stress management plan to help you manage the demands in your life. Develop strategies to determine what is important and what’s not, so you can work and live smarter, with less stress and overwhelm.
4. Reach out:
Speak to your family members about how you feel about the current situation. They may not realise how you feel and the intensity of your workload/home duties.
Speak to your boss and/or work colleagues. If your workload is too much, find other methods to create flow and reduce your overwhelm.
Setting boundaries for what you can do without burnout and speaking to those around you is crucial to your recovery.
5. Create healthy habits.
Healthy habits such as healthy eating, moderate regular exercise, and relaxation time are part of the recovery process.
It is easy to say ‘just create a new habit’, but if you’re already feeling overwhelmed and struggling, it might just add on to your current strains.
Look at making small changes one at a time that has bigger ripple effects in your life.
For example:
- If you identify that the pressure of making meals each day fuels exhaustion. Create a new habit of meal planning. Taking 15minutes per week to plan your meals and grocery list saves you time and money.
“Cook Once, Eat Twice” – refers to cooking double quantities of meals. The extra portion of the meal can be frozen and used for dinner on another night. Thus, cutting your time in the kitchen by half.
- If you find yourself looking at emails most of the day (and even sometimes after work), then set times to check emails once or twice a day rather than dealing with them every time they land in your inbox. The same process can be done for text messages and social media. Technology tends to rob us of time and creates a feeling that we do not switch off. Setting allocated times can help.
- Get the family involved. Allocate household tasks to family members. Create a board to track the tasks and maybe even use a reward system to entice kids to step up and help.
- If you have a To-Do list. Prioritise tasks and allocate time for each task. Keep the list short and specific. Do the tasks in the priority you have allocated.
Check out the Secrets on how to Beat Burnout and be a Full of Life Woman!
Want to join a community of support? Join the Fatigued, Exhausted and Burnout Women Transformation Group on Facebook.
