Ep16: Burnout Beyond Work — Why So Many Women Are Running on Empty | Dr Kate

Hello and welcome to Unmasked Minds, the podcast hosted by me, Sarah the Psych on Instagram. And I am a psychologist in real life where I deal mostly with millennial middle-aged women and all of the challenges and things that we are navigating in this chapter of our lives. And today I am joined by my incredible sister, Dr. Kate, who is a psychiatrist. And we are in the middle of filming a little miniseries for this podcast on a number of topics that seem really relevant to the work that I do and to a lot of questions that my audience have and the work that you do, I guess.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, so welcome back.

Thank you.

Um, we have already filmed a couple of episodes, so if you really like this one, then you'll have to go and check those out. Dr. Kate is the Mother Mind Doctor, correct, on Instagram, and so go and give her a follow if you like what she's talking about. But today we are dropping into the topic of burnout.

Burnout, yes.

Burnout. Now, this is something that you are very passionate about working in this space, and for me, it is something I am really passionate about learning more about and understanding, um, and helping women access support for this, because a little about my own personal journey and story has definitely involved burnout.

I think it happens to A-type personalities.

Yeah, oh, exactly. And you know, you and I obviously understand our family and our upbringing and a number of external factors that have led to that. But I guess on reflection, um, if I were to talk about my experience with burnout very briefly, but just to talk about the symptoms and things that I experienced just so that you can then sort of talk about whether that, you know, is really common or not for women. So for me, it was probably around the age of 30 when I had just returned to the workforce after having 2 young children. I was working in a really senior executive position in, you know, the corporate sort of space. And when I returned from mat leave, which was only 4 months, I returned at the same sort of capacity of output and performance that I sustained before I left. And I guess I just kept burning the candle at every end. There were way more than two ends at my— yeah, my candle. And you know, this is all beautiful in hindsight, isn't it? But when I, when I look back at that chapter of my life of burning all the candles doing everything for everybody, and the one thing that had to give was the things I was doing for myself. So, you know, there was no self-care, there was less exercise, there was a lot more self-soothing, and I really started to just feel like this, I guess, shell of who I really was. But I didn't know what to do about it, so it just kept turning. I just kept going through the motions, and I didn't really know. I knew there was nothing clinically— I use that word knowing that you might have some views on that— clinically wrong with me. I wasn't clinically depressed, I wasn't clinically anxious. I was experiencing a lot of anxiety at the time, but yeah, I didn't know what it was. And now that I look back at that sort of chapter for me in that corporate world of— and in motherhood, I believe I was experiencing burnout. And it sort of led to me leaving that space. And I do often wonder, you know, would things have been different if I didn't? If I understood how to support myself better. So I guess my first question is, does that sound like a familiar experience for you and the work that you do? And, and does that sound a bit like burnout?

So I think you've touched on a lot of really interesting points in that. Thank you for sharing that. Um, I think that a lot of people think it's not clinical. Mm-hmm. And that, that's kind of probably the issue around this because people talk about being burned out all the time. It's almost part of, you know, everyday life. I'm so burnt out, you know, it is. Something that people are feeling, but they feel like because it's not a diagnosis— and we'll talk about that— therefore I'm not entitled to help for it. And that's, that's actually the crux of it.

I truly— but that's really resonating with me. It was so unknown that that's an actual thing. Like, if I'd met all the criteria for depression, I would have known where to go and what to get for help, right?

Yeah, yeah. Okay, so, um, really interesting is that burnout is actually a diagnosis, but not in the DSM-5, which is the, you know, Diagnostic Statistical Manual that we use for mental health disorders, if you like, in Australia. And it comes from America. The ICD-11 is the one that the Europeans use, and they have a criteria diagnostic syndrome that is burnout.

Okay, so what you're saying, that in Australia, in the manual that we use, our sort of Bible of— we can only diagnose diagnose as a psychiatrist and a psychologist, anything we diagnose, we must be guided by the DSM. And there are very clear and specific, specific criteria for any mental health disorder or illness. And so what you're saying is the European version of the DSM actually talks about burnout as a clinical diagnosis, but we don't have the same of that in Australia.

So it's called a syndrome, and it's, it's considered a workplace syndrome, and it does talk about burnout in that context. All the research, uh, so far has been— well, initially I'll say was on health workers and carers because they're the ones that are more prone or seem to be more prone to burnout because you're in a caring environment, you're you're caring for somebody else, it's about somebody else and putting them first. And that, that you tend to then not look at self-care. And so these were the areas that really came up first, and then it kind of got expanded from that. So it started in the health professions, it then sort of got extended out to the education areas and the service fields, and it really became much more widespread knowledge that you could have burnout in these different fields. What hasn't been actually recognized is the home environment.

Uh-huh, right. So, uh, women staying at home looking after their children experiencing burnout.

Exactly. And of course, that's your workplace, isn't it?

Yeah.

If you're at home and you're there 24/7, it's actually worse because there's no downtime. Yeah, you don't get to clock off and go home.

Exactly.

So why not extrapolate that to the workplace?

So is there work being done on that at the moment, or—

so I think it's about how you conceptualize it, really. It's more about Well, let's acknowledge that it is a workplace and that we can experience burnout and we can call that a workplace. Yeah.

Okay. So if we interpret what they're intending and we consider it in this workplace, then it does apply.

It makes sense. Yeah.

Okay. So I would love you obviously to go into what actually is burnout and how does that present and how might people listening, you know, start to recognize if that might be going on for them. But given that you're saying it's in the European manual and not the Australian one, does that Does that mean that we can diagnose burnout in Australia?

Good question. So there are ways that you can conceptualise it, right? And this is a fairly new area and it's one— it was a connection that I really made because I was looking at it working in the medico-legal space. So I was seeing people that were on workers' comp, they're coming in under WorkCover, they're really distressed, they've had these incidents at work, they're burnt out. Yeah, but we don't have that as a diagnosis, do we? And we need a DSM diagnosis. Often these sort of things will be triggered by an event that happens at work, and so a lot of people are going, I've got PTSD. I'm going, well, actually, according to the criteria, you can't say PTSD if it's not a life-threatening event. So the fallback position from that is called— and it's not a great term— adjustment disorder.

So I'm adjusting to the situation, the cognitive loads and the stresses of work and home or whatever, right?

So I mean, the, the criteria are that you have this sort of physical exhaustion, the mental exhaustion or the emotional, you know, disconnectedness.

Yeah.

But also this kind of cynicism and your effectiveness at work is depleted. So they're the kind of three touchstones for burnout. And when you experience a workplace stress, an issue that leads to WorkCover, they're the kind of things that if you actually look at the criteria, they can actually fit under an adjustment disorder, which comes under the DSM.

Yeah. Okay. So you, in Australia, we may be diagnosing at the moment burnout as adjustment disorder in order to access supports potentially for that person?

Well, you could. I mean, it's, it's a new space. It's not something that's broadly across the system, but it's certainly opportunity.

Okay.

And that's where I'm sort of, I've been working in that space.

Yeah. Yeah. So tell me about, you know, for people listening that whether they work in a corporate environment. Now, my previous knowledge is all about burnout in corporate, you know, because that's where I have been. But I totally hear you in the sort of education and medical, like all these service areas, it's quite prominent, isn't it? But what are the symptoms across, I guess, all of them, whether you're working at home, in corporate or medical or whatever, what are the symptoms people should be looking out for?

So I guess it's that fatigue is the big one that comes up. You know, I'm just tired all the time. There's nothing wrong with me. I'm not depressed necessarily. I don't fit that criteria. I'm not anxious per se. You could have features of those. Yeah, but it's not the driving part of it, but it's this kind of exhaustion. It's the physical, the mental, the, you know, I just dragging your feet, feeling like you're walking through mud, but also that kind of almost dread, you know, oh God, what am I? Do I have to go back to work? What am I going to do? I really don't want to do this. That kind of feel. The really interesting thing around this, there's been some research done in Australia.

Yeah.

Uh, because the original research was done, um, by Christine Maslach and she developed this screening test and that you can do for it.

Yeah.

So you can actually measure it. Yes. And you can quantify levels of burnout and then measure it.

Yep.

If you, you know, do an intervention, go and have some treatment, and then you can see at the end whether that's worked. Interestingly, But that original work really focused on those kind of three criteria, the physical, the emotional, and then this kind of workplace effectiveness. What the Australian research, and based in Sydney, I think it was University of New South Wales, it was Gordon Parker who's a psychiatrist, they really looked at in their studies the other features that can contribute to burnout. And personality factors like perfectionism is one of those traits that really can contribute to you developing burnout.

Yeah, 'cause, you know, what is really interesting interesting is people come to me as a psychologist all the time with those three criteria, and often I will— or sorry, with those three, the symptoms that meet that criteria— and often I will say, feels like you're experiencing burnout, you know, as a more casual, not a diagnosis, that this is what's going on for you. And usually the work I do with them as a psychologist is around, well, what is happening internally that is causing you to behave this way. And often it is— I use the word schemas, you know, often it is these patterns of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that you have internalized or adapted or created as a result of the environments or the family or your parents that you've, you know, been exposed to. Yeah. And, you know, often what I see is people with an unrelenting standards schema, and I smile because I quite openly talk about it being my, my dominant schema.

Yep, we can relate.

Um, you know, when someone has been exposed to or raised in an environment and essentially they start to believe or feel that their sense of self-worth comes from their achievement and their performance and their outcomes then when you put a person like that into certain environments, you know, workplace environments for example, then, you know, when you sort of say, here are the hoops, jump through it, here's the, you know, here's the expectation and here's the reward, you know, you will get validation or a pay rise or a promotion or something like that, then we find that people with these types of schemas really thrive in these environments because people with an unrelenting standards schema will prioritize their performance and outcomes over anything else, right? And whilst it can be absolutely fantastic in certain stages of your life, you know, early 20s, out there kicking goals, getting all of the validation through all of these external sort of things that you're achieving people don't really notice the shift until something changes, like becoming a parent.

Well, then you haven't got the focus solely on you anymore. It's about other people as well. Yeah.

And what you start to notice then is usually when you have these types of schemas, you can throw yourself in and do everything, and the only thing you're trading off is yourself, you know. But you can survive on a certain amount of no exercise and shitty food and stuff to get the outcomes right.

Until you get burnt out.

Yes, so it's sometimes I feel it's this, um, so I guess to start with, that's sort of the work I do as a psychologist with people who may be in this space. What's happening to allow you to get to this point?

The other thing I will say is that kind of adds into the other aspect that came out in the work that they were doing in Sydney's research, is that they found that people who looked at their work in different ways had different susceptibility. So if you look at your job, it's just, this is how I'm going to get money and go home and be with my family, much less propensity to get burnt out. If you look at it like a career, then next level, your sort of mid-level vulnerability to get burnout. But if you look at it like your calling, and that's often what happens in healthcare, yeah, in these kind of roles, or as a parent, let's face it, yeah, then you are at higher risk of developing burnout, which, you know, is a really—

leads to a really great discussion around values. Right? Often people— and this was certainly my situation— often people that are experiencing burnout aren't clear on what their values actually are. And so they've absorbed or inherited the values of those around them. I know you're laughing at me because you have the same father as me. Yeah, we do not have the time, but you know, that Something, you know, often I'll say to people, they've got these schemas and it's like, where did you get that from? But with a lack of awareness, without putting a spotlight on it and sort of saying, it's not just like burnout's not just one thing. It's this combination of so many things, isn't it? It's the way you think, the way you see your job, the way you do or don't know what your values are, the way you feel in response to them, and then the behaviors.

Yeah. And it really comes back to this idea also of responsibility, this you know, overdeveloped sense of responsibility, or this idea that you have to look after everybody else before you look after yourself. And these are really sort of high-risk traits as well.

So I would call that a self-sacrificing schema, right? And, you know, women, you know, traditionally have been valued when they are self-sacrificers, right? So we are this entire generation of women who have watched the generation before us be praised for— she put everybody's needs before her own. Or we've seen it in movies, you know, every time I've been to a funeral, you hear it in eulogies. Oh, she was so selfless, she was so this, she would take the shirt off her back. And we're finally starting to listen to that and go, why? Exactly right. But that's huge. Like, and that is something that I know you work with burnout with both males and females, but it's something that traits specifically as self-sacrificing is certainly really prominent in females of this generation.

And you raise a really good point because it does present differently in males and females. Okay, so women tend to internalize things more, men tend to externalize, and that happens in a lot of different disorders, I guess.

I guess as well, typically, traditionally, women are holding a lot of the mental load and responsibility at home as well. And if we go back to sort of my example, I probably could have returned to work and performed at that level. It was unrelenting, that level, but it was like, actually, now I have this huge new piece of me where I am also the default parent. And that was a big shift that I actually hadn't understood because there was this also this sort of, yeah, we can do anything.

And that's right. And that was the other thing. It became this, this badge of honor to be the superwoman, to have it all and do it all and be able to. Yeah. Which is really damaging.

I used to like people in the workplace used to say to me, you're such a superwoman. And I know it felt good, right? Because I was like, yes.

Approval-seeking.

Approval-seeking schema. And I know now whenever anybody says that, I actually stop and sort of really address that and say, you know what, like I'm achieving these things, but here are the areas that I'm not, or I've just got a lot of support, right? Because it's, you know, so often we're looking at others, especially in your workplace, whether that's at home, you're looking at other mothers or parents on social media, or whether it's in the work context and comparing all the time.

What I really heard you say when you went through burnout was that you said, all the self-care things had to go. And I love that now you actually make that time and say, I need this, this is what I need. And so I can put on my own oxygen mask first.

Yeah.

So that I can then care for others.

Yeah.

And it sounds so simple when you say it that way, but it really is a barrier for a lot of people to getting help is to be able to say, actually, I need to do this for myself.

Exactly. And it's just so important. So an example of that is now, and I shared this with you offline, was When I have these big days where I'm working with, you know, big trauma intensives or running retreat, it's non-negotiable that I get up beforehand and do my Pilates, you know, because that's the one thing that is going to allow me to fill my cup first. Gosh, all of these classic, you know, things that we know.

And it's basics. It's really basic. It is getting the exercise. It's having the food that really nourishes you. It's making sure you get the sleep. And in the work that we do, we're really— we're exposed to a lot of these, as you say, with such privilege to get people's stories.

Yeah.

But it can be— it can really take a toll unless we make sure that we've got that self-care in place.

One thing that just came up for me, and I know will for many others, when you just said make sure you get enough sleep, there was a part of me as a mother of 4 children, some of them did not sleep very well, that when health practitioners said that that to me, I was like, fuck you, right?

Yep.

I would sleep if I could, right? What do you say? I mean, I've got a— what I would say to that, but what would you say to women who really, it is not their choice that they're not sleeping due to their family situation?

And that's absolutely fair. And every, I guess, approach has to be tailored to the individual. So you can say, these are all the targets you need to hit But in fact, you need to be kind to yourself too. It's not about saying, "I have to get 8 hours." It's about, "Well, if I don't get the optimal sleep, how can I support myself today?" Correct. What food can I give myself? What break can I give myself to make sure that I can power through?

Yeah, and it's recognizing the cycle. You know, when the sleep is bad, we wake up crankier, we're more easy to get frustrated at people, we're more likely to rely on coffee rather than real food because we're trying to make up— Or sugar.

No, sugar.

All of that. And when we fuel ourselves with all of that, we get shitty art. Like, it's, it's flow on, right? And it's about having the education and the knowledge, but also being able to access that. Like, so having plans in place, because if you're in fight or flight mode just trying to get through the day, you can't access those beautiful things that you know are good for you.

Yeah. And it's almost like having a safety plan, isn't it? You know, but on a, on a fundamental level.

Yeah.

So that you know that if I have a piece of fruit, it's going to give me better energy than if I have a cookie and I have a sugar spike and then drop down lower than what I was.

Yeah.

And it seems, or it feels like maybe it's too basic to be talking about, but it really is important because it's so easy in the community, society, the way it's structured. Everything's hyper-processed, it's super convenient, but it's not actually going to help us.

Yeah. And sometimes I will sort of talk about, yeah, you know, what are those other things we can do? Like, sort of think of it like a recipe. What is the recipe for the day and what are the things I can add to make this turn out better. Yeah, you know, I don't have flour, but if I Google what can I use instead of flour, you know, can I use something else, right? So I can't get the sleep, but if I eat well and move for 10 minutes in my break, that's going to be a better solution than not moving and just surviving on coffee, right?

My big one that I always love to do is, because work can be so absorbing intense for the time that I'm there, before I go home to my kids and my family, I need a gear shift and I need a circuit breaker. So I just, I find a place that is on the way home from work. If it's a park, if you're near water, go and take a walk. A 10-minute walk is all it takes. And it gives you that time just to breathe, you know, a bit of nature, a bit of touch back down to earth and a circuit breaker. Completely.

But how often when you are in that in that state of exhaustion and overwhelm and, you know, I don't have 10 minutes. But what I often end up talking to my clients about is, but what if you don't? Like, what is the trade-off then? You've now got 7 more hours this afternoon with your family, and is that 10 minutes worth feeling better?

Well, also maybe that when you're jumped on, when you walk in the front door and you haven't put your bag down yet and they're already asking you for whatever they need, that you don't snap. Yeah. You know, maybe you can go, okay, do you know what? I just need to put my bag down. Can I? And I need to go to the bathroom and then I'll come back and then I'm all yours. And it's about being able to respond rather than react. Yeah.

So people say I don't have the time, effort, energy, money for self-care, but like, we don't— we can't not.

We can't not. Yeah.

Right. And it sounds simple. We're talking about this really complex thing of burnout and then we're just talking about not just talking about, but it kind of feels like that. We're talking about self-care, but often, yeah, there is so much in the way for someone to actually show themselves the love, to prioritize their own self-care.

And I know we keep saying it's really simple, but we also want to really acknowledge that it has— it is actually really hard, you know, for people to take that step. We know. Yeah, yeah.

Well, for the— and, and it's not because the— that person doesn't get it. You know, I can tell you, I've worked with— on my health retreats, in the gym that I own, and in the work I do now— I've dealt with thousands of women who know what healthy eating is, who know how much they should exercise, who know all of that. But often there is some kind of barrier, which is often where I will go into schemas and, you know, psychological sort of things. What is happening for that person that's not allowing them to access all of that stuff that they do know? You know, most women are intelligent, kind, loving, amazing people, but there's something, whether it's conditioning or beliefs or just not having enough awareness of themselves to stop that.

Yeah, it could be habit as well.

Yeah.

And sometimes, um, people look at the mountain rather than the steps in front. And so I think that's a really crucial thing to, to say is that it can just start with one step. It could just be you have something like a lemon drink in the morning and that's your one thing that you want to do for yourself today. One little step is that shift that can actually change your trajectory. Okay.

So what we've been talking about is that burnout can be really complex. It can occur across a range of areas and stages of life. I think that's important to note different stages with, different mental and cognitive loads can add to your burnout. But essentially, you know, we're saying it's when people have too much going on or they're going too hard in certain areas and there's no self-care, and then the impact is being felt both physically— the body is tired— emotionally, energetically, all of that, right? Psychologically, mental health, everything is struggling, and you are therefore not living not thriving and not being as effective in your work as you would like to be. Yeah, well, in your work and, and in your family.

Well, work is family too, isn't it?

Yeah, yeah. But you know, so often then work gets the best of people and then the family doesn't. And then, then what feels heavy is the guilt, you know, of this whole, I'm living a life that's not aligned with my values and I don't know how to stop it, or this is the only way, or this is just a product of our environment when it, I guess it doesn't have to be. I guess one of my questions is when we have just simplified it like we have, you know, basically you're giving everything, you've got this, you know, the spoons analogy that we often use when we talk about neurodivergence. Have you ever heard of that one where you, you wake up in the morning and got a certain number of spoons and everything you do that requires energy, you hand the spoons out?

I talk about penguins on the iceberg.

Oh really? We'll come back to that one. So, you know, you've only got a certain amount of energy every day, and some people are just living lives that require more energy than they have. Why get help if we're just saying the simple— it sounds simple to stop doing that?

Yeah, great question. There are huge barriers to getting help or to, to addressing burnout. I, I did a whole series of of like 12 different reasons or barriers, I guess, to getting help. And sometimes it's about your values. You don't value yourself as much as others. Sometimes it's money. Sometimes it's, you know, there's a lot of different reasons. Time. There's a lot of different factors that can go into it. So I think even though you know, you cognitively know that these are the things you need to do, if you can get somebody to help you, it means that it can just they can hold your hand to start the journey. You know, it's not about even following all the way through. It's just about getting the tools, getting it in place, taking the first step and having the training wheels on, really. Yeah.

It's kind of like, you know, something I say all the time to clients and anyone who'll listen really is like, I watch tennis on TV and I kind of know the rules of tennis and I know how to play tennis. But if I'm going to go and become really good at tennis, I'm going to get a coach to really show me. Because whilst I, I think I understand all of this and I think you hit it this way, like, a coach that really understands it is going to support me to get there faster, potentially more efficiently, and I'm probably going to enjoy the process more.

Well, also they'll have specific training techniques that are proven. Yeah, and that's where we start talking about evidence evidence-based. Yeah, and I know that sounds like a clinical term, but what it means is that it's proven. Yeah, it means that they've researched it, they've worked out what works, and so then you can rely on the advice of what you're getting, which is so important.

Which, you know, we talk about this all of the time— which professionals do you go to? And it's so confusing out there. Do I see a coach? Do I see a somatic person? Do I see a psychologist? Do I see a counselor? Do I see a psychiatrist? And one of the things that we are very passionate about as health professionals, which I guess is what led to do the training and education and qualifications is evidence-based work.

Absolutely. Okay.

Okay. So we get it. And, you know, a lot of people are probably relating to this burnout at the moment. We've talked about it culturally in Australia. So what?

Yeah, good question.

Where do we go? What, what do we do next?

So I think that it's really not a developed space here in Australia because because it is so unregulated. And if we look at the European example, because it's something that's actually built into their culture, they've been doing it for centuries. They have health retreats that you can go along to that the whole town is dedicated to the type of health retreat. It could be hot springs, it could be fresh mountain air, it could be mud baths or something. But the, the really key thing over there is that they have this idea of prescribed health retreats. So they're really looking at preventative health as well as rehabilitative health. And you can go there for all sorts of things. One of the things that I really loved in Germany, they have a Mums and Bubs, right? So you can go along for 3 weeks, paid for by your health insurance, and you have eligibility for that prescribed by your doctor and paid for.

And where my mind goes when you when you're talking about this is a lot of this stuff does cost money. Certainly in Australia, it's not paid by the insurance or the government or anything like that.

Not yet.

Not yet. But the consequences of not doing it cost even more.

Absolutely. And the loss of productivity, the loss of, you know, the economic cost is really there.

The loss of incredible women in the workplace because they tap out because they don't know how to support themselves through this and they have to choose either motherhood or work. Right. And then we start to lose true diversity in the workplace.

Absolutely.

That's one of my soapboxes.

Yes. Yes. That comes into other things as well. Right.

And so what are you doing in this space? Quickly give these guys— so if anyone's really interested, they can come and follow you. I know you're so passionate about this.

So launching off that idea of what happens in Europe, because I lived in Europe for a while and really got to see what it was like, was whether we could do that here. And so where I work, I've talked to them and we've actually created an outpatient program that can be claimed with your private health insurance. And currently it's a Saturday course. Again, there's huge barriers around that.

Absolutely.

And we want to start looking at, you know, whether we can do this kind of retreat idea, but having it in the evidence-based area.

I mean, I get so excited by that. You and I have had a few chats around that. How do we make access for burnout support easier and less barriers— less barriers to access it so that we can do this work when it's needed and not have to— you and I step in and help with people after the fact.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah.

I mean, there's online courses, of course, yeah, that you can do. And again, it still comes back to that barrier around— or which barrier really? Do I have time? I don't have time. You know, I don't deserve it. I don't, you know, I don't need to do this because I've got all these other things I need to do. So it really is about how do we break through that and get people to take that first step.

I love that. I just thought of And I know you have an online course that, that does focus on this, but it's like, and I've done this myself, here is the online course that is really going to help this really busy person to, you know, look after themselves better. But the really busy person is too really busy to actually do the course. Right.

And that's really the prevailing thought, isn't it? That most people are like, I wish I had time to do a course.

Yeah. You know?

Yeah.

And, and sometimes the answer is maybe a course isn't the best method of delivery. Like, you know, some people will not engage as well with a course as they will on a retreat, which is why you're trying to offer multiple types of support.

So I think that the, you know, the idea of having that helping hand to get you on the track. Yeah. And then maybe you need the course to keep you on it.

Yeah.

You know, so that would be a way to do it. Yeah.

Yeah. So I hope, you know, just to summarize this, that we've allowed the listeners to sort of understand a bit more about burnout. I completely agree with you that it's become a really casual term. You know, we call it pop psychology where people take really clinical sort of terms like depressed, I'm so depressed, or you know, when someone makes a decision in their own way, they're such a narcissist, or all of these things, which is real, can be really, really damaging for people truly experiencing this. Like, if you are truly experiencing burnout, it is all-consuming, it is exhausting, it is, you know, it can lead to serious mental health conditions like depression because there is no light at the end of that tunnel, right?

Absolutely. It becomes a chronic thing that really kind of escalates to the next level.

Absolutely. And that's when, what I mean by when we normally see them, right? And so, so we have people with these chronic health conditions because they've been on that hamster wheel or burning out for years, decades sometimes, without even realizing it.

Yeah, and recovering from burnout is not a quick thing.

Yeah, you know, it's not a month, and it's not just a mud bath or a massage. You know, I often tell the story that when people say, do more self-care, if you're in a really, you know, busy part of life— I remember once going, I gotta go get my hair done, right? Because that's self-care, and I've got to love myself. And I went to the hairdresser 5 hours later, like I was busy. I didn't have 5 hours and I had to get babysitters for the kids for those 5 hours. And then the $400 bill. And I was like, this self-care has cost me more of my mental health than not doing it in the first place.

I'm not going to say anything about the cost.

Oh, geez. So anyway, Sarah Wills, thank you for coming along.

Yeah, thanks for talking about this. I think it's really important to look at that kind of preventative side of things.

Absolutely. And I think just sort of normalizing it in that context, people know these other terms, but, you know, I really love that you've sort of explained how it is a clinical diagnosis in Europe. And that doesn't, you know, whilst we may not be there yet in Australia, it doesn't mean it's not important and it doesn't mean we shouldn't be headed that way to understand and recognize how important important this is for so many people. So thank you for coming along. Thank you everybody for listening and being here. Like always, really, really value you being here and appreciate your feedback. So come and let us know if you've enjoyed this episode. Let Dr. Kate know if we want her back by giving her the love. Go and follow her on Instagram if you, um, really enjoyed listening to her. She's doing some cool stuff over there. So thank you and see you next time.