Melanie Cole, MS (Host): Welcome to Bryan Health Podcast. I'm Melanie Cole. And joining me today is Dr. Stacy Waldron. She's a licensed psychologist at Bryan Counseling Center, and she's here to help us and teach us how to avoid burnout in work and life.

Dr. Waldron, it's such a pleasure to have you join us and what a great topic that so many people are feeling really all over the country. Can you give us a little working definition as we start here of burnout? What are we talking about and what's the scope of what we're discussing here today?

Stacy Waldron PhD: Well, Melanie, thank you for having me. And yes, I would like to tell you what burnout is about and just how much this is infiltrating all of our lives in so many different ways. Burnout can make you feel sluggish, exhausted. It can affect simple tasks even. It's been defined by the American Psychological Association as the physical, emotional, or mental exhaustion accompanied by decreased motivation, lower performance, and negative attitudes towards oneself or others. In a sense, it's as if people feel like they just can't do anything anymore.

Many times people think of this in terms of their work, that they no longer want to go to work. They don't want to participate in their work. They feel their job is just not worth it anymore. But it's so much more than your work. It can affect any part of your life. So really, when you think about burnout, it can be anywhere. It can be as a parent. It can be as a friend. It can be in your relationship. It can be anywhere. And I've seen it widespread that people are experiencing burnout

Melanie Cole, MS: Well, I have seen that too. Now, work-life balance. You mentioned that this is not just work. It could be friends. It could be parenting. It could be any of these things. I'd like you to speak about that and how that can be out of sync with each other. And if it is, Dr. Waldron, what are some of those physical, emotional, behavioral signs that we're experiencing it? How can we recognize this work-life balance that's out of sync?

Stacy Waldron PhD: Well, for example, you and I are talking with new technology and that has really impacted our work-life balance. It's very hard to turn off these days. We have technology with our phones, with our computers. We have meetings that we, in the past, hadn't been able to do because our computers can now do this. So, we don't turn off and reset at the end of our workday. We don't slow down, and our personal lives seem to have more and more demands. So, we may be having some physical signs that we don't necessarily recognize, we don't think about. We're tired. We have frequent headaches. We have changes in our appetite or our sleep habits. Our emotional signs can be things such as feeling a sense of failure or self-doubt. We detach or we feel alone. We feel trapped or defeated. We can have a sense of loss of motivation and we can have a decreased satisfaction or a sense of accomplishment.

Our behavioral signs can include things such as withdrawing from our sense of responsibility. We isolate from others. We procrastinate from getting things done. We get frustrated with our friends or family or our work colleagues and we skip out from work or come in late or leave early. These can all happen with burnout.

Now, these can also be signs of depression, but depression is a little different because it's broader when these burnout symptoms occur and then can be pinpointed to specific triggers in people's lives.

Melanie Cole, MS: Wow. That was an excellent description. So, now that we can recognize these warning signs and we see it in ourselves or our loved ones, our partners, give us some tips for managing that. How do we re-find that spark, that love, that fire that we had for our job, for our families, for whatever it is. How can we find that again?

Stacy Waldron PhD: Well, I like the fact that you pointed out we want to recognize warning signs. That's very important. So, if you're feeling that there's no boundary between that personal and work-life such as you feel like you're going 100 miles an hour and it's impossible to slow down even if now you're only going 85 miles an hour, but that's really super fast. That's a sign that maybe you're depleted, that your physical and emotional reserves are just not there. So, that could be a first sign. And you're recognizing, "Whoa, I need to slow down." You know, 65 miles an hour wouldn't be such a bad thing. You need to reach out for support.

Focusing on day-to-day activities could give you clues about what you might need to make substantial changes in your life. Talking to a friend could help you feel that you have a different outlook on life. And letting your friends know that something just doesn't feel right. That can be a start. But also, reaching out for professional help from a therapist. There's no shame in that, but in addition it's a good thing to say, "I'm going to ask someone for help that knows how to help me." We have very good and comfortable feelings about asking a physician when we have a sore throat or when we feel we have a fever. There's no question, we'll go and ask for help in that regard. But when we're feeling that our life is out of balance, that there's something that's not right, going and talking to someone may be unfamiliar, but it is definitely something that can be just as helpful as going to a physician or a medical professional when you're feeling a little under the weather or having a sore throat. So, in my mind, those are equal.

Some other things are simply improving self-care, and those are things I love to call a personal check-in into your schedule. How am I doing emotionally? How am I doing physically? You can do that every single day and it's a perfect first step.

Melanie Cole, MS: I'm so glad you brought up self-care and that you brought up that it's okay to ask for help and to reach out for support. And that yes, if we feel sick, we don't hesitate to go to our doctors. And so, self-care is so important. The things that we do and that negative self-talk because that contributes, right, Dr. Waldron?

Stacy Waldron PhD: I think you've hit on a very important point, that looking at ourselves through that negative lens means that we're not being true to ourselves. We're not being honest, because we all need to take some time to do things to help be more positive, say to ourselves, "This is what's really going on." When we look at ourselves and see that negativity, we are feeling something that feels as if we cannot overcome it. If we looked at our friends, we would say, "Okay, I can see all of these wonderful characteristics."

So, many times, when I'm helping a client or a patient take a look and take that step back, I'll say, "Talk to yourself as if you were a friend. How would you see yourself as a friend going through this situation?" And so, when you're taking that first step to improve your self-care and do that personal check-in, asking yourself as a friend, "How are you doing today?" What do you see that's positive?" find one positive thing, find that sense of gratitude about something today, rather than, "Oh, your hair looks terrible," or "Oh, you could lose five pounds." Those are the negativities that we find by looking at our Facebook or our Snapchat or our Instagram and saying, you know, "I'm not good enough." You can be better than good enough, because you're being honest with yourself.

Melanie Cole, MS: Oh boy, am I glad you brought up social media, because that is just a place where we can see all the negative everything all the time. And I think it feeds into our own feelings of anxiety and dissatisfaction.

So Dr. Waldron, wrap it up for us and speak about the Bryan resources at Bryan Counseling Center and what services are available to people who think they may be experiencing burnout.

Stacy Waldron PhD: If you think you're experiencing burnout, at Bryan, you can explore talking to a therapist. But you can start with a free mental health screening on our website. I recommend that if you're feeling just overwhelmed, if you're thinking that it would help you to talk to someone, absolutely, you can reach out and make an appointment with a counselor. There's no harm in taking that first step and saying, "You know, I'm just wondering how I'm doing with this," sort of like that annual physical you do with your physician. Doing a check in and say, "How am I doing? What could I do better? How could I be healthier for myself?" And it is a really good thing to do. Start with that free mental health screening on the Bryan Counseling Center website.

Melanie Cole, MS: Such important information that you gave here today, Dr. Waldron, that we all really need to hear. Thank you again for joining us. For more information and to listen to more podcasts from our experts, please visit bryanhealth.org/podcasts. That concludes this episode of Bryan Health Podcast. I'm Melanie Cole. Thanks so much for joining us today.