How Nurses Can Overcome Burnout and Reclaim Balance

All human beings experience stress, even under relatively normal circumstances, but for healthcare professionals and nurses, job-related stress can sometimes become overwhelming.

As a group, we nurses tend to be caring, compassionate, hard-working people who like to put others first. This is lovely, but we can frequently forget about a very important person — ourselves.

Some nurses may occasionally experience symptoms of depression, anxiety, or other emotional challenges, but these often remain manageable. However, for others, these symptoms may arise with an uncomfortable frequency and intensity, indicating that action is necessary.

According to the Mental Health Foundation in the U.K., signs of burnout include, but are not limited to:

Fatigue
Feeling apathetic or dissatisfied with your work
Headaches and other physical symptoms
Changes to your diet or sleep patterns
A cynical or pessimistic outlook, and persistent worry
Feeling trapped, helpless, overwhelmed, or unmotivated
A sense of mental detachment from your work
Reduced performance

So, what do we do, and where do we turn, when we’re feeling like our work as nurses is taking us down a harmful or unhealthy path?

Facing the Music

Once upon a time, I was a burned-out nurse. At first, I just wasn’t honest with myself or anyone else about what was really going on. In essence, I had burned myself to a crisp, and I continued to keep my nose to the grindstone even though I had reached the limit of my tolerance and my ability to function at an acceptable level. I was miserable at work and sad at home, and there was nowhere I felt I could safely let my guard down.

Fortunately, it was my long-suffering and compassionate former wife who finally put her foot down and demanded that I be honest with myself and others about what was really going on. I had to face the music of my own off-the-charts stress and burnout, or suffer the potential consequences.

Being Proactive

If you’re a nurse whose work is taking a toll on you, being proactive is essential. There are plenty of resources available, but you must take the initiative and make a positive move. If you’re feeling like things aren’t right, you can:

Talk to a therapist or counselor
Reach out to a faith leader
Get in touch with your employer’s Employee Assistance Program (EAP)
Enlist the support of friends and family
Talk to trusted colleagues or mentors
Take a medical leave of absence
Change to a different floor/unit/shift
Request a change in work duties
Look for a new job
Go on vacation or retreat
Connect with a career coach
Do the things that you know help you feel better (e.g., exercise, spend time with family, meditate)

Being proactive doesn’t mean sitting around and waiting for things to change. Your proactive engagement in your own healing and recovery translates to action. We nurses are great at rescuing and helping others, but we’re often much less adept at addressing our own issues. However, since it’s doubtful that someone will do the work for us, there’s generally no choice but to grab a shovel and dig ourselves out of our particularly personal hole before it’s too late.

Being Kind

If you’re experiencing high levels of stress or feeling burned out, it’s really okay to be honest about it. It’s not your fault, it’s reversible, and what you need most from yourself is kindness and compassion.

Being kind to yourself is the first step in overcoming burnout or extreme stress, and that kindness is what will propel you to proactive steps. Genuinely caring for yourself means recognizing the issues and taking action to change your situation. If you feel helpless to do it alone, it’s totally acceptable — and strongly encouraged — to ask for help.

Living to Tell the Tale

My recovery from that tough time in my life and career didn’t happen overnight. In fact, it took a few years, focused psychotherapy, and some radical changes to do the trick and help me get to the other side.

Because I initially refused to admit what was going on, I was, at first, my own worst enemy. Still, once I got with the program and made some positive changes (including quitting the job that had contributed to my situation in the first place), things improved steadily and incrementally.

Realistically speaking, none of us can be 100% consistent with our self-care practices, and we can easily lose touch with the realities of our lives when we’re busy working and trying to put food on the table, raising a family, going to school, caring for our ageing parents, or whatever else we have on our plate.

However, when the going gets tough and we feel ourselves sliding down that slippery slope of unhappiness, stress, and increasingly ill mental and/or physical health, something has to be done.