Last Saturday marked the end of nine weeks of quarantine for my family and me. The first month-plus wasn't too bad. We have been fortunate to be able to continue to work; we live in a safe suburban neighborhood in which it's easy to isolate ourselves; our children are safe and we have remained healthy.
Starting about four or five weeks ago, the isolation began weighing heavily on me. For two or three weeks, I ended each day just a little more exhausted than the one before, despite doing what I knew to do to keep my energy up -- making music almost every day, hanging out with my wife in the evening, working on household projects together with her and my mom on the weekends, keeping my sleep schedule regular. I couldn't figure out why I felt like I was losing ground.
After talking with my wife and my therapist (yes, a lot a shrinks have shrinks), it became clear that I was suffering from burnout. This was, while obvious in retrospect, a surprise and a bit of an embarrassment, as I have plenty of experience with burnout both personally and clinically, so I felt like I should have recognized it. I left my last corporate position and turned to private practice specifically to avoid burnout; I felt like the institution I was working for was using me up and I would eventually be tossed aside as a desiccated, cynical husk. In private practice, I began to grow again, my compassion and love for my patients rejuvenated and I felt grounded anew in the inspiration that had led me to this path eighteen years before. How could I be burning out?
Then, on a videoconference with colleagues discussing our respective practices, a friend shared poignantly his insights about the emotional cost of conducting clinical psychology via a computer screen. As "talk therapists," the intimacy of our work creates a deep and powerful channel of energy that we experience when sharing a physical space with a patient. Conducting psychotherapy with an animated image of our patients robs us of that sustenance, leaving us feeling drained -- and, in my case, wondering why. The group consensus enthusiastically endorsed and validated our fellow's experience and I confronted my failure to recognize the loss' affect on me.
With this new understanding, I've been able to get my scales rebalanced. A few patients have completed and I'm not refilling those slots. I'm taking more rest time over the weekend, sometimes moving my work schedule around to consolidate time off, and prioritizing "shouldless" time -- hours when I do what feels good to do in the moment that it feels good to do it, whether it be washing the car, making music, taking a nap, or baking blueberry pie.
For the last two weeks, I have felt ready at the beginning of the workweek, rested and present for my patients. By the start of this weekend, I've even felt like I had space for my family, able to be present for them, like I have enough of the compassion and care that, as a therapist, I've previously had to steward so carefully, but now I can "spare" some to be a husband and father and son again.
Of course, I'm not 100%; I don't expect to be nor do I expect others to be for a long while yet, but things seem to be working well enough. I've had several creative projects going: I have a new composition I hope to publish soon. I sampled a tubulum I've had for years and made a very serviceable digital representation of it. I designed and received delivery on the materials for a workbench in my basement; as I write this my legs and back ache (in that good way) from schlepping said materials into said basement. I purchased a sketchbook and have actually put pencil to it twice.
These things to me are not only acts of repletion but evidence of balance and sustainability: when I'm burning out, I can't even lift myself up to engage in them. And preventing burnout critically depends on awareness; having been shown that, even when things seem ideal, it's possible to have more going out than coming in, I can stay alert for that debtward trend and, hopefully, catch myself when (not if) it happens again.
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