CORONAVIRUS: Emotional burnout. How to avoid it.
How to protect yourself from emotional burnout and how to recognize that you are suffering from emotional parental burnout.
INNA CODRU , OCTOBER 10, 2020
Job-induced burnout is better known and much more discussed than parental burnout. However, the period of isolation has highlighted the difficulties associated with living together in a family (even as a couple). Today, more and more people are aware of the dangers of family stress, which can definitely lead to burnout. Here's how to protect yourself from parental burnout and how to recognize if you're suffering from it.
FIRST THING TO DO: LEARN TO BREATH
Parents who suddenly had to become superhuman, forced to do their jobs and educate their children full-time, were under a lot of stress. It is already autumn, and there are still many countries in the world in which the situation with the pandemic is not simple. If you don't want to be taken aback by this situation, the first thing you need to do is learn to breathe.
Yes, it may seem simple. But when you are in a state of panic or feel like the whole world is on your shoulders, you can hyperventilate or you simply cannot breathe properly, which will affect the entire body and increase the feeling of tension. Intermittent breathing is the solution most likely to work for you.
When you start hyperventilating, your heart rate increases. Although it is not possible to slow it down on one's own, it can be done through ragged breathing, which reduces the amount of incoming air and calms the heart.
These exercises are not very difficult and you can do them right away in less than 5 minutes. Here's how to get started with breathing in 5 easy steps in just 5 minutes:
1. Hyperventilation: Inhale deeply and exhale forcefully until the lungs have cleared 5-10 times. I imagine pushing air out of the bottom of my lungs. Compared to a normal exhalation, this is a push that puts a lot of strain on the muscles.
2. Hold a deep breath: take the last deep breath at about 90% and hold it. I have found that inhaling too deeply can cause some discomfort during subsequent exercises.
3. Push-ups: While holding your breath, do as many push-ups as you can (you can do push-ups from the knees). If you run out of arm strength before you need to breathe, get up and start doing standing squats. The goal is for your muscles to make the most of the oxygen they have.
4. Normal breathing: When you can no longer fight the biological need to inhale, take a deep breath and start breathing normally again. If you tend to force yourself to tense up, I suggest getting on your knees here to get used to the dizziness you may be experiencing.
5. Repeat 2-3 times: allow yourself to recover for a few minutes. For example, I wait for my heart rate to return to my normal resting heart rate and then start over from step 1. I notice a noticeable decrease in the number of push-ups I can do if I don't rest long enough.
HOW TO RECOGNIZE PARENTAL BURNOUT?
The symptoms of parental burnout are similar to what you would feel if they were caused by work. The first is exhaustion. This is the feeling that you are physically and mentally exhausted and are at the limit of your capabilities. When this happens, people suffering from burnout begin to distance themselves from the people around them, and in the case of parental burnout: from their spouse and children. They can no longer control their feelings. Everything they do will disturb and get on their nerves. They can no longer fully empathize and care for the rest of the family.
The second symptom is inefficiency. When you suffer from parental burnout, everything you did around the house or for family members suddenly starts to feel pointless. You begin to think that no one cares about this, no one appreciates it, so there is no point in further working around the house and taking care of the family. You quickly lose that pleasant sense of accomplishment that you previously felt when raising your children.
LOOK FOR BALANCE
The main cause of parental burnout is an imbalance between the daily needs of the family and the time you spend on yourself to gain strength. Therefore, the key to protection is finding balance. To achieve this result, all family members should be given assignments (daily or weekly) and given them rest time.
In ordinary life, when children go to school and adults are at work, there is often no need to clarify these points. But with isolation, the differences in roles between each member of the family became apparent. As life returns to normal, it will be important to redistribute the load more evenly.