“I love my kids, but I just need a break.”  This is the refrain I hear from dedicated, loving parents over and over again this past year.  It’s often said with a hint of shame for feeling so frustrated and fed up with the constant demands of parenting.  We live in a society that says we should love our kids unconditionally, and if we’re frustrated or annoyed by them, then we’re bad parents.  Yet it’s amazing how much parents can simultaneously love their children wholeheartedly while also desperately needing a break from the role of parenting. 

Parents are experiencing high levels of stress these days with inadequate resources to cope with it, according to a review by the American Psychological Association. The previous blog post in this series highlights some of the many reasons parents are grappling with sustained stress over the past 18 months. 

Stages of burnout

Psychologists have identified three stages of burnout.  First there is the sense of overwhelming exhaustion.  Exhaustion comes in many forms.  Parents of younger children tend to describe the physical fatigue resulting from endless caretaking and lack of sleep.  Parents of older children describe the emotional fatigue of managing the conflicts and worries of the adolescent world. 

The next phase is characterized by a drive to disengage.  Parents want to distance themselves from their kids to preserve their energy, often fantasizing about escape.  They feel so overwhelmed and incapable of meeting the needs of the family that parents find themselves emotionally protecting themselves. 

This leads to the final stage which is a lack of fulfillment.  Parents no longer find joy in parenting.  They go through the motions of keeping the family going while feeling empty inside.  They often describe feeling distressed, shame, and guilt about not being the engaged, enthusiastic parents they wish to be. 

No matter which stage of parental burnout you may be experiencing right now, it’s possible to take steps to manage the stress and exhaustion of parenting.  Each effort we make to care for ourselves will benefit the family system.

Strategies to Manage Burnout

Acknowledge the Suffering.  Managing a painful situation always begins by honoring the experience.  We must first own the fact that we are in a burnout state and recognize the full range of consequences we’re experiencing.  We need to identify the feelings of frustration, overwhelm, exhaustion, hopelessness.  Naming the feeling helps us find compassion for ourselves.  Take time to sit with these feelings when they arise rather than judging or denying them.  This may result in tears or a sense of heaviness.  Know that this is not permanent.  Emotions pass more quickly when we allow them to flow through us rather than avoiding, minimizing, or denying them.  Be gentle with yourself.  The link below has more on sitting with difficult feelings.

Reach Out for Support.  Loneliness and shame only increase the suffering of burnout.  It’s important to talk with people about your experience and ask for help when possible.  Don’t wait until you’re already at your wit’s end.  Try to connect with a network of understanding, compassionate friends to lift one another up and navigate the challenges together. Ask for practical help to share the burdens of parenting.  This may mean coordinating carpools and childcare swapping in ways that still feel safe with COVID-19 risks.  Often parents can help one another out in ways that benefit each family. 

Many people struggle to feel safe enough to ask friends or family for help, particularly those who have felt abandoned or let down in the past.  It can feel vulnerable to ask for help.  This is when it may be wise to seek professional help from a licensed therapist who can personalize a plan for you to manage your stress and process your feelings.

Take Micro Breaks.  Parents must prioritize creating time for meaningful breaks from the labor of parenting.  While your fantasy of a month-long beach vacation may not be realistic, this does not mean you should continue plowing through your days with no respite.  Every job requires breaks because it improves our performance.  This often means doing less of the many responsibilities and chores of parenting in order to offer more to yourself.  Imagine creating a steady practice of arranging your daily life to include time reserved to replenish yourself.

What this looks like will be different for each of us.  Think about how you renew your energy.  This could look like taking a walk outside, reading a few chapters of a book, catching up with a friend, working up a sweat, mediating, baking, dancing to fun music.  The options are endless, and your choice may vary from day to day.  The point is that we cannot pour from an empty cup.  And parents must refill their emotional, mental, and physical cups on a regular basis.  Trust that children benefit from the modeling of parents who practice good self-care.

Repair Your Relationships.  Burnout often results in parents either lashing out at the people we love or neglecting our relationships from sheer exhaustion.  Be compassionate and forgiving with yourself when this happens.  It does not mean you’re a bad person or a bad parent or a bad spouse.  You’re simply responding from a place of depletion and helplessness.  Beating yourself up for these mistakes is not only harmful to your well-being but also prevents the opportunity for repair. 

Know that the work of repairing these relationships is meaningful.  It makes relationships stronger, closer.  Take responsibility for your actions that feel inconsistent with your values.  You may need to apologize for something you said or how you raised your voice.  Maybe you overinflated a small moment and threw a big fit.  Own it.  Then make amends.  Do the work of reconnecting and finding common ground again.  Focus on being fully present with your loved ones without distractions, even for just 10 minutes each day.  This effort will build a sense of connection and safety.

Let Go of Perfectionist Goals.  Much of parental stress comes from all the “shoulds” in our minds…all the messages from our culture and media about how parents should act and feel.  We hold ourselves up to unrealistic standards to be perfectly nurturing, present, encouraging, and positive.  In the end, our inner critic tells us we always come up short.  We feel like failures.  And this only compounds burnout. 

Reframing how we speak to ourselves in our minds can help us have more compassion for ourselves so we can more effectively utilize the resources we still have.  One way to do this involves swapping out the “should” in our minds.  Rather than saying “I should be playing with my kids more,” while feeling exhausted and wracked with guilt, try swapping out the language and saying, “It would be great to have more energy to play with my kids.”  This language allows us to acknowledge our current situation without shame so we can focus our attention on our good intentions. 

Allow yourself to let go of expectations that involve meeting others’ approval or keeping up appearances. You don’t need to parent the way anyone else does. You don’t need to do it all, all the time.  You can make choices that prioritize your wellness as a way of caring deeply for your family.  This often means cutting back and saying no.  This means giving yourself grace to be messy and authentic.  Eventually, it means loving our imperfect selves.  And this is a beautiful message for children to learn.

Find Meaning Through Gratitude.  In the daily grind of life, we can lose track of what we most love about being a parent.  We often ruminate on the tough moments, playing out in our minds how things went sideways over and over again.  We beat ourselves up and feel even more exhausted and disappointed.  But we can refocus our minds.  We can make a conscious effort to spend time thinking about the highlights in each day.  Notice the moments when your children are kind, funny, sweet, helpful.  Notice what you love about them.  Notice the moments when you are connecting with them, reminding them they are loved, safe, and understood.  Notice when you have fun.  Notice the moments when others are there to support you.  Notice when you make a choice to take care of yourself.

Finding one moment a day that fills your heart with gratitude will help reconnect you with the joy of parenting again.  The more we recognize and spend energy on what is going well in our families, the better we feel about ourselves and our lives. 

Written by Suzanne J. Smith, Ph.D. for Lakefront Psychology Blog. If you are interested in more original articles about mental health, wellness, perinatal mood, relationships, or parenting, please subscribe to the blog using the button below.  If you are interested in scheduling a consultation for an appointment with Dr. Smith, please email ssmith@lakefrontpsychology.com or use the contact form. 

The post Strategies to Manage Parental Burnout – Part 2 appeared first on Lakefront Psychology.

You’re not imagining it.  Parental burnout is worse than ever these days.  It’s that feeling like you just can’t keep it all together, let alone get one step ahead of the chaos.  It’s that sense that you’re juggling a set of plates while walking a tightrope as someone keeps lobbing water balloons at you.  And it may explain why you utterly exhausted and you find yourself snapping at the slightest annoyance.

Parents were teetering on the edge of burnout before the COVID-19 pandemic radically altered our worlds.  Prior to the pandemic stressors, parents already were often pushing themselves to anticipate and meet every need of their children and families. There was a cultural pressure to give kids every opportunity available, to cook healthy meals around the clock, to keep homes in top shape, to constantly engage and teach your children. Parents were already drowning from the expectation to be perfect.  And many families were already struggling with lack of resources, children with special needs, and other stressors that lowered th1eir threshold for coping with additional stress.

Then the initial COVID-19 pandemic lockdown changed everything.  Parents were expected to suddenly navigate both the pandemic altered work demands while also becoming teachers and technical support for kids in online school.  Parents hustled to figure out childcare all while carrying the worries that every cough or sniffle was a sign of crisis.  The chronic stress left parents on the edge of losing their cool at any moment.

There was hope of reprieve from this exhaustion once vaccines became available and the country opened up its doors.  These days kids have largely returned to the classrooms, youth sports resumed, and families have moved into full gear again.  Yet there wasn’t even a moment to process the initial effects of all the initial pandemic stress before the Delta variant layered new worries.  Parents worry about their kids becoming sick or quarantined, schools closing again, managing social events, and the toll this all takes on their children’s emotional wellbeing. 

Parents everywhere are struggling to find a breath of space to take care of themselves.  The American Psychological Association has recognized the growing need to understand and address parental burnout.  The demands on parents continue to pile up as the resources to support them diminish.  This is resulting in serious emotional, physical, and social consequences. 

Signs of Burnout

The signs and symptoms of burnout heavily overlap with depression.  The difference is that the symptoms of burnout typically disappear when you get a prolonged break from your stressor.  Burnout was traditionally understood as a risk for people in high stress jobs such as like healthcare workers, teachers, lawyers, or business owners.  When people experiencing occupational burnout were able to get an extended vacation from work or dramatically alter work stressors, the symptoms of burnout would naturally resolve.  But burnout is being recognized as a chronic concern among parents, a job that never gets a real vacation.  Parents never get to fully unburden themselves from the responsibilities of parenting.

Consequences of Burnout

Parental burnout has consequences for the individual and the entire family.  Burnout has strong associations with stress related health problems.  Our bodies were not built to be in a state of chronic stress.  We find ourselves struggling with body aches, sleeplessness, and stomach distress.  And many parents feel too busy to find time for doctor’s visits let alone trips to the gym.  Over time, this can lead to heart disease, obesity, type 2 diabetes, sexual dysfunction, and substance abuse. 

The mental struggle to juggle it all often leads to poor focus and performance at work.  As many parents still work from home, the work stress and family stress often overlap and exacerbate one another.  Parents never get a break from either role.  They end up feeling like failures in all aspects of their lives. 

Relationships suffer when we are burned out.  We are simply too stressed and exhausted to be good partners.  We have no resources left to be attentive, affectionate, appreciative.  This results in more conflict and arguments in families.  Couples may become distant and disconnected.  They treat one another like business partners rather than friends and intimate companions.  Everyone feels lonely.

This all affects the children as well.  Children feel the tension of the household and may respond by becoming emotionally volatile and acting out more.  When parents are overwhelmed, they have few resources to deal with these additional parenting challenges. They become irritable and prone to yelling at their children or disciplining in ways they wouldn’t consider when rested and calm.  Children must recover from these regrettable incidents.  But parents too find themselves wracked with guilt, staying up late replaying the episodes so they wake with less rest and greater stress. 

A Path Forward

If you recognize yourself or your partner as struggling with parental burnout, you’re not alone and you’re not a failure.  Recognizing the impact of parental burnout is an essential first step in making the changes required to rebalance your stresses and resources. In Part 2 of this blog series, we will identify steps you can begin taking to manage your burnout and create a lifestyle that allows you to replenish your energy regularly. 

It is important to note that burnout can also lead to depression or anxiety disorders. If you feel like you’ve lost capacity for joy, experience daily anxiety that interferes with your functioning, or have a sense of hopelessness, it’s important to seek professional help from a licensed therapist or physician.  Treating depression and anxiety early improves the outcome and reduces the suffering. 

Written by Suzanne J. Smith, Ph.D. for Lakefront Psychology Blog. If you are interested in more original articles about mental health, wellness, perinatal mood, relationships, or parenting, please subscribe to the blog using the button below.  If you are interested in scheduling a consultation for an appointment with Dr. Smith, please email ssmith@lakefrontpsychology.com or use the contact form. 

The post Parental Burnout May Be at the Root of Your Struggles Right Now – Part 1 appeared first on Lakefront Psychology.

If you find yourself drowning is a sea of responsibilities, feeling weighed down by constant exhaustion and overwhelming busyness, you are not alone.  Many Americans are reporting a drop in energy as stress levels rise.  We are juggling multiple roles and demands for our energy.  The fact is that your energy (including physical, emotional, and mental reserve) is a finite resource that must be renewed regularly.  We have to honor what it means to be human with these real limitations.  Continuing to push ourselves beyond our capacity is a recipe for stress exhaustion.

You can recognize stress exhaustion by the following symptoms:

• Fatigue
• Insomnia
• Headaches
• Body aches
• Upset stomach
• Irritability
• Crying spells
• Difficulty concentrating
• Forgetfulness
• Racing thoughts
• Low motivation

If you are experiencing three or more of the symptoms above, it’s time to take some steps to regain your energy and avoid the harmful consequences of stress exhaustion.

Honestly Assess Your Energetic Drains

Begin by identifying all the factors in your life that require energy.  This will include daily energetic drains (like household chores) as well as the less frequent drains (like medical issues).  Once you have your list of factors, assess what percentage of your energy seems to go to each lately.  Creating a pie chart or list is a helpful way to do this.  Knowing your energetic demands can only add up to 100%, be honest with yourself about how much of your energy goes towards work, kids, parents, partner, friends, exercise, hobbies, volunteer projects, household chores, running errands, etc.

• Kids – 40%
• Work – 30%
• Partner – 10%
• Chores – 10%
• Volunteering – 5%
• Parents – 5%

Match Your Energy to Your Values

Most people get about half way through their list of energetic drains and realize they already used up 100% of their energy resources.  How in the world can you create more energy for exercise, hobbies, or friends when 100% of your energy is already allocated to work, kids, partner, etc.?  Take an honest look at your pie chart and see if it matches your values.  Is this how you want to prioritize your energy?  Does this feel satisfying?

If your energy isn’t lining up well with your values, then it’s time to consider creating change.  How would you like this pie chart to look?  Can you outsource some of your responsibilities or ask for help so the burden is less?  Where can you ease up on your energetic expense in order to create space for something more important?  Maybe this month you cut back on volunteering so you can help out your parents, go to the gym, or have lunch with a good friend.  Every choice you make to spend your energy requires a sacrifice of energy elsewhere.  So be thoughtful about what matters most to you. And give yourself permission to view these choices as temporary, so you can adjust how you spend your energy over time.

Practice Self-Compassion with Your Energy

We often feel uncomfortable challenging how we spend our energy because we hold unrealistic expectations for ourselves.  Many of us feel burdened by the “shoulds” in our heads.  We should be rock stars as employees, partners, parents, friends, etc.  We believe we need to always be excelling and fully invested in each part of our lives, fulfilling everyone’s expectations all while staying fit and happy.  And if we’re not perfect in all areas, then we harshly judge ourselves as total failures.  These perfectionistic standards may come from our childhoods or our communities.  And they cause us such unnecessary suffering.  It is an act of self-compassion to acknowledge these unhelpful burdens we place on ourselves and try to accept that we simply cannot do it all at once perfectly.  Once again, we must respect that we are human and our energy resources are finite.

Allow yourself to choose just three things each day to really focus your energy on.  Imagine your energetic pie will shift from day to day.  Some days you may go all in with work, family, and partner.  While other days you’re all in with exercise, friends, and hobbies.  Imagine shifting priorities from day to day so that over the course of the month you feel like you’ve given your energy to each aspect of life you find valuable.  And give yourself permission to let the other things drop down on your list that day without guilt or anxiety.  Your focus is to spend energy in a compassionate way that reflects your values.  You can still keep up with chores and errands, but you allow them smaller slivers of the pie on different days, just 5-10%.

Renew Your Energy

Continuing to expend energy without renewing it is a fast track to stress exhaustion.  Consider what you personally find renewing: getting a good night’s sleep, reading a book, catching up with old friends, binge watching shows on your couch, going for a walk, meditating, etc.  Try to cultivate as many strategies as possible to renew your energetic reserves and prioritize creating the time and space for this in your daily life, yes…daily life.

Many people struggle to give themselves permission to rest and recover, viewing it as self-indulgent or selfish.  Yet nurturing yourself is how you create even more energy for personal wellness and caretaking.  It’s like the old saying: You can’t pour from an empty cup.  Refilling yourself isn’t a luxury, it’s a necessity.

Focus Your Energy

Mental exhaustion is often related to relying heavily on multitasking.  You respond to texts while watching the kids or work through your daily agenda while walking the dog.  Multitasking is an inefficient use of energy.  It requires our brains to constantly shift attention and focus.  We not only waste mental resources in this process, we also tend to feel like we’re failing in each role.  Without adequate focused attention on each task, we easily become confused or forgetful.  This is because our minds work better when focused on one thing at a time.  We can be more relaxed when we let ourselves get into the zone rather than juggling multiple demands and interruptions.

To focus your energy, it’s helpful to create space between tasks.  Imagine allowing yourself a brief mental break between each task or role you have.  You might take a deep breath and just tell yourself that you’re letting that last task go so you can focus on the next one.  Maybe you stretch, meditate, visualize putting your responsibility onto a shelf to get a break from it.  This allows you to more fully focus on the next task at hand without wasting energy still ruminating on the last one.  This takes practice and intention.  Be compassionate with yourself as you gradually develop the ability to focus for just a few minutes on one thing at a time.  It’s often helpful to focus on being fully present in your body to stay in the moment.  Tune into your senses while letting go of distractions.

Support a Culture of Energetic Conservation

Chances are that other people in your life are struggling with this feeling of exhaustion at times.  Creating a network of support can help each person be accountable and more compassionate with themselves.  Encourage your friends and family members to renew their energetic reserves.  Support them when they set new limit that focuses their energy.  And be honest about why you chose to skip an event or task when you needed a rest.  The more we support one another to take care of our energetic priorities, the faster we create a healthier culture around the limits of our energy resources.  Be gentle with yourself and all the demands in your life as you offer the same gentleness to others.

Written by Suzanne J. Smith, Ph.D. for Lakefront Psychology Blog.  If you are interested in more original articles about mental health, wellness, perinatal mood, relationships, or parenting, please subscribe to the blog using the button below.  If you are interested in scheduling an appointment at Lakefront Psychology, LLC for a psychotherapy consultation, please call 216-870-9816.

The post Steps to Recover Energy & Avoid Stress Exhaustion appeared first on Lakefront Psychology.