Ask HN: How to deal with burnout and its consequences?

I've been in basically the same mental state a couple times. What helped for me (unordered):

1. Different employer - over half the places I've worked have been toxic... and even some of the not toxic ones ended up inducing burnout due to corporate issues

2. Adderall - not a wonder drug... but helps postpone burnout

3. Getting a dog - wonderful for my mental health in general

For me at least, burnout was mostly a reaction to being in toxic environments. I think I could have gone straight from one of my terrible jobs, unproductive jobs to one of my good ones and been productive right off the bat.

Usually, at the point of real "burnout" there is no fix except leaving for a different setting for awhile. While I often infer Plumbing is a cleaner trade than the tech sector, there are real consequences associated with some toxic corporate cultures. ;) I usually recommend self-evaluation though Ikigai as part of long-term career planning.

'Ikigai starts with the awareness of four key pillars:

Business Values

Core Competencies

Income Generation

What the World Needs' ( https://singularityhub.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/ikigai... )

I can't tell you it's all gonna be okay because I don't know that it will, but I do know that you should go fishing, because for that moment of clarity and relaxation, what does matter to you will become clear.

Living with someone who went undiagnosed for their entire life until their 40s and then started Ritalin and Cognitive behavioral therapy it made a huge difference.

>Earlier this year I burned out hard and spectacularly, having nothing short of a total breakdown and being forced to take many, many months of medical leave by my GP.

I went from 1 bad job to a worse job. Burn out happens. Dont blame yourself, your job pushed too far. You'll find the next job and it will be awesome and you'll cling to this job. I know, I'm clinging to an awesome boss.

>I returned to my job late last month and I find that I simply don't care anymore. My burnout was never really fixed despite the time off. I'm unable to accomplish even basic tasks at work now and truthfully I'm at a point where I don't even care if I get fired. In the time I've been back I think I've been able to close one of two tiny tickets, the rest of the time I've literally done nothing.

It's hard to be sure. It sounds like you're bad off and this will take a long time to properly recover. It won't be months unfortunately.

>During my time off I've been poked and prodded by psychologists and they seem to think I have ADHD and that it was a large contributing factor to this, though I'm not completely sure I buy this explanation.

Certainly possible, yes there is a factor of oversubscribing drugs, but those psychologists are there to help you. No one here can diagnose a throwaway account.

>which I'm likely going to have to consider given my firing seems imminent at this point. I simply don't think I'm capable of maintaining this job anymore.

The thing about burnout is you become extremely defensive and see "im about to be fired any moment" which often isnt true. This actually is what gets you burnt out. You feel like, if only I worked a little harder then i wont get fired. Shitty managers who dont care about turnover use this trick to get maximum productivity.

https://www.sunstar.com.ph/article/1889985/cebu/feature/four...

>I really don't know how to get over this and how to move past it. I feel quite literally incapable of working. My mind knows what needs to be done, but my body says no and I am overwhelmed by apathy. I'm honestly not sure if I'm capable of working in tech anymore at this point and that's doing quite a number of any selfesteem I had.

Dont worry about your job. Hopefully you have 'unemployment' benefits where you live. If not, hopefully you have welfare. You shouldn't care about this job. Instead work on solving your mental health.

Here's what you need to do.

You no longer care about the past, yesterday doesn't matter anymore. cant change it, dont worry about it.

Tomorrow doesn't exist, don't even attempt to think about tomorrow. You're not nostradamus and have no chance of predicting the future. If you could predict the future... might I recommend day trading lol. None of us can predict the future.

When you wake up in the morning, you are only allowed to think about NOW.

Multi-tasking is a myth. Human brains literally cant multitask. You now work on only 1 thing at a time IN THE NOW.

>Truthfully I didn't know things could get this bad. I'm trying to figure out what my future even looks like and how to move past this and any advice would be really appreciated.

Take a baseball bat to that crystal ball. The future is not something you can predict. Tomorrow doesnt matter; it's a trap to try to imagine the future.