Burnt Out, Chile

They say you can have it all, but at what cost?

Image by Nadia Snopek

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Chile, I am burnt out. Instead of being flewed out, I’m Burnt Out. You don’t need me to tell you that one is significantly better than the other. Working my corporate job full time, working on the woo-woo part-time, maintaining a health and wellness routine, and trying to keep myself afloat mentally is a very low-vibrational plate. My plate is not only full; it’s physically draining me. During my study sessions, I have found myself going in circles from day to day, not retaining information and overall dreading the act of facing the information. Any number of things can lead to this feeling, unfortunately. For me, in this season, it's a culmination of grinding too hard for too long at something that is still weeks away. Normally, 7 weeks out would be prime grind time. Instead, I wish I could take this test next week and be done with the whole thing. There’s so much more I have to learn, yet the will to do so is nowhere in sight. Taking the practice exams feels like such a huge endeavor I give up by the last section. Reviewing the exam feels like it won’t amount to any progress, so I should bypass that as well. I keep asking myself, “How do you expect to become a doctor and change your circumstance, if you refuse to push yourself?”

I finally had to just take a PTO day randomly in the middle of the week a few weeks ago. When I sat down across the table from my manager and told him I was feeling burnt out, so I needed to take tomorrow off he confusingly said, “…. It’s Monday. How are you stressed already? What’s going on?” In that moment I wanted to offload all of the things sloshing around on my low-vibrational plate. I wanted to emphasize that Monday is only the start of this job’s responsibilities. Days of the week have started to mean less and less in my world, but I can’t relay that to him in any meaningful capacity. So, instead, I chose to explain that sometimes folks can just be drained and there may not be any one thing that caused it or any one thing that will fix it. However, I think just having the day to unload, put my low-vibrational plate in the fridge, and not even think about it for a full 24 hours could be a nice place to start. That day off felt like magic. It felt the way black grandmas think ginger ale will make you feel when you’re sick. In the days following I felt motivated, I checked off the things on my list, and I finally felt excited to do them again. I vowed to make a practice of integrating those self-care days more often.

However, I have now found myself in a position where I no longer feel that I deserve them. Taking a break just feels like a nosey person at work looking over my shoulder while I’m shopping online at my desk. Hypothetically speaking, of course. Yes, I’m doing something that should make me feel calm. Instead, I feel shame and disappointment that I am yet again, slipping farther from my goals. Those feelings just turn into a cycle; a positive feedback loop of negative results, if you will. Let's peer into my headspace: I know that I need to review my exam results before I can move on because soon it will be time to take another exam. Then, I run out of time to study because I’m working. If I have time to study, I waste it cooking or cleaning because I tell myself a clean environment and a full belly are optimal conditions for successful learning. If the house looks presentable, I rest because I am tired from cleaning until the nosey person has found their way into my room, watching me watch hopeless couples on Netflix. I feel as though I can’t get out of this loop. This dreadful way of thinking and habit pattern is not where I want to reside, and I know I can do better. I deserve a higher quality of life.

So, I have to think smart. We know that doing the same thing expecting different results is insanity and when you know better, you do better. That is exactly what I intend to do in these next few weeks. Maybe studying more now will positively impact my future scores, maybe the score is already set and I am beating myself up to no avail. There’s a small chance I know more than I think I do and on test day I will just show up and show out like never before! Focusing on what I can control vs. all that’s not going the way I intended is much easier said than done. What I do know, is trying new things can be scary, but sticking with practices that yield unsatisfactory results is even scarier. One small change at a time will ideally lead my steps in a new direction to the same destination… ,MD.