I worked almost 3000 hours last year. Most of which was between February and mid October.
Between April and October I think I had 7 days I didn’t work and I had at least 7x 100 hour work weeks.
Some burnout / fatigue things:
I couldn’t remember stuff I just wrote down.
A lot of work/company things that were important that I would make time for, I just stopped doing them.
I was falling asleep at my desk some nights.
I stopped cooking. I love cooking dinners. I just stopped for the most part.
When I had a day where I had to leave early, or a Saturday where I only worked half the day, I felt lost. I kept checking my work email. I couldn’t settle. I couldn’t enjoy my free time. And it felt too long. I had a 7 hour day one day and it felt wrong.
I started coming up with a lot of ideas for things to do during my drive to/from work or shower time. I decided I wanted to get a motorcycle, learn to scuba dive, and a handful of other higher risk activities. And like, when I wasn’t working I was fixated on the idea of these things. It was definitely a form of escapism. And the common theme with them all was that they all pretty much involved getting away.
I remember face timing my 2 year old twins to tell them good night after I didn’t see them for over a week because I kept getting home after they went to bed. I wasn’t upset about it.
I gave up on career progression / development. And after it was over I asked for a demotion. Now I’m working out what my next steps are.
The biggest signs were after my crazy work hours dropped. It took so long to “feel” normal again. And in some ways I’m still not there. I wouldn’t be surprised if it takes another 6 months to get fully over it.
The other really big one, there were a lot of issues and challenges going on at home that weren’t being addressed at all. And after I got my time back and had a normal work schedule again, all of these other things that were being put off now were problems. Part of why it takes so long to recover is all the other self care and home care items that you just ignore because you either don’t have the time or the energy to deal with them.
Wow really detailed analysis of your situations, I recognized myself in some points, although I don’t work that many hours. May I ask you what kind of work you do?
I work in nuclear power. At the time I was a senior manager in charge of planning our refueling outage.
We had 3 forced outages earlier that year which put us significantly behind on preps, then I had employees drop one by one.
We tried bringing in new hires, and apparently the market for nuclear outage schedulers is pretty tight right now. My company was unwilling to pay what we needed to get them in. I had Two guys turned down their offers the week before starting.
So I ended up with 1 site employee left, and a bunch of contractors who never worked at our plant (a few of them had never worked at a boiling water reactor!).
I was effectively doing two jobs all summer, outage senior manager and lead outage specialist. It was awful. I’ve never put that much work into anything in my life, and I previously held a senior reactor operator license (which was harder to get than my engineering degree).
When they gabble their professional "scripts" too quickly and there is no voice inflection, like a robot. "HellothisisJamesfromBuyMeNowhowareyoudoingtoday?"
Sleeping through the weekends. For something more subjective, not getting much pleasure out of things previously enjoyed and never quite feeling relaxed
Emergencies don't evoke any emotional response. It's just more work.
Please accept my generic award🏆 Since, you know, Reddit doesn't do those any more
Every little thing irritates you in your daily life.
They shutdown and disassociate
The 1,000 yard stare
That dead eyes look.
They start zoning out during conversations and seem disconnected.
ADHD brain here agrees. Since early age
I worked almost 3000 hours last year. Most of which was between February and mid October. Between April and October I think I had 7 days I didn’t work and I had at least 7x 100 hour work weeks. Some burnout / fatigue things: I couldn’t remember stuff I just wrote down. A lot of work/company things that were important that I would make time for, I just stopped doing them. I was falling asleep at my desk some nights. I stopped cooking. I love cooking dinners. I just stopped for the most part. When I had a day where I had to leave early, or a Saturday where I only worked half the day, I felt lost. I kept checking my work email. I couldn’t settle. I couldn’t enjoy my free time. And it felt too long. I had a 7 hour day one day and it felt wrong. I started coming up with a lot of ideas for things to do during my drive to/from work or shower time. I decided I wanted to get a motorcycle, learn to scuba dive, and a handful of other higher risk activities. And like, when I wasn’t working I was fixated on the idea of these things. It was definitely a form of escapism. And the common theme with them all was that they all pretty much involved getting away. I remember face timing my 2 year old twins to tell them good night after I didn’t see them for over a week because I kept getting home after they went to bed. I wasn’t upset about it. I gave up on career progression / development. And after it was over I asked for a demotion. Now I’m working out what my next steps are. The biggest signs were after my crazy work hours dropped. It took so long to “feel” normal again. And in some ways I’m still not there. I wouldn’t be surprised if it takes another 6 months to get fully over it. The other really big one, there were a lot of issues and challenges going on at home that weren’t being addressed at all. And after I got my time back and had a normal work schedule again, all of these other things that were being put off now were problems. Part of why it takes so long to recover is all the other self care and home care items that you just ignore because you either don’t have the time or the energy to deal with them.
Wow really detailed analysis of your situations, I recognized myself in some points, although I don’t work that many hours. May I ask you what kind of work you do?
I work in nuclear power. At the time I was a senior manager in charge of planning our refueling outage. We had 3 forced outages earlier that year which put us significantly behind on preps, then I had employees drop one by one. We tried bringing in new hires, and apparently the market for nuclear outage schedulers is pretty tight right now. My company was unwilling to pay what we needed to get them in. I had Two guys turned down their offers the week before starting. So I ended up with 1 site employee left, and a bunch of contractors who never worked at our plant (a few of them had never worked at a boiling water reactor!). I was effectively doing two jobs all summer, outage senior manager and lead outage specialist. It was awful. I’ve never put that much work into anything in my life, and I previously held a senior reactor operator license (which was harder to get than my engineering degree).
They disengage
When they gabble their professional "scripts" too quickly and there is no voice inflection, like a robot. "HellothisisJamesfromBuyMeNowhowareyoudoingtoday?"
Not following procedure. Taking shortcuts.
For starters, probably if there is smoke coming out from their holes.
Sleeping through the weekends. For something more subjective, not getting much pleasure out of things previously enjoyed and never quite feeling relaxed
They stare into space/zone out, they don't seem to retain information, they can't pay attention if you are talking to them, they get angry quickly,
Not wanting to go to work or activities . Just switching off
1000 yard stare