Middle age burnout

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i was in the same position. i just had to pull in a lot of "extra-curricular" (or extra-career, rather) activities and make sure i took really, really good care of myself nutritionally, rest-wise, as best i could. It severely limited my life outside of home and work but it did extend my ability to function for a number of years. my best to you.

Thanks for the advice, opi.

I already have almost no life outside of home and work, but I can try a really healthy diet and more sleep.

Lately anxiety has been killing my sleep. I meditate and that helps, but I know I rarely get enough sleep. This may be a big part of the burnout symptoms.

I hope things have gotten better for you, now.

yeah i started to get insomnia under stress when i was 35. initially i was able to counter it with melatonin, warm milk (with sugar and cinnamon, only way i can stand it) before bedtime, dropping the temperature in the room, using a white noise machine, et al. it helped for some time. eventually i had to turn to medication. by *had* to, i mean, i hadn't slept in months and was falling asleep on the way to work behind the wheel. not to mention the depression, sheesh.

the importance of a good night's sleep cannot be overstated in my opinion. there are certain neurotransmitters your brain ONLY manufactures in stage 4-5 sleep (the deepest stages) (told to me by a professor who specialized in sleep research). not to mention information processing and memory formation (it's believed that another function that occurs during sleep is the "processing" of short term into long term memory). and of course our simple need for rest to recharge our energy reserves.

getting enough protein has also been important for me. the older i get the more i notice how my memory and concentration fade if i don't get enough protein through the day. and of course all neurotransmitters and hormones (which are the same things as neurotransmitters but found outside the brain) are manufactured in our bodies from amino acids, which are broken down from protein we consume. so no protein = poverty of neurotransmitters.

in my case i think it has been a combination of a build-up of stress over the years and the shifting hormonal levels of perimenopause. i had migraines which progressed along the same curve at the same time which have since resolved, since i reached menopause, but the sleep issues have not. of course, getting hot flashes 5 or 6 times a night could be the problem now.

I know you're not supposed to use the internet before bed, but I go to bed and look at this website at night, it makes me feel more able to rest. And that's helped a lot.

That, and I make time for exercise even when there isn't.

i'm prone to falling asleep with the TV on or a movie playing on my laptop. yeah, it's advised against flickering/bright lights, supposed to stimulate your brain to wake up, and there's some truth to that i'm sure, but after trying everything else, i find it's the only way i can go to sleep now.

started out, read that instead of tossing and turning if you really can't get to sleep after say 20 minutes you should just get up until you feel tired. of course they tell you to read or something low-key and no bright lights, but often when i'm tired i just can't focus on a book, and have a hard time finding books i like to read these days anyway. sometimes i drop off five minutes after i put on a program. i may wake up in an hour or two (usually i do), but at least i got that much. put on another program and i'm off to dreamland again. without it, i can be up easily until 3 or 4 am, going silently nuts.

The thing that works that way for me--and that I often use to get back to sleep in the early morning hours, is story podcasts.

http://escapepod.org/
http://podcastle.org/
http://pseudopod.org/
http://www.drabblecast.org/

I guess I am still relying on a bed-time story!

I find listening to audio with no images allows me to close my eyes and visually imagine, when gets me to sleep faster than looking at images.

oh i didn't know about this! that's a great idea, i'll try it tonight!

This set in for me after I turned 50, and looking back, it was the coming together of a number of different factors.

1) Physical: my blood sugar levels became less stable, my thyroid function declined (waking up very cold in the morning, however hot it was), fatigue unrelated to activity became increasingly troublesome (typical of adrenal stress), I often felt as if I was "running on empty" despite a good diet etc. Osteoarthritis meant constant daily pain and broken sleep, and it all got on top of me.

2) Emotional: The memories of past adverse experiences - workplace bullying, relationship failure et al - compunded and eventually seemed to reach a "critical mass" level at about 50 (I am in my late 60s now).
The effect of the critical mass was that I lost a lot of motivation; instead of thinking "well I'll try this or that instead", I would feel swamped by the memory of past failure. I lost most of the capacity to reignite hope in myself.

3) External factors: Being a single older women in this society (men too) means that the impacts of ageism
really start to accelerate after turning 50: social exclusion intensified, employment opportunities shrivelled,
so that isolation greatly increased. Spending a significant portion of my life alone affected my anxiety levels very badly. Social disconnection compounds the burnout from 1 and 2.

4) Psychological factors: Grief for what was and what never was and what can never be. I grieve the waste, of my talents, hopes, efforts, life..

I eventually responded by making lifestyle changes: no alcohol, regular meals, joining groups. This did help, to slightly diminish the effects of the burnout rather than resolve it. What I think might help more is if I could somehow reignite in myself some enthusiasm for life - I seem to have lost or mislaid the capacity for enthusiasm and it has been replaced by a despair I can't seem to resolve.

Please don't reply suggesting I take anti-depressants - uggh, they didn't work for me

well, ya know. there's a lot of research that suggests that SSRIs really DON'T work any better than placebo. they just don't publish it. i found that out working for a psychiatrist.

so while i take one (and also for it's side effect of suppressing, mostly, my urge to smoke), i don't particularly think they are super helpful for most people. it's more important to address the underlying issues.

it does sound like you have some depression, but depression in and of itself is not necessarily pathological anyway. it's a normal part of grief, for one thing. it's a normal response, to a point, to stress too. not pleasant, but not something any of us can entirely avoid.

i am also hypothyroid and found taking levothyroxine (a hormone supplement) to be very helpful. still don't have a ton of energy, but, better than not taking it.

i also find - and i'm very directionless right now and have a lot of pain about that - that certain activities just lift the weight right off me. when i had my motorcycle a couple of years ago, anytime i went riding was great. got me out of my head and feeling alive for however long i was on the bike. just getting a BREAK from the relentless ennui made life so much easier all around.

there is evidence to support that 20 minutes of sunlight a day (at minimum) can really help with depression.

therapy helps some, but at this point i've had so much of it, it's main function is to keep me somewhat socially connected. i have found, though, that WHERE i live has as much to do with my social life, as my willingness to try. I just don't get along in my area. I move south or west and frequently my social life improves.

The bottom line, my own basic belief based on my own lifelong battle with depression, is that the old adage about momentum in physics applies; a body at rest tends to stay at rest, a body in motion tends to stay in motion, and it takes more energy to change speed or direction than it does to keep things the same. if i stop, i tend to stay stopped, or in my case, i tend to sink. so my first line of defense is to make sure i get a certain minimum of things done and try to add from there, to stay in motion. i might not feel very enthusiastic right now, but quitting is not an option. i've tried it. life just gets much worse. original problems still there. my experience is that sometimes you have to chip away at a rock (problem) 200-500 times and then suddenly it cracks right open. but it wasn't that one blow that cracked it, it was the 200-500 blows before hand that made it possible. so i keep looking at my life, my situation, and try to learn from my mistakes. it's all any of us can do, but i believe in the process. i kind of have to, but i also know it works. eventually. the in-between part is difficult, though.

Thanks, I enjoyed reading your thoughtful response. I have found joining a social anxiety meet up group has helped alleviate some of the despair, and helped me overcome the social isolation issue