Help with burnout treatment: how do you handle your burnout recovery properly?

“What is the best approach for good burnout treatment? We are often asked this question and are happy to answer it. It is relevant to you if you are currently experiencing burnout symptoms, such as fatigue, panic attacks, physical exhaustion, loss of concentration or a feeling of depression. Or perhaps you have even been diagnosed with burnout.

So what can you do to recover from a burnout? Read it in this article. Find out what it takes to make a burnout treatment a success, so you can get a better grip on your life and health!

You need to know this about burnout treatment:

• How to enable burnout recovery in 6 phases
• 6 tips for a good burnout treatment
• Most common burnout causes
• Treating burnout yourself?

Burnout recovery in 6 phases

In order to recover from a burnout, you have to go through certain phases in order to experience the process mentally healthy and with dedication without having to resist what you have to do in order to become fitter and more energetic.

Burnout recovery phase #1: Panic and disbelief

There is a moment when you wonder: ‘Do I have a burnout? To be on the safe side, you’ll go out for an examination to check whether your symptoms correspond to most burnout symptoms. You want to know where you stand, don’t you?

If you are still in doubt whether you have a burnout, I have a handy e-book for you. In this e-book you will learn to recognise more than 60 burnout symptoms in time. You will receive a free checklist. In this way you prevent your energy reserves from becoming permanently depleted and ending up in a serious burnout, with all its consequences.

Burnout recovery phase #2: Denial

Burnout is certainly not fun, but it can be a good wake-up call for you to take better care of yourself. After someone has recovered from a burnout you sometimes hear someone say: “I wouldn’t have wanted to miss this, because now I have learned so much better to listen to my own body and heart”.

But fair is fair, at first you do not want to believe it. You deny that you have burnout.

Because of your fatigue you may be physically exhausted, but still a little voice in your head says: “This can’t be true, why is this happening to me?

I can imagine that you have a burning desire to turn everything back to the past. To the time before this annoying situation, but it is what it is, despite your quiet hope of how you felt before you had a burnout.

Perhaps you still have a tendency and will to continue with what you were doing on a daily basis, such as your work or your own company. However, that is not wise. It costs you even more energy. And this while nothing actually helps take you any further in your burnout treatment.

Burnout recovery phase #3: You shoot into the resistance (anger, guilt or fear)

After the denial phase, everything becomes clearer. It varies from person to person, but this can be a difficult phase for you. You are more easily irritable and everything is too much for you. The pressure you feel, you may therefore project unfairly on the people you love from your surroundings: your family members, friends, partner and children.

At the moment, it is still difficult to realise that you have allowed it to happen so far yourself. Maybe you are angry with yourself, blame yourself or regret the ‘wrong’ choices you have made. That you think: “If only I had handled this differently, because then I could have prevented it and I wouldn’t have burned out now”.

Or the opposite happens: you don’t express your anger and fears at all. You live in your own world because you are ashamed. In a world where ‘happiness’ as a central theme is explicitly mentioned in magazines, TV programmes, online training courses and on social media, it can feel as if it’s bad to indicate that you’re not feeling well. You don’t want to fall through the cracks and saddle others with your problems and fears, do you?

Obstructive thoughts can then go through your head, such as: “What are others going to think of me or say about me?”

Burnout Recovery Phase #4: Accept, Release and Accept

The first real step you take in your burnout recovery is to recognise and acknowledge that you are not doing so well. There is nothing at all about that. As soon as you really resign yourself to it, you can start the treatment of your burnout in a good and relaxed way.

Because instead of remaining in the role of victim, you suddenly look and experience your burnout differently in this recovery phase. You realise that you apparently still had something to learn to take good care of yourself. And not only that, you also start to feel it in your body when you have accepted your burnout, because you:

• Sleeps better and you wake up less often at night
• Are not at all or are less emotional when you think or talk about the situation
• Body feels relaxed and your breathing is calm

In any case, it is wise to work less. Instead of 40 hours a week, for example, only half. That you work five half-days of an average of 4 hours a day.

But do you want to recover as quickly as possible? Feel comfortable if your body needs rest and possibly stop working indefinitely to be able to relax fully. By doing this, you also tell yourself that you take your own burnout treatment seriously.

Burnout Recovery Phase #5: Explore and learn

Yes, you need rest during your burnout treatment. But not only that. More is needed for a good recovery. This is the moment to climb back up from the bottom. The low point has been reached and it is time to reflect on what has caused you to go beyond your own limits. You do this with self-reflection by means of clear questions that make you think:

• Which signals have I not listened to sufficiently?
• What factors have caused me to burnout?
• What can I learn from my burnout? What lessons can I learn from it?
• What advice would I give myself based on my feelings?
• What has someone in my area done to recover from a burnout?
• What small steps can I take today to get more energy?
• What do I need to accept to let go of my burnout even better?
• What is the greatest thing I can do for myself now?

Asking yourself questions is a signal that you are on the right track. It is not only the answers and conclusions to the questions that help. The fact that you enter into dialogue with yourself is already helpful.

Burnout Recovery Phase #6: Invent and implementing solutions

If you want to recover from your burnout, it is important to make proactive choices and take steps forward. Tying the knot helps you to break through old patterns. By doing so, you distance yourself from the ‘old’ and make room for the new. Because where doors close, doors open again.

So quit your job, change jobs or work less if you no longer like it and it costs you too much energy. Or put an end to your love affair if it continues to cause you frustration and unconditional love is lacking.

Do what you have to do and what feels good for you. To get you in the right direction, these questions will help you to find solutions for during and after your recovery period:

• What are you (partially) going to stop?
• What are you going to start with?
• What are you going on with?
• What more are you going to do?
• What are you going to do less?

Recognize that your energy is one of the greatest predictors of successful burnout treatment, so also ask yourself: “Where do I get energy from and what does it cost me at work, in my relationship or in your private life?

5 solutions for good burnout treatment

If you want to treat a burnout, it is tempting to look for solutions straight away. This is logical, because you want to get rid of these annoying burnout complaints as quickly as possible. However, you do realise that in the long term you will benefit from a different approach in order to recover in the long term.

What works better to treat your burnout is that you start investigating how you actually got the burnout complaints. Because what is the cause of your burnout?

The first practical solution is: put possible causes on paper, write them down and talk about them with others. Talking about them often helps to understand the situation and process events.

In addition, the solutions below also work well for your burnout treatment:

• If you are an employee, call in the company doctor to discuss how you can recover more easily by making adjustments to your work.
• Follow an online training course and learn how to deal better with pressure, emotions and stress. Or learn to better define your limits in order to stand up for yourself.
• Ask family, friends and colleagues for extra support so that they can be there for you at this difficult time.
• Take advantage of professional coaching to make targeted steps towards a stress-free life without burnout complaints under supervision.

Training and coaching

Milltain provides training and coaching for private individuals and organisations. Our team consists of 35 coaches and trainers who have now helped thousands of people struggling with stress and burnouts.

Milltain for private individuals:

Are you stuck in life because of stress or a burnout? We developed an effective online program that is fully focused on the complete recovery from a burnout. More than 2000 people have successfully completed this training!

Movement and nature play prominent roles in this training. Recovery is a process that contains peaks and troughs, and that’s something we know all about. Our highly experienced coaches provide you with active support.

Learn more: Stress and burnout coaching