The Real Treatment for Mommy Burnout
"It's not my husband or the kids, it's everything else."
“In this life no one can fulfill his longing, nor can any creature satisfy man’s desire. Only God satisfies, he infinitely exceeds all other pleasures. That is why man can rest in nothing but God.” - St. Thomas Aquinas
You wake up tired every morning, with an aching head and sore eyes, not matter how much you sleep. Everything seems a lot harder than it used to be. You can’t focus, and your husband’s little quirks, usually endearing, are starting to irritate you. “I’m just stressed and overworked”, you tell yourself. But the things that used to help you relax - going on walks, reading, kickboxing, baking, seeing friends - just feel like another chore now. Maybe, in a desperate attempt to unwind, you’ve found yourself bingeing sweet or salty treats at night, zoning out with social media or trashy reality shows, or spending too much time on Temu. And, just maybe, you identify a little too closely with this hippo:
Pop culture psychology will likely try to diagnose you with depression. However, it might be something else: burnout.
Burnout is a state of complete mental, physical, and emotional exhaustion caused by chronic stress.
Here are some of the most common symptoms:
You’re tired all the time, no matter how much you sleep
Every task feels like a chore, even things you used to love
You’re irritable, moody, or emotionally dysregulated
You’re having frequent physical pains like headaches, stomach or digestive pain, or muscle tension
You’ve come to resent your responsibilities, particularly taking care of your family, when you used to be thankful to have people to care for
At this point you may be saying, “Yeah… this sounds like me. So, what do I do about it?”
The advice you’ll get from the internet (and most therapists)
Take stuff off your plate. Stick to the bare minimum essentials. What do you need to do every day to meet everyone’s basic physical, emotional and spiritual needs? Then, remove literally everything else. That might sound extreme, especially if you’re someone who’s always run a tight ship (i.e., a clean house, home cooked meals, preplanned family outings, etc.). But, keep in mind, these changes are only for a season, a season of actual rest and recovery for you. After all, what you’ve tried so far hasn’t fixed the burnout, so it’s time for more drastic measures!
Recruit help. Whether it’s your family, in-laws, neighbors, friends, or that one lady at church who seems to adore your children, now is the time to ask for help. If you’re like me and asking for help triggers a guilt spiral, tell that guilty part of yourself this: by asking for help you’re allowing the other person to love you. Jesus calls us to love one another. So, by leaning on others, you’re helping the people around you honor the Lord. In other words, you’re helping get them that much closer to heaven! What could be better than that?
Find Ways to Decompress. Whether it’s a bubble bath, back rub from your hubby, walk in nature, a nap while your kids nap, doodling or painting, or something else that you love (or at least that doesn’t make you more tired), do something every day for at least 15 minutes that’s rejuvenating.
Avoid Energy Zappers. Avoid frequent bingeing on junk food, social media, TV, alcohol or gossip with friends. While these ways of coping provide a temporary escape in the moment, they actually make us more tired and restless over time by hurting not just our minds and bodies, but our souls*.
Now, while all this advice is all good, it’s also missing the central ingredient for treating burnout.
What this advice is missing
Most of the time burnout has a foundational spiritual component. When laboring for God, our work is rejuvenating and life-giving. When laboring without God or even against his will for us, we end up depleted and burnt out.
While it’s a good idea to regularly take stock of how we’re spending our time, to reflect in prayer on whether we’re using our time, talents and resources the way God wants us to, ensuring that we’re laboring for God has as much to do with how and why of our day as with the what.
I recently heard a great recommendation of how to make God a central part of your day. At the start of each new activity (e.g., waking up, making breakfast, taking a shower, nursing your baby, reading with your toddler, going to work), you follow these three steps:
Ask God to be with you in that moment: “Jesus, please be with me while I wash these dishes.”
Offer that moment to God as a sign of your love for him: “God, I will wash these dishes well and in good spirits out of love for you.”
Accept whatever may happen to you in that moment: “I accept whatever happens to me in this moment as if it’s coming directly from you, Lord.”
When we keep Christ in our hearts, asking for the Holy Spirit’s guidance in each moment and remembering the love our Father has for us, we allow the Lord to nourish our souls with the spiritual blessings and graces we need to weather the storm we’re in.
“Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:29-30)
In this way, burnout is like any other injury or illness: our beloved Jesus is the only one who can bring about true healing. And he does just that, once we choose to lean on him instead of ourselves.
Keep it up, mamas! You’re doing the Lord’s work.
~ Cameron
*Why do these activities harm our souls, you might ask? As you’ll read in the section, “What this advice is missing”, we find our true rest in Christ. As we were made to be in communion with God, what wears us down most is anything that pulls us away from him. That’s why numbing or distracting activities like eating a bunch of ice cream or doom scrolling, if done often, actually make things worse: the purpose they serve, to pull us out of the pain of the present moment, actually ends up separating us from God, as well. The only place we can truly commune with God is in the present, so anything that distracts us from this moment, right now, distracts us from him.