A lived experience of Burnout
It was the early hours of 26th September 2012, I was in bed next to my husband in Malaysia, I awake abruptly with a stabbing pain in my side, it is excruciating, the aircon is blasting out but sweat is pouring down my face. I gently shake my husband and in my very British reserved way gentle say ‘Darling, Darling I think I might need to go to hospital’, because I don’t want to cause a scene (yes, yes I know I’m in my own house but habits and behaviours run deep!). He is just waking up and is disorientated so asks ‘can’t you wait till Lennon goes to school?’, I pause for a second and decide no I need to go now.
I’m terrified on the way to the hospital, I have never had pain like this before the only thing that comes close is childbirth but you know what’s happening then, this was scary because I didn’t know what was happening. So on top of the pain, is the fear of what’s wrong, plus never having experienced this before and I’m on my way to a foreign hospital - needless to say all my alarms are ringing and I feel like my body and senses are on fire.
After diagnosing me with a burst appendix they rush me to have emergency surgery tell my husband I’ll be an hour. This was the post on my husband’s Facebook Feed:
Four hours later and he’s still waiting but all is well and I recover from the scars and get straight back to work as if nothing had happened.
I loved my role of Regional Human Resource Director for an Oil & Gas Consulting firm, the company had bought and merged 3 companies in the last couple of years. It was a difficult market when I arrived in 2010, with the business struggling to be profitable, low engagement (42%) and high staff turnover (33%). My focus and purpose in the organisation was to build one culture, with a strong management team and engaged workforce. With 7 countries under my remit I also got to visit and make real meaningful connections with the teams in those countries to really understand their challenges and cultures creating solutions appropriate for them. The task was a huge one which I was 100% committed to achieving, however I failed to look after my own personal wellbeing and although we saw an amazing change in culture and engagement improving to 65% with 87% participation and profits and turnover improving by 50% by the time of my operation afterwards I started to struggle.
It felt like when you are a kid and you spin around and around then stop but the world continues to spin around you. I no longer felt in control, my emotions were hard to maintain with me often feeling stressed and frustrated which resulted in conflict with others, I was completely exhausted and struggled to keep up with the hours and travel the role required and the worst part was my mind felt like it was in a fog making creative problem solving, something I needed to do all the time, really difficult. I was the Head of HR, I should have asked for help but stigma and years of keeping problems to myself, believing that sharing made you vulnerable to attack ,I kept quiet.
Instead I worked for a solution so I could leave me role with no-one suspecting why which I achieved. So I left the job I loved, an amazing team I was committed to because I couldn’t ask for help. This is no reflection on the company, their policies or anyone who I worked with because I respected them all, it was a very personal decision. This is the first time I have spoken out about my lived experience and I do so now in the hope I can help others so they don’t leave a job they love and for those who have left or been made redundant from a job they love, recover and dig deep to find their 3rd Wind to Thrive.
My spiral into complete burnout didn’t stop at leaving Malaysia however, as shortly after arriving in Perth my father passed away from cancer. So I found myself, burnout, grieving, separated from family and friends (knowing no-one locally), without any purpose. As you can imagine quite a dark place to be.
I needed something completely different and decided to embrace my creative side with Interior Design. I obtained my certificate, renovated our home and had a reasonable business renovating properties but as I started to heal and recover my energy I realised it wasn’t fulfilling enough. So I reflected on why I went into HR in the first place, how I had healed myself and immersed myself in gaining knowledge on growth mindset, neuroscience and put into practice all I learnt and now share that knowledge with others.
I have found finding your second wind allows you to survive but to Thrive you need to dig deep and Find your 3rd wind. This connected directly to my original purpose 25 years ago which was to build environments that enable people to thrive so now I get to do what I love, with people I like and achieve a balanced life with purpose.
