After 20+ years working in the engineering field in different roles I finally walked away completely burned out. I was mentally defeated and physically deficient in my health and lifestyle. My life was not a total wreck but between stress eating and alcohol to numb the feelings of stress, I was miserable in almost every aspect of how I was living. The long-term effects of alcohol, stress and burnout left me in a state where I had no other option than to walk away. My wife and I decided we needed to get out of the lifestyle we were living and figure out a new path. We were able to sell our house during the height of the housing market in 2021 and this allowed us both to take an extended sabbatical to relax and recover from the effects of being in jobs that were no longer healthy for us. We are now living full-time in an RV and trying to start a business with others to bring to light the symptoms and effects of burnout in people’s lives.
There were many factors that played into my experience of burnout: picking the wrong career path, then continuing in that career because of the proverbial “golden handcuffs;” not recognizing aspects in my day-to-day work life that I was allowing to negatively impact my life; and finally, not realizing soon enough that I needed to walk away. There were other factors involved but burnout rarely happens because of one or two events. It is layers and layers of events until you finally have a ripe onion of burnout ready to pick!
Over the last year while my wife and I were on our sabbatical, I was in complete recovery mode for the mental issues that developed from burnout. I was tired, but mostly I was angry. I was angry at all the people and situations that I felt had led me to this situation. I was constantly replaying in my mind situations that had happened and even some that were imaginary conversations that let me express the things I never said out loud. This took three to four months before I was able to move on. Next came the anger at leaving a career that I had put so much effort into. Including going back to college during the middle of it. I am a stubborn individual and walking away from anything that I know I can do is difficult. But I had to remind myself that I left for a reason, it wasn’t the situations and slights that caused my overall spiral into burnout. It was choosing to stay in a career that didn’t fit my personality and fulfill my desire to constantly be challenged with new ideas.
In the midst of being angry at walking away from a “great career,” I also started to feel guilt at walking away. You might ask “why would you feel guilty for walking away from something that was clearly making you unhealthy?” Well, even though the job was burning me out, there were still aspects of it that I enjoyed. There were co-workers and bosses that I had worked with for years and projects that I was in charge of that somebody else had to take over. Even though I gave plenty of notice there were still misunderstood feelings and it seemed to be more personal to everyone involved since I was quitting my job entirely and not just joining another company. It’s more acceptable in the business world to switch jobs then to just quit. Guilt slowly faded as I continually reminded myself why I needed to walk away.
At this point in our sabbatical, we were a good nine months in, traveling through multiple states and experiencing the country. I was finally starting to see daylight from the burnout fog that was shrouding my brain. Yet now I was coming to a point where I needed to start figuring out what was next. Another part of burnout that you don’t recognize when you are experiencing it is that you can’t see past anything that you don’t already know and have been doing. I was finally ready to move on but all I knew was engineering. There was no way I could go back to that. Even now, if I even consider going back into the engineering field my brain just shuts down. I knew I had exhausted that avenue. But I was specialized in bridge and retaining wall engineering and I couldn’t see how those skills could cross the job market and make me desirable to a different industry. I have all the skills that other industries need from problem solving to project management, product management, leading teams, analytical skills, and the list goes on. Even though I could see a little light at the end of the burnout tunnel, I knew I wasn’t at a point that I could successfully join the job market again. I was also starting to realize that maybe I wouldn’t join at all but start my own path forward.
There are many different paths to burnout. My partners and I have each experienced burnout in different ways yet ended up in with the same result. We have started to walk away from it and heal via different methods. My wife and I were blessed enough to be able to take the time we needed to recover and start to move on. Others have realized that seeking therapy both physically and mentally has allowed them to move forward. There is no road to recovery from burnout . There is only recognizing the symptoms before it makes you physically or mentally ill and then start to search with purpose for your solution knowing it takes small steps to move toward a new life. For me it was leaving a work environment that was impacting me negatively and starting a journey to find my purpose and passion that will allow me to work, live and enjoy both.
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