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You know the drill. After a period of intense autistic burnout, you learn that you need to make changes in your life to prevent this from happening again. You fill your life with the self-care you know you need to survive. You try so hard to deliberately slow down. You are learning to say no.

Then the thoughts and behaviours creep back in.

Feeling the guilt of not being able to please people the way you used to.

Convincing yourself you can take on more work despite knowing that your energy levels won’t stretch that far.

Ignoring your own needs and silencing the voice in your head that is sounding the alarm. “This is all too much.”

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It has happened again. I talk the talk and consistently fail to walk the walk. The only upside to my current situation is that I am burn-ing out. It’s a process and I’m not yet at rock bottom. This can be salvaged.

This time I knew what was happening. In the past when I have experienced autistic burnout, I have thought it was chronic fatigue syndrome, or something else entirely. Now I know that autistic burnout is a thing that I need to watch out for and I am almost hyper-aware of it occurring.

I have tried my best to walk the tightrope and avert my eyes from the ground below. I am trying to say no to people’s demands (hard going when you are a manager of a large team). Although my negative self-talk still features heavily in my day to day existence, I am making an effort to be kinder to myself and stop putting myself on a pedestal. I have been carving out time to do my hobbies, namely reading books and writing anything that comes to mind.

Yet I feel like the stress container I can picture in my mind’s eye is filled to the brim, and is starting to trickle down the sides. This is a careful balancing act.

I’m sat here thinking about what else I can do to guard against needing a good eight weeks to sit alone in a darkened room. Perhaps it’s a community of kindred spirits I am missing? Perhaps I don’t have a good understanding of my own energy levels even now? Perhaps I am not getting out into nature enough?

There is plenty to go at, and there lies my problem. My attitude has always been ‘What is the problem and how do I fix it right this second?’. I’ve spoken about my struggle to slow down on here before. It is still something I am trying to learn about every day. I get so overwhelmed by all of life’s options, and what I ‘should’ be doing. Yet so often I end up paralysed sat on the sofa watching TV quiz shows, trying to suppress the guilt I feel.

I can’t write a conclusion to this because there isn’t one yet. It’s ongoing. Writing helps me a lot. It takes my jumble of disconnected thoughts and lays them out for me. I then read it back and understand what I think. It doesn’t do the job a good therapist does, but it’s a start.

All this navel gazing I do, particularly since learning about my diagnosis a few years ago, does worry me. I always want to make sure I am looking outwards as well as in. I may be burning out, and I may need to continue being selfish with my time and energy in order to live a decent life, but I don’t want to compromise my compassion, my empathy and my desire to help people. That is something I would like to explore in a future letter.

In amongst all my jumbled thoughts is a poem, something I learned as a kid which seems to be etched into my brain.

My candle burns at both ends.
It won’t last the night.
But oh my foes and oh my friends,
It gives a lovely light.

To my neurodivergent subscribers, what do you do when you are burning out? Any tips, tricks or magic spells are so gratefully welcomed here.

Until next time,

Ren

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