I was flying at a 100 miles per hour and somehow I didn’t even realise that everything else came to a standstill.
I knew I was exhausted, but I still kept going. I just thought I could sleep later and when I finally took time to sleep it didn’t help. I thought I was just exhausted because my body felt tired, it took me a while to realise that it was a lot more than that. I think I realised the true nature of it all a little too late.
I didn’t know what a burnout was, I thought it’s just something people say when they are too tired to function. I thought it was something that would blow over with a few hours of extra sleep. I thought I could cure it with just trying to relax for a while, but I was so wrong.
Like I said, it all started with this chronic fatigue and exhaustion. I was absolutely lazy and because I thought it was just laziness, I pushed myself to do better and that just made me more exhausted – to the point where I couldn’t function at all. It wasn’t until I couldn’t work anymore that I realised what was going on.
As a creative it feels like your head keeps getting run over by a train when you can’t come up with new ideas. My thoughts were so loud, but yet there was nothing. I couldn’t come up with a single thing to write. I couldn’t come up with a single video idea. I couldn’t even come up with the words to review a new TV show or a movie I watched.
For a few days I felt like I was just floating, but not in a good way.I felt purposeless, drained and overwhelmed all at the same time. A part of me just wanted to quit everything, shut down all my pages and disappear. I was already disappearing into a maze of my own incoherent thoughts.
I didn’t talk to anyone about it, because I didn’t feel like it was important enough or that I was important enough. I didn’t want to bother people with something that seemed so insignificant. Just because I was suffering doesn’t mean I should draw other people into my suffering.
And on top of all of that, some other things were falling apart in my personal life – things I’m not ready to share with others yet. I lost out on a big project I was working on and nothing seemed to make sense. I think the lost project was the final nail in the coffin. It not only broke my heart, but it shattered my dreams.
I felt alone.
That was until yesterday or rather last night. I mastered up enough energy to try and figure out what was wrong with me. Like I’ve had depressive episodes and anxiety attacks before, but what I felt for the last few weeks exceeded those by a mile. And to be honest yesterday felt like it was the worst day of my life ever, it felt like something or someone died.
Finally all my questions and searching led me to finding out it was a burnout. I’ve been pushing my mind and myself so hard that I didn’t take the time to just figure stuff out. If things went wrong I just tried to move on instead of cleaning up what broke. In a way I was just piling up these broken pieces of me and trying to ignore it.
And if you’ve read this far, then I just want to say you should never do that to yourself. I’m trying my best to not let that happen again. After I realised what was going I decided to tell people that I needed time. I needed to rest, and frankly I feel a little better today.
I had to be honest with myself and my friends, family and followers. And sorry if I didn’t sent anyone a direct message, I just felt like I needed to announce it on social media, because I didn’t have the energy to deal with everyone individually. I know a lot of people still have questions, and I will answer it all soon.
I had a lot planned for this week and next week, but all those plans have been put on ice for now. I’m not cancelling anything. I’m not shutting down any of my social media pages. And I won’t be making any videos for the time being (I only have one review to do). I will be focused on writing, it feels like it’s the best place to start this healing process.
I know I still have a lot of work to do to fully recover.I feel like I finally have my mind back to myself, or at least my thoughts seem to make sense again. And here I am writing a thousand word column, because I can write again. I can finally tell my story again and it actually makes sense.
I wrote columns over the last few weeks, but it never really felt like I wrote them – that was until today. This is me being open and vulnerable, not because I want sympathy but because I want everyone to realise that it’s okay to talk about stuff. I know that most people won’t post their life online for the whole world to see and that’s why I do it – so you don’t have to.
I want to share it on a public platform so others can see it’s okay to be vulnerable sometimes, especially with the people you’re most comfortable with. This column is for everyone, but especially for my fellow men. There’s nothing more masculine than being honest about how you feel and being open about what you’re struggling with.
You don’t have to talk to the world, just talk to the people who mean the world to you. I know that at times it seems like no one cares, but believe me you will find someone who will listen, someone who will care. I post my stuff online because I sometimes struggle with one-on-one conversations. I’d rather tell everyone than tell no one.
And to those of you who reached out after I talked about my burnout yesterday, thank you. People always say social media followers is just a number, but you guys proved that you are genuine friends to me. The words of encouragements, the empathy, the well wishes and the overwhelming support and understanding means the world to me. I can’t do any of this without any of you. Thank you!
If you want to support me in other ways, please go check out my PATREON.
