What burnout actually felt like, what it cost me, and the three changes that helped me recover.
“What the hell is wrong with me?”
It is a question I asked myself constantly.
I asked it in meetings. In traffic. At daycare pickup. Sitting next to my family while everyone else laughed and talked.
No one knew.
On the outside, my life looked like the one I had worked for. The career I dreamed of. The rooms I wanted to sit in. The marriage I prayed for. The sports practices and packed calendars that signal you made it.
And yet underneath all of it, I felt like I was standing outside my own life watching it.
Nothing was collapsing. Nothing was dramatically wrong. But everything felt heavier than it should.
I did not realize I was burned out until I started resenting the life I prayed for.
The Night I Knew Something Was Off
I was sitting in my car waiting for my oldest to finish basketball practice.
The twins were in the backseat eating dinner out of containers, tablets blasting far past their bedtime. We were all exhausted. I already knew we would get home late, rush through showers, and wake up tired.
And I remember sitting there thinking, I cannot keep doing this.
Not because basketball was bad. Not because my job was bad. Not because my family was too much.
But because I felt like I was drowning in a life I had prayed for, a life I wanted.
There was no dramatic failure. No missed milestone. No obvious breakdown.
I just felt like I could not keep up with the life I had built.
The Lie We Absorb
We glorify busy. We reward endurance. We celebrate women who can do it all and still smile while doing it.
Somewhere along the way, I absorbed the belief that capacity equals worth. That if I could manage everything without breaking, I was succeeding. And if I could not, I was failing.
So I kept carrying more.
That belief nearly broke me.
I Tried to Fix It
I tried sleeping more. I tried vitamins. I told myself I just needed a break.
But life does not stop so you can catch up. Every day kept moving, and I felt slower, foggier, weaker.
The hardest part was this. I was the person people came to for answers. I was the fixer. And suddenly, I could not fix myself.
I struggled to focus. My thoughts felt scattered. Tasks that once felt simple took longer. I was more irritable. More tired. Less sharp.
It felt like something was wrong with me.
I Did This to Myself
For a while I wanted someone to blame. Work. Motherhood. Marriage. The season of life.
But the truth was quieter.
I had done this to myself. Not intentionally and not recklessly, but slowly.
I was people pleasing even though I would have sworn I was not. I believed everything I was doing defined me. The career. The parenting. The showing up. The holding it all together.
Somewhere deep down, I believed that if I could not do it all, I was failing.
So I kept saying yes. I kept carrying more. I kept proving I could handle it.
Until I could not.
It was burnout.
And to be honest, I did not even believe in burnout. I thought it was something underachievers said to get out of work.
Now that I have lived it, I have never felt anything more real.
You Cannot Recover From What You Will Not Name
I could not start recovering until I admitted what it was. Until I stopped calling it weakness, laziness, or just a rough season.
Burnout is not just being tired.
Research shows prolonged burnout affects cognitive function, memory, focus, and emotional regulation. It can create brain fog and reduce executive functioning. It also increases something called decision fatigue.
Decision fatigue happens when your mental energy is depleted from making too many decisions over time. When you’re burned out, even small choices feel overwhelming—dinner, emails, text messages, what to wear. Everything feels heavier than it should.
Everything feels heavier than it should.
I had to admit I was not invincible. I was not superwoman. I was exhausted in a way sleep could not fix.
And burnout recovery is not a quick reset. It is not one weekend away or two days off. It is not a single trip that magically restores you.
It took years to build the pressure that broke me. It will take time to rebuild differently.
Burnout recovery can take months and sometimes longer because it requires changing patterns, not just resting from them.
The First Three Steps That Helped Me
I am still in recovery. But here is what helped me get present again.
1. I Stopped Pretending It Would Fix Itself
Recognition is step one. This did not happen overnight, and it will not disappear overnight. Burnout demands honesty.
2. I Cut Back for Real
Not “let me optimize my time.” Not “let me reorganize my calendar.”
Actually cut back.
I had to take a hard look at my life and ask what was taking more from me than I could give right now. Then I had to accept that pulling back might disappoint people.
That was the hardest part.
Saying no felt like failure. Stepping back felt like weakness. But I realized I could not show up well for anyone if I refused to show up for myself.
Some things are not never. They are just not right now.
3. I Reduced My Daily Decisions
I underestimated how exhausted I was from decision fatigue, so I put parts of my life on autopilot.
I created a weekly menu for my family. I cook once and we eat leftovers. That is it. No daily dinner debate. No mental energy spent at 6:30 pm.
I built simple morning and evening routines, not to maximize productivity but to remove decisions.
And I was honest with my family.
I told my husband I could not keep doing mornings the way we were doing them. Not because he was unwilling, but because I had not been honest about what I needed.
So we rearranged tasks. He started morning drop off. We began tag teaming more intentionally.
Not because something was broken, but because I finally admitted I was overwhelmed.
Asking for help did not mean I was failing. It meant I was choosing sustainability over silent suffering.
Going Slower Is Not Failure
One of the hardest things to admit is that I cannot go as fast as I used to. Things take longer. I get tired faster. I need breaks.
That does not mean I am broken. It means I am healing.
Recovery is not about getting back to the old version of you, because that version is what burned you out. Recovery is about building a new pace. A sustainable one.
If any of this feels familiar, you are not broken.
You might just be burned out.
Where in your life are you moving faster than your capacity? What would it look like to pull back for one season?
Maybe nothing is wrong with you. Maybe you are just tired of being everything to everyone.
And that is not weakness.
That is awareness.
And awareness is where recovery begins.
If this resonated with you, you might also want to read: The Quiet Signs Your Body Is Asking You to Slow Down – so you can recognize burnout before it gets as bad as mine did.”
A Gentle Note from Keisha Denise
Keisha’s House is a space for reflection, journaling, and burnout recovery. While I hold a BSW and MSW, this content is not therapy or clinical mental health treatment.
If you need additional support beyond reflection, Headspace offers guided meditation and mindfulness tools for stress, sleep, and emotional regulation. Explore Headspace.
Disclosure: This link may be an affiliate link, which means I may earn a small commission at no additional cost to you. I only share resources I genuinely believe support emotional well being.
You are always welcome here at Keisha’s House. Take your time, explore what resonates, and come back whenever you need a moment to breathe.
