The Importance of Connecting to our Physiology when Healing from Burnout

Today, I want to talk about how important it is to tune in and connect with your physiology when you’re in burnout. Understanding what is happening in your body when you are experiencing burnout & adrenal fatigue is incredibly important to facilitate healing. 

When you have been go go go for an extended period of time (months or even years) this takes an incredible toll on your body, specifically your adrenal glands and kidneys. The adrenals are tiny glands that sit above the kidneys and are responsible for releasing your stress hormones of adrenaline and cortisol. When you are living in survival mode, your adrenal glands are fighting like crazy for you; pumping these hormones into your system so you can maintain your output.

The increased production of these stress hormones shoot out to multiple organs causing them to work in overdrive including your kidneys and heart. They don’t actually need to work so hard for you because you’re not really under attack but your body doesn’t know the difference between a real and perceived threat. Your blood pressure rises and your kidneys start filtering at an expedited rate. Eventually, the adrenal glands run out of steam and cannot maintain the same output. Your cortisol levels decrease rapidly and it starts to feel like you’re flatlining. 

This is very high level what is happening inside your physiology when you are in survival mode and eventually hit burnout. People may be praising you for being able to manage your schedule the way you do. They compliment the way you handle your workload, and family life & your social calendar. They call you a super hero!

It may seem like you are maintaining this crazy survival mode lifestyle because your adrenals are keeping you jacked up. You may be able to live this way for a long time (I’m talking years) and may not notice how it’s impacting your health.  

When you are in this go go go mode you are living off of adrenaline at first but then this quickly changes to you living off of cortisol which is much more long acting than adrenaline. Cortisol is an incredible hormone and is wonderful at regulating your stress response, but when you are creating excess doses of it it actually becomes toxic and harms your tissue and DNA. Your body will eventually start to scream at you to stop and rest. When you don’t listen to your body’s natural impulse to release stress, and you are chronically depending on high cortisol levels to survive, your cells will stop functioning well. Your Autonomic Nervous System starts to shut down and then you cannot heal properly. This is what leads to leaky gut and issues with immune function. 

I will say here that the amount of time you are able to live in survival mode varies from person to person. For example, if you were raised in an environment that felt safe and you were able to learn how to regulate your nervous system, you will likely be able to push for a longer period of time because you have the foundation of an already regulated nervous system. But you are still human and when you have been in this survival mode for too long and have been simultaneously ignoring your body’s signals, this is when you can start to burnout. 

You may experience a few mild symptoms at first but you’re able to ignore them. 

For example, you may have trouble sleeping or your digestion starts to go a bit wonky. You’re not sure why so you just keep pushing through and ignore your body’s request for attention. 

Eventually your adrenals will run out of juice and your system says nope I’m not doing this anymore. It waves the white flag & shuts down.

This is when the symptoms worsen. 

• The fatigue sets in. Deep deep exhaustion. 

• You may start to feel pain. 

• Brain fog sets in & your memory could be impacted. 

• You may start to become increasingly irritable. 

• Your sleep is affected.

• Your digestion can become even more disrupted. You could experience leaky gut, bloating, IBS, etc.

• Your immune system is no longer functioning well. You may get sick and feel like you can’t recover or it takes way longer than normal to recover. This is also when an autoimmune disorder could show up.

Your motivation and drive will be significantly reduced because you no longer have the high amounts of stress hormone pumping through your system so feelings of extreme depletion start to set in. 

When you’ve been overriding fatigue for so long and then suddenly stop everything just whoosh—shuts down. This used to happen to me in university. I would be pumping out a massive hand drafting project for my Interior Design degree for weeks. It would take 100s of hours to complete and I would often pull multiple all nighters. My system would 100% be all jacked up on cortisol in order to get it done and then the day after I’d finish the semester I would often crash & burn and get sick. It was like clockwork. Or if you’ve ever had a crazy two weeks at work trying to wrap up a bunch of projects before you go away on holiday and then a after couple days relaxing on the beach you get sick. We’ve all experienced some form of this happening right? 

This is when change needs to happen. Your body is begging you for rest. But a weekend of self care is not going to do the trick. When the burnout has become this extreme, healing & recovery needs to happen on multiple levels. 

Nutrition, sleep, sunlight are all important here but, at this point, they are not enough on their own.

You need to get to the root problem that is driving your burnout. 

Gabor Mate in his book ‘The Body says No’ writes:

“Awareness also means learning what the signs of stress are in our own bodies, how our bodies telegraph us when our minds have missed the cues. In both animal and human studies, it has been observed that the physiological response is a more accurate gauge of the organism’s real experience than either conscious awareness or observed behaviour.”

So the first step is to be educated. How does your body let you know that it is stressed? If the physiological response is a more accurate gauge, then you need to learn how to listen to your physiology. To your flight fight freeze response. Pay attention to how these responses show themselves. What does shut down look like? Are you having trouble connecting with others or even to your own body? 

When you become aware of these physiological cues you can literally reroute how you respond to stress. If you cannot get a handle on understanding and rerouting your physiology, no matter now great you eat or move or even sleep, you won’t get to the root cause of your burnout. Your autonomic NS is protecting you so if you have these elements that are stuck in survival mode it’s so hard to get out of that and start to heal. 

Everyone has a different experience and a different way in which they hold their stress. For example, some people disconnect from others and go into shut down. It’s important to be able to recognize how you hold your stress. 

Unfortunately, chronic stress has become so normalized so we as a collective have had to find unhealthy ways to push through. This needs to change. We need to normalize and give permission to follow our natural impulses - our body’s cues- and act on them. 

For example, I love the super simple example that Irene Lyon always talks about which is to listen to when you have to pee. Don’t ignore the body’s natural impulses and what it needs. Maybe when you’re working you ignore the urge to pee because you want to finish the copy you’re working on or the email you’re sending out even though the bathroom is right down the hall or in the next room. Next time you feel the body’s urge to pee, I invite you to listen to your body instead of overriding your biology. This is simply honouring your biology on the most basic level. Same goes for if you are thirsty: honour your body’s request for water. Or if you are hungry, give your body the nourishment it is craving. 

Ignoring these impulses has become so normalized in today’s society but it can also be linked to your experience growing up. For example, if you weren’t allowed to be yourself when you were a child your impulses and capacity to feel your internal environment gets squashed and it’s very hard to reconnect to it. If it didn’t feel safe to show emotion you may be disconnected from how you are really feeling in your physiology. It’s important to feel into frustration, anger, grief in a healthy & safe way. 

Another example could be that when you said you were hungry as a child you were told no that you had to wait for dinner or told that no you weren’t hungry and to go play. Your biology’s basic impulses and needs were ignored or not met. These very subtle messages (or maybe not so subtle) that you received growing up influenced you greatly to the point where you became incredibly disconnected from your body. There’s nothing wrong with that, it’s what you had to do to survive. And we have all become disconnected to some degree so this is not something I want anyone to feel any shame around. It’s just about bringing our awareness to it as we slowly start to reeducate ourselves around what is happening inside of us. 

So the self awareness of what you are feeling and allowing those feelings to move through you is a key step to getting to the root cause of your burnout. Listen to your body’s natural impulses. Practicing presence and bringing awareness to your environment is also incredibly helpful to rebuild connection with your body. 

Rewiring how you and your nervous system responds to various stressors is crucial for healing burnout and managing stress in a more sustainable way moving forward. 

If you have been disconnected from your body for a long time this will likely be difficult and feel incredibly uncomfortable. If you’ve become disconnected from your body as a trauma response, this should be done very very slowly and maybe with the support & guidance of a trained professional like a therapist, somatic healer and/or coach. Someone that you trust and feel safe with. 

So for example, if an orienting exercise of sitting in a chair and slowly taking in your environment, the feeling of your sit bones on the chair, your feet on the floor, the smell and temperature of the room and what it looks like visually, if all of this feels overwhelming that is okay. That is incredible awareness and I would encourage you to work with a professional that can support you in gentle steps toward building capacity to practicing presence. 

There is no quick fix to this work. It takes time and consistent practice. It’s like strengthening a muscle or learning a new skill. It’s never fully mastered but it becomes increasingly easier the more you practice. 

So just to review, understanding what is happening within your physiology is important to facilitate healing. This allows you to gain more awareness and build a deeper connection to your body so you’re able to act on it’s natural impulses. Once you’re able to understand your body on a deeper level and rebuild your connection to it, I guarantee your experience & healing will improve greatly. Your body just wants to be heard & acknowledged instead of continuously being ignored or stifled. 

I also don’t want to disregard the importance of the fundamentals that I talk about so often which are: 

1. Ensuring you are nourishing your body with nutrient dense, single ingredient whole foods. 

2. Getting consistent, quality sleep. 

3. Following your body’s requests for rest. 

4. Making sure you are moving your body in a way that feels honouring and restorative. That could be some soft stretching, a walk outside, whatever feels good for you. 

5. Getting outside into nature, getting sunlight in your eyes and your bare feet on the earth. 

6. Ensuring you are connecting to people that love & support you. It is crucial to surround yourself with people, even if it’s just one person, that you can talk to about what is going on for you. Someone you can call on for help or simply to just hold space for you. 

Lastly, I highly recommend finding a coach, a trauma informed therapist or a somatic experience expert to support you on this journey. We cannot do this work alone my friends so ensuring you have the right people in your corner makes all the difference.

If you’re going through it right now I am sending you so much love. I have been in those same trenches and I know how you feel. You will get through this even though it doesn’t feel like it right now. Ask for support. Ask for help. And most of all have grace for yourself and for your experience. You are doing your best in the season that you are in and this season won’t last forever. 

K xo