Dr Kylie Soanes, University of Melbourne.

This article was originally published as a thread on Twitter.

This is a short story about academic burnout, compassion, and when your brain insists that your limb is gravely injured when, in fact, it is not. I’ve had to say no to a lot of things recently. Not because I’m not generous (I am), or because I’m making a stand against overwork (I should), but because, I’ve found myself in a situation where burnout has fairly dramatic physical consequences.

See, I recently had the fun* experience of a relatively minor injury developing into something more sinister (*not actually fun). Pain, swelling, inflammation – these are signals that your body is injured and needs to heal. Except sometimes, they’re not. Essentially, my central nervous system short-circuited and decided that pain was now the only appropriate response to any stimulus. Knock your thumb on the bench? INFLAME! Have to catch a toddler? INFLAME! Water running down your arm in the shower? INFLAME!

By January I’d lost the ability to do most things and was convinced I was now permanently incapacitated. I couldn’t independently care for my toddler. Typing was almost impossible. Bras and hair buns were out of the question. I couldn’t figure out what was going on. Why couldn’t I heal correctly? I’d done every stupid exercise, followed every stupid rule, had every stupid cortisone shot. And still it just got worse.

Luckily, a very switched-on physio recognised the patterns and explained, “Hey, so… I don’t know how to break this to you, but you’re technically not injured. Your brain has made a mistake. The symptoms are real, but they’re unnecessary and disproportionate.”

Sometimes the brain is so used to a pathway that it just kind of defaults there. And then begins to generalise; to other parts of the body, to other stimuli (like stress, anxiety). And I felt, once again, simultaneous annoyed and impressed by the complexities of our brains.

Anyway, good news – I know what’s going on. Bad news – it takes time and patience and mental energy to rehab. And that is not conducive too the “above and beyond” mentality that academia typically rewards. Too often, rest, hobbies, work-life balance, are treated as a luxury, an extravagance, or even an act of rebellion. To be quickly abandoned when things at work get VERY URGENT AND IMPORTANT. But that’s exactly when they’re most needed.

My rehab is dependent on these ‘extravagances’ – cold ocean swims, meditation, music, arts and crafts, novels – anything that disrupts the well-worn neural pathways and allows new ones to forge. That and backing the workload down from 175% which is SCARY as an ECR. Saying no to opportunities, not putting your hand up for more service, or even withdrawing from commitments is hard. You never know how it’s perceived. Who have I just annoyed? Am I on a naughty list now? Have I been added to the selfish pile? But the choice is obvious for me. There’s no “stretch” in my system at the moment. If I try and work overtime to “just get this grant in”, there’s a good chance that I won’t be able to get my son out of his cot the next morning.

Mine is just a tiny, tiny tase of what people with chronic illnesses deal with. There are many reasons why people say no to extra service or going above and beyond. Most are protecting themselves in ways that are, quite frankly, none of your business.

So, Kylie, what’s the point of this thread where you’ve openly stated that you won’t work too much? And where should we send all of our job offers?

Image credit: @SamLeightonDore