One year after crashing
Labor Day 2022
I woke up with a strange feeling--like my heart was skipping beats over and over.
For years, I had been under considerable stress.
In 2020, I led our ethics committee as we hastily made preparations for the global pandemic. I led our chaplain team, which responded to 5,563 deaths during the pandemic.
2021 was a year of death and grief. Kristen Riecke's sweet dad died. Our good friend Bre died during childbirth just down the hall from my office at Parkview Health. And several other family members died before July arrived.
In 2022, I experienced my worst leadership struggles to date, and my leader at the time threatened to fire me. I didn't know it yet, but my anxiety was starting to drive the car, and I was along for the ride.
This resulted in new physical and mental health problems. "Vagally-mediated Atrial Fibrillation" Meaning that stress had compromised my nervous system so badly that my heart was out of rhythm. This is actually pretty common.
So, in the ER on Labor Day 2022, I received 255.1 joules of electric shock. Without sedation (my choice).
I was wide awake when the doctor said, "Charging. Clear. Clear." Then, whoosh!
My arms and legs shot up off the bed, my teeth slammed together, my eyes widened beyond capacity, and my belly jumped toward the ceiling. My heart returned to a sinus rhythm.
In the coming months, I experienced 30+ days on a heart monitor, a shaved chest (yuck), therapy, an official depression and anxiety diagnosis from my doctor, but most profoundly...
The sense that something had to change. Everything had to change.
In the 12 months since that day, here are SOME of the many steps I have taken to recover and overcome what I now know as MORAL DISTRESS and BURNOUT:
1. Secured intermittent FMLA
2. Daily nervous system work (thank you Sukie Baxter)
3. Decreased focus and intensity at work
4. Meditation
5. Worked on my bucket list (thank you, Ben Nemtin)
6. Adjusted my expectations of myself
7. Journaled 2-3x per week
8. Counseling (thank you, Cheryl Confer)
9. Committed to new boundaries (no more checking work email at all hours)
10. Regular walks
11. Self-discovery (thank you, Enneagram)
12. Opened up with trusted friends (thank you, William Curry, Matt Burke, Jana Vastbinder, Jon Swanson, and Kristen Riecke)
13. And I (finally) started some medication for my mental health
They say that recovery from burnout takes 1-3 years. Today, I have been in recovery for one year. I am not done.
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