One of the first concepts I introduce in Authenticity is the idea of ‘stressors’ and ‘soothers’; things that make Autistic Burnout worse and better respectively. 

When you’ve had a long period of too many stressors and not enough soothers your stress levels have been too high for too long.  

In an ideal world, to recover from Autistic Burnout you would reduce or remove the stressors and increase the soothers so that your stress levels drop to a low level and allow you to recover from Autistic Burnout. 

The problem is that this isn’t as simple as it sounds (or even possible) for most of us.  

Often the question comes up ‘what if I can’t get rid of my stressors?’ 

In this article I will cover:

• Why you might not be able to reduce or remove all of the stressors in your life.
• How to recover from Autistic Burnout without removing all of the stressors in your life. 

Why are some stressors impossible to reduce?

It could be that your stressors are unavoidable, such as physical illness, berevement or debt.  It might be that they’re actually really important to you, such as children, pets, family members or a job that you love.  And it might be that the consequences of dropping the stressor would be worse than the reality of keeping it, for example a well paid job, less than ideal housing.

And probably, if you were in a position to remove or reduce all your stressors you would have done so already.

I have purposefully written Authenticity with the real life demands on Autistic people taken into account.  We look at different options for people depending on their personal situation and the demands that they are experiencing.

It might be harder to recover from Autistic Burnout when you can’t remove or reduce your stressors as much as you would like, but it is very much possible. 

How to recover from Autistic Burnout without removing all the stressors

if you find yourself in a situation which you know is too stressful and you know is draining your energy I have some advice for you:

Double check

Please take the time to double check that the demands you are experiencing can’t be reduced, removed or adapted. I’m very aware that we can get very rigid about what we need to do, especially when we are in Autistic Burnout. 

We can internalise ableism, overcompensate for our perceived difficulties and hold ourselves to unrealistic standards. 

“I clung on to doing cloth nappies for a long time despite ‘drowning in laundry’ because I was arguing that it was ‘only a few extra loads”

What are the consequences for you if (for example) you take sick leave from work? Put the children in childcare more? Use ready meals? Clean the house less frequently?  What would happen if  you didn’t make enough money to pay the rent/mortgage?

How bad would that be? Sometimes the consequences of these things are dire and intolerable, but sometimes the consequences are worth putting up with for the stress reduction they would provide. 

It might help to talk your options through with a friend, family member, therapist or on an online forum to check there isn’t anything you are missing.

Acknowledge and validate your feelings.

Acknowledge how truly stressful this situation is for you.  We get very used to normalising and dismissing our stress levels, or even, in some social circles wearing our stress as badges of honor. 

Example:

“As a parent with young children I though I was doing quite well to get 5-6 hours of sleep a night, and if I talked to other parents of small children many of them would have agreed, but when my GP asked  they were quite sure that wasn’t enough.  The truth was it wasn’t enough, but Id got so used to dismissing it I had stopped even acknowledging the impact on my energy levels”

We do this all the time when we say ‘every one is stressed’ ‘there’s always too much to do’ or ‘other people do so much more’ minimising our stress and distress teaches us that our feelings don’t matter, our needs are unreasonable and we stop paying attention to really useful information about what we need. 

Validating our own feelings by acknowledging them rather than dismissing or arguing with them ends some of our own internal struggles, helps us to start to develop self compassion and to collect information about what causes us stress, even if we can’t act on that straight away.

Make life easier wherever you can. 

You might not be able to do anything about the major stressors in your life but as you start to notice the smaller ones, the hassles, the things that are taking time and energy you might be able to reduce or remove some of those.  For example: If you’ve got enough money you might get a cleaner, if you don’t then you might reduce how often you clean your house or put other limits in place. You might buy ready meals or takeaways or simplify your evening meals, use a slow cooker or cook double and freeze half for another day a few days a week so you can eat pre-prepared meals the rest of the week. 

Meet your basic self-care needs

When we are stressed it’s easy to neglect our very basic needs which adds to our stress.  You might need to generate a routine or reminders to drink, eat, use the loo, take any medication you are on and go to bed.  

Increase soothers

Acknowledging the things that are causing you stress in your life can help you to plan how to regulate and soothe yourself before, during, after stressors and in general.  This could be as basic as doing a minute of rhythmic, soothing breathing before you get out of the car, keeping a stress ball in your pocket, engaging sensory soothing activities such as chewing, rocking, moving your body or spending time under a weighted blanket at the end of the day.

Prioritise activities that bring you joy and/or regulation, such as hobbies, exercises, walking, spending time in nature or with animals, connecting with people you feel safe with.  

Unfortunately soothing and enjoyable activities are often the first things we stop doing when we are stressed we do this because they are seen as non-essential.  They may be at the bottom of your ‘to-do’ list or not make it onto the list in the first place.  

Although it may seem counterintuitive, engaging in soothing and enjoyable activities is likely to enhance, or at least protect, your energy levels help you to regulate your senses and your emotions and safeguard you against depression. 

I appreciate that when you are stressed, you may feel that you have very little time for these activities, however, I would encourage you to find small ways of engaging in these activities, even if it is only for a  few minutes at a time. 

Summary and Conclusion

Recovery from Autistic Burnout requires a reduction in stressors and/or an increase in soothers.  It is absolutely understandable that you might not be able to get rid of some of the major stressors in your life.  This might be because some stressors are just unavoidable, others might be too important to you and others might have dire consequences if removed or reduced.  

You can still recover from Autistic Burnout by acknowledging and validating your feelings about these stressors, making the rest of your life as easy as possible, meeting your basic needs and increasing soothing, regulating and fun activities, even if it is just for a few minutes at a time.  

I am an Autistic Clinical Psychologist specialising in  Autistic Burnout  if you would like to know more about my work please check out my: 

• Mailing list community for people who want to receive helpful information and resources about Autistic Burnout.
• Free short course on How to Break the Cycle of Autistic Burnout (link goes straight to registration page) 
• Authenticity Basecamp:   A 90 day support programme for people in the early stages of recovering from Autistic Burnout who want to get calmer, clearer and more supported.
• Authenticity: The Course and Community: For late-realised, high-masking Autistic adults who want to build more sustainable, authentic lives and break free of the cycle of Autistic Burnout for good.