Burnout

What’s on Megan’s Mind?

This is a little vulnerable, but I did make this newsletter to keep everyone in the loop about what is going on at Synchrony, so here’s me being as honest as I can be. 

I’ve been feeling burned out. 

Not burned out on matchmaking, and certainly not on Synchrony work. As I’m getting older, I’m learning a lot about my brain and how it functions, and as a stereotypical MITwD (Millenial, in therapy, with diagnoses) I’m starting to develop a language for what happens when I feel the way I’m feeling. At the risk of navel-gazing, I’m letting you into that behind-the-scenes mental horror carnival just in case someone else out there is running into the same thing, and just in case it’s also making relationships hard for you, as it does for me. 

I’ve been formally diagnosed with ADHD and Autism, two things I didn’t know about myself until I was an adult. I’ve met lots of people in Synchrony consultations who also carry formal or informal diagnoses and who can relate to the kind of neurodivergent experiences that are familiar to me. For those who aren’t immersed in that terminology, “Neurodivergence” is a blanket term, which the Cleveland Clinic defines as “a nonmedical term that describes people whose brain develops or works differently for some reason. This means the person has different strengths and struggles from people whose brains develop or work more typically. While some people who are neurodivergent have medical conditions, it also happens to people where a medical condition or diagnosis hasn’t been identified.”

Multiple ‘neurotypes,’ or neurological conditions are lumped under the umbrella term ‘neurodivergence,’ including the two I mentioned above: Attention Deficit (Hyperactive) Disorder and Autism Spectrum Disorder. I’m no psychiatrist, so that’s where I’ll push pause on trying to define and explain how these neurological patterns and labels work. I can only tell you how they impact me, and my relationships, and a bit about what it feels like to be in the middle of a period of neurodivergent burnout. 

One facet of my neurodivergence is that I’m not able to regulate some of my sensory and emotional experiences in the same way that other people seem to be able to do. Imagine a conveyor belt, carrying a steady supply of bricks (one brick at a time) to a worker at the end, who stacks the bricks on pallets to get them ready for where they need to go next. In a neurotypical person, sensory experiences, tasks that need to be done, and emotional shifts move down the conveyor belt in an orderly fashion, at a cadence that the worker can keep up with, and they are picked up and sorted into their appropriate piles very quickly and easily. All the bricks look and feel the same, so they all go onto the same pallet and the job is done quickly and efficiently. In my brain, the bricks aren’t all moving down the conveyor belt at the same pace; sometimes the belt runs empty for a while, and then a whole pile of bricks arrive in a wave. Some bricks are larger than others, or are different colors. The frantic  worker at the end of the conveyor belt tries her best to keep up with the onslaught of bricks, but she’s confused about where to put them and how to sort them. Sometimes she becomes paralyzed with indecision about where the bricks go. Sometimes she creates a fairly neat stack, only to have it collapse when she adds a new brick to the top. Her pallets are not orderly, and sometimes she doesn’t move fast enough to keep up with the flow of bricks, so they fall off of the conveyor belt and begin to pile up until they back up the belt itself and production has to stop altogether. 

For me, the bricks are all the sensory things my brain notices and has to mitigate daily–the brightness of fluorescent lights, the humming noises made by air conditioning and computer fans, the hundreds of small-sticky-hand touches that my kids initiate throughout the day when I’m in proximity to them, or too-loud music being played in the car. My bricks are also the tasks that I need to manage, which should get sorted in a nice orderly fashion into my working memory, but which always seem to get lost on the way there, sometimes in between me saying “I should do this,” and the step of picking up a pencil or device to write the task down. My bricks are also the emotions that are tied to my experiences and my work, and the emotions that I encounter and observe in other people, all of which need to be carefully felt, considered, and compartmentalized so I can step out of the emotion and back into whatever task I need to take care of. 

I’m usually able to keep up with the bricks. I have strategies that I’ve learned over time to help me do that– scripts that I say during new conversations to minimize overthinking, patterns and routines that I stick to at home to make sure that my tasks get done. I’m privileged and blessed to work from home, which means that on some days when the bricks are piling up, I can shut off all the lights and work in a dark bedroom with just the light from my laptop screen, minimizing sensory input to buy myself some bandwidth. I also have an incredible husband who witnesses my challenges and actively works to make space for me to manage them, for whom I am immensely, deeply grateful. 

Some days, despite all of that, the bricks start to overrun me. This past week, the overwhelm has come from a mix of:

• I slept in a weird position and hurt my shoulder (I hear this happens more and more in your 30’s), which has been throbbing and keeping me up at night, leading to some sleep deprivation

• I put in about 20 extra working hours over the past week and a half due to a rush of new consultations (yay!!!!) and some rescheduling

• I have a trip starting this week that I haven't planned for and am not at all packed for

• I forgot about a plan I made with my mother and have felt horribly guilty about it

• I saw the end-of-year calendar and its associated expenses (birthdays, holidays, and travel) and had a panic about the budget

• I've been feeling intermittently bored for a little while at work because I’m waiting on teammates to complete something

• I have a growing pile of Synchrony tasks that are falling behind (matching, outreach, event preparation, etc.)

• Other sundry emotionally or physically weighty tasks that I just can't seem to get ahold of

As a result, I’ve been a mess. My brain can’t cope with the noise, and unlike in college where I could retreat to my silent bachelorette studio and snuggle my cat, I can’t get away from it because I need to be a parent and also need to stay employed. The path forward is to try to squeeze as much spare bandwidth as I can for myself (using some tried and true strategies like wearing pajamas for most of the day and enforcing a decent bedtime), and trying to be less consumed by guilt. With the help of the Lord and a couple of strategically-placed naps, I’ll eventually pull myself out of the overwhelm and get the bricks stacked up enough to get production moving again.

If you’re a single adult managing anything like what I’ve described on your own, I just want to call out the obvious: it’s likely extremely difficult to be in your brain, sometimes. My coping strategies are made possible in large part by my supportive husband; it would be very difficult to keep up with the bricks by myself, especially if I were parenting as a single person also. Everything I’m describing would also make dating much more challenging– even things as simple as messaging someone on social media or texting a prospect back can be paralyzing if you have to think through every potential scenario in order to feel safe in the interaction. Neurodivergent folks often find it difficult to start new relationships–whereas beginning a dating relationship with someone at your own church who understands your patterns and limitations may have felt approachable, dating a complete stranger and having to strategically unmask without knowing what the outcome will be can feel terrifying. 

I say all that in the hopes that those of you who are dating with neurodivergence deserve to give yourselves grace–it is difficult to be you, sometimes. None of these tendencies makes you less of a great potential partner for someone. In fact, neurodivergence can offer some amazing benefits to your partner. In our marriage, my autistic tendencies to dive into special interests and spew information about them at Steven feeds his ADHD curiosity and desire for novelty, and that’s probably what made our early conversations feel so energizing to both of us. Your challenges and capabilities can be met with complimentary strengths in someone else, and I’m sincerely praying for that type of relationship for each one of you. 

In the meantime, I’m working my way out of this pile of bricks I’ve been under. The silver lining for me has been the beautiful, enriching conversations I’ve been having with all of our new clients, who have made me feel so energized to do this work! Thank you for the gift of your time and your stories; they inspire me. 

Sincerely, and with love,

Megan

Resources

For other neurospicy types: My therapist recommended a book that I’ve found to be really helpful during this season of burnout. It’s called The Autistic Burnout Workbook, and it’s written by another Megan (Dr. Megan Anna Neff, who IS a Psychologist for real) so you know it has to be good. :) 

Announcements

Ladies, if you sent me an email with questions about signing up during our sale and didn’t get a reply during the frenzy of it all, please forgive me and rest assured that I’ll get back to you with that information as soon as I can. I’ll be happy to send you the link to purchase your consultation so you don’t have to wait until the pipeline opens again–please stay tuned!

Pipeline Profile

By the numbers:

Available men: 32

Available women: 178

Matches in progress: 9 (18 people total)

I’ve finally gotten back to hosting some dates this week! I’ve been so excited to be able to reach out to some of our long-awaiting clients with prospective matches, and I’m hoping to continue that trend. If you’re an actively matching client, please make sure to whitelist my [email protected] email so that any matching communications reach you directly!

Hey Single Friend, 

Welcome to Love Notes! I’m so excited that you’re here. If you’re new: Love Notes are weekly updates from Megan, designed to give you a boost of encouragement and keep you looped in on all of the happenings at The Synchrony Project. These are always written straight from my heart, never with AI.