Welcome to Episode 6 of The Business Oddcast, where we dive head-first into one of the biggest challenges facing neurodivergent entrepreneurs: burnout.
We’re diving headfirst into the messy, misunderstood world of burnout, overwhelm, and recovery — especially when you’re neurodivergent. From supermarket meltdowns to sofa-based spoon recharges, we’re getting real about what happens when the tank hits empty and life keeps demanding more.
We unpack the difference between burnout and overwhelm, why rest isn’t a reward (it’s maintenance!), and how to spot the early signs before you crash. Stuart shares the reality of “energy bankruptcy” and building firebreaks into his week, while Hannah talks honesty with clients, meltdown management, and turning recovery into an act of self-kindness.
Expect tangents, laughter, brutal honesty, and some hard-earned wisdom on boundaries, energy management, and making peace with your limits — because surviving the crash is one thing, but learning to truly recover is where the magic happens.
You’ll hear:
🔥 What burnout truly is and how it creeps up on neurodivergent minds.
💡 The surprising benefits of self-employment for managing ND energy.
🧭 Why resting isn’t laziness (it’s ALL about energy management!).
🧠 How energy management beats time management every time.
⚡ Our personal “burnout tells” and how to spot yours early.
🌍 Why society might be facing a burnout crisis, and what we can do about it.
🛠️ Real-world tips, recovery ideas, and mindset shifts for getting back on track.
If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed, exhausted, or stuck in survival mode, we really hope this episode will help you feel seen and give you practical tools to rebuild without guilt.
We’re keeping it honest, messy, and real, because you’re not alone, and your capacity deserves respect, not shame.
🎧 Hit play now and start rewriting your story of burnout, balance, and belonging.
🙌 Don’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe for weekly conversations on neurodiversity, self-employment, and sustainable success.
TIMESTAMPS
00:00:00 – Introduction to Ep06
00:00:36 – Hannah’s round up of the week…
00:02:13 – This Week’s Topic: Burnout, Overwhelm and Recovery for NDs
00:03:09 – Definitions of burnout and overwhelm & our experiences
00:08:42 – Benefits of self-employment when managing burnout & overwhelm.
00:13:24 – Resting – it’s not laziness, you are not lazy…
00:15:56 – Benefits of self-employment for NDs Pt2
00:18:32 – Managing the overwhelm (or not)
00:19:47 – Hannah’s recollections of her 1st burnout
00:20:44 – Stuart’s burnout “tells” & signs of overwhelm
00:22:47 – Full-time employment pressures & energy management
00:23:34 – Energy management not time management, knowning when to stop
00:25:32 – Analyzing your own behaviour and fire breaks…
00:26:45 – The mental health crisis – are we ALL reaching burn out?
00:27:44 – Hannah’s “timps and hits” – hints and tips…
00:30:40 – Hannah’s down-day Monday… and self sabotage.
00:32:10 – Self-employed quality of life and trade-offs
00:33:20 – Managing overwhelm and burnout with your youth
00:34:33 – Energy, capacity to cope and ageing
00:35:47 – Tips on recovering and recovery, what recovery looks like
00:42:31 – Timescale to get used to being neurodiverse, esp for the late diagnosed.
00:44:22 – Self-talk – being harsh and unsympathetic to yourself
00:45:59 – Soceital pressure for hidden disabilities and requirements
00:46:48 – Penelope enters the conversation
00:48:51 – Episode round up
00:50:37 – This week’s Homework
00:52:54 – Message for the Employed NDs…
RESOURCES
Read our accompanying blog post on this topic here: businessoddcast.com/overcoming-neurodivergent-burnout-overwhelm
Download the Neurodiverse Emergency Overwhelm Kit, which gives you a whole array of coping mechanism to help prevent the build up of overwhelm, and help you recover if you need it: businessoddcast.com/neurodiverse-emergency-overwhelm-kit
As mentioned in the podcast – Struan shares his journey & insights youtube.com/@amineurodivergent
Emergency mental health support for FREE – Bigmoosecharity.co
If this topic resonates perhaps you might want to look into the subject a little more.
Use these tests to have a clearer understanding of your own neurotype profile. https://embrace-autism.com/autism-tests
STAY IN TOUCH
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Content 100% created by humans, byut we tried formatting with A.I. Emojis? Yay? No? Hmmm…
Stuart: The Business Oddcast—and welcome to what is our sixth Business Oddcast. I’m your host, Stuart Morrison, and this is the fabulous…
Hannah: Hello again—fabulous as ever!
Stuart: We’re trying to be. No, no—we both were born awesome and we’ve just been getting better ever since.
Hannah: Yeah, and if you don’t come out the other end with a few battle scars, what was the point, you know?
Stuart: Yeah. So how should we be—no, we start with that, but I find it very, very accommodating and it allows you to go wherever you want. So—what’ve you been up to?
Hannah: I’ve been up to… well, I’ve been up to a mixture of productivity—but I’ll be honest and say that’s been like… small this week so far, which is progress, which sucks. But I’ve been in that kind of distracted, not quite in-it mode. And when I’m in that, I get easily… you know, I go to put the pair of socks on—before I know it I’m trying on all my shoes randomly. Like, yeah, it’s just bizarre, isn’t it? You know, like “Oh, I need socks before I start work.” Two hours later I’m trying on high heels for some weird reason—for no reason at all, actually.
So yeah, there’s been kind of productivity in the wrong areas. I’ve also unfortunately kind of been hitting myself with a stick about the lack of productivity in all areas. So yeah, it’s been a mixture of me telling myself to do more and then me not really doing that much.
Stuart: The biggest regret that old people have on their deathbeds—this has been said over and over again—the biggest regret is they worked so much. So, you know… if you got distracted wearing sparkly heels when you’re doing yourself—you can only spend your life working so much. There’s only so much of living and saving yourself you’re preventing—which tees us up incredibly. Amazing. I love it. It’s like a game of volleyball—tees us up for this week’s topic.
Hannah: Yes! This week’s topic—very appropriate today: burnout, overwhelm and recovery. So we’re going to look at… I think that’s very common for all of our viewers, no doubt—and certainly Stuart and myself. We’re going to look at burnout and overwhelm as a neurodiverse business owner and also the recovery, and probably suggest some ideas for recovery.
Stuart: Okay—before we go deep into it and we look at all of this, I think it’s useful to outline what these terms are, for people who may be on the journey of self-discovery—looking in a mirror. For me: what is burnout? What is overwhelm? And obviously recovery is the opposite of that, but that looks different for different people. So let’s cover the first part of that—burnout and overwhelm. What are burnout and overwhelm, Hannah?
Hannah: I always struggle with the kind of real definition of them, but I guess your thoughts on what you experience as burnout and overwhelm—because those things are kind of relative as well.
Stuart: Yeah, I think they’re relative and they’re also kind of playing a game with each other, aren’t they? They’re in cahoots to bring us down. For me, burnout—I often don’t see burnout, and that’s something I need to… you know, I don’t see it and it’s on me. I think I need to recognise those signs better because it would make my life a bit easier.
I guess the burnout for me is kind of overloading myself with stuff and not really understanding the implications of that until I suddenly have run out of spoons completely and go into… in my way, I kind of tend to either completely shut down, or just go into a massive overwhelm and just have a massive meltdown, which is never pretty, basically.
Hannah: Yeah. And the burnout for me goes in cycles—which I’m sure it does for everybody—but there are recognisable cycles. Mine are not always exactly the same. I’d like it to be an exact science—like, recognise it and prevent it—whereas sometimes I’m like, “Oh, here we are again. Now it’s too late because I’m shouting at everybody, crying in the supermarket.”
Stuart: Crying in the supermarket—really messy.
Hannah: Yeah.
Stuart: That’s quite interesting. And I agree with you. For me, overwhelm is—I always say if a pint is holding a pint, it’s doing the absolute best it can. If you try and ask it to hold another half a pint, it’s never going to happen. It’s never going to work. That, for me, is the overwhelm—by mishap or blind, you know? I have a great optimism in my faith and ability to get sh*t done—way over and above my ability to get sh*t done. Quite often I’m trying to get a pint and a half in a pint pot.
It’s required a lot of self-discipline to go, “No—actually sitting on the sofa right now is a really good idea.” Especially when—so I saw this the other day and I was like, damn straight. It said: “Rest is necessary to put in the work. Rest is not a reward for putting in the work.” And just—yes. A thousand times yes. Because that’s where the overwhelm comes: not giving yourself the rest. And that then leads to, on a long enough cycle for me, the burnout. The blown fuse. You’re pulling the levers and… they’re random and your brain’s misfiring.
That entire scenario is a well-worn path for myself. In retrospect, looking at the context of my life through an autistic lens, I can now see how times where I was diagnosed as being depressed were just—just absolute, sheer, 100% “I had no more fuel in the tank, no more spoons to give.” So again—I totally understand it.
Hannah: Absolutely that. And I think… in the context—(that’s not even a word, I’m making words now, Stuart!)—in the context of day-to-day life, burnout and overwhelm has a massive impact. But then when you add in that extra layer of business—and the pressure that we put ourselves under through our own business, or God forbid we’re actually employed—step away from PAYE, don’t do it! I think when you add in that extra layer of business pressure and stuff, it’s just… For me, other people—even also—are relying on me in a business context. They’re relying on me to hit deadlines and produce the things I promised to produce and all of that stuff.
Stuart: Whilst I have got, over the years, very good at making sure that I’m not taking on oodles and oodles of projects—because I know my limits. Or I know, you know… I am very good now at spacing them out and working out what’s realistic and what isn’t. But if you add the burnout and overwhelm of life—you know… If we didn’t work, then we’d have a lot more opportunity to pre-empt those burnouts—think, “Oh, I’m heading towards the rocks. I’m heading towards the rocks—go and rest.” Whereas, you know—Titanic-esque—sometimes I just find myself on those rocks because I’ve kind of… you know, work is pressuring, life is pressuring, work and life are pressuring, and… yeah.
That’s what I find with self-employment: it allows me to better judge my capacity before overwhelm—and that capacity changes. Knowing what you’ve got to give, rather than being obligated to give more than you know you can afford to give. I find there is more opportunity in self-employment to do that than in regular employment.
Hannah: Yeah, absolutely that. I had a conversation with a new client—just a little project I’m doing on somebody’s website—the other day. I decided—I know her very well and she’s fabulous, and her husband is definitely spicy—so she gets it, which is magnificent. She’s a perfect client really. I said to her, “I’ll be very honest with you: I had a really overwhelmed week last week, so this week I’m playing catch-up and I’m building my spoon collection. I will try… How urgent is this project? Because I’m a bit limited at the moment.” And she said, “Just go with your own energy, Hannah. It’s not urgent.” She’s amazing—she’s not pressuring me. Literally perfect.
So yeah, I found in that particular instance—because I know her well—it was actually a really good idea just to be really honest about that.
Stuart: I think there’s a lot of that in quite a few of my clients. A lot phone me up and ask me to do stuff and go, “In your own time. Not a problem.” I recognise some of the traits and… you get it. You understand that the world isn’t going to stop tomorrow because your website didn’t have a new button put on. Conversely—still need it done in a relatively short scale of time—but I can judge my own…
Like last week—last two weeks in actual fact—there’s been a personal project. I’ve been on that for about four months and it’s just knocked the absolute stuffing out of me. I have programmed this week to be purposely full of all of the things I enjoy that give me energy, rather than take energy from me. I’m not sure you could do that as much—well, I didn’t know when I was employed any of this—but I try and judge it through that lens. It’s much harder to say to the business that employs you, “I’d like to take that entire week off as holiday.” Great. “And the week after as well. And then the week after, what I’d like to do is put in about 50% effort so that I sort of ramp back into it. But when I’m back, you’ll get 200% out of me. No small talk. No chit-chat.”
Hannah: I mean, exactly that—what you’re saying there I completely, completely agree with. One of the things that I love is that I can literally—when I do a lot of writing, you know I do a lot of writing—sometimes when I’m in the writing zone I will just… I mean, don’t do this at home, kids—but I’m not eating, I’m not drinking, I’m just churning like some kind of crazy typewriter—like some kind of cartoon—churning out good quality content. Bang! And you know, I might work five, six whatever-it-is hours straight and churn out all the projects that I’d planned probably for two weeks.
But then I might have four days of just being like—face pressed against the edge of the sofa—with a little battery flashing: “I’m just recharging, don’t come anywhere near me.”
Stuart: I said the other day: my phone was at 5%, my watch was at 5%, and I was at 5%. My drinking was 5%…But I tell you—I was sat in the pub with my eyes shut, just gently nodding backwards and forwards. I had my Beats on and I was just doing the finger thing—doing the ting-ting-ting. And part of me was like, “I don’t care. At this point—what? I’m in a loud jacket, rocking in the corner, listening to beats and doing that?” Yeah—that’s true. These people will leave you alone. “Don’t go over there.” But you see, that’s also the point: taking the necessary breaks, allowing yourself time, and acknowledging to yourself that you’re not lazy—no, it’s not laziness. I have to remind myself: if I am not stood up, on the go, I’m not being lazy.
The other day I started work in my office at about half-ten. As I got off the sofa I said to Gemma, “Oh, I’m going into the office—there’s something I needed on my computer. I’m about to start work.” Half-ten—“Just start work? You’ve been sat in there texting people and updating people, and you said to me that you cleared down a couple of bills.” Well that’s not really work, is it? Because my mind wasn’t in, like, knocking out a few of the little to-dos.
I think we also forget that, whether you’re spicy or not, that kind of cognitive load in the background—mums have it: that mum admin. You kind of know when the alarm bell goes off like, “Has anybody checked the… When was the last time we…?” Yeah, absolutely.
Hannah: And I was thinking—one thing that we really can do when we’re self-employed is make sure that actually (or what I try and do a lot) I’m really managing my time to maximise the really, really good, productive time. We just kind of touched on that, really. But I’d rather do three “Hannah at her best” hours of work—the best stuff that’s really efficient and doesn’t drain me because I’m in the zone—so I’m not getting drained too badly. Making the most of those moments, which do come along a lot.
And then also recognising those times when I force a piece of work and I’m not in the zone. The overwhelm is crazy. It is literally, isn’t it, like trying to push a car up a hill that hasn’t got any petrol in it. It’s brutal—the overwhelm, the burnout that comes with that. And yet, occasionally I forget, and occasionally I’m like, “Just push on through, Hannah. Have a couple of cans of Diet Coke,” and try and self-medicate myself—and actually what happens is I’m just really twitchy and crying. So yeah—don’t do that.
Stuart: No. We’re all adults and we know we have our obligations—familial and work—whether that’s self-employed or whatever. We’re not just advocating that you lie under a blanket and do nothing. But there is a way that self-employment allows you to have more time to do the life admin—so you don’t get to the end of the workday burnt out from the work, then having to do an hour of family admin or household chores on top.
Also, it allows for the time to do it, like you say, when you’re most productive. First thing in the morning, between five and seven, is when I do all my learning. I watch the videos I want to watch, I read the articles, I deep-dive into stuff—and there’s no one around. I know I can do it without being interrupted. I’m not constantly like, “One ear—is my name going to be called?” I can literally tunnel in. So: know thyself, don’t they say? Know thyself. Knowing that allows you to prioritise that. That is a priority for me in the day.
Hannah: Yeah, absolutely. And I think that’s a huge benefit of being self-employed. Another one which I really like is being able to create our own environment—our own working environment. As a self-employed person I get to pick: I don’t want to be in a bright office with loads of strip lights and noise. Actually, I can be tucked away in a room in my house, in the quietness. Occasionally there’s a noise in the background or something, but generally I like a kind of dull light. I like to reduce the unnecessary stimulation of my senses. I can do all that. But then another time I might get a bit lonely—and then I go to a shared workspace that I can use and need people around me.
The benefit—or the point I’m trying to make—is I can be the boss of that. I can decide whether I want to be co-working in a busy environment for a couple of hours, or whether I want to be shut away. Not in a cupboard—I was going to say in a cupboard! I don’t work from a cupboard like the elf from the Shoemaker—just in a cupboard, tapping away.
Stuart: Be it all, I mean—yeah, yeah. But see, this is the point of this topic: you’re managing the overwhelm. Because you know if you spend too long in that overwhelm—too long in the red—it’s gonna blow up. And that’s burnout.
I’ve experienced it, like I said, a few times. At the worst there was catatonia—there was just inertia. Literally I would lie in bed, be unable to… just be like, “Why is my brain empty?” Even simple tasks like the washing felt like a Herculean task. “Oh—find the… What? You haven’t got the right… The washing powder is out, and the one that you like isn’t stocked in the store down the road. You have to get in the car and drive to the supermarket. Oh my God, you’ve got to deal with the supermarket…” All of this goes through your head as you’re lying there trying to go, “Why can’t I just go round the corner and get that?” You just know that that’ll add to the burnout, because you’re then irritated by the clothes you put on because the smell’s not right and it’s a bit… yeah—everything.
Hannah: I experienced the dreaded burnout—I remember the first time I had a proper burnout. I didn’t recognise it as that at all, because it was a first for me. I was convinced I had flu or… I just was like, “Oh, I’m really ill,” because it just hit me. But I didn’t have a temperature or anything like that. I just felt, like you said, really—my brain was completely empty and everything felt like too much. I thought at the time, “Gosh, have I got depression or something?” Because I just needed to be in bed for a few days and I felt completely wiped.
Actually, I now realise it was burnout. I try and avoid that as much as possible because it’s horrible—really difficult. Although much easier to manage now I recognise it. I’ve got some strategies in place, which helps. I mean—have you got any good strategies to stop yourself falling off the cliff edge?
Stuart: There are some. I’ve got some real tells. I get really clumsy. I’ve got more marks on my shins and cuts on my fingers than I usually have from being a maker and a doer. The world seems more angular. Tastes are off. I’m much more sensitive to noise and smell and light. I’ll be wearing my sunglasses all day no matter what the weather—it’s just like the visual power of having what effectively feels like two torches shone in your eyes all day, every day.
Knowing that those things are indicators—when they happen, now I’m able to take stock and not ignore them. I used to go at it with the attitude of: “This will pass—without stopping, without changing anything—this will pass.” We have had way too many household family events ruined because Stuart was burnt out. I don’t mean big, blow-out rows or whatever—I just mean being unable to participate in them. “You can’t come—why?” Because I could literally not face people. I didn’t have the… The brain was just not there. Christmas, where I’m supposed to be cooking the Christmas meal—I cook the Christmas meal, then just have to go to bed because that’s it. I’m done for the day. Done.
I’ve not had the deep, months-long burnout ever since my first one, and that’s because I left employment. I say this without hyperbole: I’m not sure if I would have been here if I had returned to full-time employment. The pressure that came off me, it most… And I’ve just been writing about this, because we’re going to be putting out some guides of strategies—tips, things that we’ve found helped us. They might help you, they might not—everybody’s different. But they might give you a clue as to where to get started.
One of the things I’m really conscious of is preserving my energy. So if I get through the day, and at three o’clock rolls around—I’m not much of a clock-watcher, I’m more of an energy-watcher—and if my mind starts to wander and I flick off to YouTube, I’ll just take a five-minute break and watch YouTube. If that five-minute break becomes a ten-minute break and I’m like, “You’re done for the day.” Your brain is telling you that it needs not to go back to that task. It’s quite happy now. That might seem like you’re abdicating responsibility for the work, but I’ve got processes in place that if a customer even phoned me and said, “Our website’s down, can you get it back up?” I could pass that along to someone. Yes, it costs me money, but it allows me to go and lie down when I’m—yesterday I did the minimum input all day. Minimum input. And I did it mostly from the sofa.
I’m not sure if—you phone a boss and say, “I want the week off.” “Well, we’ve got a huge product launch. You’ve got to be in the office on Monday morning because we’ve got a massive meeting.” Participation isn’t voluntary—you’ve got to be there. When you’re self-employed those things rarely turn up. I know there are meetings, and I’ve agreed to meetings in the future—not knowing what my energy levels will be—but I know what those are, and can manage my energy levels accordingly in the run-up to them.
I find that the business of business can sometimes just steamroller the person. So, in conclusion: I avoid the burnout now because I recognise the overwhelm. And this is the other thing as well—the two are… You really have to analyse your own behaviour and think, “Oh, I do that because of that.” Things I thought were just me—but that’s a thing for the ‘tism or the whatever.
I build in firebreaks. This week is a firebreak. I knew the event—the party we had on Saturday—in the lead-up to it, I would give my all to make it the best thing for our guests. Every year we try and improve both our property and our guest experience, and just have a party that people go, “Oh my God, that’s a brilliant party.” I know that it’s putting on an event, effectively, and I know what that does to me, because I’ve put on so many different events over the years. I know I’ve got to give myself time off—time for my brain to process, or re-process what I’ve just been through. I still haven’t processed all the changes I’ve made in the garden—I’m still looking at it going, “Wow, that looks really good.”
So having the ability to do that helps me manage the overwhelm before it gets to the burnout. Unfortunately, I think there are a lot of people who are not diagnosed who are in burnout—and there are more and more of that happening. They call it a mental health crisis. I think it’s also happening with the neurotypicals—burnout isn’t just a spectrum thing. Burnout is a genuine thing. If you spend too long in the red, you will burn out—just too much cognitive load, too much stress. They call it whatever. It can happen to anyone. It’s just that the threshold for it is a lot lower when you’re on the spectrum, and it fractures along different lines. Yeah. No—those are my tips, my thoughts. Have you got any tips—any thoughts, any hints that you can share?
Hannah: Tips—whatever. I’ve got a lot of those. I’m not so good at noticing the signs yet; I think I’m perfecting it. So—kind of tips from me: things I’ve learnt recently that are definitely helping. I’ve done a real overhaul of the way that I work—like you were touching on, too, really. I do now allow more time. I love your analogy of a firebreak—that’s kind of what I’m building into my day-to-day.
I have to battle, unfortunately, quite a lot with the hyperfocus. If I get it into my brain, “Right, this week’s a networking week,” then I’m like back-to-back, blocking people in like I’m some kind of machine churning through meetings—and after about three days I am dead behind the eyes, regretting my choices and letting people down—having to cancel them. So I often have a conversation in my brain where I’m like, “No. Hyperfocus mode—you’re not my friend this week. You need to back off.”
I use a lot of reminders—so I block in work on my calendar, on my phone—but it’s all movable. I have an idea of what I want to achieve in a day, but I’m very kind to myself and I can move that to tomorrow or later on in the week if I need to. They are not set in concrete, and I’m very kind with myself on that—I don’t beat myself up. There was a time where I’d have beaten myself up for not ticking that to-do list on the right day.
Stuart: So yeah—using tools, electronic tools, reminders, calendars, stuff like that. I have what I call “Free-Play Friday.”
Hannah: Nice.
Stuart: And it means that I don’t put any work in the diary. We had—when we had the business, the mis-metric business—we had a policy where we just would not have a website launch on a Friday. I know there are many developers that do that—too many problems. Things can go wrong, you’ve then got the weekend—and of course you’re paying people, so you’re either paying them a lot more or they’ve got to wait until Monday. So we would never launch a website on a Friday. That then led to working-from-home Fridays, which then led to: if we’re done for the week, I’m not forcing people to come in just to answer emails. But if I needed them, they would be there for me as a resource. I started to get more out of people in the four days they were in the office.
Hannah: It makes so much more sense, doesn’t it, though? I used to do the same—but with the Monday. Monday would be… It wasn’t a really restful day because what I’d do is cram in all the other life stuff like dentists and all the crud—car MOT. So actually, yeah—what started off as almost like a down day, an extension of my weekend to regroup and recharge—quite quickly I started cramming it full of all the other crud in my life that didn’t fall into the work bracket. Actually, yeah—now Mondays are not… well, now I work on them as well.
I guess—there you go. Part of my ADHD means I put a lot of this stuff in place and then forget that I did it—or move it out of place. Sabotage it.
Stuart: But, you see, if you recognise that, you can get back to it. It’s one of those things—and sometimes you have to accept that in the short term you will be in overwhelm for a bit. You will be slightly out of your depth whilst either the project progresses to a point where you can put it back down and it’s sort of self-sustained, or the customer’s need does take a priority. But again it’s like, “Okay—I can, mentally, sustain this for two weeks. Happy to sustain this for two weeks—or two months.” I know that I can get to the end of this. I just take a more methodical approach and reduce all of the extra external stuff—so, you know, not staying away, not going to the friend’s barbecue. You make the trade-off: that’s the trade-off for me being able to do this stuff in the timescale they want and them giving me the money.
But that then means that for the next two months I can do what the fuck I like. More work comes in—I will take it on, whether I’ve got the energy or the desire for it and timescale and blah blah. For me, I think that being self-employed has massively returned on quality of life—massively—in a way that I think if I had a… I don’t want to say high-pressure, high-powered job—but a job that paid a hundred grand a year but I had to get on a train and go up to London—it would break me. I would be a quivering jelly under my desk within months. It’s different for different people.
I’m also not as young as I was. I think there are a lot of very young neurodiverse—or younger—people, who are making up for their burnout by burning out their youthfulness and youthful energy to make up the energy deficit they have going on in their lives. Much like a bank account, you can run into the overdraft for quite a long time before the bank suddenly goes, “Do you know what? You’re bankrupt.” That’s what it is: energy bankruptcy. You’re bankrupt. Your ability to recover, almost—we have to take double the length of time and relaxation to even get back to the point. You know when a battery runs out on your phone? When you plug it in, it doesn’t want to switch on immediately, does it? It waits a little while.
Hannah: You’ve touched on something really important for me, really, because I have noticed as I’ve got older—along with many other things—my energy is even less. I think you’re right: when I was working up in London, when I’d just finished uni and stuff, I had so much energy. Although I was recognising—I recognise now I’m late diagnosed—obviously I didn’t know what it was at the time. I was in this cycle of kind of “bit of a meltdown, get back up”—you know, a slightly toxic energy cycle. But actually, I notice so much more as I’m older. I’m wise, thank goodness. I am managing my energy better. But as I’m older—and the energy in general, regardless of whether you’re neurodiverse or not—is lessening. Even if we’re all trying to fight it by running and trying to be fit and stuff—it is still less. Like you said with the battery: as we get older the batteries are just slower to recharge and they don’t hold their energy as long, you know?
Stuart: Yeah, that’s exactly it. I used to be able to do ten hours in the garden—proper, putting a proper shift in. Six hours, maybe—making a cup of tea. It’s not me. I have to go sit down. Need a cup of tea to get over the cup of tea.
Hannah: Yes! (Laughs.) It’s funny, isn’t it? Well—it’s not funny.
Stuart: That brings us neatly, actually—so we’ve discussed the burnout, given some examples, shared some tips. Recovery—what does recovery look like? How does recovery begin? How do we get back on the horse and hopefully understand a little more about what leads to the burnout and the overwhelm? What tips have you got for the recovery cycle—what’s your recovery like?
Hannah: So my recovery is very much kind of: go into a… turn all the noise down, turn all the lights down, go into my room with my noise-cancelling headphones. It depends how big the burnout was. My burnout is probably a bit more dramatic, by the sounds of it, than yours. My burnout starts with a massive verbal meltdown where I am quite mean to anybody in my household—and unfortunately my husband is usually the one in the room. It’s not really abuse, but it’s definitely a kind of big princess meltdown that gets lots of tears and lots of… And then I end up retreating like a little dragon—quite like a little angry dragon—into my cave with my noise-cancelling headphones. I prioritise that kind of rest—removal of anything that feels really demanding.
So I kind of offload stuff. If I’ve got to take one of the kids somewhere, in my shouting bit I’ll add, “Can you take so-and-so to the dentist, by the way?” And then what I’ll do—and this is always the process I go through—I reduce the stimulation after I’ve been mean to everybody, I go and take myself into my little cave. I make sure I’ve eaten something, because often I’ve forgotten to eat—something that blows everything up. Low blood sugar and not looking after myself properly is huge. Make sure I’ve drunk something. Then I try and get into kindness mode—self-kindness. I don’t want to sound like I’m being a bit rude, but I do: I start to explain to myself, “It’s okay to have this. I understand why I’ve done this. Actually, I’ve probably—well, I’ve definitely—pushed myself a bit too hard, and I’m not going to beat myself up over that.” It’s kind of not punishing myself, but being gentle and looking to be more self-aware, in the hope that it will prevent it happening again anytime soon.
Stuart: When my cope is broke—as I think of it—my ability to deal with anything, it means I have to… Like, it was at the party: I just took myself to bed. It was because I literally ran out of all of the spoons to have conversations. To consume any more alcohol would have been folly—absolute folly. It wouldn’t help anything; it was just gonna make me even worse. I started talking in the conversation and it was literally—I couldn’t string words together. It wasn’t drunken, slurry words—it was like I was having a conversation and my brain just went, “Nope.” It’s like it got all the tiles on the Scrabble board and went *fweep*—and just introduced it up again a bit—and that was it.
It’s recognising that, and being kind to yourself, like you say. “Well, of course this was bound to happen because…” But I’m just a human. I do make mistakes. There isn’t a mental gauge going, “You have this many spoons and this is your time.” It’s all a bit of a juggling act.
Hannah: It’s funny what you said about slurring your words. You know I don’t drink, but I notice—and I haven’t drunk for quite a few years—but people used to say if I went to a party and I was talking to everybody, I’d start to slur my words when the energy got so depleted—but I wasn’t quite ready enough to go home. People would say, “Oh, you a bit drunk?” and I’d say, “No, not at all.” I wouldn’t even really notice it. But actually, I was… yeah. My mouth was just not working as well as it needed to, and the brain and everything like that. So it physically does—yeah—it physically… all those physical signs. Sorry—bit of a tangent.
Stuart: No, no—absolutely. Bicycle tangents—I love a tangent. I love a side story or a side quest. The recovery is mental, but it’s also a physical recovery. I find, again—you’re not playing a game where… If anyone’s played an adventure game and you’ve got a character, you have different health bars. You can have overall health, you can have spiritual health—but it’s like one of your health bars is flashing and in the red. The others are coping—but if you let a second one go into the red, you’re in deep do-do.
So the recovery has to be almost the exact opposite—like you say: lessening the inputs, reducing the stimulus, and allowing yourself to get more regulated sleep. Sleep is a big one for me. I knew I was going to crash this week—I just knew I was going to crash. But last week there was a day where I slept 12 hours straight through—bang. That’s amazing. I went to bed at something like half-nine and I got up at half-nine. Peeled my face off the pillow…
Hannah: (Laughs.)
Stuart: The ear-free sizzle on the cheek—and you stumble around like you’re half-cut, and your brain takes a while to boot up. The cursor’s blinking: “Off…” Your eyes are twitchy. But the recovery doesn’t have to be huge. If the burnout is deep and long-lasting, then yes—put yourself in full blanky, weighted blanky, marshmallows and hot chocolate on the sofa if that’s your thing—(tofu and dips if not, I don’t know!)—but the point is: do what you need to do to reset and recover.
I also think… So I gave this piece of advice to one of the channels I follow—and I can’t remember his name off the top of my head; I’ll put a link to it down there. We exchanged a couple of messages backwards and forwards. He said he wouldn’t mind being a guest, and I said, “Well, let’s get up and running before that.” It was the idea that—being newly diagnosed—how long does it take to get used to the idea of revealing this to yourself and agreeing with it yourself? It can be a real shock to people. I was… I’ve lived so long as me that when they went, “You’re autistic,” I was like—“Was that me? Oh—that’s the explanation for why all of this—right. At least I’ve got a word now. I’ve got a thing I can say to people—that’s what I am. Go and do your own research.”
We home-educated our children. We were told this very early on: you have to de-program from the school. You have to go through a period—your child and the family have to go through an unlearning of school. The rule of thumb given was: one month for every year they were in school.
Hannah: Gosh.
Stuart: But you think about it. I was masked to myself for 56 years—I’m 57 now. It’s going to take 56 months—five or six years—for me to get my head around all of this and the rest of it. So any progress I’m making is good progress, but it’s maybe not the final package. So: lighten up on yourself. That’s the other thing about the overwhelm—the self-talk. “Why are you failing at this? You know how to do this…” That harsh tone. I thought I had one of the harshest tones of any inner voice. People have different—some people have a really nice inner voice. Oh really? I don’t. I’ve got several—and most of them are telling me that I’ve done something wrong.
Hannah: You’ve got several voices in your head, Stuart?
Stuart: “Hello? Hello? Can you come in?” But you know what I mean—the tone you take with yourself. Sometimes I have to respond like: “You would not say that to somebody else.” You’d use a completely different tone. You’d be way more forgiving of somebody else. Your kids—if your kids messed up or did something wrong, if it’s minor, you’d be like, “Don’t worry about it.” With yourself, you’re like, “How dare you, you screw-up.” Unlearning that as well—that’s what takes the time: to unlearn these reflex behaviours you’ve put in place, many times not even understanding why they’re there. “Why have I got this sergeant-major voice in my head? Where’s that come from?” Partially my mum, partially my dad, partially my grandparents… received “you will behave like this” and you will do this.
Hannah: And society, right? I won’t go off on a massive soapbox about hidden illnesses and hidden things—but, you know, in society if you break your leg everyone’s like, “Oh yeah, you can lie on your sofa for two weeks and recover.” Whereas if you say “I’m completely exhausted, I’m completely overwhelmed,” suddenly you’re a bit of a lunatic, or you’re a bit lazy, or you’re not trying hard enough. Maybe we absorb—well, not maybe, we definitely absorb those thoughts, don’t we? “If I was better I wouldn’t have an overwhelmed meltdown.” You know what I mean? It’s quite hard to change that.
Like you said with the voices—I had a meeting with a lady the other day and she… I won’t say the name, because it’ll out her if she ever comes on here or is watching this—but she was telling me, and she said a woman’s name. She said, “Oh, so-and-so won’t like that though.” I said, “Who?” She said, “That’s the person in my head that has an opinion on stuff that isn’t very like me.” I was like, “That’s the opposite.” We were talking about her website and I said, “If you want to, I’ll do a bit of an audit of it.” She said, “Well, go easy, because this other—Penelope—will get…” Yeah, let’s say Penelope. “Penelope’s a bit of a bitch.” I was like, “But you’re so calm and quiet.” She said, “Yeah, but Penelope is in there and she will tell you how it is.”
That’s kind of cool. She said Penelope is harsh on her. I said, “Then why can’t we work on Penelope? Why can’t you work on making that Penelope kinder?”
Stuart: Whatever you do, don’t suggest she gets a ventriloquist puppet of Penelope.
Hannah: (Laughs.) It was slightly alarming when she started talking because she kept looking at Penelope.
Stuart: I love her already! Okay—right: do you want a conversation with Penelope? I want Penelope to meet the sergeant. Maybe they’ll start haranguing each other and I can get rid. (Laughs.)
Hannah: But she was acting it out—like, “Shut up, Penelope.” I thought it was reassuring to me that I wasn’t quite there at that stage.
Stuart: And what a wonderful thing for her to be that open with you. Yeah—must’ve trusted you. Must’ve opened her heart to the conversation. So that’s good.
Well—I think we’ve come at the topic. I think we’ve looked at it. This is one we will return to, I’m sure. If people have got comments, thoughts, questions—stick them in the comments. Write to us—was it ‘hosts@businessoddcast.com’ We’d love to hear from you. Sign up as well—go to businessoddcast.com, sign up on the website mailing list. We guarantee you we will never sell our mailing list. We will never send you “buy socks,” because we’ve done a brand deal. That’s not where we’re coming from. We will send you updates about Oddcast stuff.
We’ve got a lot planned. We’ve thought about this quite intensely—Hannah and I have been looking at ways to support our community. I think sharing a lot of these hints and tips, thoughts, approaches—even just, “I’ve thought about it like this—how do you think about this?” Even like—you’ve spoken about this woman with a harsh inner critic. You’ve now spoken to somebody else with that. If someone else out there is thinking, “I must be a bit mad because I’ve got this voice in my head”—you’re not. You’re perfectly, perfectly “normal”—I use the word normal in inverted commas. This means—you’re not normal. You may not be normal, but you’re not alone! There you go—you found your people. You found your people. Normal amongst us.
I’ve got some homework. I’ve got some homework—and everybody can do this. Your homework this week is to do one thing which helps with the overwhelm or helps with the recovery. Put your feet up. Have a gin and tonic at three in the afternoon—because. Go to a film that you want to see, that the rest of the family don’t—on your own. I’m not saying I’ve done all these things… but I’ve done all these things. Insert whatever tiny little pleasure—go buy a LEGO kit, make a LEGO kit. Don’t wait and put off doing the nice stuff, because there will always be more work. You’re never going to get on your deathbed and go, “Do you know what? One more day in the office. One more day in the office, please. Just one more spreadsheet. One more thing—I’ve just got one more email to send. I’ve just realised where the error was on that particular site—it’s if you go into the config…” “Bring me the laptop!” That will literally be me—and I’ll have an IV line. Got an IV line and the surgeon… “What am I going to do?”
Right—thank you for listening. Thank you—if you have been—for watching. Please do like, subscribe, and share this with as many of the odd, weird and lovely people that this podcast is for—because we want to help. Suggestions, feedback—if you want to be a guest—hosts@businessoddcast.com.
We will see you next week. In the meantime: do your homework, put your feet up, relax. You’ve got this. You’ve got it. Step away from PAYE. Don’t do it.