End Professional Burnout: Become More Energized and Less Stressed | Liz Aguirre | TEDxManitouSprings

When I graduated from medical school in 2006, I took the Hippocratic Oath which included the oath to do no harm after

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than 10 years of practice. I had to confess that I had broken that oath hundreds, if not thousands, of times. I broke it when I hurt myself. I thought I was doing the right thing after all, becoming a doctor meant working long hours, going 24 hours or

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without sleep was an expectation, sometimes drinking a whole cup of coffee was pretty standard for me, okay, maybe two, I actually have to be brutally honest. In fact, I have drunk three cups of coffee on numerous occasions and despite this state of hypercapination I have also fallen asleep standing up when I got home.

Insomnia attacked me the next morning. I was too tired to eat and I went straight to the coffee maker one day. Again, I often went 16 to 18 hours without eating, of course, now I know that's called intermittent fasting, so maybe it wasn't so bad after all. I'm also embarrassed to admit that when I was hungry, I was sleep deprived. He says he wasn't the nicest person. I took it out on the nurses I worked with, but it wasn't just the nurses. I took it out on my family and friends too when we got to the point of neglecting sleep which is one of the most basic human needs, we have done a lot of harm to ourselves up to that point, the people closest to us try to tell us but We didn't listen every time my husband tried to point out my need to take a break.

It always leads to a sarcastic rhetorical question about what time, lack of sleep and working long hours are examples of how self-neglect appears in our lives, this leads to overwhelming frustration and eventually

burnout

, but the question is: why do we neglect ourselves? We try to pretend that everything is fine before we can create change. First of all, we have to understand why this happens. It took me a long time to find the answer to this question, but it is finally very clear that the answer is fear in order. To change the culture of self-abandonment we must face our fear and make a conscious decision to prioritize ourselves.

I thought that working harder was the only way to succeed is what I did to prove myself to prove that I deserve to be in the room. I pushed my body to its limits over and over again and eventually my body stopped accepting the challenge. I developed unbearable migraines. I couldn't concentrate and I was criticizing my beautiful children. I became a version of myself I didn't even know. I recognize that pushing our limits can be a good thing and is necessary for growth, but not when it is at the expense of our precious human life. The truth is that beer was driving my decisions without me realizing it and this is the case for many people around the world. my medical school training I was afraid that my classmates would realize that I wasn't really one of them I was a small town girl who grew up in extreme poverty I spent years without running water or electricity and I went through a lot time and energy trying to hide the fact that most people didn't know I was looking for food in a dumpster, but that was my reality from ages 10 to 13.

Yes. 10. Dumpster day was a normal part of my life and it was a happy day. day because this was the day of the week when I would receive a gourmet meal in which scraps of meat were thrown into the trash, but one night, as I was running home with my big black garbage bag, the happiness disappeared, I heard the squeak of tires and I saw the police lights coming. behind me I was so scared that I didn't think it was a crime to dig through dumpsters, but for some reason at that moment my mind thought it was.

I dropped my bag and ran as fast as I could towards a field of tall trees. Alas, I will never forget the feeling of those candies hitting my face, how they felt penetrating my body as I fell to the ground trying to stay as still as possible while my body shook uncontrollably, the police officer got out of his car and after searching for What seemed like an eternity passed, but I remained paralyzed as I lay there with tears streaming down my face, it was at that moment that I made the decision that I would never live in poverty again.

Some time later I heard my Mom call me, but I still couldn't move. It was only after I heard the panic in her voice that I finally found the strength to get up, but I made it blurry enough to collapse in her arms. We all carry a dramatic weight and sometimes traumatic stories we carry guilt and regret that lives beneath the surface of our conscious mind and drives our actions the night I made that promise to myself is the night abandonment began for my young mind the only solution I had It was working harder. I told myself that I would work harder than everyone else and never give up no matter what, but what I didn't realize was that this led me down a path where I was no longer making conscious decisions and instead, he defaulted to a decision he had made.

In a moment of intense fear then how did I come full circle? How did I go from that scared young woman to this strong, confident woman standing on stage today? Well, here's another confession. I'm still scared. The key is not to eliminate the fear, but to learn to resolve it how we do this is a process first we must

become

aware of the fear and take the time to examine it many times we do not realize that it is driving our actions once I did this I went from saying things like no I have no choice to understand that the path I was on was my choice, we always have a choice even when it doesn't seem like it, what are you afraid that drives your actions once we take the time to face that fear? and understand why we are making certain decisions, it is possible to choose something different, then the new question is: what do you really want?

What are you no longer willing to live without? What are you choosing for fear of having to? leave it? Let's create space for the things that matter most. Many times we do not make conscious decisions because of this hypothetical scenario that repeats itself in our minds, but when we face that fear we can develop a plan on how to overcome it. From now on, we have to learn to be vulnerable. I spent a lot of time hiding from my past stories and allowing them to make me believe I wasn't good enough. Even now, uncertainty and fear continue to arise from having this awareness.

It is possible for me to course correct, learning to be vulnerable means asking for help from those who can help guide us to see things more objectively. It can be a friend, a mentor, a coach, a therapist or even an online network, and believe me, I've had a lot of training, Lastly, it's important to eliminate unrealistic expectations. I discovered that many of the expectations were mine and they were not even real. Is it realistic to stay up all night studying for an exam or work a triple shift? Do we really need it? Do what everyone else does the answer is no, we can choose.

I want to challenge the belief that we have no choice because it's our job or the belief that we have to do something a certain way because it's always been done that way. It's just not true, it's time to move from the point where self-neglect is acceptable and, in some ways, expected, to a place where we set healthy boundaries. Self-neglect leading to

burnout

is a pandemic hiding in plain sight, and it's not just about healthcare. Long work hours are common for oil and gas workers, truck drivers, sales managers, corporate executives, legislators and many more; in fact, in recent decades, several well-known disasters have leaked, at least in part, to employee fatigue.

Some examples include nuclear plant disasters, the space shuttle Challenger accident and the Exxon Valdez oil spill, to name a few, lack of sleep has negative consequences, weakens our immune system and causes illness, causes mental deterioration, the Institute National Occupational Safety and Health explains that being awake for 24 hours is similar to having a blood alcohol level. of 0.10 percent, which would be above the legal level for driving in the United States. This is a risk not only for ourselves but for everyone around us. The training of a doctor is called residency because historically working long hours meant that they were practically residents of the hospital after In my first year of training the Libby Zion law went into effect stating that residents could no longer work more than 80 hours per week or 24 hours straight, at that time there were arguments that it was impossible to limit it to 80 hours.

There were debates that patients here would suffer and residents would not receive proper training, but these debates forget the very reason work hour limits came into effect. First, her name was Libby and she was a college freshman who died in a New York hospital while being cared for by two residents who worked long hours and were exhausted as a result of this case, the Health Commissioner of New York decided to challenge the systemic problems with long hours of work in job training, even today doctors and training continue to demonstrate that it is possible to find success and still work

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than 80 hours is still a lot, although it makes this be the part of the talk I didn't plan.

One of my best friends was supposed to be here with me today and she called me yesterday. and she said she couldn't come because she missed her flight and she was very upset but for me I had a little bit of relief because she had called me the night before and explained to me that she was working a 16 hour day and her plan was to go to home and sleep two or three hours and then drive an hour and a half to the airport. If you are a person like me ever, your mind will offer you the same words that she said to me yesterday and they hurt me to the core she said you don't understand I have no choice she gave me back my own words those are the words I used to always say We have a choice.

I don't feel like it, but we do remember that there is a point of diminishing returns where no matter how hard you work, you don't achieve more. I went through burnout three times. I know that means I'm triple certified in Burnout. I thought that when I reached my goal I would slow down and be happy. but we don't do that, we continue with the same lousy habits, as a result, unhappiness continues and burnout follows us, but when we say me first and prioritize our essential needs, we

become

a much more powerful version of ourselves, the result is a paradoxical result in which we have more energy, we are more productive and we are able to achieve greater success with better time management;

In other words, we do the job better and in

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time a change begins with each of us individually when we present ourselves as the best version of ourselves. This is the final success we not only achieve the goal but we can also enjoy the achievement. I hope you all will join me and tell me first to challenge the status quo, create healthy boundaries and set an example of what is possible for generations to come, thanks, laughs.