As the end of the year approaches, many of us are limping to the finish line, and if you’ve got family, it’s less of a finishing line when you can have a rest but more of a transition from work to Christmas craziness with even more to do.
It’s the most common time of year for burnout, especially if we’ve not had enough of a break across the year so far, hanging out for the summer and Christmas break. It’s also been a challenging year economically, job insecurity, restructures and redundancies and perhaps rethinking our plans for holidays and time away from work.
Whilst the end of the year can bring about feelings of exhaustion it’s also the time Christmas arrives and potential overwhelm and overload of a different kind. At the very time we most need a break and are running on empty.
Much of this load still falls on the shoulders of women. Often the organisers of Christmas, presents, social gatherings, food provisions and emotional labour to make sure everyone’s happy. It’s also the time we’re being told to rest and put our feet up after a hard year – enjoy the break – but for many it’s more like ‘give me a break’.
We’ve created this helpful checklist that can be download and used to help you through the end of the year. My encouragement with this is that you go through it with those closest to you, share the load or at least reflect on who’s doing the majority of the jobs and just how many jobs there are that need doing!
Not all of these categories apply and you might have your own actions to add to this list that are specific to your family – again, where’s the equal share and distribution of these tasks?
This is a task that’s helpful all times of the year to help all family members see exactly what’s required to keep the household running and open up an opportunity to redistribute the load if its unequal – which, even today, it so often is.
There’s a reason women are more prone to burnout than men and often it’s these lists of jobs we either do or carry the mental load to organise others to do. It can also be wider than our societal norms of our roles and expectations though. If we’re unable to delegate or redistribute the load, not say no, or ask for help then this will also increase our burnout risk. Here’s a perfect time to practice!
Enjoy the Christmas break and make sure there’s enough time and energy left for you.