Erin O'Hara: Naturopath and wellness expert on treating end-of-year burnout

End-of-year burnout is a concern plenty of us grapple with ahead of the Christmas season - but how can we get ahead of it?

Workplace stress, holiday obligations, self-reflection and all the anxieties that come with those can contribute to the stressful feelings.

Naturopath and wellness expert Erin O'Hara says it's an important time to prioritise self-care and healthy habits - without adding to the seasonal to-do list.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudgin
from News Talk SEDB.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Time to talk Wellness, and I'm joined by naturopath Eron O'Hara.
Good morning, Good morning. I don't know about you, but
I kind of feel like everybody has saddled up the
horse and is galloping to Christmas. Like everybody's already got
Christmas on their mind, the end of the year on
their mind, and I just feel like that sort of
adds quite a lot of stress and pressure, you know,

(00:36):
at this point in the year, whereas I'm sort of
trying to take to step back and go I'm just
gonna take it day by day. I'm not going to
let that end of year pressure build. But there are
a lot of people facing burnout about now, aren't there.

Speaker 3 (00:47):
Yeah. I think everyone kind of gets to this point
of the year and time starts to really speed up,
and you start to think, oh my gosh, I've got
so many things to do. Work commitments, social commitments, and
it's kind of trying to wrap up for the year,
and it's easy to kind of get into the place
in your mindset where your thinking, I'll just keep going,
I'll just keep going and then I can just fall

(01:08):
apart in this in the holidays. But actually it's a
good time to kind of just think about, you know,
keeping that balance through this busy time. As you know, yes,
the body can cope with short term stress and being
extra busy, but we don't really want to end up
getting into the holidays and feeling super tired and burnt
out and having to sleep through our entire holiday. So

(01:31):
this is the time where we really want to bring
in all those self care tools and it's not adding
to the to do list, but it just thinking about
how we can maintain a healthy lifestyle as we head
into the last few weeks heading towards Christmas and bring
in some nice healthy eating, keeping the balance and making
sure we don't just fall apart through this part of

(01:53):
the year.

Speaker 2 (01:53):
What are some of the symptoms of burnout?

Speaker 3 (01:56):
So burnout you can get physical symptoms, so starting to
get things like headache, feeling just really exhausted, more frequent illness,
changes in sleep padner, as well as emotional symptoms, so
feeling a lack of motivation, feeling a little bit helpless
but sorry for yourself, and also behavior changes which might
be super procrastination or withdraw or reduced performance in your workplace,

(02:23):
and they are kind of the main things that you're
kind of heading towards that burnout and burnout if you're
feeling like that, So.

Speaker 2 (02:29):
What are some good tips to keep the energy levels
stable and avoid this?

Speaker 3 (02:35):
So keeping that life balance, it's always back to those
foundation things of the nutrition, exercise, sleep, and stress management.
When it comes to nutrition, being organized and remembering keeping
the balance of the meal, so plenty of vegetables, protein hydration,
and some good carbohydrates, making sure you're getting good three

(02:55):
meals a day. Limiting the snacks as well as maybe
popping in a few supplements can help you for this time,
whether it's adding a multi vitamin or a B vitamin
the morning for a nice bit of BB balance as
well as the magnesium to really help with winding down,
getting a good quality sleep and supporting a nervous system.
Exercise you can bring in, like we talked about last week,

(03:17):
some maybe some exercise snacks into the day of little
short bursts of exercise or even just like adding in
a ten or twenty minute walk in your lunch break,
and then also prioritizing sleep where making sure you're kind
of still getting to be at a decent hour, prioritizing
getting a good night's sleep by reducing the amount of caffeine,
maybe reducing the amount of alcohol they're having, which we

(03:40):
tend to drink more at this time of the year
as we head towards summer, and then also managing stress
and just having some self care tools. Maybe it's in
the weekend, taking some time out, maybe going out for
a beach walk or reading a book, you know, simple
joys of life, or getting a massage or having a bath,

(04:01):
just to do something that's actually carrying and nurturing your
body and your soul.

Speaker 2 (04:05):
And just saying no occasionally eron, you know, like if
people are trying to catch up and do things, and
you may asked to do things, and if you don't
have time, whire you going to eat it? That's just
making everything too busy.

Speaker 1 (04:15):
Just say no.

Speaker 3 (04:16):
I think that's probably the hardest thing that people find
to do. But actually the simplest tool that we can
actually use is that when we know that we've overloaded
ourselves with too many commitments of being like, actually I'm
at my full capacity and no, can't do anymore, and
just finding that confidence to be like, actually, I need
to pull back and do less.

Speaker 2 (04:36):
Love it. Thank you so much. Erin will talk next week.

Speaker 1 (04:39):
For more from the Sunday session with Francesca Rudkin, listen
live to News Talks it'd be from nine am Sunday,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio