Burnout

[ppragman]

I burnt out once, turned into the best few years ever. We moved to hawaii and I flew medevac for a bit. I was never an airline guy, but yeah, burnout is real. Outside aviation I'm constantly crispy (though not burned out). Living for the weekend is bleak as • and the amount of time off you *don't get* out of the cockpit is a bummer. I fix it by large backpacking trips.

Bank up that PTO then run off to Spain and hike El Camino de Santiago, I've done it twice now, and I'm about to go do it a 3rd time in October. I highly recommend it.

 

[derg]

Got vacation coming up next month thankfully. It’s been a while but I’ll say I’m pretty good about shutting work out when I’m off. I think I’m just at a point where it’s time to really reflect on where I want to be career wise. Seems like I’ve been trying to fit a square block into a circle the past few years.

Vacations absolutely help. I’m still pretty bad at it because a lot of my personal connections and workplace colleagues are on in the same so even though your Outlook away message says “I’m away for a week”, then they do the end-run and just shoot you the same message through text. Which adds up and builds anxiety because I know I’m returning to hundreds of emails and smoldering fires that people could have fixed themselves.

My suggestions: Get out of town. No internet package if you do a cruise. Explicitly tell anyone in your work/social circle to refrain from sending messages concerning the industry or work but you’ll get back to them for a week. Just do your best to absolutely tune-out because when you’re back, the world is just as effed-up, airplanes have been flying, the work “emergency” people wanted to contact you about, *wasn’t* an emergency but just someone wanting to throw something on your plate.

As you can see, I’m actually talking to myself about what went right and what went wrong with my vacation… while I failed miserably at.

“Did you get a chance to to look at…”

“NO MAN, NO. Next week.”

“My buddy has a question about…”

“NEXT… WEEK”

See if you don’t have an internet package on a boat, you can’t reply to what you haven’t gotten!

 

[🦈💜]

In short: YES.

Also, it's frustrating to hear vacation as a suggestion when you literally don't get vacation or days off or any ability to drop days on your schedule.

At my shop, vacation isn't something you can just take. You have to bid for it, and it's awarded by seniority, and there aren't enough slots for everyone to get anything. I got one DAY of vacation awarded last year in October. It was between work blocks, so it ended up being three whole days off.

Yes, burnout is absolutely real, and if you can't or won't address it, it can cause big problems.

Just remember that if/when you can take vacation, as @derg suggests, don't just do your normal scrolling thing—time will just fly by.

 

[MFT1Air]

It definitely wears on you over time. The place you work at doesn't help and possibly the night flying. Changing things up might help as far as doing international vs domestic. Night vs day. There was a time when reserve was easy. I just talked to a guy who lives in Indiana and does afternoon turns out of SDF. I don't know. I know you like where you live and it would have been a stretch for me to move for the job like that. The job does pay pretty well and there are ways to drop trips now. If you did afternoon turns it would be easy to drop half of them. I think you have decent seniority in your seat. Maybe bid something that isn't perfect for you. Smaller blocks. But stuff that someone else could pick up easy. Give yourself a break and just work less. I did guard my seniority and use it for QOL my whole career but that's not so easy to do now. I got out at 60 and now realize I could have got out a few years earlier cause of my lifestyle and savings.

Agree wholeheartedly. You can feel it. My problem was the fact in being true to myself, I worked VERY WELL independent of others which can take it toll on your long term emotional mindset. Add to the fact my Sigma personality mindset coupled with the military's "BE ALL YOU CAN BE" can push one to both mental and physical fatigue/degradation over time more than a few never fully recover. Yes, it's a reality especially when lives of others are your responsibility.