The therapy session had barely ended when Dr Hayley Quinn closed the door and realised she had nothing left.
Not for the next client. Not even for herself.
Her body was on edge, nauseous and exhausted, and she was already searching for something to carry her through the rest of the day. She reached for a quick fix, hoping it might spark some energy.
“I remember shoving handfuls of cashew nuts into my mouth, hoping that would magically give me the energy I needed to continue my day. It didn’t,” she says.
“I cried right there in my office.”
For nearly two decades, Dr Quinn had supported others through stress, anxiety and emotional strain. As a psychologist on the Sunshine Coast, she was trained to recognise the warning signs.
“Burnout crept up slowly for me andI did a great job of ignoring the signs,” Dr Quinn says.
“Being a psychologist at the time, I thought I ‘should’ be able to manage how I was feeling.”
That quiet pressure to cope, to keep going and to hold it together only made things worse.
“Shame can be a common feeling when people are heading towards or are in burnout and that is one of the reasons I’m so passionate about talking about it,” she says.
The turning point came in that moment between sessions, when her body could no longer keep pace with expectations: “My nervous system felt like it was on fire. I was feeling nauseous and exhausted. I couldn’t wait for the session to end and, at the same time, hoped my client didn’t notice and still felt supported by me.”
Afterwards, the reality became unavoidable: “At that point, I knew I couldn’t keep going the way I was. So, I had to make some serious choices about the future of my work and health.”
Dr Quinn’s experience reflects a broader shift.
Once considered a problem confined to high-powered roles, burnout is now being reported across almost every sector – from healthcare and corporate workplaces to households where parents juggle competing demands.
The World Health Organisation defines burnout as “a syndrome resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed”, typically characterised by exhaustion, mental distance and a reduced sense of accomplishment. New research from Allianz Australia suggests the issue is widespread, with nearly six-in-10 surveyed Australian employees reporting they have experienced work-related mental distress.
Now an author, mindset and wellbeing coach, Dr Quinn has channelled her experience into her book From Self-Neglect to Self-Compassion: A compassionate guide to creating a thriving life.
“It’s for the quietly exhausted,” she says.
“The people secretly Googling ‘burnout symptoms’ while smashing through another deadline. The ones who look successful on paper but feel like they’re running on empty.”
She believes social expectations play a significant role.
“Many of us, particularly women, are socialised to be of service to others,” she says.
“So many women are holding multiple roles, ensuring everyone else is okay and leaving no time to take care of their own needs.”
Recognising burnout early can make a critical difference.
One of the most overlooked signs, Dr Quinn says, is ongoing fatigue.
“Many people minimise the tiredness they’re feeling,” she says. “If you can be aware of early signs, then you can intervene with small, easy-to-implement strategies and changes.
“But if you find yourself in full burnout, the changes you have to make are much bigger.”
Recovery is rarely quick or simple.
“It can take weeks, months or even years,” Dr Quinn says.
She encourages people to start small, beginning with a daily check-in.
“A quick ‘How am I feeling today and what do I need to help me with the things I need to do?’ can make a big difference to how you approach your day,” she says.
“Remember that you are human first and your needs matter as much as anyone else’s.”
Burnout doesn’t follow a single pattern.
For Peter Sutton, it unfolded in a very different way.
He has spent more than 35 years working across leadership, executive coaching, education, business advisory and facilitation in Australia and overseas.
On paper, that can sound like confidence, capability and control.
But he says that that was never the whole story.
“For much of my life, there was a gap between my public story and my private story,” Peter says.
“The public story was that I was capable, driven, reliable and holding it together. The private story was much more complex.”
In 2020, at the height of COVID, he walked into a mental health unit with his wife beside him: a decision he describes as one of the most important moments of his life.
“I have called it one of my greatest achievements, not because it was heroic,” he says.
“It was deeply humbling. It was the moment I had to stop thinking I could manage everything on my own.”
That experience did not make him an expert in everyone else’s mental health.
“Mental health is deeply personal,” he says. “I am very wary of projecting my experience onto anyone else.
“What I can do is tell the truth about my own story and use that to open a safer, more honest conversation.”
Peter says one of the biggest misconceptions about burnout is that it looks the same for everyone.
“Some people fall apart in ways others can see,” he says.
“Others keep performing, answering emails, leading meetings, caring for families, and saying they are fine.”
From his own experience, Peter believes people benefit from understanding their personal warning signs.
For him, those signs include changes to sleep, appetite, thinking, memory, social behaviour and even humour.
“When my humour disappears, the people close to me know to pay attention,” Peter says.
He says one of the most practical steps is speaking up early.
“You do not have to be at breaking point to ask for help,” Peter says.
“Sometimes the bravest and most practical thing you can do is say: ‘Something is not right and I need to talk’.”
He also encourages people to build support networks before they need them, including trusted health professionals, family and friends.
“I used to think strength meant carrying things privately,” Peter says.
“I now think strength is having the humility to let the right people in.”
Peter says workplaces also need to rethink how they approach mental health.
“Wellbeing posters, awareness days and resilience messages can all have a place, but they are not enough if the work, itself, is making people unwell,” he says.
He points to factors such as high job demands, poor support, unclear roles, conflict and lack of recognition as key contributors to psychological harm.
“A workplace can care about its people and still miss the risks. A leader can have good intent and still unintentionally contribute to harm. That is why curiosity matters,” he says.
Research from Safe Work Australia estimates low psychosocial safety climate costs Australian employers about $6 billion each year, while depression-related absenteeism and presenteeism costs about $6.3 billion annually.
“In a tight labour market, burnout prevention is more than workplace compassion,” Peter says.
“It is essential to retaining high-performing people.”
For Dr Quinn and Peter, the message is less about dramatic turning points and more about recognising what often goes unnoticed.
Work can replace you.
Deadlines can be reset. Money can be earned again.
Your health cannot.
And for many, it takes losing their health to realise that it was never just one priority among many, but the foundation everything else depends on.
Top 10 tips
How to avoid mental distress at work
- Take regular breaks throughout the workday to recharge.
- Make sure you eat healthy and drink water throughout your workday.
- If your work is desk based, make sure you get up and move your body regularly.
- Respect your non-working time and avoid checking work emails or taking calls during off-hours.
- Schedule and take vacations or personal days to fully disconnect from work.
- Set clear boundaries between work and personal time and communicate them to colleagues and supervisors.
- Learn to delegate tasks and say “no” to additional responsibilities when your plate is already full.
- Explore flexible work arrangements or remote work options, if possible, to better suit your lifestyle.
- Prioritise tasks and create to-do lists to manage your workload efficiently.
- Avoid procrastination and last-minute rushes that can contribute to stress and burnout.
Try Beyond Blue’s Burnout Check-In Tool to see how you’re doing: beyondblue.org.au/mental-health/work/burnout/burnout-check-in-tool
