In this cohosted episode with Nikki (@teachspeech365) about Autistic Burnout & Professional Ennui.

Time Stamps

0:00 Intro

1:53 What's Up & What's Down

5:20 Autistic Burnout

15:10 Have you considered leaving the profession?

23:35 Outro

Autistic Burnout

Article to review on Autistic Burnout

Podcast: The Autistic Life (apple)

So here’s what I look for and observe and ask myself when considering Autistic burnout:

Look for signs of stress or exhaustion - for my current client they have a furrowed brow, their attention is really poor, they are having more behaviors like hitting and pinching. This is saying to me - hey, this isn’t working for me, I need a break.
Look for signs of slow or limited growth - this may be cognitive, language, or really any area. For me, when I’m doing the same thing day in and day out in sessions, I even sometimes (with parent permission) will video myself in a session and really honestly ask myself if I’m modeling the AAC for example, commenting, communicating using their AAC and so on. If I need a second opinion (again with parent permission), I’ll ask an SLP friend to review the footage and give me honest feedback.
Is the child responding to you? In heightened stress, the child may not be responding to you at all but be doing a solo activity and communicating to you - I need my space right now. If that’s more of the rule than the exception, take note.
Does the child want to be there?
Are there increased sensory needs and behaviors that show you that the child is trying to self soothe and perhaps isn’t getting enough downtime to resource themselves, to do what play and self soothing looks like for them.
Is the child overscheduled? Do they seem tired?

Here’s the 3 step process I usually recommend if you may want to leave your job:

If you can, go to therapy to work on this. I did this and it was really important to me. If not, ask a trusted friend for support to talk this out.
Implement a boundaries plan (with the help of your friend or therapist) for a finite amount of time (don’t make it take two years like me, give it a few months max - I did six weeks) as well as a self care plan and implement it.
If you are still exhausted, burned out, unhappy - you have two choices; one - change the system you are in two - no longer participate in that system; the choice is yours

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