In my last post I talked about my burnout in a professional setting, as in quitting my software engineering career. Quitting my job gave me the first jolt of confidence that I could shape my own life with my own imagination, but it was just one tiny piece in a huge puzzle. And me working at a job I actively hated was only the tip of the iceberg of unhealthy patterns I unconsciously lived by and had to address. Not having boundaries, resistance, unrealistic expectations, people pleasing and perfectionism kept me at bay from a joyful life and dimming my light.
I was sitting in an orange plastic chair, the kind that sticks to your sweaty thighs on a hot summer day, in a piss-yellow waiting room. It was already an hour late to my appointment with a psychiatrist I was assigned to based on the street I live on. This dude was the only person who could give his signature to extend my sick leave on mental health grounds. I had high levels of anxiety not just from my life’s circumstances but also in anticipation of meeting him. Based on the stories I’ve heard about psychiatrists in public health care centres in Hungary, I feared that he would shoo me off with being a lazy person instead of an anxious one, and throw some half-ass remarks about how I was imagining all this.
When the psychiatrist eventually came out of his office, I was drenched in sweat and fear. He ushered me into his office. It was a dimly lit room with boring white walls and some informational posters on the wall. His desk was in one corner and in the complete opposite side of the room were three white faux-leather chairs, a big void in the middle. I asked whether I could move a chair closer to his desk. He looked at me baffled and said no. I looked at the chair, then I looked at him. He wasn’t wearing a mask. And it was way past covid time. I sat down on a chair farthest away from him and clutched my bag tightly.
‘I am already seeing a psychologist, I have high levels of anxiety and I can’t work like this. I’ve been on sick leave for the past two weeks and I want to extend it to have some time to rest,’ I said.
‘I cannot treat you then,’ he said. I looked at him, shocked.
‘Why?’ was all I could muster, rage building up inside me.
‘I cannot sign you off on your sick leave if you also go to a psychologist. She should sign your sick leave, then,’ he said looking offended. Oh I cannot go to a psychiatrist, the leading profession of the illness of the mind AND a psychologist. Got it.
‘She can’t,’ I said furiously.
‘And sick leave isn’t for resting. Resting never cured anyone,’ he said. ‘Prescriptions I give do.’
Suddenly a lightbulb went on in my head. I’m not here to be liked or validated or approved by this asshole. He clearly has issues and he doesn’t care about me one bit. My fury started to settle a bit. I asked him under what conditions he could help me and my sole focus became for the session to get his approval for my sick leave, whatever I had to say, whoever I had to be. I may have said that I won’t go back to my psychologist, too, I have no idea. I was still bent over with anxiety, fidgeting with my fingers, my body feeling like a disco club for my nerves but I felt a tiny beam of light start to shine in me. I can be in the presence of an authoritative asshole and detach myself from his attitude towards me. I was proud of myself but I had no idea how this happened then.
The remainder of the session felt long and agitating, there were some periods where he was drifting off on his own enlightening thoughts about how psychologists were ruining people and after years of therapy go to him, get a prescription and be cured immediately. He must have thought he was some god. I cut him short whenever he was drifting on for too long to rest his attention on my case and whether he would assign me to an additional month of sick leave. He eventually did. He decided that I wasn’t burnt out (I couldn’t be because I was too young for that in his opinion!) but depressed and this is my personality. I won’t even comment on that last one. It was absurd and it was brutal. And even though I know it’s not just false but there is no such concept, sometimes it still creeps into my head in my low days. He gave me a prescription for anti-depressants I decided to never take but was nodding that I will. His terms for staying on sick leave was taking the pills and going back to him a month later but I decided to resign from my job instead. This session was horrible but I acted (mostly) like an adult and I got a glimpse of what I could become. Someone with boundaries.
Limiting yourself vs boundaries
I have read a lot of articles, books and listened to podcasts on the topic of boundaries in the past years. I knew they were healthy and everyone on Instagram advised me to do them. In fact, I thought I was already doing them. Like when I said no to something I feared and could talk myself out of on some ‘reasonable’ grounds. Or when I pushed another person away because they made me anxious. Yes, it could be that they were rude but most of the time, they just triggered some old wound in me that should have been addressed instead of running away completely. Who doesn’t have flaws? I thought these were boundaries but now I see that I was limiting myself and I made them more about other people than myself. Boundaries should preserve my energy, my power, my shine, my joy. Limiting myself kept me in misery.
There are countless resources that teach you how to set and communicate a boundary to others but first I think boundaries need to be discovered. And most of them shouldn’t even be communicated verbally, you just simply live by them. At least, that’s what happened to me. After I started to take steps towards my dreams, my authentic self felt more and more secure to show herself and I discovered lots of boundaries in me and it was easier to act upon them then. Not easy, but easier. I’m still no expert and fall into my old traps every day but things are changing. Before, I did not have boundaries around a lot of things. Like the perception of myself, my children, my friends, anyone’s opinion could send me adrift in my views. I had zero to none time management, it was extremely hard for me to say no to something I actively wanted to do but it just wasn’t the right time for it. I could not say no to meeting in a pub if a friend wanted to go there even though I don’t drink and I hate crowds and loud places. And I ordered that cocktail every time out of habit and I regretted it the next day when I felt sick with a hangover. Yes, one drink does that to me. And most of all, I did not protect the time around activities that could have given me joy and fill up my cup: writing, doing yoga, dancing, singing, connecting to others or adventure time with my kids, instead of rushing through our routines. Or even doing chores that would benefit me and my family later. I skipped cooking an embarrassing amount of times in the past years, only to spend more money on delivery and have less nutritious goodness in my body to thrive.
And there’s an extra downside to not having proper boundaries next to the obvious soul-killing ones: not respecting others’ either. Whenever I have extended myself way past my own limits, I became rude and did harsh things that would hurt and jeopardise relationships. And I’m still there healing from it. Healing is a brutally slow but rewarding experience. It is fucking hard to let go old ideas you practiced for 30 years. But it’s doable and it turns out, boundaries I thought would squash me (like not having a lot of spare time due to kids) just shone a light on areas where I could be instead of unrealistic dreams, like having an endless amount of time to spend on friends or visiting Svalbard. I spend and enjoy a lot of fun time with my kids, connecting to other moms on the playground and at daycare, arranging meets with friends that would suit my schedule and needs, prioritising sleep and following an insulin-resistant diet, and have realistic expectations about my writing. I will publish that novel I work on but it will take years. I can accept what life can offer at this stage now, and, hopefully, I will shine more brightly.