Parental Burnout: What It Is, Causes, And How It Affects Fathers And Mothers
Taking care of children can be very rewarding but also exhausting. Many fathers and mothers have to be aware all day of what their children do and don’t do, and in times of health crisis with confinements involved, this obligation has increased.
Spending more time with our children is what every good parent would want, but within limits. Little ones can be very demanding and this makes their parents exhausted, tired and even irritable.
Parental burnout is a syndrome that affects many parents, a problem that has exploded with the pandemic and that can involve a lot of psychological and physical suffering. Let’s discover the particularities of this syndrome.
Having children is not an easy task. No matter how much they love them, all parents know that raising and educating their children is not a piece of cake.
It requires a lot of effort, love, time and energy, all invested until the little ones begin to take their first steps towards independence during adolescence and fly from the nest when they are adults. But until that happens, Fatigue can become the faithful companion of moms and dads…
It is normal to feel a little tired because we have had to help our children with their homework, take them to class, buy them textbooks, prepare for their birthday… Even though they bring us happiness and pride, having to pay attention to their needs is tiring, exhausting and can burn us out easily if we have to do it for too long. Every father and mother needs some time off from their children.stop putting up with them for a few hours no matter how ugly it may sound to say it like that.
But fortunately for most parents, there are daycare centers, schools and institutes. Those wonderful educational centers where our children spend their hours being the business of teachers and professors. The teaching profession is very respectable not only because of the knowledge they impart to their pupils, but also because they have to manage the demands and needs of children of all ages.
However, there is a group of parents who had to take care of their children for longer, almost at all hours. Many boys and girls have the misfortune of suffering from a serious or chronic illness, medical conditions in which a lot of care is required. In many of these cases, one of the two parents has to stay at home watching over their sick child., making sure you have everything you need. They are fathers and mothers who can suffer a lot of stress if, in addition to this, they have other obligations.
Parental burnout, also called parental exhaustion, is a very common syndrome in fathers and mothers who are exposed to highly stressful situations in which they have to combine caring for their children with the fulfillment of other obligations, such as work or the care of other people. Originally, the expression “parental burnout” began to be used in the 1980s to refer to stress syndrome suffered by parents of children with chronic or serious illnesses and that, having to act as their caregivers, exhausted them physically and emotionally.
The symptoms of parental burnout are similar to those suffered from work burnout, only with the difference that fathers and mothers who suffer from this syndrome They cannot “escape” or “take a break” from their children with the same ease as a person burned out by their job.. Among these symptoms we find:
Parental exhaustion can have various origins, which vary depending on the type of family, the number of children and the historical moment that the family unit may be going through. There are several risk factors that increase the chances of suffering from parental burnout:
The characteristics of parental burnout
We can describe parental burnout as a three-dimensional syndrome in which we can identify the following characteristics.
1. Physical and mental exhaustion
Fathers and mothers dedicate a good part of their time to caring for their children. This not only implies investing a lot of time in caring for children, but also will, patience, hours of sleep, and physical and mental effort.
If you add to this the stress of work problems, having poor sleep hygiene and having the feeling that you have no time for yourself, frustration becomes a strong physical and mental exhaustion that brings with it potential psychological problems and mood disturbances.
2. Feeling of incompetence
Parental burnout makes those who suffer from it feel like they are failing their children. Feeling exhausted and cranky from having to care for them also causes the feeling that not enough is being done or that things are being done wrong.
Besides, The belief that we should love our children unconditionally is often misunderstood. for doing things for them without feeling exhausted. This means that when a father feels exhausted because his child tires him, he fears that he is not doing it well, that he is a bad father, or even that he does not love her enough.
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3. Emotional distancing from the child
When fathers and mothers do not have sufficient resources to manage the care of their children, stress and anxiety appear.. These feelings directly related to fatigue can deteriorate the relationship with their children, since they do not feel like having them around or they do not respond in a good mood due to their exhaustion.
Children may see their parents as people who are always moody, and parents may see their children as a source of discomfort despite wanting the best for them. All of this can imply emotional distancing from the son, who fears that her father will not respond well to him.
It is very important to highlight that Suffering from parental burnout is not synonymous with being a bad parent, much less so.. Being exhausted by parenting has nothing to do with the love or relationship between parents and their children, but rather it is linked to work because of having to educate them, take care of them, take them to school, make sure they do their homework, take care of their diet. , encourage their learning, make sure they are healthy… There are many small problems that, accumulated, can become a ball that makes us suffer regardless of how much we love our children.
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Parental burnout and pandemic
Until not long ago, this syndrome was relatively little known, being manifested among parents with children with disabilities or in family units with high dysfunction. In families without problems, both parents who worked outside the home and those who did not always have a break from their children. The children went to school and then maybe they stayed home or maybe they went outside to play with their friends. But there was something that changed everything, so many things changed that parental burnout became more general: confinement.
Our lifestyle changed radically overnight.. Every adult who did not have an essential profession had to stay home, either teleworking or remaining in job limbo without knowing what was going to happen to their job. The boys and girls also had to go home, perhaps with joy in the first moments of the pandemic when classes were cancelled, but as time went by the burden of not being able to go out even for a walk would affect them so much. like their parents.
The confinement measures due to the COVID-19 pandemic have been a real headache for many families. The parents, who had to work from home, also had to act as improvised teachers for their children who, although they received the lesson virtually, the doubts about this math problem and the other language problem went to the closest reference adults. . All this without being able to rest from each other, because they shared space 24/7.
Parenting is exhausting, but doing so in a context of general crisis such as a pandemic makes it even more so. Teleworking is an added factor to parenting, which due to the cancellation of in-person classes during the worst months of the pandemic meant that they were not only added, but given at the same time. How many parents had to keep an eye on their children attending virtual classes while they had a meeting with their bosses via Skype?
Anxiety, overwhelm, frustration… the fatigue of caring for the children did not wait long. The only free time was to go shopping and, if you were “lucky,” to wait in line at the supermarket longer without having to put up with your children. Parental burnout skyrocketed without having to have a child with health problems, but rather the simple fact of having him at home every day was enough. In the case of large families, things were even more stressful.since there were no adults for so many children.
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It is clear that raising a child is never easy, especially when situations arise that increase stress, such as the current pandemic. But as with everything in life, Prevention is our best ally to prevent us from suffering a case of parental burnout, quickly detecting the symptoms and addressing the problem as soon as possible. In this aspect, the couple is key, since it is the closest person who can detect how their spouse is exhausted due to caring for the children and can put themselves in their place.
The couple must look for moments and spaces that allow one of them to disconnect while the other takes care of the children, taking turns. This way, you continue to take care of the little ones, but at the same time one of the adults finds a moment of rest and peace that serves to replenish energy after a stressful day having to deal with the children and other obligations.
It is essential to talk about this problem with other parents, who will surely have suffered it on more than one occasion and may have found strategies to reduce their stress. It may also happen that these same parents offer to take care of our children when we have other chores, doing us a favor that we can return in the future either by taking care of their children or helping them with whatever they need.
But We can also reduce our stress while we are with the children. This may seem contrary to what we are trying to achieve, reducing the stress associated with caring for the little ones, but it is worth saying that we can all let off steam at the same time while having a good time and turning a potentially stressful moment into a pleasant one. A good way is to exercise with the little ones, something that will help us release tension and will also tire the children out, making them not so heavy later.
If the cause of our stress is that our children have behavioral problems, in addition to consulting a specialized professional, it is a good idea to introduce rewards for their good behavior. Children sometimes find it difficult to behave well, especially if they see it as an obligation empty of meaning. However, if we turn it into something that brings a reward later we can make them behave better. Some tasks for which they can be rewarded are doing homework, collaborating at home, not disturbing when parents are on the computer…
