On the Problem of Burnout for First-Generation Professionals Like Me
The privilege and pain of admitting you need to quit a decent job
I recently had an experience where I found myself headed toward burnout fast, and I had to recalculate my life. If I didn’t, I was zipping toward a mental health break and that is not something a mom of six, freelance writer, and wife can manage discretely. A breakdown would have destroyed our reality, especially our finances, for quite some time. My biggest problem was that this burnout was caused by a very toxic work environment, and I did not see it coming.
Burnout is not something that I am accustomed to claiming. This sentiment, I believe, is especially true for first-generation college students (and first generation professionals) like myself. We don’t know what’s the norm! How would we? Ain’t nobody in the family been in our spot before. This makes the phenomenon of burnout more damaging for us.
I was raised to accept any job that paid me to be there every day and to thank God if they kept me longer than a few months.
