MIDWIFERY BURNOUT BECOMING MORE AND MORE PREVALENT

MIDWIFERY BURNOUT BECOMING MORE AND MORE PREVALENT

Burnout and stress in today’s midwifery profession have become a prevalent issue that continues to afflict the increased demands, rising inflation business costs, poor reimbursement, and stringent practicing regulations. Stress can be harmful to the human body and have bad consequences for individuals. Stress can never be precisely articulated in terms of how it affects each individual; it differs from one person to the next.

Work overload contributes to burnout by reducing people’s capacity to meet the job’s demands. There is little time to rest, recoup, and rebalance when this type of overload is a long-term job condition. A manageable and sustainable workload, on the other hand, allows you to practice and improve your existing talents while also learning new ones.

Midwives are with no exemption in this matter. Midwives give so much to families!  We give our skills, complete call availability, personal time, relationships, and health.   Being on call all the time is focused on client satisfaction and making them a top priority in life.  By putting birth first, all other relationships and personal self-care is put second and many times last if available.  Obstetrics is full of legal pressure and stress is high to give the best care and still protect your business and yourself.  Most of what we do is amazing and great, it is just very difficult to separate work and personal life from this profession.

Recently, the World Health Organization (WHO) decided to redefine the important definition of burnout. It now refers to burnout as “syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed,” in the organization’s International Classification of Diseases diagnostic manual. This action clearly states that burnout is an intense discussion everyone must take into consideration. It helps remove people’s notion that burnout is not as serious as it is, it should be addressed accordingly. 

Self-care is vital for being a midwife, mother, wife, sister, and daughter. Haven’t you ever heard we can’t put the oxygen mask on someone else until we put our oxygen mask on first?  We can do a better job caring for our clients and family when we put ourselves FIRST! Daily exercise, meditation, boundaries on personal life from work, gratitude journals, and life couches, good support networks, and vacations really protect midwives from professional burnout.  Don’t become a “midwife nun” and devote your entire life’s purpose to midwifery.  Some women choose to pick that style of midwifery, but most want a work/life balance.  

Life exhaustion is normal. We may feel exhausted with a little problem we face today not because we are weak or we want our life to be easy, but because life is never easy at all. So if you may encounter someone you know feeling less of a person they are, or having a blast of emotions thinking that they are not happy with whatever they are doing right now, remind them to take a short break. A short break to rethink why they even started, and what are their goals in life. 

Great Midwifery FREE Midwifery Burnout Course: https://midwiferybusinessconsultation.teachable.com/p/how-to-prevent-and-recover-from-midwifery-burnout