Autistic burnout changed me

mentally, but physically too - here's how

As the conveyor belt of the treadmill started to whirr faster I realised I had no choice but to catch up with it. I was in control of the incline and the speed, but I didn’t feel in control of my body. My limbs felt like jelly, flailing in unpredictable directions, and my mind was screaming at me to stop before I fall and break a leg. I felt like I was starting from scratch - like learning to ride a bike again.

This was me yesterday morning; my first day back to running after a two year break. It wasn’t intentional; one day I was running and exercising, the next I wasn’t. The day I stopped moving was the day I most recently fell into a two-year autistic burnout. 

I adore exercise and sports. At school, it’s how I felt the most ‘me’. At University, it’s how I made friends. In my 20s, it’s how I survived. Since I’d been exercising almost daily since my childhood, up until ‘the great autistic burnout’ (as I now refer to it in my mind), I didn’t think twice about my physical fitness. There were months where I was fitter than others, but generally speaking I maintained how I looked and felt in my body. I want to say this happened without effort, but it didn’t - I worked really hard, pumping hours of my spare time into fitness, had a dubious relationship with food at the time which certainly prevented me gaining weight, and was chronically stressed.

Over the years, I played netball, hockey, and tennis, swam all the strokes, became a yoga teacher, weight-lifted, took up pilates, and tried spinning. Despite my propensity for movement there was one thing I could not stand: running. Any jog or run I attempted left me in pieces, tasting blood in my mouth and swearing never to put myself through it again. But I always did; not because I found it fun, but because I wanted to be able. Being physically able felt like the only area of my life I could control.

In the months before I burned out I managed to train for, and run, a 10 kilometre race (against myself, might I add - what I hate more than running is running with other people!). I remember asking Andrew to film the finish line on the assumption I would make it, and tearing up when I saw him in the distance cheering me on to the end. 

Looking back, I didn’t appreciate how lucky I was to have an able-body - to be capable of moving my body in the ways I wanted, to enjoy learning new physical skills, and to be physically healthy.

What I didn’t understand at the time was that whilst I was moving my body a lot, I wasn’t fuelling it properly and chronic stress was taking its toll. A lifetime of pushing past my limits in every area of my life, including sports, was quickly catching up with me.

A few weeks after completing my 10k challenge I crashed, burned out, found out I’m autistic, and spent the best part of a year predominantly sedentary in my house. 

Since then, I have spent two years educating and learning about myself. I now know the warning signs of autistic burnout. But, at the time, I was so used to them that I thought it was just how I would be for the rest of my life. I thought I had to just suck it up and get on with it. I would push myself, telling myself that if I could physically go through the motions then I’d be able to keep going. The gym, unlike work or the rest of my life, was where I felt strong and capable. And, I was - but it was my mind, in the end, that broke me. It was my body that followed suit. 

I’ve written about my experience of mental breakdown that came with autistic burnout, but I haven’t shared how this affected me physically. The mental impact felt more acute at the time. The emotional and cognitive impacts of autistic burnout, like meltdowns, increased sensory sensitivity, brain fog, debilitating fatigue, and reduction in cognitive capacity scared me so much that addressing them became my priority. They were what stopped me being able to go to work, spend time with my partner, leave my house, see my friends and family, and engage in hobbies. What fell by the wayside, and consequently started to decline, was my physical health. I suppose I was in such good shape before my burnout that it took months for me to realise what was happening; I was putting on weight, losing muscle, and becoming less mobile. 

I’m trying to separate the mental and the physical, but I’m not sure I can. Now I look back, it is clear that during autistic burnout I could not exercise my body in the ways one needs to to maintain it precisely because of the mental strain I was under. I couldn’t go outside because of fatigue, sensory overload, and an inability to process being around people. When I did go outside, it was because I had to walk my dog and I went on the same slow walk around the block every day. I couldn’t go to the gym or swimming for the same reasons, and the idea of going on a run (had it occurred to me) would have been so ludicrous as to make me laugh for the first time in months. 

My mental decline drove my physical decline, and I’m not sure what else I could have done to prevent it. Moving my body was the last thing on my mind. Most days all I could do was try to get dressed and brush my teeth. If that happened, it was a big win. 

I often wonder, ‘could I have done more at home?’ to support my physical health. The answer is objectively yes. I could have stretched or taken an online yoga or pilates class. I could have ordered a treadmill and walked indoors. But subjectively, if I’m really honest with myself? I don’t believe I would have been able to even do that without someone literally moving my body for me. Even then, my nervous system was so dysregulated that I would have been fighting through tears, heart palpitations, and bone-crushing fatigue.

Either way, I’ll never know - because I’ll never have that experience again with the knowledge I had at the time. But what I do know now is that if I go through autistic burnout again I will try my utmost to find ways to support my physical health whilst my mind feels like it’s failing me. 

I say this with confidence because I have a hard time accepting the outcome of my autistic burnout. Not only in its effects on my career, my relationships, and my mind, but also on my physical body. In the last two years I have sustained an acute back injury, lived in chronic pain, put on three stone, lost basic flexibility, and said goodbye to much of my muscle mass. My body feels tired and lethargic and creaky almost all of the time. 

I’ve been struggling with this a lot over the last couple of months: the realisation that although my mind is starting to heal, and I am getting energy back to re-engage with the world again, my body isn’t as capable as it once was. There are things I can’t do at the moment; lift heavy objects, go on a run, sit up out of bed without rolling onto my side and pushing myself up with my hands, lift free-weights at the gym, do yoga. Given my physical ability was so much of what made me the me I was before autistic burnout, I am finding it hard to accept that this is where I’m at in this phase of my life. My mind punishes me by telling me that I will never get physically capable or strong again. 

But that is simply not true. If there is anything these last few years has taught me it is that the human body is resilient, responsive, and flexible. I know I am strong enough to make it through autistic burnout, so I remind myself I will be strong enough to repair my physical health too. 

The challenge is to change my belief that because I’ve experienced a dip in my physical health that is the end of the road for me. Lately I’ve been falling into the self-pitying trap of resigning myself to this physical body being the ‘new me’. Maybe it’s okay if I feel restricted in my body? Maybe it’s okay if I don’t feel strong? Maybe it’s okay if I am less mobile?

This defeatist attitude is undoubtedly fed by the societal notion that after thirty you may as well give up on ever feeling youthful again. We’re repeatedly told that we better get in the best shape of our life before thirty because it’s a downhill battle with wrinkles, weight-gain, and creaky bones from then on. 

Sure, our bodies do change as we get older - that is a natural part of ageing. I suspect if I had not become so sedentary as a result of autistic burnout I would still have put on a few pounds at this age. But I refuse to believe that turning thirty signifies the start of your automatic and inevitable demise.

There are moments in life where I feel as though the Universe is listening to my inner troubles. I logged on to YouTube the other day (yes I’m back on YouTube, but I’ll cover that in another essay another time) and stumbled upon two podcasts one after the other that between them changed my perspective on the journey I am on with my physical health.

The first was with Dr Vonda, an orthopaedic surgeon who shared a clear holistic outline of what to prioritise and how, especially as a woman who will go through perimenopause and menopause, in terms of fitness and diet to promote longevity. The clarity and sincerity with which she spoke inspired me.

Second, I listened to Chef Babette Davis who is 73 and still weightlifting at the gym, eating a plant-based diet, and focusing on the importance of mental fortitude. Babette spent many years of her life struggling with drug addiction and abuse. At 40 she turned her physical and mental health around - and now, in her later years, is a pillar of health. She spoke with such optimism about ageing and about taking care of our physical vessels as the ultimate act of self-love. 

There are many complicating factors that make being consistent with my physical health challenging. Being autistic and having ADHD means struggling with what society would consider ‘consistency’. I’m in a phase now where I’m going to the gym, swimming, or out for long walks most days, but I know there will be weeks or months where I cannot leave the house because I’m burned out, fatigued, experiencing a shutdown or meltdown, or my executive functioning is particularly challenging. Those of us who are neurodivergent are also more likely to struggle with co-morbid mental health conditions, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, sleep disorders and other physical disorders like Ehlers-Danlos syndromes and hypermobility syndromes which each present their own unique set of challenges.

In pursuit of this new goal of mine - to recover my physical health - I find myself falling back into black and white ways of thinking. That if I can’t go to the gym everyday, then it’s not worth it. That if I can’t eat ‘healthy’ all the time, then I might as well not bother at all.

I have to remind myself to have compassion for myself, and learn to be okay with existing in the grey where - sometimes - I am physically unable. Being autistic and having ADHD may be an invisible disability, not a physical disability, but that does not mean that it doesn’t impact my physical abilities. I am not the average able-bodied person; I am an able-bodied person who is autistic and has ADHD. This reality needs to be reflected in the way I approach my health, because if I pick up old ways of pushing through and continue to try to function as if I am able 100% of the time my mind and my body will crash again.

I used to monitor my eating and exercise habits based on how big I was. Growing up in the noughties surrounded by celebrities like Kate Moss I learned that as a woman it is desirable to make yourself as small as possible. As a tall child who turned out to be a tall athletic adult I regularly felt bigger than my contemporaries. It saddens me to look back and see how much time I spent worrying and obsessing over my physical appearance when I was, in fact, much smaller than I thought I was at the time.

Autistic burnout doesn’t have silver linings. I wish I’d never gone through it, and I hope I never have to survive it again. But the knowledge I have gained is invaluable; not just about autistic burnout, but more generally about what matters to me.

I care about my health, not what size jeans I wear; I care about longevity, not whether I can beat the next person at the gym; I care about staying mobile as long as I can, not about whether my body fits in with the latest trend. Of course, I am just as vain as the next and will always have physical preferences - but I find myself obsessing over my looks less, and finding reward in how my body feels more.

Ultimately, I am grateful that after recovering from autistic burnout I have the opportunity to move my body again.

That’s why I got back on the treadmill this morning.

WEEKLY NOTES

Here’s a little list of video essays, podcasts and articles I found interesting:

‘The aftermath of the instagram face’

‘Transform your life at any age’

‘The healthy ageing doctor’

‘Your authenticity is your art’

Thank you for reading! xoxo

REWILD is free to read, but paid subscribers (a.k.a. patrons) help financially support the creation of this weekly newsletter, the videos I make on YouTube, and the development of other creative projects. If you enjoy my work, consider taking out a paid subscription - I thoroughly appreciate it and you are helping me to build a new career and financial independence post autistic burnout. THANK YOU. Charlie xoxo