Life’s stressors affect everyone. Although you might think they only make your mental health worse, your body feels the effects of long-term stress. It all comes down to how burnout affects you. If you’ve felt extra stressed and dealt with frequent muscle pain, the two could relate. Learn how massages can counteract burnout, restore your energy and improve your mental health.

What Is Burnout?

Burnout is a condition that occurs when someone experiences long-term stress related to their job or primary responsibilities. It can happen to anyone, even if they love their careers. Burnout builds when people forget to manage their mental health with preventive measures and can result in intense unhappiness that deteriorates their quality of life.

Typical Burnout Symptoms

People experiencing burnout can live with a range of mild to extreme symptoms if it remains untreated. Researchers found that people experience shared symptoms during burnout in any job or phase of their life, including:

• Headaches
• Muscle aches
• Insomnia
• Lack of concentration
• Fatigue
• Loss of motivation

If you feel generally depressed about life, unhappy at your job or isolated in your routine, you may be experiencing burnout. Muscle pain may accompany that experience. It’s crucial to reflect on how long you’ve felt this way to determine if they might be connected.

You could also talk with your loved ones for a better perspective. They can note if you haven’t been acting like yourself lately, which might help you understand when your burnout began. It’s also a great opportunity to vent your feelings. Experts note that having a supportive community can minimize burnout symptoms because you’re processing and releasing the harmful stress.

How Does Burnout Affect Your Muscles?

Burnout affects your muscles in a few ways. First, you might be dealing with the condition while working a physically demanding job. If you’re not taking care of your body with stretching routines, your muscles might need time to recover from the continual physical demands of your career.

Your muscle aches could still be a symptom of burnout even if you sit at a desk all day. Stress causes oxidative reactions in your cells, which alters blood flow regulation and reduces blood flow to your muscles. The aches might be your muscles asking for increased blood flow to restore their oxygen levels.

Does Massage Help With Burnout?

Massage does help with burnout if you maintain a long-term routine. You could visit a spa for a professional massage, but at-home solutions provide equal relief if you don’t have extra time in your schedule. Look for a massage tool with a cushioned pad and wide surface area so it’s safe on your bones while easing widespread muscle tension.

If your muscles are too sensitive for a massage tool, start your pain relief with an ice pack. You could apply it to your muscle for 20-30 minutes before warming your muscle back up and trying again with your massage tool. If there’s still too much pain, contact your primary care provider for assistance.

Other Benefits of Frequent Massages

Once you get into the habit of routine massages at home, you’ll effectively reduce daily muscle tension that adds to your overall discomfort. Your mind and body could also experience a few other benefits aside from your pain relief.

Better Nightly Sleep

Falling asleep is challenging if you’re physically uncomfortable. Massages ensure your muscles are at rest when you’re ready to sleep. They’re so powerful that they help people get deeper sleep while they’re going through menopause, undergoing cancer treatments or living with fibromyalgia. 

Improved Communication With Your Partner

If you live with a partner or invite them over for an evening, they could help you massage parts of your back that you can’t reach. Talking them through what you need and where you need it improves your communication skills, which benefits all other areas of your relationship. Challenges are much easier to navigate when you know how to describe what you’re feeling and work together toward a solution.

Increased Interest in Self-Care

It’s easy to brush off self-care as something you’ll do during your next vacation. When life’s busy, it’s difficult to save time for things like massages, hot baths or journaling. Once you experience the pain relief of routine massages at home, you may feel more inclined to care for your mind and body with self-care. It’s harder to procrastinate self-care habits once they start improving your daily quality of life.

More Exercise Endurance

Massages help with burnout, but they can also aid your exercise routine. It’s easier to be active if you aren’t experiencing muscle tension. After a massage eases your aches and pains, you might feel motivated to continue your exercise routine. Your health will improve, your body will get stronger and your burnout may abate.

Better Immune Functionality

Placing gentle pressure on your muscles won’t just reduce your body aches. It can also improve your immune system by decreasing your oxidative stress. Although massages are no replacement for measures like annual flu vaccinations, they can help you stay healthy throughout the year. See how often you get sick after adding at-home massages to your routine alongside efforts like eating healthy or taking vitamins to keep your immune system strong.

Experience Burnout Relief With Self-Massage Tools

Physical tension in your muscles doesn’t have to linger while you reduce your burnout. Try using the new Myobuddy self-massage tool to experience a professional-grade massage at home. The Pro, Pro 2 and Pro Elite all use the latest technology to deliver maximum pain relief.