• AmCham Secretariat Head Vrai Raymond on females not always being responsible to put out the fire 

It is International Women’s Month and it is a month to celebrate females. While we do believe that all females are super females, there is always the danger of expectations on females being way too high. Keeping up the momentum can be tough. On Kaleidoscope this week, the focus was on super females heading towards burnout, which is a very realistic phenomenon. In 2022, it was found that 25% of employees experienced burnout symptoms and more recent studies say that 52% of all workers could be feeling burnt out at work. One third of females in work reportedly suffer from burnout, as opposed to 25% of males in the workforce. A total of 69% of females cited the work-life balance and mental wellbeing as top reasons for taking on a job. 

The American Chamber of Commerce in Sri Lanka’s (AmCham) Secretariat Head Vrai Raymond has been in corporate communications, event management, and media for 20 years. A Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing and holding a Masters in Strategic Marketing, she was recognised as the ‘Upcoming Entrepreneur of the Year’ for her entrepreneurial venture The Achcharu Kade. A single mother with three children, she burned the midnight oil first to look after  her siblings and then her children, having been thrust into adulthood at the age of eight. Life eventually caught up with her and she caved. She discusses her very frightening episode of burnout this week.

Following are excerpts from the interview

You are a mother, daughter, and wife in a complex family environment. What is your story?

I actually became a mother at the age of eight as I had to be a parent to my siblings. My mother, a single parent, was out working to put food on the table. By 14, I had dropped out of school and was working full time. It has been a long journey for me, from different kinds of motherhood, to a career, to finding my way back to having relationships with the siblings and I have faced multiple personal challenges, including surviving various forms of abuse. Throughout the journey, I realised that I have used the females in my life, like my grandmother for example, as a source of strength. When a challenge comes up, I always think that: “I can survive this, I can do this.” Whenever I think that ‘I can I get through this’, I rationalise that: “I survived the previous issue, so I can always get through this one.” Unfortunately, this mindset and constant work resulted in a burnout situation, which came last year (2023). People speak about a physical manifestation of burnout, but, in my case, it manifested mentally as I had stress induced memory impairment. I am still coming out of it as there is still some loss of memory and my life is very fragmented at the moment. However, I still have to handle tough situations and get through my day.

How did you figure out it was burnout? Did you realise it in the first place?

There were signs that I was not taking seriously at the time. I kept feeling very emotionless. I was feeling beyond tired, meaning that I was too tired to feel tired. I use crystals and believe in energies and auras. When I had an aura reading done, I told the reader that I felt very empty but was outwardly perfectly fine and did not feel depressed. I just felt ‘bleh’. The reader told me that I had only about 20% energy and was surprised that I was surviving. Although I physically felt the drop in energy, I did not know at the time that it was burnout. When it did hit me, it was during a high stress incident with my children. I broke down and fell asleep and I woke up having lost 15 years. I thought that I was in 2009 and I did not recognise my children or my friends. I did not know where I was. When I was taken to the hospital, I did not recognise it. It was a very scary situation, because you don’t recognise anyone and you wonder whether people are lying to you. When my 21-year-old son came in, I did not recognise him, because I only remembered him being a six-year-old. So, it hit me out of nowhere, with a bang.  

What factors contribute to feeling burnt out, especially in our culture?

It is a combination of things. It is the pressure that we put on ourselves because of societal expectations. In Sri Lanka, one in four households is female led. However, we also put certain pressures on ourselves to do more and to be perfect, to never say no and to keep pushing to give our 150%. Sometimes, we have to let something fall by the way because it is impossible to do everything. Females in Asian societies feel that they must not ask for help from anyone. We want to be the strongest one in the circle. That needs to change. 

Do you think that there is a gender component at play here? Do females or males suffer more from burnout?

There is something called a ‘double burden’ that females have and males may have a little less of. However, as things change, males get more involved in household chores, child care and elder care. We are moving away from a patriarchal and misogynistic society to a more balanced one, so the males are also feeling the double burden now. Both males and females have experienced, do experience, and will experience burnout. But, they burn out differently. Males and females experience burnout differently because different factors contribute to it. The way you deal with it is also different. We also need to ask ourselves whether we actually understand the concept of burnout, and if we are ready to accept it as it is, or if we want to think of it as something else and push through it. We need to ask these questions and figure out the answers.  

As females, there is the expectation that we must do it all – work, family, everything. But, the question is, should we do it all?

I believe that we should not do it all. I have done it all, because of circumstances. Over the last 30 years, there has not been a day where I have not been working. There has not been a day where I have been able to rest. Adding to the various challenges of being a single parent, taking care of sick loved ones, while continuing to work in a challenging environment, is very complex and busy. The one thing that gives me pleasure is studying, which I could not complete as I left school at 14. I keep wanting to go back to studies, although I have not been able to do it properly. It was the optional work, the studies, that made me happy. So, that is where the decision lies. How much of this work must you do and which of it can you opt out of doing? Must you do it just because you are able to do it?

It is no secret that, most often, the burden of the home falls on the female’s shoulders. How should companies react when it becomes clear that their female workers are overextended?

I work with lots of corporates and I see much of what they do in terms of best practices. There is a shift towards considering employees’ mental health and looking at where people need some extra space and extra time. Is it enough though? I think that it is a two way street. We, as females, need to understand that we are doing a job and that we need to know where to draw the line to get done what needs to get done. You may face an emergency, and, at that point, it is fine to see to it in lieu of working, but, as a general rule, if you are doing what you need to do, companies will be a lot more understanding when you cannot meet the deadlines or when you cannot continue to work for whatever reason.

How can males help females deal with the demands that being a female brings with it?

There is a shift happening now. There is a lot more support in terms of sharing the burden in the home and similar things. I think that both males and females have their own share of demands and pressures. However, males can be more understanding of the pressures put on a female a bit better, in that they understand and accept when a female may not be able to keep up with her burden. In the traditional society, the male is the breadwinner and the female is the caregiver of the family. I think that females are more understanding when males are unable to meet the burdens that they have to shoulder, more than males understanding females shortcomings in the same situation. 

Given the demands of the workplace, do you think that mass burnout is going to be inevitable in the future or do you think that our females will soldier on?

If we keep running the way that we do and soldier on, we are going to have a huge crisis on our hands. But, as females, we tend to soldier on. However, it is important to stop soldiering on. It is important to bring awareness about the concept of burnout and about what we can do to avoid getting there. It is important to build awareness around what we can ask and expect from our higher ups. Corporates also need to look at solutions and options. I have realised that all our problems eventually boil down to economics and finances. It is as simple as corporates providing financial literacy workshops to employees. Then, people can better manage finances and juggle what they need to juggle. The actions are not massive ones. They don’t have to hit your bottom line or use lots of man hours. It can be something simple, like entrepreneurship loans.

Did you have a support network?

I have a very close friend network, for which I am eternally grateful. They did not move from my side until they were able to push me in the right direction, to start remembering things. For about two weeks, there was someone at my side. My friends would prompt me to remember people and they did this until my memory returned. They put their lives on hold to help me, but, how many people actually have this support? People need to start building that support. The message I want to give is to be aware that burnout can happen to you and to the person next to you. You need to be prepared for that.

What do we need to do to be prepared for that?

See the signs and start accepting your situation for yourself. Start telling people that doing their best is enough. You don’t always have to put out the fire. If necessary, let the house burn.

If you were to give females a word of advice, what would it be?

Over the years, I have looked at dealing with stress with various options. I have done yoga, fitness, and everything in between. What happens when you have such a complex and convoluted, continuous lifestyle is that you take on the added stress of making time for yourself. I would tell females to look into their hearts and understand that they are the best that they can be. Stop pushing yourself to be a super female. Stop treating yourself like a rubber band, where you think that you can stretch as much as you can. Eventually, the rubber band snaps and you are going to break. Conserve that energy so that you can use it when you need to, instead of using it all the time. 

(The writer is the host, director, and co-producer of the weekly digital programme ‘Kaleidoscope with Savithri Rodrigo’ which can be viewed on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. She has over three decades of experience in print, electronic, and social media)