I want to be upfront about something.
I didn't figure this out proactively. I figured it out after my second burnout in three years — sitting in a period of forced recovery, unable to look at a code editor without feeling a specific kind of dread that I couldn't logic my way out of.
I'd done everything the burnout recovery advice said to do. Took time off. Set better boundaries at the new job. Worked on the psychological stuff. All of it helped. None of it explained why recovery felt so much harder and slower than it should.
Then I got bloodwork done. And the picture became considerably less mysterious.
The Diagnostic Output
