Emotional Exhaustion While Working: What It Feels Like and How to Respond

Written By Mairi Joyce

Emotional exhaustion is one of the most common yet least recognised symptoms of burnout, especially for working women who are still keeping everything running. You may appear “fine” on the outside, meeting deadlines, managing your team, keeping your household in order, while inside you feel drained, detached, or perpetually worn out. This is high-functioning burnout.

Turns out, burnout isn’t about the big stuff. It’s often the small, relentless stressors or microstressors, that quietly pile up until they tip the scales. In this post, we explore what emotional exhaustion looks like when you’re still working, how it shows up in your daily life, and practical ways to respond without quitting your job that can form a key part of your own burnout recovery plan.

What Emotional Exhaustion Really Feels Like

Emotional exhaustion often starts subtly. You might notice that tasks that used to energise you now feel draining, or that it’s harder to summon enthusiasm for work or social activities. You’re showing up, physically present, responsive, and capable, but your internal reserves are depleted.

For many working women, this feels like:

• Chronic irritability or impatience

• Feeling “numb” to successes or joys

• Reduced empathy for colleagues, friends, or family

• Difficulty focusing or making decisions

• Carrying an underlying sense of dread or fatigue, even after rest

  
  

On the surface, life appears under control. Inside, every small decision or interaction feels heavier, and it takes more effort to push through your day.

Microstressors and Our Emotional Reserves

Microstressors are tiny, often overlooked moments of tension that chip away at your emotional and mental reserves. Research shows that burnout is more commonly caused by the accumulation of these small stressors than by one single event.

Interestingly, the concept of microstressors emerged by accident. Researchers were interviewing high-performing employees to understand what made them effective collaborators. They found many were struggling with work-life balance, feeling like they were barely holding it together. The cause? Not one identifiable stressor, but the cumulative effect of everyday life. Many of them were experiencing high-functioning burnout.

From these interviews the researchers identified three main categories of microstressors:

1. Stressors that drain your personal capacity

Stressors that drain your personal capacity include uncertainty about others' reliability, unpredictable behaviour from someone in authority, or sudden increases in responsibility at work or home.

2. Stressors that deplete your emotional reserves

Stressors that deplete your emotional reserves include managing and feeling responsible for the success and well-being of others, confrontational conversations, lack of trust in your network, or dealing with people who spread stress.

3. Stressors that challenge your identity and values

Stressors that challenge your identity or values, such as pressure to pursue goals that don't align with your personal values, attacks on self-worth or confidence, or draining or negative interactions with family and friends.

Many working women are experiencing several of these microstressors on a daily basis.

Why Working Women Need to Understand Microstressors

Working women often face more microstressors due to the dual demands of career and home life. Balancing work responsibilities, household tasks, childcare, and social expectations creates a constant stream of small stressors that accumulate over time. These microstressors, ranging from managing conflicting schedules to handling emotional labour, can quietly drain energy and increase the risk of burnout, making it essential for working women to adopt strategies for managing both internal and external stress.

How Microstressors Tip the Burnout Scales

Imagine a set of scales with microstressors on one side and your resilience and ability to manage those stressors on the other. Most of the time you have the strength and mental wellness to manage what life throws at you so the scales remain balanced or even tip in favour of wellness. However, over time the microstressors can get too much, tipping the scales in the other direction, resulting in burnout.

To protect your wellbeing you need to manage the number of microstressors you are exposed to and the effects they have on you.

How Microstressors Affect Others

Microstressors don't just effect you, they can ripple outward. For example, a colleague misses a deadline, so you commit to spending your Sunday completing it. This puts you in a bad mood so you over react when the supermarket tills are not working, making the shop assistant’s job harder. When you return home and tell your partner they have to take both children to their activities, they have to cancel their gym class, putting them in a bad mood. You then feel guilty about how you reacted at the supermarket, that you have to work on Sunday, and that your partner can’t go to their gym class, and so on and so on.

So not only do you have to be aware of your own microstressors we need to learn how to manage them so we don’t increase microstressors for those around us.

How to Manage Your Microstressors

Internal vs external microstressors

For me , I found it helpful to separate out the internal and external microstressors.

• Internal microstressors: Thoughts you generate, like self-criticism or nagging reminders. You control whether to engage with them.

• External microstressors: Real-life events or people. You can’t always control them, but you can manage your exposure and reactions.

Internal micro stressors are created by you, this means you have complete control over whether to let them breathe or not. This was a revelation to me, if I was creating many of my microstressors myself then I had the power to remove some of them.

External microstressors is a little harder because these are real people and real responsibilities, but you can still make progress. Remember the scales I mentioned previously, this is a numbers game so just removing a few microstressors can make all the difference.

Tools and strategies

The first step is to identify all of your microstressors. This may take a few goes but find some time and just note down everything that's in your brain. What are you worried about? What is keeping you up? You won't be able to remove all of these concerns but just the action of acknowledging them is going to make a difference.

The next step is to separate out the internal microstressors from the external ones, as your treatment is going to vary.

Tools for internal microstressors

For internal stressors I use an exercise I found in a brilliant book called Unstressable, I have a direct conversation with my brain. The conversation goes something like:

Me: "Brain what is wrong why are you feeling so stressed?"

Brain: “ The house is a mess”

Me: "yes, I know the house is a mess and I will tidy it, what else ?"

Brain: “ You need to eat more healthily”

Me: "I know I am doing my best and we will work on this more next week, what else?"

And if you keep going eventually your brain will eventually start to slow down and will even start saying some positive things. I’ll be honest I was sceptical about this at first but I find it really works and helps alleviate some of my internal microstressors.

Limiting technology stressors can also really help. Reduce or remove social media which makes you feel inadequate, insecure or drained.

Tools for external microstressors

The key to managing your external microstressors is to find ways to either delete, delegate or delay tasks. Have a real think about whether everything on your list is really your responsibility? Are there things you can give up or ask someone else to take on? Or are there things which just don't really matter?

I like to think of having a microstressors budget—what deserves to be included in your budget, and what should you let go of?

Managing technology is also recommended here. If you manage all of the WhatsApp groups or your kids school and activities, are there any you can remove? Can you ask you partner if they will share the load? Introduce strict boundaries for social media and phone use, for example switch your phone to aeroplane mode after 8 pm.

You may also have to reduce contact with some people in your life that cause you these stressors. This doesn’t have to be dramatic and can be as simple as saying no to a coffee every now and again.  There may also be some aspects of your work set up you can tweak to limit stressors such as declining a meeting or seeing if someone else can take on chairing the next committee meeting.

Keep in mind that this is a numbers game; you just need to decrease your microstressors enough to balance the scales. Try tracking your microstressors for just one week and notice the difference.

Your Next Steps to End Emotional Exhaustion at Work

Your resilience may fluctuate over time but being conscious of the need to balance those scales can be a valuable tool in managing your risk of burnout.

Emotional exhaustion while still working can feel invisible, even to yourself. But noticing it early, making small adjustments, and protecting your energy can prevent it from escalating into full-blown burnout.

It’s not about doing less permanently; it’s about working differently, sustaining your energy, and reclaiming your sense of wellbeing while continuing to meet your responsibilities.

Interested in finding out more? try out my Ultimate Anti-Burnout Recovery Plan for Working Women and start your burnout free life today.

FAQs

What is emotional exhaustion while still working?

Emotional exhaustion while working is a state of chronic mental and emotional fatigue where you continue to function, meet responsibilities, and appear “fine” on the outside, but feel drained, overwhelmed, or numb internally. It often develops gradually and can be an early or middle stage of burnout.

How is emotional exhaustion different from burnout?

Emotional exhaustion is a core component of burnout, but not the whole picture. You can feel emotionally exhausted and still be productive, engaged, or coping day-to-day. Burnout usually involves emotional exhaustion alongside detachment, reduced motivation, and a sense of ineffectiveness over time.

Can emotional exhaustion be caused by small, everyday stresses?

Yes. Emotional exhaustion is often driven by microstressors, small, frequent pressures like constant interruptions, competing demands, emotional labour, and never fully switching off. Individually they may seem manageable, but over time they quietly drain your energy reserves.

Why does emotional exhaustion often go unnoticed?

Because many people experiencing emotional exhaustion continue to perform well. Productivity, responsibility, and busyness can mask what’s happening internally. This is especially common for working women, who may minimise their own needs or feel pressure to keep going.

Is emotional exhaustion just being tired?

No. Tiredness usually improves with rest. Emotional exhaustion often doesn’t. You may sleep, take time off, or slow down briefly, yet still feel flat, depleted, or overwhelmed. It’s more about emotional and nervous system overload than physical fatigue alone.

Can emotional exhaustion affect relationships and home life?

Yes. Emotional exhaustion often shows up as irritability, withdrawal, reduced patience, or feeling mentally absent with family and friends. This isn’t a personal failing, it’s a sign that your emotional capacity is being stretched beyond what’s sustainable.

Is emotional exhaustion a sign I need to quit my job?

Not necessarily. Emotional exhaustion doesn’t automatically mean you need to leave your role. Many people recover while still working by understanding what’s draining them, adjusting expectations, and addressing burnout-fuelled patterns before they escalate further.

What should I do if I recognise emotional exhaustion in myself?

The first step is awareness without self-judgement. Noticing patterns, such as constant overwhelm, irritability, or emotional numbness, allows you to respond intentionally rather than pushing harder. Early recognition makes recovery easier and can prevent progression to deeper burnout stages.

Find out more at balancingbluebells.co.uk

Mairi Joyce