Burnout
Stress, Burnout & Boundaries
Burnout does not usually announce itself. It arrives as a slow flattening: the things you cared about start to feel like obligations, your patience thins, and rest stops restoring anything. Often the people most affected are the most competent ones, because competence attracts more to carry. The work here is not about doing less and caring less. It is about changing the arrangement that made this sustainable for everyone except you.
For people who are dependable to everyone and running on empty — the work of setting limits without becoming someone you do not recognize.
15 minutes, free, no obligation. Scheduling via Headway.
- Format
- Telehealth
- Available in
- New York State
- Languages
- English & Spanish
- Telehealth throughout New York State
- Therapy in English & Spanish
- Sessions 45–60 minutes
You may be here because
Some of this may sound familiar.
You are carrying more than the people around you realize.
You are successful by any external measure and something still feels missing.
Saying no leaves you feeling guilty for days afterward.
You have lost yourself somewhere in the process of taking care of everyone else.
You are irritable with the people you love least deservingly.
You rest and it does not touch the tiredness.
You are the responsible one, and you have never really examined how that happened.
Who this may help, and what therapy may explore
Who this may help
- Professionals in demanding roles and high-responsibility positions
- Caregivers supporting aging parents, children, or a partner with ongoing needs
- People in helping and healthcare professions carrying vicarious stress
- Anyone whose value in their family has been tied to being capable
- People who describe themselves as people-pleasers or conflict-avoidant
- Ambitious people trying to hold on to relationships and rest at the same time
What therapy may explore
- What burnout is actually signalling about your workload, role, or relationships
- The specific guilt that follows a boundary, and where it was learned
- Over-functioning — doing things for others that they could do themselves
- How to say no in language that is honest, kind, and not an apology
- Resentment, and what it reliably indicates about an unspoken limit
- Cultural and family expectations about obligation, duty, and self-sacrifice
- Rebuilding rest, identity, and interests that are not in service of anyone else
Karla’s approach
How I work with burnout and boundaries
I start by taking the load seriously rather than going straight to self-care suggestions. Most people in burnout have already been told to take a bath. The more useful question is what is structurally unsustainable, and what could actually be changed.
Boundaries then get practical. We work out the specific conversation — the words, the tone, the likely pushback and what you will do when it comes. Knowing what to say the moment your mother calls is worth more than a general principle about limits.
We also look at the guilt directly, because for many people that is the real obstacle. If being needed is how you learned to be safe or valued in your family, a boundary is not just an inconvenience — it registers as a threat. That is workable, but only once it is named.
I hold both compassion and accountability here. I will not push you to make a change before you are ready, and I will also not collude with a pattern that keeps costing you. If you are the only person in your life being asked to absorb everything, I will say so.
Approaches that may be drawn on
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
- Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
- DBT-informed interpersonal-effectiveness skills
- Psychodynamic therapy
Not every approach is used with every client. What we draw on depends on what you are working through and what you find useful — and we talk openly about whether it is helping.
Questions
About burnout & boundaries.
More general questions about fees, insurance, scheduling and telehealth are answered on the FAQ page.
Is burnout the same as depression?
They overlap and can look similar from the outside, but they are not identical — burnout is typically tied to sustained demand in a specific domain, while depression is broader. They also frequently occur together. Part of early sessions is sorting out what is actually going on, which changes what helps.
I do not want to become cold or selfish. Will boundaries do that?
That fear comes up almost every time, and in my experience it is unfounded. People who worry about becoming selfish essentially never do. What usually happens is the opposite — with limits in place, there is more genuine warmth available, because less of it is being given under duress.
What if I cannot change my job or my caregiving situation?
Many people cannot, at least not immediately, and therapy that ignores that is not useful. We work with what is genuinely movable — how the load is distributed, what support exists, where the small recoveries are, and how you relate to a situation you did not choose. Sometimes that is also where a longer-term plan starts to form.
Related
Other ways we might work together.
Individual Therapy
One-to-one therapy for adults 17 and older — a steady, private place to understand what you have been carrying and decide what you want to do with it.
Anxiety Therapy
For minds that run ahead, rehearse conversations, and scan for what could go wrong — therapy that works with the anxiety rather than against it.
Creator Mental Health
For people whose work happens in public — therapy that understands the algorithm, the comments, the parasocial pull, and the cost of always being available.
Start with a short conversation.
A 15 minutes consultation costs nothing and commits you to nothing. We can talk about what has been going on and whether this is the right fit.
15 minutes, free, and no obligation to book a session afterward. Scheduling continues on Headway.
- Therapy in English & Spanish
- Telehealth across New York
- Response within two business days