How do I know if I’m burned out or just tired?

Burnout tends to involve persistent exhaustion, reduced resilience, emotional depletion, and difficulty recovering even after rest. It often comes with sleep disruption, irritability, fogginess, and dread about responsibilities.

Can burnout cause anxiety and physical symptoms?

Yes. Chronic stress can keep the body in threat mode, creating anxiety symptoms, tension, palpitations, stomach issues, headaches, and sleep problems. Therapy helps calm the system and change maintaining patterns.

What if my burnout is linked to perfectionism or people-pleasing?

That’s very common. Therapy helps you change the beliefs and habits that keep you over-functioning, so boundaries become possible.

Can therapy help if I can’t change my workload?

Yes. Even when external demands are real, therapy can help you reduce unnecessary load, change coping patterns, strengthen recovery, and build psychological flexibility so the situation becomes more manageable.

Will therapy tell me to quit my job?

No. Therapy is about helping you make decisions from clarity rather than collapse, and building sustainability. Sometimes changes are needed, but we approach that thoughtfully and practically.

Do you offer stress and burnout therapy in London and online?

Yes. We offer therapy in London and online across the UK.

Stress and Burnout Therapy

Stress is part of life, but when it becomes constant, the nervous system starts to pay the price. Burnout often develops when you’ve been carrying too much for too long — high responsibility, high pressure, too little recovery, and a steady sense that you can’t properly stop. People often reach out when they notice they’re no longer bouncing back: rest doesn’t restore them, motivation has dropped, and even small tasks feel heavy.

Burnout isn’t simply “tiredness.” It can affect mood, cognition, sleep, confidence, and relationships. Some people feel anxious and wired, others feel flat and depleted, and many feel both. Often, the most painful part is the sense that you’re failing at something you used to be able to handle.

At Hampstead Psychology, we offer evidence-based therapy for stress and burnout in London and online across the UK. We help you understand what’s maintaining the overload, reduce patterns that keep you stuck, and rebuild a more sustainable way of working and living.

This page is for information and does not replace a clinical assessment, diagnosis, or medical advice.

When stress and burnout start to take over

You might recognise some of these experiences:

You feel exhausted most of the time, and rest doesn’t properly help.
You wake tired, or you sleep poorly because your mind won’t switch off.
You feel overwhelmed by everyday tasks you used to manage easily.
You feel irritable, emotionally reactive, or close to tears more often.
You can’t concentrate, you feel foggy, or your memory feels worse.
You dread work or responsibilities that used to feel manageable.
You feel detached or numb, as though you’re running on autopilot.
You feel anxious and “wired,” even when you’re exhausted.
You feel guilty for resting and push yourself until you crash.
You worry you’re not coping, and self-criticism adds pressure.

If this fits, it doesn’t mean you’re weak. Burnout is often the outcome of a system that has been running beyond capacity. Therapy helps you reduce load and rebuild recovery in a way that actually works.

How stress and burnout can show up

Constant pressure and threat activation

When stress is ongoing, your body can stay in threat mode: tense, vigilant, and unable to settle. This can lead to anxiety symptoms, physical tension, irritability, and difficulty sleeping. Therapy helps calm the threat system and build steadier regulation.

Emotional exhaustion and reduced resilience

Burnout often involves feeling depleted, emotionally flat, or unable to access motivation and enjoyment. People often interpret this as personal failure, but it’s a common response to sustained demand. Therapy helps you rebuild resilience without relying on willpower.

Overwork, perfectionism, and the inability to stop

Many people burn out because they cope through over-functioning: high standards, people-pleasing, feeling responsible for everything, and struggling to say no. Therapy helps you work with perfectionism and boundaries so recovery becomes possible.

Burnout and identity

When your identity is tied to achievement, being capable, or being needed, slowing down can feel frightening. Therapy helps you build a sense of self that isn’t dependent on relentless output.

Burnout alongside health conditions or life stressors

Burnout can be intensified by caregiving, parenting, menopause, chronic illness, grief, or relationship strain. Therapy helps you address the full context, not just your “work habits.”

Related difficulties we often see alongside burnout

Burnout often overlaps with anxiety, low mood, insomnia, panic symptoms, health anxiety, relationship difficulties, and compulsive coping habits such as scrolling, overeating, or drinking more than you’d like. Some people also experience a loss of confidence and a strong inner critic.

Therapy considers the whole picture while keeping the work focused and practical.

Medical input alongside therapy

Burnout symptoms can overlap with physical health issues, and exhaustion can have medical contributors. Therapy supports the psychological patterns and nervous system strain that maintain burnout, and where relevant we recommend appropriate medical input through your GP or treating clinician alongside therapy.

What keeps stress and burnout going?

Burnout is often maintained by loops that make sense in the moment.

Demand rises and you respond by pushing harder.
You get things done, but recovery is sacrificed.
The nervous system stays activated and sleep becomes less restorative.
Your tolerance drops, and everything feels harder.
You try to compensate by increasing effort again.
The cycle continues until you feel depleted and stuck.

Therapy helps you step out of this cycle by reducing load, building boundaries, strengthening recovery, and changing the beliefs and habits that keep you over-extended.

How therapy for stress and burnout helps

At Hampstead Psychology, we use approaches that are widely used in evidence-based psychological practice. Depending on your needs, this may include CBT, ACT, compassion-focused work, and schema-informed therapy.

In practice, burnout therapy often involves understanding your overload pattern, reducing perfectionism and people-pleasing, building boundaries that you can actually hold, and creating a sustainable approach to work and responsibility. We also work with nervous system regulation, sleep, and the harsh self-talk that often drives burnout.

Where burnout is linked to deeper themes — worth tied to productivity, fear of disappointing others, or longstanding schemas around responsibility — we address the roots so change is lasting, not just a short break followed by the same cycle.

What to expect from sessions

We start by understanding what’s been happening: the demands you’re under, how you’re coping, what your patterns are, and what you need to feel different. We build a shared map and agree clear, realistic goals.

Sessions are collaborative and practical. You’ll leave with insight you can use and small steps to try between sessions, reviewed and refined over time. We take pacing seriously, because recovery usually comes from consistent adjustments rather than dramatic changes.

How long does therapy take?

This varies. Some people want focused support to stabilise, recover, and rebuild boundaries. Others benefit from longer therapy, especially when burnout is tied to identity, perfectionism, trauma stress, or long-standing patterns of over-responsibility.

We review progress together so therapy stays purposeful and aligned with your goals.

Stress and burnout therapy in Hampstead and online

We offer therapy for stress and burnout in person in London and online across the UK. Many people choose online sessions for convenience, and it can work very well when you have a quiet, confidential space.

Take the next step

If stress has become constant and burnout has left you exhausted, foggy, or unlike yourself, you don’t have to keep pushing through alone. With the right support, it’s possible to recover and rebuild a way of living that is sustainable, not punishing.

Contact Hampstead Psychology to enquire about OCD therapy in London or online.

Useful links: Anxiety Therapy, Depression Therapy, Insomnia and Sleep Problems, Coaching, Therapy for Men, Menopause Therapy, Health Conditions Support, Fees, Meet the Team, Contact.

Urgent Help

If you are worried about immediate risk to your safety, call 999 or go to A&E. If you need urgent support but it isn’t an emergency, contact NHS 111 or your GP. You can also contact Samaritans on 116 123 (24/7).

Meet The Team

At Hampstead Psychology, all of our psychologists have extensive training to doctoral level and decades of experience in their field of expertise. You will be matched with a psychologist that has the knowledge and skill to help you understand and overcome your problem - not just in the short term but for good.