How I Went From Burnt-Out Mess to Finding Calm
Look, last month was pure hell. I mean, pure hell. Work pressure through the roof, sleep? Forget about it, maybe 4 hours if I was lucky. Coffee wasn’t fuel anymore, it was survival juice. My brain felt like mush, couldn’t focus on anything, snapping at my partner over stupid things like leaving a dish in the sink. Felt like crap all the time, honestly. Tried the usual stuff:
- Downloaded three different “mindfulness” apps, felt like a zombie staring at my screen.
- Promised myself I’d start jogging – made it two blocks before I felt like my lungs would explode. Just stopped.
- Even joined a Facebook group for stress, scrolled for hours reading other people’s misery, felt worse.
Nothing worked. Felt totally stuck. Like I was drowning. One Tuesday night, after crying myself to sleep (yeah, it got that bad), I just sat up and thought, “Okay, this has to stop. What the hell else is out there?” Started desperately googling things like “digital help for burnout” and “actual online mental health stuff that works”. That’s when Instride Health kept popping up. First reaction? Skepticism. Big time. “Another app? Seriously?” But their thing was different, said it was real people plus tech, personalized, not just a robot spitting quotes at you. Figured I had nothing left to lose.
Signed up online – super easy, took like five minutes, just basic info about how crappy I was feeling. Next day, this guy calls me. Not a robot, a real person. Actually listened to me babble for like twenty minutes about work stress, insomnia, the panic when my phone beeped. Felt weirdly good just to dump it all out there to someone paid to listen, I guess? He didn’t judge, just asked questions. Then, based on that chat, they set me up in their online system. No more digging through confusing menus. My little space had:
- Simple tools to log my mood (pick from grumpy faces to slightly less grumpy faces mostly back then).
- A weekly video chat slot right there with my guy.
- Weirdly practical exercises that weren’t just “breathe” – like actual steps to shut off work email at 6 PM.
- A way to message if I hit a wall between calls.
Started using it. Skeptically at first, yeah. Filled out the mood thing daily. Made me realize I felt bad before work even started. Did that 6 PM email shutdown thing – my partner nearly cried the first time I ate dinner without my phone vibrating. Small win, but a win. The weekly chats weren’t magic, but the guy kept me focused on tiny steps, no huge “fix your life” pressure.
Fast forward about six weeks? Look, I’m not cured. Life’s still messy. But the panic attacks? Gone. I’m clocking 6 hours sleep most nights. That constant exhaustion? Lifting. I can actually watch a movie without thinking about work constantly. That feeling of drowning? Down to maybe wading through puddles on bad days. Didn’t happen overnight, and it took sticking with their simple system week after week. No flashy promises, just practical tools and a real human actually helping me figure it out piece by piece.
So, why Instride? Cause when you’re drowning in your own crapstorm, you don’t need another shiny app telling you to meditate harder. You need a life raft thrown by someone who actually gets it, and a plan simple enough you can grab it with shaky hands. That’s what they did for me. Found my raft.