Burnout or Depression? How to Tell the Difference, and When to Get Help

Burnout is a work injury. That’s really the clearest way to think about it. It builds from chronic stress on the job that never got managed, and it has a fairly specific shape. Depression doesn’t respect that boundary. It’s not a reaction to one part of life; it colors all of it. Sleep, appetite, concentration, how much someone likes anything, how they think about themselves. A depressed person doesn’t necessarily feel better after a week at the beach, and that’s often the detail that gives it away. The heaviness follows them into things that used to be enjoyable, not just into Monday morning.